. But When ... ?

So basically
I've been afraid that vivid lucid dreams
will be so realistic --- that it is terrifying

This is mainly why I haven't lucid dreampt more than once
fear

and so I think that if I really try...
I have enough motivation, and dream recall (etc) to achieve it eventually

I'm going to start waking up at an appropriate time to try LD
(I'm going to conquer my fear!!)
so... I was wondering

About how many hours after you've fallen asleep is a good time to try LD?
I know it has something to do with the dream stages...
sooo please fill me in before tonight :)

First of all, lucid dreams should be anything but terrifying. No matter how vivid the dream may be, once you realize you are dreaming you should also realize that there is nothing to fear because everything you see/hear/feel is being created by your own mind. In any case, they certainly shouldn't be any more scary than normal dreams.

As far as how long you should sleep before attempting a lucid dream, I would say somewhere between 4 and 6 hours. After you've had that much sleep, you've gotten most of your deep sleep out of the way, and most of your remaining sleep time will be spent in REM sleep, where you do the most dreaming.

Aah!
Thank you so much
that is vveerryy helpful
and yes
I probably shouldn't be so scared
I just don't want to get stuck in a nightmare!

Don't know if this helps, but I've learned how to wake myself up from lucid dreams if they become scary. There is more than one method, but here's the one that works for me: I just close my eyes really tightly, sometimes put my hands over my face, and then open my eyes verrry slowly. I open my eyes into the waking world! If you should ever need to, you could always give this a shot.

Yes, that's one thing you can always do in a lucid dream, is wake yourself up. In fact, many people's (including me) first lucid experience is a nightmare from which they wake up on purpose. You really can't get "stuck" in a lucid dream any more than in a regular dream -- even less so, since you know that you are dreaming and can awaken at any time.

I always awaken from nightmares anyway, I never sleep right through them.. For example, once I had a nightmare in which I was being executed for a crime I didn't do... By firing squad, which isn't legal anymore, I think... The moment the guns fired, I woke up. Happens every time.