How can I know which technique to pick?

Hello everyone! I have been practicing lucid dreaming for two weeks or so.
I write my dreams down every morning. And I do RCs often... Also, I am meditating every evening.
I am working on my self awareness also.

But my question here is, how can I know which technique to pick?
I know, you may say : "Trial and error" but that is kind of waste of time...
I have tried some techniques but I am not sure I liked them.
Is there some quiz or questions that could determinate the technique suitable for me? :)

Thanks :)

Which techniques have you tried and why you didn't like them?

2 main techniques are WILD and DILD. They can both be aimed for together. WILD at nap time, or middle of the night with WBTB. DILDs when going to sleep normally.

They both require daytime practice. But the good news is, that practicing for DILDs helps with both DILDs and WILDs, and vice versa.

Also, read up on DEILDs in case you find yourself in right conditions to do a DEILD.

Happy dreams

You might try starting with MILD, which is a technique that covers most of the bases for both WILD's and DILD's. As Gab already sort of said, after you are comfortable with your MILD skills, choosing to attempt a WILD or DILD are more a matter of timing than technique: for instance, if you can't practically do a WBTB for WILD, you can always try for a DILD.

Oh, and welcome to Dreamviews!

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Originally Posted by gab

Which techniques have you tried and why you didn't like them?
2 main techniques are WILD and DILD. They can both be aimed for together. WILD at nap time, or middle of the night with WBTB. DILDs when going to sleep normally.

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I have tried WILD and FILD, WBTB

I know that I have to fully immerse myself into one technique for at least a month before I know if it works for me or not.
But when I tried WILD, I just ended up lying there for hours with no results(I am not ready for it yet :P)
Both FILD and WILD messed up my dreams(When waking up, I didn't remember any of my dreams, just some little fragments)
WBTB was kind of good except that I couldn't fall asleep when doing it :D

Now, I am doing that DEILD with alarm clock(Because I don't wake up during nights, maybe once a year). If it doesn't work, I try WBTB...
And yesterday I had a simulated LD that way...

About that napping... I have tried but I cannot fall asleep during the day. I don't know why. Maybe I just have to wake up earlier :D

Thank you for your answer though!

Yeah, I am doing MILD when going to sleep(in the evening and when doing WBTB)...
But it doesn't work for me yet :(

Thanks :)

^^ Give it a chance. Two weeks is not a very long time to be practicing this stuff. Also, much of MILD is done during the day; it would probably be a good idea to include daywork in your schedule.

I have tried SSILD and to my surprise it worked on the very first night. And it's really easy to do aswell.

Hey, I tried it a few nights ago too and it worked on my first try :D
BUT, now it does not work :(
What has happened?

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Originally Posted by Reinards

Hey, I tried it a few nights ago too and it worked on my first try :D
BUT, now it does not work :(
What has happened?

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Hmm.. not sure. Did anything go differently from the first time you did it? Maybe you were too tired and fell asleep too fast or too late because you were too awake? Or maybe you didn't do the technique properly this time?
Or maybe you did your WBTB at a not-so-optimal part in your sleep cycle this time?

EDIT: forgot an important one; maybe it DID work and you had a false awakening, but you just didn't realize it?

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Originally Posted by Reinards

Hey, I tried it a few nights ago too and it worked on my first try :D
BUT, now it does not work :(
What has happened?

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Probably nothing.

This seems to happen quite often to people, which is why I tend to suggest that success after the second and third attempts is the time to decide you may have gotten the technique right.

First attempts can go well for a variety of reasons, from heightened expectation to the placebo effect (in other words, it was going to work no matter what you did); so don't be too disappointed if your second attempt didn't go well. Keep your hopes up for the third...or the fourth.

Thank you guys! :D

I got it working tonight also.
I think that this has something to do with the way I woke up.
Tonight I woke up naturally and did it.
So maybe that is the problem...

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Originally Posted by Sageous

Probably nothing.

This seems to happen quite often to people, which is why I tend to suggest that success after the second and third attempts is the time to decide you may have gotten the technique right.

First attempts can go well for a variety of reasons, from heightened expectation to the placebo effect (in other words, it was going to work no matter what you did); so don't be too disappointed if your second attempt didn't go well. Keep your hopes up for the third...or the fourth.

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I have two questions for you tho.

====FIRST====

All lucid dreams(WILD ones and SSILD ones) I have had happened in the morning(6am or so)
BUT I always wake up from the dreams several minutes before 7am.
No one wakes me up, disturbs me nor I have to go to school(still holidays). I just want my dreams to last longer than 5 minutes.
HOW?

====SECOND====
How can I wake up naturally more often?
I only know that water trick(haven't tried because I am usually not thirsty)
And mantra way(does not work for me)

I'm not Sageous, but I'm going to try to answer as best as I can.

====FIRST====

Maybe your dream was not stable enough causing you to wake up prematurely? You could try stabilizing the dream by either rubbing your hands together or spinning around.
Also try to engage all of your senses in the dream. Smell the air. Feel the ground under your feet. Try to notice the details... stuff like that.

It could also be that your WBTB was improperly timed and you woke up at a sub-optimal time within the sleep cycle. (note: this graph is just an example, everyone's sleep cycle looks a bit different)
Try timing your WBTB a bit earlier, or perhaps even a bit later in order to catch the following REM-cycle. You'll have to experiment a bit and see what works best for you.

You could also make use of a supplement called melatonin. It suppresses REM in the earlier stages of the sleep cycle which causes a rebound effect in the later stages of the sleep cycle.

If you do wake up however, you could try to remain completely motionless and visualize the place that you just woke up from. Either you'll bounce right back into the dreamscape, or you'll have a WILD.

====SECOND====

Try to use mantras, but also set your alarm clock!! Make use of both at the same time.
It might not work immediately, but after a couple of days your body should adjust and start waking itself up naturally before your alarm goes off.
When this happens, I would keep setting the alarm as a backup so your body knows that it's going to wake up no matter what and that it's best to do so naturally. You can always turn the alarm off again each time you naturally wake up.

Those were my 2 cents. Good luck! :goodjob2:

Thanks :D
It couldn't be timed wrong because:
1st - I didn't use WBTB
2nd - I woke up after a dream :|

^^ Maybe the first step here is to suggest to yourself that it could be possible that you timed it wrong, Reinards. Allowing yourself to question whether you may have missed a bit on the timing might reveal changes that need to be made, while assuring yourself that you couldn't have timed it wrong allows you to ignore possible fixes. Something to think about, I think.

For instance, in this case you did not use a WBTB. WBTB is by far the most important technique for successful WILD's, and not doing one does suggest that you may have gotten something wrong with timing. Why? Well, one of the main reasons for using WBTB is that it is an instrument for aligning your timing for your WILD dive. This is because you tend to wake up immediately after every REM period, and that wake-up is followed by a period of NREM. So, if you attempt a WILD immediately upon waking, you very likely will need to negotiate a period of NREM before your next REM period begins, which can be difficult. WBTB, when done properly, allows you to bridge this NREM gap to land your WILD attempt within a REM period, with no wait.

Also, as I think I already said, attempting a WILD right after waking up from a dream is actually not a sign of timing it right, but just the opposite. You really need to have that WBTB pause (minimum 15 minutes, max 1hour, generally, if done after 5 hrs' sleep) both for the reason listed above, and also to gather some waking-life self-awareness, so you are properly prepared to WILD. Trying a WILD immediately upon waking tends to have one of two effects: either you simply go right back to normal sleep, because you were never quite awake enough for a WILD dive, or you will have a successful WILD, but will emerge into NREM, which, with its lack of dream imagery, might be very difficult to lucidly navigate (However: Later, however, when you have a better handle on the WILD process, you might find NREM lucidity very interesting; I do).

So there may have been things you did wrong regarding timing. I hope you might consider this, and, more importantly, that you allow yourself a chance to question whether you did something wrong.

[As an aside, this all goes for SSILD attempts as well, because SSILD is actually a WILD technique.]

Thanks! I really appreciate your help :)

So, if I understand correctly, I should sleep for 5 hours or so, then do something(probably meditation) for 15 minutes and then go for my WILD or SSILD?

To add to what Sageous said, it specifically mentions this in the SSILD FAQ:

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Q: Can I do SSILD when I go to sleep?

A: Yes you can, but it won't work. When you go to bed you typically start with a lot of NREM sleeps which are not ideal for lucid dream to occur. The level of acetylcholine (an important neurotransmitter which is a major driving force for lucid dreams) is also at lower level. Trying to lucid dream with any technique at this stage is a waste of time, even though this is the favorite mistake virtually every beginners make.

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Also you shouldn't do any meditation for SSILD:

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1. Go to bed early, preferably before 11pm. Set your alarm to wake up after 4 or 5 hours.

2. Get out of bed and stay awake for 5-10 minutes. I suggest you visit the bathroom, rinse your mouth, and walk around or stretch a little bit. Try not to become too awake though.

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Q: Can I combine other breathing, meditation, relaxation techniques during or prior to doing SSILD?

A: No. As mentioned earlier, SSILD is all about "conditioning". You condition your mind and body to the most optimal state for lucid dream to occur. This state, however, is very delicate. Mixing in other techniques will likely interfere with this state and cause negative impact on SSLID's performance. You're free to create your own routines once you master the technique, but for beginners I expect you to adhere to the instructions in this manual.

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I highly suggest you thoroughly re-read the updated SSILD tutorial: Senses Initiated Lucid Dream (SSILD) Official Tutorial

Okay!

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Originally Posted by Reinards

So, if I understand correctly, I should sleep for 5 hours or so, then do something(probably meditation) for 15 minutes and then go for my WILD or SSILD?

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That would be a start. You might find out later that more or less than 5 hours' sleep and more than 15 minutes of WBTB is better in terms of timing, or that simply relaxing and thinking about your upcoming adventures in dreamland is enough to keep your mind in a "dreamy" state during your WBTB. Or not. All it will take is some experimentation to find what works best for you. What you should not do during WBTB, though, is watch TV, use your phone or computer, have involved conversations, or anything else that might wake you up too much.

Yea...
Tonight I failed or canceled my attempt...
When I woke up, I went to toilet, rinsed my mouth went to bed and it was veeery difficult to concentrate on senses.. Once I started focusing on my vision, i found out thinking about motorbikes seconds or minutes later :D So I thought I will try tomorrow in different time :)