Thread: Fear of not being able to wake up

Hi guys, as the title suggests my question is regarding the fear of not being able to wake up during a lucid dream.

I have been learning about lucid dreaming for the past 4 months and in all I've had about 10 lucid dreams. 7 of them were more lucid "experiences", i.e. I woke up very soon after becomming lucid. In the other 3 dreams however, after learning more and more I managed to stabalise the dreams and try things out.

The thing is, I've wasted two of these lucid dreams by waking myself up. After the joy of realising I am lucid, the thought of not being able to wake up and being stuck inside my own head starts to cross my mind. I reassure myself that everything will be fine and to make the most of the experience, although the thought is still there. A few moments after stablising the dream, I wake myself up, and as soon as I do so I kick myself for wasting the dream.

The reason for this fear is down to one of my childhood lucid dreams (when I was about 6 or 7 years old), back when I didn't understand what they were. I had dreams in which I would become lucid although almost always it would be during a nightmare. So I would wake myself up straight away by hitting my head really hard on the floor, or jumping out of a window etc...

So anyway, I became lucid during a dream and tried to wake myself up as I assumed it would be a nightmare. I hit my head on the floor, jumped through windows, ran infront of cars etc... but nothing worked. I started to panic, thinking that I would be trapped inside this dream forever...
It seemed to go on for hours, I was running around a town on a dull, rainy day, just trying to wake myself up! Much like the film Waking Life.

Eventually I talked to a man that looked like a detective in a resturant, and told him that I was dreaming and couldn't wake up. I don't remember what he said, but after the conversation the dream faded to black and in bold yellow letters I read "The End". After reading that I woke up.

After wasting 2 lucid dreams to this fear, I am now assured that I will wake up, and I won't waste the next lucid dream I have! The dreams I woke myself up from were also in pretty creepy environments, the one I remained in until I woke up naturally was in a very "normal" environment with other people around.

So, have any of you had this fear?
Have any of you also been unable to wake from a dream at will?

Please let me know, I am fascinated by lucid dreaming and would like to know as much as possible!

it has happened to me that ive become lucid in an unpleasant dream and tried waking up but was unable at and other times its easy. Its nothing really to be scared of though because whether you like it or not your body is gonna wake up like normal in the morning - even if the dream lasts thats just the way it goes so i dont understand what you have to worry about.. i find when i cant wake up from a dream its because im actually not trying to, only thinking about trying to if that makes sense.

huh...a fear of waking....sometimes i wish that i wouldnt wake. But only when im having a great dream

Like we all say, our dreams dont controll us, we controll our dreams, we shouldnt WANT to wake up at ALL, we should want to dream as much as we can , its the best thing since sliced bread!, you face your fears etc... its why we become lucid.

It is very hard to awaken yourself during a REM cycle. It should end naturally, otherwise you may panic yourself out again. Take advantage of being lucid. And don't worry about spending hours dreaming. That isn't possible. It is done through a phenomenon called: Time Dialation.

As pspsoldier mentioned, it is very hard to awaken yourself during a REM cycle. If try very hard and actually manage there is a risk you will experiece sleep paralysis when you wake up.. this can be quite scary as it often also involves hallucinations. bottom line is just enjoy the dream and if anything avoid waking up haha