Thread: Losing My Touch?

Hey everyone,

I haven't had an LD in like a month. Why is this? I havent even been able to recall barely any dreams either. Am I losing my touch? Because when I first started out, I had all my first LDs in my first monh. Now I don't have any.

Nah don't worry about it, we all go through dry spells every now and then. Could you give us some more information, like what methods you try, how much you sleep, what you eat, etc etc?

Well generally, i get 8-9 hours of sleep each night. i eat ALOT of junk food. lol. umm whenever i am in a dream, i try breathing through a plugged nose and if air gets through, i know im dreaming. i also pinch myself. so generally DILD's. i had all my 4 in one month. now i have none. (i have a DJ, but only record LDs not fragments.)

Mes is right. Dry spells happen. I once had a dry spell that lasted over 4 months - just hope yours doesn't last that long. You're not losing your touch. In the meantime why don't you try recording all your non-lucid dreams and try looking over them for patterns that might indicate what your dream signs are.

By the way, while the nose-pinching RC is considered highly reliable, pinching yourself is an essentially worthless RC.

Yes, i hope it isnt that long lol. okay a few questions. What do you mean look em over for a pattern? like what kind of pattern? and the pinching thing. why is it useless? when im in a dream and pinch myself, i feel a strange numb feeling. although i do agree that the nose one is better, whats wrong with the pinching?

Originally Posted by Jerad

What do you mean look em over for a pattern? like what kind of pattern?

For example, Let's say that you recorded a weeks worth of dreams and are reading over them. You notice that a very common setting in your dreams is your back yard. This can be a useful dream sign. You would then try to establish a habit of doing a reality check every time you are in your back yard. This will make you more likely to do a reality check in your dreams, since in them you frequently appear in your back yard. So the patterns you would be looking for are any kind of recurring theme, place, scenario, person, object, etc in your dreams that might indicate a useful dream sign that you can use to help you in becoming lucid.

Originally Posted by Jerad

and the pinching thing. why is it useless? when im in a dream and pinch myself, i feel a strange numb feeling. although i do agree that the nose one is better, whats wrong with the pinching?

First of all, dream sensations are not always consistent. Sometimes you can feel pain in a dream, although more often you can't. Similarly, sometimes a pinch will be a strange, numb feeling, other times it will feel like a regular waking pinch.

Second, the dreaming mind is incredulous. You may have noticed how it will attempt to explain away or flat disregard things that, in retrospect, should have been obvious clues that you were dreaming. Breathing through a pinched nose is something that is hard to argue with. If you can breathe through a tightly pinched nose, even a tiny little bit, you can be absolutely certain that you are dreaming. It's a true/false thing. Pinching yourself, on the other hand, is more variable and subjective. There is no true/false, real-sensation/dream-sensation thing with that. Your dreaming mind will try to second-guess you and convince you that perhaps whatever you feel is normal.

While it has the potential to work, it's best just to go with the fail-safe one. (It hurts less, too.)