Some simply questions and some serious questions (long post)

I'm back again after giving up before, but have some questions, and I hope they don't offend anyone it is not my intention at all, I am just looking for some input. Section 1 is general questions, Section 2 is more serious matters.

Section 1

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I would like to know how you all manage to wake up during sleep, jot down notes about your dreams, and instantly fall back asleep.

I don't know about you all but once I wake up and move around, I'm going to be up at least another hour. To add to the problem, I get allergy attacks EVERY single day when I wake up.

When I wake up to focus on remembering a dream I become fully awake, how can you simply fall back to sleep?

This seems impossible to do and it interferes with my day because I am too tired from waking up all night and am fatigued all day, and that's bad while at work etc. :(

I am getting so frustrated after 6 years of trying with no success, I have read tutorials, tried reality checks, read other users' techniques, no luck at all.

I finally have identified my problem though ; the ability (or lack of) to fall asleep quickly without inhibiting my day. :(

With reality checks I know I am awake, and I can't trick myself while I am awake. While dreaming I do checks and think everything is normal, even weird things. :roll:

I tried the "full bladder technique" and all I do is dream about bathrooms devoid of toilets, then I wake up with a sore kidney or bladder for holding it so long. :eek:

I also tried the dream journal, I wake up and I am dead tired and can barely write down a dream, how can someone be clear minded after waking up? I practically stumble out of bed :D. After a full day's sleep (night shift) I will barely remember one dream and I'm too focused on rushing to work.

Does lucid dreaming fade with age? When I was in my early 20s I seemed to be in my prime dreaming period.

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Section 2

I also don't understand the origins of LDs study and it confuses me.

I tried something called a "mantra" word before and it would trigger an LD almost instantly (usually a horrible terrifying nightmare). Is it simply a placebo effect, or am I casting a bizarre invocation spell? I don't remember the word and I don't care to remember it. *shudders* It took years to forget and caused many bad nights.

I joined some gnostic forum a few years ago not knowing what I was getting into, and all the discussions about LDs were different from here, even religious (which crossed with some of my current beliefs).

I know this confusion about "gnostics" still lingers in my subconscious. I also know this is a scientific forum, but I also have knowledge from the their side.

The scientific side states LD is simply a process or ability of the mind.

The gnostics believe they inherit the LD and OBE abilities from their god named "Beelzebub".

What is weird is that when I mentioned this on the gnostic forum, I was instantly banned because I mentioned Beelzebub was a demon (checked Google), and they said I was "scaring" other users. Hopefully you guys don't ban me -_-

So how is it possible to clear this up scientifically? If the gnostics believe this power was granted by their deity, and it was/is studied and taught throughout their cults for 1000s of years (specifically lucid dreaming and OBE induction) how is it possible to argue LDs are simply a science?

It is strange how when people are experimenting with LDs, the experiences are many times associated with fear. Which makes could make one believe the process is indeed inducing something negative to one's psyche.

Sleep paralysis? A very frightful experience indeed, and it is not just simply because of being paralyzed. Many people on this forum and many other sources report seeing "black spirits or shapes". Others report "evil sounds and voices". One would think simply trying to have fun in a dream would not create such horrifying experiences.

I can't believe this is PURELY coincidence how so many people experienced this same dark phenomenon. In my case I experienced all three of the "symptoms" before I knew anything about OBE and LDs, so I could of no way created the illusions just because I read about them; they happened on their own.

Okay sorry for all the jabber, had to get that off my chest :D

I'm looking forward to some well thought out scientific responses, not simply "believe what you will".

This is all for open for discussion, I'm curious what other users think, that's all.

It honestly saddens me to read that you have been tryin 6 years without success. I'm sorry for that. You seem to have lot of knowledge on the subject as well. You even know your main problem, not being able to fall asleep quickly. DILDS don't seem to work well since the reality checks aren't working. BUT, don't stop doing RC's, it can't hurt, I hope.

There is little that I can do to help you but i'll give you just a few pointers. WILD seems like your best chance, I think.

The dream journal thingy, that you have a problem with, you need to try still. Maybe when you wake up, go to the restroom and splash some water in your face. Wake up from a loud alarm, and turn on lights right away. Whatever you can do to wake up. Then jot down w/e dream recall you have from your dreams. You don't have to do this several times a night, maybe just after 5 hours of sleep. You just NEED to do this to increase your recall, which seriously increases your chances at getting lucid...When you go back to sleep, try the wild technique by lying still yada yada, you probably already know it all. Since you have a hard time going back to sleep, you can let your body fall asleep and enter SP, and try to take it from there. (assuming you know how to enter SP) Practice that technique more.

In case of actually doing a RC in a dream, you can do some things to increase your chance of it working. While doing RCs when you are awake, don't just do the RC, be more aware of everything. Look around at your surroundings and ask yourself if everything is normal, in your head of course. Look at your hands more deeply and imagine what you would do if anything was different.... meaning you'd be in a dream. This helped me a lot at least.

Since everythings been failing, maybe look into buying some of those "lucid dreaming pills" on the market. Or invest in one of the machines that can help induce it. Or, just vitamin b6.

About your allergy attacks EVERY morning, can't you help that with medicine?

I don't know much about section 2, at all. All I know is I've been having LDs all my life, and it's a state of mind. And I know SP occurs since your brain thinks your body is asleep.

BTW, I've more than experienced this dark phenomenom, I've been attacked by it, twice. I would really like explainations on it also. It wasn't "old hag" either... This was serious.

Hey there,

Several answers to your questions:


I would like to know how you all manage to wake up during sleep, jot down notes about your dreams, and instantly fall back asleep.

The simple truth is that there is always a physiological part in this. Our bodies all work slightly differently. For some people falling asleep will always be easier then for others. There's no way around that fact.

There are however plenty of things that can 'prevent' you from falling asleep. Basically, falling asleep is about withdrawing your attention away from the waking world, and your body. So waking things like stress, tossing in turning, not feeling comfortable in your bed, can all have a detriminal influence.

Additionally, constantly worrying about waking problems, constantly keep going over the things you have to do tomorrow lest you forget them and other similar psychological acts can make it hard for you to sleep as well. The trick is to find a way to be very comfortable, stop the intrusive thoughts from your waking life from occupying your mind, and then find something soothing to focus your attention on, and keep it there. Some people focus on their breathing, some try to blank their minds, others count sheep, others visualise they're already dreaming and in a great fun relaxing dream (that one works wonders for me personally).

We all have to find our own method... but the basics remain the same. Cut out the stress and clutter from your waking life, turn your attention elsewhere.

NOTE: It is however not necessary to wake up and go back to sleep during the night to have lucid dreams. Its simply one method. Its a very effective method, but if it really doesn't work for you there are other ways!



With reality checks I know I am awake, and I can't trick myself while I am awake. While dreaming I do checks and think everything is normal, even weird things. :roll:

I would advice you to check out Billybobs recent tutorial called "How to Lucid Dream." He describes reality checks very well, in my opinion. Some people do reality checks all the time, but I feel its better to do them everytime something in your waking life that seems 'just a little out of place' happens.

You can in fact train your awareness to catch these things. Don't do random reality checks every 30 minutes, but look for things that either seem 'odd', or that remind you of dreams.

For instance, I sometimes dream of insects in my dreams, which tend to be grossly enlarged and out of proportion (and a bit scary too). So I'd do a reality check when I'm sitting outside having a drink and a wasp lands on the table. Or there is this strange guy I sometimes see on the streets, and I meet him all over town, at the oddest places. I don't quite know why (I guess he has some of the same living patterns then I do). But whenever I see him, I have this 'oh look there he is again how odd' kind of feeling, and I do a reality check. Or I'd be walking the street and come across some grafitti, where a word or image written there reminds me of a dream I had tonight, and do a reality check there.

These are the things I think you want to train your mind for. To be looking for 'signals' so to speak. In any case that's how it works best for me.

Ultimately though, the most important thing about reality checks is not that you do them in your dreams too, but simply that every time you're doing one, you're turning your attention to your dreams and your desire to lucid dream. So even if they seem to give no direct result whatsoever, they are still very helpful because of the underlying mechanism of turning your mind to 'dreaming' periodically.



I also tried the dream journal, I wake up and I am dead tired and can barely write down a dream, how can someone be clear minded after waking up? I practically stumble out of bed :D. After a full day's sleep (night shift) I will barely remember one dream and I'm too focused on rushing to work.

That's your problem there. You're rushing. Give yourself fifteen extra minutes then. (ie set your alarm clock a bit earlier). And when you wake up, don't rush. Give your mind time. Lying still in your bed for a few minutes, let your mind relax, do not think about the coming day. When you wake up and instantly turn your thoughts towards work or what you have to do that day, you dramatically decrease the chance of being able to remember a dream. Dream recall is not something you can rush.




Does lucid dreaming fade with age? When I was in my early 20s I seemed to be in my prime dreaming period.

I've been experimenting with lucid dreaming for 15 years now and so far it's only gotten easier :)



So how is it possible to clear this up scientifically? (about the gnostic side and the scientific side)

I'm sure you'll get about a million different answers to this, but the hard and cold truth, in my opinion, is that you cannot. What it comes down to is your own belief. You chose what you belief, be it scientific, gnostic, or any of the other myriad of explanations for lucid dreaming (trust me, gnostic isn't the only one!).

Personally, I believe in the psychoanalytical explanation. Which tells me that it doesn't matter whether you give a scientific, gnostic, new age or other explanation to it. What you're doing is using words as symbolisers, metaphores and analogies to capture something that is in essence 'wordless'. You're trying to capture a sensation, an experience, a feeling.

So name it what you will, symbolise it how you will. It all works. The act of trying to symbolise and capture it into words itself is far more important then the words you chose. Whether you chose words like 'science', 'psychology', 'consciousness' or words like 'mysticism', 'beelzebub', 'granted powers', it doesn't really matter. What you're doing is consciously trying to grab this sensation, and give it a place in your conscious mind.



I can't believe this is PURELY coincidence how so many people experienced this same dark phenomenon. (about sleep paralysis)

It's not a coincidence. Sleep paralysis brings with it very specific bodily sensations. One of most fearful things that we as humans can experience is the ability of not being able to do anything. Passivity breeds trauma like you won't believe. Oftentimes those who have to witness a traumatic event passively end up being more traumatised then the person that actually underwent the trauma and could fight against it.

Paralysis does exactly that though, it brings you in a state of passivity, of not having control. Add to that the feeling of opressiveness, when your limbs go numb, and its little surprise our first natural and instinctive reaction to this is fear. But its just that, in my opinion, an instinctive reaction, and little more.

Anyways, hope that helps a bit,

-Redrivertears-

Zakar,

Are you taking antihistamines for your allergies? The active ingredient dyphenhydromine hydrochloride used in many allergy meds can really screw with your sleep rhythms. I also am prone to these attacks in the AM, and have found that if I tie a bandana over my nose and mouth as soon as I wake up the allergies don't flare up. (This doesn't work 100% of the time but it helps a lot.) The allergy meds also give me extra freaky dreams - not the good kind.

Good luck w/ your efforts, Nemo

In regards to sleep, I am the same way taking about an hour to go to sleep right once I hit the bed unless if I stay up really late (which I can only do successfully on the weekends). One of the greatest things that I've found that makes me exhausted is taking two calcium pills two hours before I plan on going to bed. Calcium acts as a natural tranquilizer and makes me feel so relaxed. I would highly recommend you look into that.

I have also noticed, which my father also let me know, when my body lacked a lot of water/oxygen is when I would get into sleep paralysis. For me, I've become very accustomed to drinking a lot of water on a daily basis and it is very simple for me to get dehydrated if I don't drink 6 glasses of water or more a day. When I'd take naps dehydrated, I always got sleep paralysis.

Double posted..sorry my connection lagged I think..!

Thank you for the insightful replies everyone. :)

Redrivertears : That is a very good point about only doing reality checks when something odd happens. I don't know how to trigger SP, but it always happens when I drink caffeine before going to bed. :roll:

Michael : Vitamin b6 helps? I used to take them, I forgot about them though, they usually gave me stomach cramps >< Perhaps vitamin deficiency is my problem :D

little nemo : Yes I take allergy medicines (Allegra D/Benadryl) but the side effects sure are a hindrance. (I've tried just about every allergy med on the market). My body adapts to every medicine and they stop helping after 1 day. This is probably my biggest obstacle and prevents me from keeping a dream log. :?

My friend drives me crazy when he says "Oh yea I get LDs every night I don't have dream journals or anything, I just get them naturally every night, I ALWAYS know when I am dreaming!". Why can't I be that lucky! :?

Thank you again for all the insight, I feel much more motivated now! Now to work on the hard part, not rushing and being stressed out! :D

"I don't know about you all but once I wake up and move around, I'm going to be up at least another hour. To add to the problem, I get allergy attacks EVERY single day when I wake up."

About this one, when you mean move around, do you shift in bed? Or do you physically get up? Because some people don't get up when they WBTB, or it takes them a long time to fall back asleep.

Of course, if you don't get up, then you don't get the benefit of writing down your dreams, but you could try just writing a few key words in a notepad or something, instead of writing down the entire dream. That IS how we normally recreate memories, anyway - from key bits of information, rather than from detailed explanations of what happened...

Well, I myself don't have any problems with the stuff you mentioned (dark things, scaring myself, etc.) My only problem is actually ATTAINING the dream itself :P.

Sleep paralysis really doesn't freak me out, and the times I have gotten it, someone was talking behind me, as if they were laying behind me on the bed. So, weird things do happen, but they aren't always freaky. I think its really just how you take things. The first time I experience SP, I didn't freak out when I figured out I couldn't turn around to see just who the hell had snuck into my room. I took a couple of deep breaths, and turned slowly.

[However the second time, that didn't work. Looked like I was still asleep this time :P. However, then my body started falling asleep and I was quite excited :O only to wake myself up cuz I still expected to see someone behind me -.- lol]

EDIT: About allergies, I wouldn't recommend over-the-counter allergen reducing whatevers. I have allergies too, and all my medications are prescription. There are no side-effects to them, at least the ones I have.