Thread: Senses Initiated Lucid Dream (SSILD)

Gahhh, first LD this morning!!! Yeah, so in the end, after hours of moping about, I went to sleep about half 3 in the morning, after practically running from the bathroom to my room, despite having all the lights, bar one, on - yeah I am that weird about the dark/night/monsters. I woke up at around 7:40 and thought about doing the SSILD. So I did, but my thoughts kept on wandering and in what I presumed was not a good way, because I was just thinking about how I would write-up everything I was doing, you know, "Hmm, this worked for me. Then this happened." etc. I fell asleep and woke up quickly, but it definitely wasn't a FA and if it was, it was insanely realistic. I did about 3 different RCs and they all failed. Anyway, I kept on doing the cycles, nothing much happened in them, but you said that's fine. The feelings one was good, lots of tingles and vibrations and the hearing one was the worst, because it is well busy here day and night and my clock ticks But anyway, I thought it was difficult to fall asleep, but then I did and had some dreams. I know they were dreams, but I wasn't lucid. I was in my bed, right where I left myself, but I was on my computer. It didn't feel like a FA, it felt like a dream, but I wasn't aware (I think I tried doing RCs though, I can't remember clearly now). Anyway, I don't know what happened next, but I woke up in my bed and my computer was there, but it was going wappy and strange stuff was happening on it and I knew I was dreaming! I looked at my hand and could only see it's outline and it was kind of hard to keep track on. And I said, "Omg, I'm dreaming!" My voice felt really thick and distorted and I felt like I was losing the dream, so...I rubbed my hands together!! It worked. I got out of bed and practically skipped across the room towards my door. Unfortunately, I didn't concentrate on gaining more lucidity or control, I just shouted in a kind of weird super-hero voice, "I will be in Teesside!" Everything felt thick again, so I crawled around on the floor and I could feel it, I could really feel it. But that made me even more excited so I woke up. It was 9:05.

So, it lasted about 10 seconds and it was kind of gloomy, but it was a LD!!!!! The feeling was just incredible.

Originally Posted by CosmicIron

In general though a lot of inner-conversation will result in pre-mature awakening or other instability within the dream.

Yeah, tbh, it is more of a detailed conversation. I mean, IRL I don't have a full-blown conversation, because nobody is really answering me except myself, but I do a lot of talking

Lula x

EDIT: This is kind of a response to my own question about clothes, but I'm hoping someone can elaborate. I went to bed in underwear and a jumper (you know, just in case it gets a bit chilly in that lucid world! ) I was wearing the jumper in the LD dream, but the only point at which I was aware of that was when I was looking at my hand. I couldn't feel the cold floor until I got down and crawled around on it and I wasn't aware of whether I was wearing clothes or not. I guess that just comes with better awareness?

hmmm id like to try it.

Originally Posted by Ashylus420

hmmm id like to try it.

Can't hurt

Lula x

I have tried this technique on and off about a dozen times without success. Then yesterday I read CosmicIron's blog with the excellent description and explanation of the technique, as well as the Q&A section and realized "Hey, I haven't been doing this exactly right."

Last night I decided to follow the instructions on the blog to the letter and guess what happened?


Even though it's almost exactly what the instructions say to do, here's what I did along with what the experience was like:

- Went to sleep at 1AM, set my alarm for 6AM (5 hours later)
- When my alarm went off I answered a few emails and then got up to go to the bathroom and get a drink of water. This took 5 minutes.
- I lay down on my back and did 6 quick cycles. They got progressively slower, so I might spend 3-5 seconds per sense in the first one but maybe 6-8 seconds per sense on the last. This happened naturally since I got more relaxed and absent minded.
- Did 4 slow cycles, 30-40 seconds per sense.
- Once I was done I tried to fall asleep, with difficulty. I did some reality checks to make sure I was really awake and then when they failed, I continued to just try to drift off to sleep.
- At some point, I snapped awake. It was like someone tore a blindfold away from my face and a dream version of my bedroom appeared. I knew I was dreaming immediately, almost as if I was expecting it. Perhaps my mind was subconsciously conditioned to be waiting for a dream to happen (just like the guide says).

Thanks CosmicIron, I will continue to try this technique following the instructions to the letter. I enjoy the approach here because usually while monitoring my senses I would be trying to monitor my INTERNAL senses (noises or visions in my head, vs real sensations picked up by my ears and eyes). Here I can just focus on what's really happening, it's much simpler and less stressful.

Originally Posted by bluremi

I have tried this technique on and off about a dozen times without success. Then yesterday I read CosmicIron's blog with the excellent description and explanation of the technique, as well as the Q&A section and realized "Hey, I haven't been doing this exactly right."

Last night I decided to follow the instructions on the blog to the letter and guess what happened?


Even though it's almost exactly what the instructions say to do, here's what I did along with what the experience was like:

- Went to sleep at 1AM, set my alarm for 6AM (5 hours later)
- When my alarm went off I answered a few emails and then got up to go to the bathroom and get a drink of water. This took 5 minutes.
- I lay down on my back and did 6 quick cycles. They got progressively slower, so I might spend 3-5 seconds per sense in the first one but maybe 6-8 seconds per sense on the last. This happened naturally since I got more relaxed and absent minded.
- Did 4 slow cycles, 30-40 seconds per sense.
- Once I was done I tried to fall asleep, with difficulty. I did some reality checks to make sure I was really awake and then when they failed, I continued to just try to drift off to sleep.
- At some point, I snapped awake. It was like someone tore a blindfold away from my face and a dream version of my bedroom appeared. I knew I was dreaming immediately, almost as if I was expecting it. Perhaps my mind was subconsciously conditioned to be waiting for a dream to happen (just like the guide says).

Thanks CosmicIron, I will continue to try this technique following the instructions to the letter. I enjoy the approach here because usually while monitoring my senses I would be trying to monitor my INTERNAL senses (noises or visions in my head, vs real sensations picked up by my ears and eyes). Here I can just focus on what's really happening, it's much simpler and less stressful.

Great! That's classic! Now, one thing I forgot to mention in that tutorial is what to do when you try to fall asleep after performing SSILD. Sometimes it is difficult to fall asleep even when we become very drowsy during the exercise. I found this was caused by the "desire" to fall asleep. That's right, when we focus too much on falling asleep it just backfires. Think what you normally do when first going to bed? Do you try very hard to sleep? Perhaps you take your day-time problems with you and drift away while thinking about them? Perhaps you like to tell yourself a little story or do a little bit of role playing? Whatever you do you rarely focus on falling asleep itself. You should do the same after SSILD. There is no need to keep lucid dreaming as the last remaining thought. This is not MILD or mantra. Just do whatever you can to fall asleep ASAP and SSILD will take care of the rest

Hey, CosmicIron, have you already tested how this technic works by itself? I mean, withput the aid of dream journals and reality checks throughout the day? I was just thinking this technic has some similarities to Raduga's one (As you have already mentioned yourself) and apparently his technic works well all by itself. Maybe it is the case with SSILD too?

Originally Posted by lucsande

Hey, CosmicIron, have you already tested how this technic works by itself? I mean, withput the aid of dream journals and reality checks throughout the day? I was just thinking this technic has some similarities to Raduga's one (As you have already mentioned yourself) and apparently his technic works well all by itself. Maybe it is the case with SSILD too?

I do not use any other techniques nowadays, and SSILD gives me 100% success rate. I occasionally record dreams but only the interesting ones. I do not perform reality checks or other similar stuff such as all-day-awareness (I used to, many years ago) throughout the day as I believe they are not effective and based on false theories.

In all, I believe SSILD can be used as an effective standalone technique. In fact, I believe it performs better without other techniques interfering. The only exceptions are WBTB, dream journaling, and perhaps mantras, which are supplementary techniques to begin with.

Cosmic:

I recently had a bit of success with this technique (I have had 2 total instances,) but every other time I attempt the technique it seems that I either fall asleep or get distracted, even on the quick cycling stage! I don't feel like I'm too tired, but this distraction or falling asleep almost always seems to occur. Do you have any suggestions? I am still unsure what was different about the two times I had success with the cycling. Is it possible that I'm waking up at a wrong time and my body is trying to go back into NREM sleep instead of a dream?

Originally Posted by CosmicIron

I do not use any other techniques nowadays, and SSILD gives me 100% success rate. I occasionally record dreams but only the interesting ones. I do not perform reality checks or other similar stuff such as all-day-awareness (I used to, many years ago) throughout the day as I believe they are not effective and based on false theories.

In all, I believe SSILD can be used as an effective standalone technique. In fact, I believe it performs better without other techniques interfering. The only exceptions are WBTB, dream journaling, and perhaps mantras, which are supplementary techniques to begin with.

Even ADA? I had the impression everybody thought it to be the most effective supplement to lucid dreaming.

Originally Posted by DinoSawr

Cosmic:

I recently had a bit of success with this technique (I have had 2 total instances,) but every other time I attempt the technique it seems that I either fall asleep or get distracted, even on the quick cycling stage! I don't feel like I'm too tired, but this distraction or falling asleep almost always seems to occur. Do you have any suggestions? I am still unsure what was different about the two times I had success with the cycling. Is it possible that I'm waking up at a wrong time and my body is trying to go back into NREM sleep instead of a dream?

That could well be the case. I suggest tweaking with your schedules a bit to see what the differences that makes. Also don't worry too much about distractions. Just stay as comfortable as possible, and if that means moving around then by all means do it. Remember, you don't have to feel anything during the cycles. Just do plenty of them and go to sleep. Magic happens after that

So after reading the majority of this thread I decided to post my results! Let me give some background info: About two weeks ago I have had trouble falling asleep. I just couldn't do it no matter what I tried. Hoping to find some answers I came onto this forum and used the search function to try to find a technique to just help fall asleep let alone lucid dream. I found a post that mentioned a technique called SSILD just while glancing through the results. I found this thread after some research and read all about the technique and how to do it. Since it seemed to give the mind something to think about while falling asleep I thought it might be the help I needed to get a good night's rest. Turned out it was, and much more! I would use it at the beginning of the night just to help me fall asleep and it worked wonders. I then started to notice some interesting side effects: increased dream recall, more vivid dreams, better sleeping patterns and whatnot (probably due to me actually falling asleep XD). I began to read the forum some more and after a week of using this as my new sleep aid I decided to set a WBTB alarm and try my hand at some lucid dreaming, something I haven't done in a long time...here are my steps and results for my first serious try:

-I set my alarm to go off in exactly 5 and a half hours and then used the technique to fall asleep.
-My alarm woke me up, and even though I was really drowsy I knew what I needed to do because the last thing I did before falling asleep was cycling through the technique. I set my alarm for 90 minutes so that I wouldn't oversleep and would have (more or less) a whole sleep cycle to use
-I was still feeling drowsy, but I sat upright in bed and stared forward until my drowsiness was gone. I now knew it was time to begin
-I layed on my back and began doing the cycles...
-I stared into the darkness, nothing at first but then started seeing waves of colors wash over my eyelids the more cycles i did
-I listened to the ringing in my ears, mentally focusing on them and making my perception of it louder, almost deafening
-I then focused on my body as a whole, feeling for tingles, but also stimulating the area between my eyes (by thinking about it...something I always do to induce a tingle sensation)
-After about 5-6 cycles my mind began to wander, and my drowsiness came back so I went to sleep

Once I went back to sleep I remember a few vivid dreams, but nothing too spectacular. I then woke up after a certain ammount of time, but i remember the most distinct feeling to close my eyes, so i did and BAM suddenly I am in a school setting, the same one that I was in, before I woke up, in one of my dreams, but I knew I was dreaming...I didn't even use a RC! I instinctively used some of the stabilization techniques that CosmicIron had mentioned earlier in the thread, notably crawling on the floor. I accomplished a few of my dream goals before I woke up again. This, though i didnt know it at the time, was a FA. My bed was shaped all wrong and I awoke standing up, but my silly brain thought it was normal lol. But I got that nagging feeling again...like I NEEDED to close my eyes, so I did and BAM back into the school, though this time in the library. I did some more fun stuff before I actually woke up. This was a fantastic experience! I plan to use SSILD every night now in order to improve my LD'ing skills! Thank you CosmicIron for this amazing technique!

Originally Posted by lucsande

Even ADA? I had the impression everybody thought it to be the most effective supplement to lucid dreaming.

According to ADA, it increases your awareness during the day and thus making you more aware in dreams too. Now most people take this claim as a "fact" and rarely question it. However, I beg you to really think about it. Do we really carry day-time habits into our dreams? What if we don't?

Do this: we all have many habits we do during the day, right? Pick a few and ask yourself, "Do I do that in my dreams?" Chances are you rarely, if ever, do them within your dreams! For example, you may like to sing to yourself whenever being alone, but you probably never do that in dreams. Now this may come as a surprise but if you look at what our dreams are meant to do then it's not surprising at all. Dreams are NOT meant to be a replica of our daily lives. They are complementary. Being complementary means it is more likely to contain content which we don't see often during the day, and day-time habits are certainly among these often omitted content. Moreover, dreams are highly symbolic. This means whatever occur in the dream do not necessarily share the same semantics with their day-time equivalent, and this include a wide range of things including the dream elements, events, and even your own behavior!

If we can't bring our existing habits into dreams, what make you think a new routine will? Assuming ADA works as advertised, then an avid practitioner should be able to achieve lucidity all the time, in nearly every dreams (maybe even in the NREM ones), and all without any other aid. That's right, you have to have this level of consistent performance to really prove ADA's effectiveness. That may sound a little unfair, but many people have come to assume it being the ultimate "technique for the rest of your life" without even questioning the validity of its theories. Unfortunately, if you look closely at the reports from ADA practitioners you will rarely see such cases.

Of course, what I've said is of my own opinion. I'm currently conducting a large-scale survey on our Chinese lucid dream forum. The goal of the survey is to verify the validity of the "developing some habits and do that also in your dreams" claim, which is the basis of some of the de-facto techniques people have assumed to be effective without questioning. Let's see how it goes, and let the numbers do the talk.

Hey cosmic iron. I can attest to carrying things over in dreams. Here is my story about that:

I have always been ridiculously obsessed with dreams. I didn't think there was anything I could do more than remember dreams, so I never researched it till I was 19 and heard about LDing.

Anyways. So at about 16 I was keeping a DJ to get more vivid dreams. I was obsessed with star wars then (as opposed to now) and I walked around the house for two weeks "moving things with my mind" I would sporadically throughout the day fully believe I had the force and I would lift my hand up and imagine it moving. So after two weeks of that, guess what happened? You got it! I started having dreams that weren't star wars related that if something happened like a fight or I wanted to reach something, I would use "the force" (or telekinesis) in a dream. This would have been written off as "just because it was on my mind," but to this day, I use it all the time.

This was a long summer alone, I had was in between my first "girlfriend" and my second gf. So don't judge the nerdiness.

Anyways. At 17 I remembered this thing I had done, since I had 1 dream every single night. But then I was watching anime. I thought about the cool things they did and remembered my force powers. I decided then to practice rasengan (from naruto) and melchee's door (from psyren). I can use both in non lucids now. Using the basic technique of RCs, not really ADA.

But! If RCs (or sporadic awareness) works. Shouldn't ADA?

I hope this helps. it is my own studies of dream control before lucid. That is why for me when people say "lucidity does not equal control." It makes sense to me.

Interesting discussion. But don't think ADA could help at least with dream vividness?
Anyway, leep us dated with your chinese experiments, please. They seem to be very interesting.


Brandon, wouldn't all these things be just intention, rather than habit? I mean, we certainly carry stuff to dreams from daily life (for instance, one theory is that you cannot dream about unknown people), but in your case wouldn't it be just the manifestation of a strong desire and interest, rather than an habit?

Originally Posted by lucsande

Interesting discussion. But don't think ADA could help at least with dream vividness?
Anyway, leep us dated with your chinese experiments, please. They seem to be very interesting.


Brandon, wouldn't all these things be just intention, rather than habit? I mean, we certainly carry stuff to dreams from daily life (for instance, one theory is that you cannot dream about unknown people), but in your case wouldn't it be just the manifestation of a strong desire and interest, rather than an habit?

That is what I thought at first, but I am almost 22 now and anytime I am in a dream I use those things at will. I don't really think about them too much anymore, but my dream self never got out of the habit, even though I don't have the intent.

Originally Posted by BrandonBoss

That is what I thought at first, but I am almost 22 now and anytime I am in a dream I use those things at will. I don't really think about them too much anymore, but my dream self never got out of the habit, even though I don't have the intent.

Brandon, I highly suspect your example is a special case. I have a very interesting observation, both from my own experience and others, about dreams within which we develop and use super powers. It appears that we often have super-powered dreams (flying, telekinesis, mind control... you name it) when we are approaching lucidity. That's right, those failed LD attempt often turn into super powers in dreams, and that even happens to people who have no clue or interests in this kind of things! One hypothesis is that when we gain more self-consciousness within a dream, we start to want certain things to happen. If in normal dreams we are rookie actors and actresses who simply carry out the director (unconscious)'s will, then in this case we become the more creative ones and start to improvise a bit on our own. The dream world in turn respond to our mental command, and that manifest into super powers.

As for carrying things into our dreams, I'm not ruling out everything. There are of course things that we can carry into our dreams, for example, those that cause strong impact, desires, anxieties, etc. However, they are not your regular "habits". And in fact, I believe their effectiveness diminishes once developed into habits. Now back to ADA. Trying to stay aware all the time is definitely not something that creates strong psychological impact. Even if it is, it differs from the the basic premise of ADA -- being highly aware of the surroundings can be trained into a "habit" and carried into dreams. LOL if that is true then a highly trained spy like Jason Bourn is most likely to have lucid dreams all the time, right?

I have nothing against ADA or similar type of techniques. People are free to choose whatever works best for them. However, I am a little disappointed by the fact that many people consider ADA the ultimate, almost holy grail like, technique, without ever questioning the theories behind it. I don't doubt ADA can supplement your LD techniques, but it doesn't seem to me all that effective by itself. Yet its theories tend to suggest otherwise, and people also like to interpret it that way. If ADA was to truly meet this claim, then the benchmark should look like this -- consistent lucidity every night within every dream (including NREM ones) without the aid of any other techniques. Unfortunately, I have not seen a single person who can claim this, not even highly skilled Tibetan dream yoga practitioners.

CosmicIron, I think you are probably overgeneralizing with your doubts about ADA. I agree with you that it's not "the only technique you will ever need," and this applies for most people, but it is certainly very helpful for many reasons:

People who develop a habit of permanent awareness (i.e. those who do so as a lifestyle unto itself, such as monks, meditation teachers, etc) do not "carry over" their habits into dreams. There is nothing to carry over, since there is an unbroken sequence of awareness from wake to deep sleep to REM sleep and back to wakefulness. Nsargadatta Maharaj often said that during the day he was aware of being awake, at night he was aware of being unconscious, and during dreams he was aware of being asleep and dreaming. Awareness is separate from consciousness, but that's a different topic for now...

What makes ADA seem to be ineffective is that in order for it to work the practitioner needs true earnestness to pursue it as a lifestyle. It is difficult to make "awareness" into your default state of being. I have been meditating for years and I can't maintain it for more than an hour at a time, hence I have almost no chance of remembering to be aware in the midst of a dream, where I am even more distracted than usual.

That said, practicing awareness does have supplementary effects that are very useful. The main one is that it improves your ability to sustain focused attention. When doing cycles you will find it easier to not drift away into daydreams immediately, and when you find yourself in the middle of a lucid dream you will find it easier to remember to stay lucid and not fall back into a "sleeping dream."

While other techniques, including SSILD, are probably way more effective in both the short and long term, ADA is worth practicing for anyone as long as they have realistic expectations. Just my two cents.

Originally Posted by bluremi

CosmicIron, I think you are probably overgeneralizing with your doubts about ADA. I agree with you that it's not "the only technique you will ever need," and this applies for most people, but it is certainly very helpful for many reasons:

People who develop a habit of permanent awareness (i.e. those who do so as a lifestyle unto itself, such as monks, meditation teachers, etc) do not "carry over" their habits into dreams. There is nothing to carry over, since there is an unbroken sequence of awareness from wake to deep sleep to REM sleep and back to wakefulness. Nsargadatta Maharaj often said that during the day he was aware of being awake, at night he was aware of being unconscious, and during dreams he was aware of being asleep and dreaming. Awareness is separate from consciousness, but that's a different topic for now...

What makes ADA seem to be ineffective is that in order for it to work the practitioner needs true earnestness to pursue it as a lifestyle. It is difficult to make "awareness" into your default state of being. I have been meditating for years and I can't maintain it for more than an hour at a time, hence I have almost no chance of remembering to be aware in the midst of a dream, where I am even more distracted than usual.

That said, practicing awareness does have supplementary effects that are very useful. The main one is that it improves your ability to sustain focused attention. When doing cycles you will find it easier to not drift away into daydreams immediately, and when you find yourself in the middle of a lucid dream you will find it easier to remember to stay lucid and not fall back into a "sleeping dream."

While other techniques, including SSILD, are probably way more effective in both the short and long term, ADA is worth practicing for anyone as long as they have realistic expectations. Just my two cents.

I agree with you on the "awareness needs not to be carried over" statement, and I admit ADA can have other benefits when practiced earnestly. My argument really was centered on its claim and people's unquestioned belief of its effectiveness as a lucid dream induction technique.

That said, I'd like to express my own opinion on the unbroken sequence of awareness theory. This kind of state is often mentioned in the context of Tibetan dream yoga, and is seen as one of the highest achievements. However, there are many different interpretations of this. One of which is what you mentioned, basically saying your awareness is never broken regardless being awake or asleep. Personally I think it is exaggerated though. In religions and occults people have that tendency to exaggerate things since there is often no way to prove them wrong. If you look at the dream yoga books, however, you will clearly see that they have many categorizations of dreams. And there are those which even the "masters" rely upon for inspirations and other purposes, and no, they are not aware of them being dreams while they are having them. I have met some of this world's highest ranking and most respected Tibetan buddhists, and they do not possess this kind of unbroken awareness. They have extremely high awareness for sure, but that does not extend automatically into their dreams -- bear in mind, dream yoga is only one of MANY practices in Tibetan buddhism. Same goes with the Taoists. While they claim even way more miraculous things, there is no denying that their most worshiped saints had dreams and no, they were not aware (e.g. the butterfly being me or me being the butterfly story by Chuang Tzu). We can also look at this from a more scientific angle. Our brain's functions rely on many different kinds of neurotransmitters. One of them is Acetylcholine which affects sensory perceptions and sustaining attentions. When we initially go to sleep the level of Acetylcholine drops to all-time low, and gradually rise as we gain more sleep. When we wake up in the morning and maintain wakefulness for a while (such as doing WBTB or SSILD), our body start releasing more of these in anticipation of increased awareness. At this point if we go back to sleep we have heightened awareness and often result in spontaneous LDs. Now assuming this "unbroken awareness" is achievable, it probably means an extremely high level of Acetylcholine in the system and gets maintained that way day and night. I dunno, is that even healthy? LOL.

There is another version of this though. It is a higher state of consciousness which can be achieved through practice, and invoked on demand. It is an entirely different state of consciousness from our typical ones, and the kind of awareness one gains through it is beyond words... you can call it unbroken, but it is also vast, thorough, infinite, and much more... It is anything but earthly, and is fundamentally different from our normal definition of "awareness". Now this, is what I believe to be the true goal of dream yoga, and I can attest it from personal experience.

I hope my criticism on ADA is not offending anyone. I always feel this is a fascinating subject and worth more in-depth study and research. What I have said are based on my rather un-scientific experience and observations so they probably don't have much value. This is why I'm conducting this survey on our forum. Hopefully by the end of it we will have some statistics to either back up or undermine my hypothesis. Either way I'm happy.

One of the things acetylcholine (ACh) does is to help the arousal of the body. Other is to enhance the sensory perceptions... If its levels really increase throughout sleep, than it is, as you said,a probable explanation of how SSILD could work. After the cycles, we probably estimulate even more AChto be produced and it could really be making lucidity easier.

However, I don't understand how meditation right before the cycles could be prejudicial. I mean, the cycles themselves are a sort of meditation. Besides that, meditation helps with awareness, what could increase ACh too, right? CosmicIron, do you have any idea why meditation has no impact - or even a negative impact - on SSILD?

I know that I, with all my lack of knowledge, am saying some bullshit and am also really lost here. However I believethat getting to the core of the technic, understanding the science behind it, is important and could help us to make it even more effective and adaptable for individual needs...

Originally Posted by lucsande

One of the things acetylcholine (ACh) does is to help the arousal of the body. Other is to enhance the sensory perceptions... If its levels really increase throughout sleep, than it is, as you said,a probable explanation of how SSILD could work. After the cycles, we probably estimulate even more AChto be produced and it could really be making lucidity easier.

However, I don't understand how meditation right before the cycles could be prejudicial. I mean, the cycles themselves are a sort of meditation. Besides that, meditation helps with awareness, what could increase ACh too, right? CosmicIron, do you have any idea why meditation has no impact - or even a negative impact - on SSILD?

I know that I, with all my lack of knowledge, am saying some bullshit and am also really lost here. However I believethat getting to the core of the technic, understanding the science behind it, is important and could help us to make it even more effective and adaptable for individual needs...

I noticed that some of the effects generated by SSILD felt very similar to the ones resulted from taking supplements such as Galantamine. This got me thinking, and after more experiments I formulated a hypothesis: By repeatedly stimulating the various senses, we create a need for the body to release more ACh. However, this is very subtle and does not have immediate effect, so there is going to be a slight delay before ACh level gets raised. Now we know if performed correctly, SSILD can help one to fall asleep pretty quickly, or in some case put us into a trance. This, combined with the latency of the rising ACh level, gives us the spontaneous LDs and OBEs after we fall asleep from SSILD. Of course, just the stimulation of the senses might not generate sufficient amount of ACh, this is why we also typically need WBTB.

I notice in the other post you mentioned that your SSILD exercise did not give you any result. I think this is due to insufficient stimulation. The trick with SSILD is really to find the perfect balance between enough stimulation and losing sleep. We want to stimulate the senses sufficiently while also maintain the trance so we can fall to sleep quickly. I hope this helps.

Edit: Oh, the meditation... Assuming meditation also generates ACh, then doing so will cause a sudden increase of it, which destroys the "latency" mechanism of SSILD. Also keep in mind that we normally do meditation before going to sleep. This is at a time when ACh level is at the lowest, thus it is counter productive. We need ACh level to be low so we can sleep quickly and get enough NREM sleep.

So I love SSILD. It has given me more lucids than any other technique (even a couple nREM lucids) but I have run into a few snags. I don't know if I am getting bored with it or what my deal is but the effectiveness seems to be wearing off. One potential problem may be that I have begun to devolve insomnia after any WBTB. Sometimes I use LDS that cause wakefulness, but even when I don't, I have issues getting back to sleep. That's a separate issue but it is hindering my focus on SSILD cycles. Could I be getting to used to WBTB?

Also, one thing that was great for SSILD was my almost immediate HI when falling asleep. That seems to be not as strong as it once was. I know its the action of each cycle not the effect but I think it causes me to lose interest rather quickly.

Any ideas?

For getting more stimulation, what could I do? Just try to wake up for longer amounts of, trying to move more around, get more light, more body sensations... Stuff like that. Or are there other suggestions?
One more thing: when you wake up, doyou stay awake for a predetermined amount of time, or by now you already have developed a feel for when drowziness and alertness are most efficiently balanced for getting back to bed?

Besides, you have any information about wether meditation does increase ACh? Because, just like with the cycles, meditation usually gets me relaxed and drowsy instead of wide awake. Could it be that both meditation and the cycles stimulations have a couple of minutes of lag?

Originally Posted by Xanous

So I love SSILD. It has given me more lucids than any other technique (even a couple nREM lucids) but I have run into a few snags. I don't know if I am getting bored with it or what my deal is but the effectiveness seems to be wearing off. One potential problem may be that I have begun to devolve insomnia after any WBTB. Sometimes I use LDS that cause wakefulness, but even when I don't, I have issues getting back to sleep. That's a separate issue but it is hindering my focus on SSILD cycles. Could I be getting to used to WBTB?

Also, one thing that was great for SSILD was my almost immediate HI when falling asleep. That seems to be not as strong as it once was. I know its the action of each cycle not the effect but I think it causes me to lose interest rather quickly.

Any ideas?

I have had similars feelings myself so I can easily relate to what you are saying. This is what I do:

1. Take a break from SSILD and LD in general. Use the next few days to improve dream recall instead -- record dreams upon each awakening, for example. In the event I feel fully rested and would like to try some LD, I usually use visualizations.

2. Take some supplements. My typical ones are Melatonin 1-2 hours prior to sleep, and Galantamine+Choline Bitartrate after 4-5 hours of sleep. After taking the later combo I immediately return to bed to work on a few focused SSILD cycles and fall asleep as quickly as possible afterward. This usually results in spontaneous OBE and last a long time. Doing this will make you feel motivated and in turn help make SSILD more effective later on.

3. I also alter between two different SSILD styles throughout the week:

Style 1: Long WBTB + focused SSILD + hell with insomnia attitude
Style 2: No WBTB + multiple sessions of quick and relaxed SSILDs performed upon each awakening.

Style 2 can fix the insomnia problem for you.

Hope this helps.

Originally Posted by lucsande

For getting more stimulation, what could I do? Just try to wake up for longer amounts of, trying to move more around, get more light, more body sensations... Stuff like that. Or are there other suggestions?
One more thing: when you wake up, doyou stay awake for a predetermined amount of time, or by now you already have developed a feel for when drowziness and alertness are most efficiently balanced for getting back to bed?

Besides, you have any information about wether meditation does increase ACh? Because, just like with the cycles, meditation usually gets me relaxed and drowsy instead of wide awake. Could it be that both meditation and the cycles stimulations have a couple of minutes of lag?

I guess what you suggested for getting more stimulations could work, except perhaps they will wake you up completely, LOL. Personally the more effective ones are:

1. Staying awake a little longer, say, 10 minutes.
2. Stay focused during the slow cycles of SSILD. I know, generally we advise people to lose focus and get immersed in random thoughts, but that is to help enter the trance state more easily and avoid losing sleep. Once you get the hung of it you can try to raise the focus level a bit so you get sufficient stimulation at the same time.

I don't really follow a precise schedule. Sometimes I feel lazy and I hardly get up at all, and sometimes I get distracted and can stay on my iPad for an hour or even more. When I find it hard to fall asleep I usually force a phase entry by shifting the "focus point", which usually allows me to enter a dream state immediately.

As for meditation... You do know that proper meditation is not supposed to make you feel drowsy right? It's supposed to put you into a calm yet fully conscious state. Unfortunately, falling asleep while meditating is probably what pretty much everyone does, LOL. God knows what neurotransmitters get released while we are doing that!