Arrrghh!!!! So CLOSE!!!!!!!

[DoubleHelix]

Last night I had a dream (#2 of 3) that I was walking through my old home, which was vacant. That is the super-short one-line version. I woke up and recoded the dream in my journal, then fell back to sleep and had the same dream start all over again!! I am once again entering the house through the garage entrance. The house again appears to be vacant - or so I thought because there is no furniture. This time, as I walk towards the bedrooms and bathroom, I can clearly hear the sound of an electric razor being used behind the closed bathroom door. Somehow I know it is a girl in the bathroom, based upon the appearance of a “girls” bedroom and the unmade bed. I suspect she is using the razor to trim/shave her legs. Now that I am aware there is someone else in the house, I feel the need to find a place to hide, so I go down the narrow hall past the bathroom to an unused, unoccupied bedroom (bed is made). I initially think of hiding behind the door, but then realize that if discovered my only way out would force me past the girl in the bathroom. I decide to leave the house entirely, so I stealthily walk past the bathroom on my way out. All is going well until I reach the living room area, just short of the den, and the way out through the garage. There is a long couch blocking my path!! I discover I am holding a broom, which I think I had for a while, intent on sweeping the floors clean for the new owners of the house. At first I can’t figure a way past the couch and out of the house undetected. I decide to use the broom as if it were a pole vault. When I do, the bristles do not collapse under my weight, and I float in super-slow motion over the couch. I realize how odd this is, and it dawns on me I am dreaming! The scene goes black and I wake up. Arrrggh!!! This is the second time I realized I was dreaming and woke up! Would you call that a WILD??? Frank

[FryingMan]

Nice dream! I wish I had the instinct to run from dream girls, my first thought is rather the opposite and it has detrimental affects on dream length . A WILD is where you enter the dream from the waking state without first passing through unconscious sleep. I've hit "the void" (where you're still lucid and dreaming but all the visuals disappear) several times, sometimes a black void, sometimes a white one. In my 2nd to last LD I was able to crawl back from the void by spinning. Some other things to try if you haven't woken up yet is: rub your hands, try to see your hands, do a silly dance hopping from foot to foot, and dive through the "floor" You want to do *something* other than just stand there until you wake up, if you can remember to do that. Progress, excellent, every time you get lucid your brain will get more familiar with the dream state, and the shock will lessen. I like to rehearse "getting lucid" behavior: I count slowly to 5 while rubbing hands, look all around me slowly, and pat down my dream body/legs with my hands, looking down at my dream body. I've only managed to remember to do it a few times in LDs, but it really helped the quality and length of the LD.

[DoubleHelix]

Hi, FryingMan: Again, great advice, for which I thank you. Rehearsing becoming lucid sounds like an EXCELLENT idea! I LOL'd regarding our respective differences towards dream girls. In this instance, my "impression" was that it would have been age-inappropriate for me to engage in any relationship with this DC, even though she was unseen and it was a dream! Maybe it's because of my Buddhist training. A non-virtuous thought or act, whether in real life or in a dream still carries a negative impact on a person's mental continuum. I know I woke up for a time in-between these recurring dreams. I wrote a goodly amount in my journal, then turned off the light. I can't rightly say what happened after that, though. I can't remember if I was dwelling on the dream and fell asleep and that was why it re-played, or if (as you say) I passed back into the recurring dream without passing through unconscious sleep. I suppose it really doesn't matter. Pigeonholing or strictly characterizing the mode of having become lucid is not really my aim here. My aim is to become lucid and have it last long enough to be fun! For those few seconds where I was floating in slow motion above the broom looking down at the non-compressed bristles - that was so cool! The strangeness of that occurrence popped me straight into lucidity! Too bad that's where it all came to an end as well. Frank

[FryingMan]

Yes sometimes I have the "what just happened?" feeling upon waking up, yesterday morning in fact! Woke from a lucid (or rather, the LD ended), then next thing I know I'm waking from another dream without remembering being awake in bed after waking from the LD. Was quite confused on the ordering of those two distinct dreams until I put together what had just happened. Hold on to that feeling, as that is basically what DEILD is all about: after waking from a dream, try to remain still with eyes closed, and with a quiet "dreamy" mind contemplate the last dream you had, and drift off to sleep like that.