Semi-Lucid Dream?

A few years back I had this one dream and came across some kind of spring/lake and in then in the middle of it I became aware of dreaming and started jumping about to test the control of my dream, soon later I lost control of my dream and ended up getting attacked my some black lake monster before I woke up.

I had this other dream where I was wondering around, not aware I was dreaming, then I entered this public bathroom and saw my friend's sister in there and out of no where I became aware of my dreams. I turned the my friend's sister and said "I'm dreaming" and she kind of smirked at me as if she knew all along, I didn't do any reality checks, I just realised with no hints or anything.

Next I started summoning characters I wanted to have in my dream, I'd summoned about 4 or so and summoned another but it didn't appear how I wanted it and I lost control of my dream and forgot I was dreaming just like that.

Another time this happened a few weeks before this, I was dreaming and I exited a shop or something and just suddenly realised I was dreaming with no real evidence other than just the realisation of it and shortly after I lost control of my dream and forgot I was dreaming.

I think I should've done reality checks, which I didn't know about then, but I do now and I want to have more lucid dreams so I can have fun with it instead of dreaming of random crap that's probably not that exciting or is just extremely scary or weird.

I think those were normal lucid dreams.

It's common to

1. realize you are dreaming without an RC
2. lose lucidity and continue with a dream as non-lucid

1. Reality checks are crucial part of training. But not because they get us lucid. Just a plain RC without belief that you are dreaming will not likely get us lucid. RCs are a vehicle to which we attach our belief that we are dreaming. Our awareness. Then this awareness will happen in a regular dream and either gives us an urge to RC, or just gets us lucid without RC.

Once lucid, we can keep RCing or saying mantras to keep our awareness longer.


2. Losing lucidity is normal and so is not having control. Those are not signs of semi-lucid.

Btw, I think we are either lucid, or not. But the level of awareness can vary greatly.

Happy dreams.

Funny, just had a similar experience the night before. Sometimes though, one acquires and loses lucidity so fast in a dream that makes you wonder whether you actually acquired lucidity or was it all just part of the dream's plot. A very low level of lucidity doesn't help much either in classifying said experience as a lucid dream or not.

I have heard reports from others, that intense feelings are present at the time you realize you are dreaming. It was certainly true for majority of my DILDs. But now, after maybe 60 DILDs, the sensation is not as strong. Now, instead of out-of-this-world happiness, I have more like "fianally, took you long enough to get lucid again".

So to me personally, this incredible feeling of happiness was unmistakable proof of a dream being lucid.

But yes, if the dream fades into very low lucidity soon after, or it doesn't even start out as very vivid LD, it's hard to tell sometimes what it was.

What I think is the most important thing we can take away from this is the fact, that no matter how vivid was the LD, and no matter if it really was a LD or just a regular dream about us getting lucid, it's a sure sign of our practice working. Encouragement for us to keep practicing and keep on dreaming.

I am not sure how long the term semi-lucid has been in use or if it is something me or Sageous made up. Who knows, but I can tell you what it means when you hear one of us use it.

Semi-lucid: A dream in which you do not actually believe it is real life. Part of you is observing with a casual thought that this is just a dream, however you do not pull waking awareness into the dream.

Examples:

Semi-lucid: A monster is eating your lawn furniture. You kind of shrug and think "what a weird dream" and feel no need to run, perhaps just wandering away.

Lucid: A monster is eating your lawn furniture. You kind of think "what a weird dream. Oh, hey let's see. Ok yep do an RC. Ok a dream, right, what is next."

I guess it was semi in some cases and just lucid in others. I don't remember having anymore lucid dreams, except for when I was younger I would have a recurring event in almost every dream where it'd just be a normal dream and towards the end there'd be a sign that this recurring murderer was coming after me and this was when I would realise I'm dreaming and try to wake myself up by closing my eyes really tight and tensing my muscles until I could hear ringing or I would wake up just before he killed me.

So I guess that was lucid.

The one where I walked out the shop and went "oh I'm dreaming" stopped for a while, then carried on and forgot was I guess semi-lucid. This was all before I knew about reality checking, it just happened spontaneously which is why they didn't last very long, all that prompted this lucidity was simply hearing about and becoming interested in lucid dreaming until I stopped and gained interest again (haven't had one since re-gaining interest - yet) - which I guess is a good way to achieve it, or so I've heard.

Lucid dream: Awareness that you are dreaming.

Well, there you go. Congratz.