ADA versus Illusory Body versus Feasibility help

Hi guys. I realize these two practices are similar in that they are both daytime mindsets which can be extremely effective in cultivating awareness in dream. Is there anyone here who has developed ubiquitous dream awareness due to either of these practices? I have heard from some that they are the Holy Grail of lucid dreaming; I've heard from others that they are an effective waste of time. The detractors claim their ineffectiveness is due to a different part of the brain becoming active during sleep which doesn't necessarily carry over specific memories which are governed by another section of the brain while it's awake. Hence why we're not always checking our cell phones in our dreams, etc. I do find this curious.

Without WBTB, DILDs for me have always seemed completely arbitrary, regardless of how rigorous my pre-sleep intentions or daytime mindful & illusory efforts are. I do, however, frequently dream with vivid non-lucidity of specific objects and disjointed thoughts which were encountered earlier that day. So I realize there IS a carryover of memory, but it is one of such seeming randomness that it escapes all efforts of governing or control without a WBTB preamble. What makes it even more curious is that these objects and thoughts are often encapsulated within the very illusory mindset I am trying to appropriate as a carry-over itself. So in essence, the contents of the letter but not the envelope itself, are being delivered. And so again, the dismaying thought arises: "Why the hell don't I ever look at my phone in a dream?"

I am trying to get away from the WBTB, MILD stuff. It worked great for me years ago and gave me plenty of lucid dreams, but now I'm having trouble with insomnia and getting back to sleep. I'd love more than anything to develop a DILD-producing default sense of dream awareness, if such a thing is indeed attainable. Otherwise, why waste my time chasing the fabled pot of gold? If someone has found it -- if even a coffer of silver on route to the motherload -- it would be of infinite encouragement to me. I can achieve anything to which I put my mind if is literally achievable. But fairytales are where I draw the line. Can WBTB-less general dream awareness be developed without becoming a full-blown Tibetan lama? Thanks for reading guys! Peace out.

Hey, I'm already excited about this thread :)

My philosophy about awareness is that under healthy and normal circumstances, we are always conscious all day and during our dreams: we are taking in sensations and are involved in some cognition, if sometimes more passive.

About ADA
Aiming for just "lucid dreams" discredits the awareness present in "non lucid dreams." The philosophy of ADA even maybe overshadows the importance of filtering. ADA philosophy implies we are missing out on a lot of stimulus and urges us to notice all the filtered out sensory information... Well, the process of filtering is important. At every instant, we receive enormous amounts of unnecessary information and our brain is designed in a way that hopefully helps us hone in on the important or relevant information. During my master's, mice that were less good at filtering sensory information were indicative of symptoms relevant to the study of schizophrenia or autism. My point is that perfect all day awareness of everything is not a desirable goal. Now, when someone practices ADA with more reasonable goals, it may be a nice experience and beneficial.

But, I do wonder, how much does focusing on filtered out sensory information help during dreams... since the information is simulated. I guess, you are more likely to notice the details are off... But honestly, the big picture is off too!

I think what's interesting about ADA, is the -effort- you are making to be "aware." The will, the intent. Yet, I feel sadness for the ignored ever present awareness we all have as conscious beings. Let's say I'm cooking... in waking life OR in a dream, regardless... if I am focused on the cooking, and not on some meta-awareness, focused on irrelevant information, or focused on the awareness of my awareness of this information, filtered out and not... I am still conscious.

With lucid dreams, I think we are confused. What is it do we want? Meta-awareness in the dream? Sharp senses? A sense of clarity, wakefulness? The other day, I reread my DJ entries during my participation in Spellbee's competitions. I found I discredited the majority of events in which I identified my experience as a dream experience because my cognition was so drowsy... (because, you guessed it, I was sleeping). I always marked a dream as lucid, when I felt more awake within the dream (and also identified the dream as a dream, which I can do even when far from "mindful"). Yet, I could never expect to always feel refreshingly awake in dreams (because I am sleeping!) Being able to identify the dream as a dream is second nature however. And it's not thanks to ADA. It's thanks to basal awareness.

About Illusory Body
About the philosophy of identifying waking experience as an illusion similar to dreaming... I don't deny the appeal of it. Yet, I'm intrigued by the... dishonesty? You can't genuinely equate waking and dream experience in order to, in the dream, being able to distinguish waking and dream experience.

Waking experience and dream experience, though maybe both illusory, are not equal illusions. This difference must be important when lucid dreaming.

Conclusion
So, these are my perceived flaws of these techniques... and I do not encourage a "ubiquitous dream awareness" similar to ADA or illusory body. Holding a ubiquitous mindset in focus is unnatural. We already have ubiquitous awareness, in dreams included, and I encourage embracing that this awareness focuses on different things, is involved in different cognition, sometimes passive. This basal awareness is sufficient to unmindfully identify the experience as a dream. Conversely, ubiquitous sharp mind through all of sleep seems delusional. It's more natural for there to be shifts and variability in cognition during sleep because of the sleep cycle which affects wakefulness and cognition.

Heightened wakefulness is more likely closer to waking or at certain moments in the sleep cycle as taken advantage of in WBTB. But other than that natural wakefulness, I notice for myself that aimlessness, danger, and oddness often improve my cognition. I think the similarity is that they drive me to think harder, to try to rise my cognition. So I'm thinking of how to integrate this... maybe insert a question into the dream (rather than a statement like "I am dreaming" which does not rise cognition but... maybe even turns it off: "The puzzle is solved")

About your fabled pot of gold... it's right there in your lap. Between your ubiquitous basal awareness and your ability to carry-over images and thoughts and such in the dreams, that does it. Let go and enjoy dreaming. Dreams are not a fantasy escape world. You will not suddenly wake in a stable mindful fantasy. It's dreams. It's REM cycle. It's many things. And you're living it.

Some people, notably Hukif, claim to have achieved ultra-frequent lucidity on the basis of daytime practices- if you don't know it yet here's the link

I found that I don't need to do all kinds of RC's during the day to have a LD, in fact I never had a LD which start with me doing a RC. Due to my early OBE journey's I developed a special mindset, if I see something weird, even if it is very insignificant, I just say "wtf, this is so strange, am I in the right place" and look around to check my surroundings, because I occasionally found myself in another world's, because of this I started to have spontaneous LD's for the first time consciously. I'm not doing it anymore, but if I can keep a week or so this practice, I'm starting to have spontaneous LD's again.

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Originally Posted by Occipitalred

Hey, I'm already excited about this thread :)

My philosophy about awareness is that under healthy and normal circumstances, we are always conscious all day and during our dreams: we are taking in sensations and are involved in some cognition, if sometimes more passive.

About ADA
Aiming for just "lucid dreams" discredits the awareness present in "non lucid dreams." The philosophy of ADA even maybe overshadows the importance of filtering. ADA philosophy implies we are missing out on a lot of stimulus and urges us to notice all the filtered out sensory information... Well, the process of filtering is important. At every instant, we receive enormous amounts of unnecessary information and our brain is designed in a way that hopefully helps us hone in on the important or relevant information. During my master's, mice that were less good at filtering sensory information were indicative of symptoms relevant to the study of schizophrenia or autism. My point is that perfect all day awareness of everything is not a desirable goal. Now, when someone practices ADA with more reasonable goals, it may be a nice experience and beneficial.

But, I do wonder, how much does focusing on filtered out sensory information help during dreams... since the information is simulated. I guess, you are more likely to notice the details are off... But honestly, the big picture is off too!

I think what's interesting about ADA, is the -effort- you are making to be "aware." The will, the intent. Yet, I feel sadness for the ignored ever present awareness we all have as conscious beings. Let's say I'm cooking... in waking life OR in a dream, regardless... if I am focused on the cooking, and not on some meta-awareness, focused on irrelevant information, or focused on the awareness of my awareness of this information, filtered out and not... I am still conscious.

With lucid dreams, I think we are confused. What is it do we want? Meta-awareness in the dream? Sharp senses? A sense of clarity, wakefulness? The other day, I reread my DJ entries during my participation in Spellbee's competitions. I found I discredited the majority of events in which I identified my experience as a dream experience because my cognition was so drowsy... (because, you guessed it, I was sleeping). I always marked a dream as lucid, when I felt more awake within the dream (and also identified the dream as a dream, which I can do even when far from "mindful"). Yet, I could never expect to always feel refreshingly awake in dreams (because I am sleeping!) Being able to identify the dream as a dream is second nature however. And it's not thanks to ADA. It's thanks to basal awareness.

About Illusory Body
About the philosophy of identifying waking experience as an illusion similar to dreaming... I don't deny the appeal of it. Yet, I'm intrigued by the... dishonesty? You can't genuinely equate waking and dream experience in order to, in the dream, being able to distinguish waking and dream experience.

Waking experience and dream experience, though maybe both illusory, are not equal illusions. This difference must be important when lucid dreaming.

Conclusion
So, these are my perceived flaws of these techniques... and I do not encourage a "ubiquitous dream awareness" similar to ADA or illusory body. Holding a ubiquitous mindset in focus is unnatural. We already have ubiquitous awareness, in dreams included, and I encourage embracing that this awareness focuses on different things, is involved in different cognition, sometimes passive. This basal awareness is sufficient to unmindfully identify the experience as a dream. Conversely, ubiquitous sharp mind through all of sleep seems delusional. It's more natural for there to be shifts and variability in cognition during sleep because of the sleep cycle which affects wakefulness and cognition.

Heightened wakefulness is more likely closer to waking or at certain moments in the sleep cycle as taken advantage of in WBTB. But other than that natural wakefulness, I notice for myself that aimlessness, danger, and oddness often improve my cognition. I think the similarity is that they drive me to think harder, to try to rise my cognition. So I'm thinking of how to integrate this... maybe insert a question into the dream (rather than a statement like "I am dreaming" which does not rise cognition but... maybe even turns it off: "The puzzle is solved")

About your fabled pot of gold... it's right there in your lap. Between your ubiquitous basal awareness and your ability to carry-over images and thoughts and such in the dreams, that does it. Let go and enjoy dreaming. Dreams are not a fantasy escape world. You will not suddenly wake in a stable mindful fantasy. It's dreams. It's REM cycle. It's many things. And you're living it.

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Very good thoughts, and meat for meditation. I guess the term "ubiquitous awareness" I used was somewhat inaccurate, as you are correct: we already have it whether in LD or NLD scenario. What I mean to say I guess is just a general pervasiveness of the "Hey, this is a dream!" moment even if the revelation doesn't occur immediately upon dream onset. I am fascinated in particular with the genesis of the "aha!" moment. I keep thinking of past DILDs where the spurring of lucidity came without any premeditated determination or set intention on my part. Where lucidity just seemed to arrive like thunderclasps out of clear a blue sky. The techniques which purport to generate these "aha" clasps all seem steeped in some form of either self-awareness, object-awareness (ideally a hybrid of both) or illusory fantasy. Which would make sense, if not for fact that apparently not every thing we do with habitual regularity carries over to the other side. Things I do daily like bathe, brush my teeth, check my phone or open my refrigerator do not transfer over to non-lucid recall. Maybe they do, but if they do I'm not recalling them. So that is a bit of a concern to me. I have these Tibetan bracelets I wear that I'm trying to anchor to illusory body/mindfulness thought patterns. Meaning I see the bracelet, I remind myself to "awaken" within the daytime dream as though it were the "aha" moment in a nighttime dream. My NLD recall has really amped up as a result. But last night I saw my bracelet in an NLD and it remained just that -- a bracelet. Even though I specifically assigned a lucidity anchor to it. I still celebrate! I saw the damn thing in a dream, after all! Half the battle already won. Now get the anchor to hold and we'll be in business.

Well, Astronomy, you were clear. I just like to be stubborn :)
It's dishonest for me to pretend I don't get what you are saying... but I do like to pick at this. When you have your 'aha' moment and 'wake up' from the 'dream' (the waking life one), what defines that moment? How is that moment more "awake" than the instant before? Is it:
1. Your ability to identify your waking experience as illusory? (Isn't that kind of similar to your ability to identify you are home, or you are in 2020... sidenote: doing that in an actual dream is worth congratulations).
2. A sense of being in a different state of mind? (If so, in which other ways can you feel in this state of mind. I'd argue it feels much like doing any sort of meta-awareness cognition).
I guess I always sort of subconsciously associated lucid dreaming with meta-awareness, now that I'm thinking of it...
Also, when talking about a -Reality check,- I do like to think of it as a moment to consider what is -real- and what's -illusory-... what do you know and to what extent? How is it limited... I encourage doing a Reality/Illusory (same thing) Check preferably during salient moments over monotonous moments.
Anyway, sorry about this tangent.

To talk more directly about your topic... I encourage you to look at your dream behaviour. (By this, I mean, how do your dreams/simulations behave normally, how are they structured, how do they flow, what are the contents?) Personally, my dreams do not include many very irrelevant autonomous habits such as checking my phone for notifications or scratching an itch. Maybe because dream content is generally more relevant? That's the fun part, study your dream journal. Analyze.

Personally, the most monotonous recurring dream content for me is transit. Busing from a place to another. So if I were doing your technique, I'd incorporate it to taking the bus. If you don't ever dream about showering... maybe let that go for now. Congratulations on seeing your bracelet! You can be proud! I do wonder, how often in your dreams are you aware of your clothes? (for me it's never.) Did you see your bracelet this time because it's a new thing and you are frequently checking it now? Will it manifest more in your dreams as the novelty of the bracelet and the technique ebb away? Despite these questions, I do like this technique of yours and hope you keep doing it. I just encourage you to pair it with things that naturally commonly occur in your dreams. People. Places. Things. Situations.

I wrote a bit above about my study of the induction of the 'aha' moment in my comment above (aha moment being different from non-aha lucidity). To reiterate, for me, it either comes
1. Randomly (probably because I am naturally waking) much like you I assume.
2. Amidst aimlessness (the dream is directionless and I start wondering, what am I doing? what's going on? where am I going? where am I?); whilst I spot something odd and start questioning; whilst I am responding to danger.
In the scenarios for (2), the link I am making is that I am asking questions. Asking questions calls for higher cognition. Maybe, I'm thinking, the effort raises my cognition. It happens naturally.

That's why going back to your technique, (and to ADA and illusory body)... I said, I would assign it to the bus. I don't know why I dream about buses... but it's surely not because of "illusory body." so if I associate with "I am dreaming", it might not carry over... It's for me to question and figure out why am I dreaming about this? Is it because I often feel stress before taking the bus "will I make it in time?" Makes sense. I often also have this stress in real life and in the dream. Seems relevant. So instead of starting to do ADA while I get in the bus, and suddenly listen to my heartbeat and the person coughing in the back, I personally want to try asking myself relevant questions that heighten my cognition. Like... uhm... "What is time?" Because it relates to my stress (time restraint) and a higher cognitive task (with no real answer).

To close, I was going to apologize for writing so much, but this helped clarify some of my journaling analysis. I'm looking forward to try the -bus, time question- strategy (and with my other salient events) like for self-awareness "Who am I?" or better "Who are we?".

Occipitalred if you don't mind me asking, how often are lucid, say in a monthly average, and through which sort of induction do they come?

I am interested in you elaborating more on your strategy and sharing the results. You have buses for dreamsigns; I have certain geographical locations -- and funeral homes lol. Last night I had an extremely vivid NLD which featured a known DS: my old house in San Marcos. It has been an established DS now since 2017, when I started journaling. It's rare for a DS to trigger lucidity for me; apart from waking analysis and identification IRL, my confirmed dreamsigns are not yet sufficiently anchored...at least that is what I suspect. I'm not quite sure how to anchor them. I know what they are, and I know they exist. They're all throughout my journal. It's uncanny. I just haven't figured out yet how to appropriate them in conscious dream. I've had some success in fixating objects with anchors, but with immaterial thoughts not so much. Especially if it's a location, like a specific country or a cemetery.

Funeral homes, cemeteries...? Are you a mortician? haha (I do love walking in cemeteries in any case.)

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

Occipitalred if you don't mind me asking, how often are lucid, say in a monthly average, and through which sort of induction do they come?

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I don't mind your asking. Recently, how many times I know I'm dreaming in a month? Let's say 10? I do think that during dreams I remember, the knowledge that I am dreaming is readily accessible. Dreams in which I know I am dreaming AND feel awake, clear, lucid... 3. Dreams in which I have clear waking life memory. None. I also interpret my lucid moments as being very short: ~1 min. For techniques, I don't recall success with WILD. I DILD. I don't set intentions to lucid dream, but I do set goals. I don't RC. I journal and maintain a relationship with my dreams.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

You have buses for dreamsigns; I have certain geographical locations -- and funeral homes lol. Last night I had an extremely vivid NLD which featured a known DS: my old house in San Marcos. It has been an established DS now since 2017, when I started journaling. It's rare for a DS to trigger lucidity for me; apart from waking analysis and identification IRL, my confirmed dreamsigns are not yet sufficiently anchored...at least that is what I suspect. I'm not quite sure how to anchor them. I know what they are, and I know they exist. They're all throughout my journal. It's uncanny. I just haven't figured out yet how to appropriate them in conscious dream. I've had some success in fixating objects with anchors, but with immaterial thoughts not so much. Especially if it's a location, like a specific country or a cemetery.

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What's an example of when you anchored an object to a dream sign? I'm interested.

My worry is that using dream signs, you limit your 'lucidity' to a fraction of the dreams where they manifest, which is fine really. But you seem to seek a way to reliably be lucid every night. I guess, it might be because I have failed at this goal myself, that I have decided to shift my expectations. But I do doubt the feasibility of ubiquitous clearness of the sleeping mind.

What I noticed instead, is that the reason I loved dreams was not dependent on that goal. I like dream study. For example, the other day, I tallied my responses to perceived danger. I noticed I fight only in imminent danger, flee as soon as possible, and prefer hiding somewhere safe by far. This information is quite relevant to me: I have been playing it safe in real life, and part of me knows it's time to leave that comfort zone. This is something I must do in real life. It barely matters that I get 'lucid' so I can be a fighter in the dream. But it'll be interesting to see how I change. And interestingly, in my last lucid dream, I was guided by the dream to war. It was very thematically satisfying. This is how I measure my success, more than LD frequency. That's kind of what I advocate for now.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

I am interested in you elaborating more on your strategy and sharing the results.

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'ADA', 'illusory body,' and traditional LD practice is what I used to do, until I just didn't have the discipline to keep it up. My strategy nowadays is just to study my dreams. Notice trends. Decide if I want to play with anything. For example: If there is danger, instead of hiding, confront it (both in real life and in dreams). Anyway, isn't this -self-awareness-? If in a dream, not only am I aware that I am dreaming, but I am also aware that I am avoiding healthy confrontation and I am partaking in a trend of excessively seeking safety... then, how about that for self-awareness. That's what I seek. (compare this to knowing you are dreaming and using basic dream control to indulge in the pattern of avoidance behavior).

You're interested in the 'aha' moment. But what is the 'aha' moment, cognitively speaking. Is it the same as -lucidity-?

Are we seeking a transient 'aha' moment? I guess, I would consider an 'aha' moment to be a -metacognition- ('awareness and understanding of one's own thought processes,' in this case, being aware and understanding specifically that you are presently dreaming). Meanwhile, what is lucidity? I would say it's the access to many different cognitive functions that are generally inhibited during sleep. Which cognitive functions are inhibited during sleep? Maybe all, I guess?

In terms of executive functions, here's a list from Wikipedia:
- Attentional control (funny story, I once thanked a psychiatrist for his attentional control at the end of a presentation and though he laughed, he said it wasn't a thing... what an embarrassing moment, oh well, it's on Wikipedia, damn it!)
- Cognitive inhibition Attentional control and cognitive inhibition, isn't that what you train with ADA or concentration/attentional meditation?
- Inhibitory control I'd say this might be irrelevant because you don't act anything out in dreams, am I wrong?
- Working memory Think, remembering goals in dreams, remembering dreams, remembering anything about waking life in dreams. (I find this so difficult to do)
- Cognitive flexibility Maybe this involves metacognition like the aha moment? And self-awareness which is another metacognition...
- Planning
- Fluid intelligence (reasoning, problem solving)

My questions are not rhetorical, I am wondering about this. But it's complex. This is why I'm curious about ADA, is training attentional control enough? Or why is it valued above the other cognitive functions? Isn't practicing ADA comparable to someone practicing All Day Problem Solving so that while dreaming, they can easily access their reasoning skills, because that's what they do all day? Then they can have lucid dreams characterized by clear reasoning skills while all the ADA people have their lucid dreams characterized by enhanced attention and concentration? And/or, maybe, is it that practicing any of these in a dream helpful to access any of the others, because maybe they all wake up together somewhat? I guess, personally, I've been focused self-awareness/understanding. But, I guess, there is no need to do an All-Day of anything as long as you are using your mind in some way all day.

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Funeral homes, cemeteries...? Are you a mortician? haha (I do love walking in cemeteries in any case.)

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LOL Yes, former mortician, as a matter of fact. I spent 10 years working as a night embalmer and funeral director. I vividly dream of funeral homes and embalming without fail on a weekly basis even though I've been out of the profession now going on 8 years.

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What's an example of when you anchored an object to a dream sign? I'm interested.

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I've been able to link my hands, which was inspired from Carlos Castaneda's Journey to Ixlan book. I even went so far as to create a visionboard with a several images of two hands being held out, cupped, palms up, surrounding the mantra "When I am dreaming, I am aware that I am dreaming." It worked fabulously about three years ago, when I was averaging 2-3 full-blown lucid dreams per week regularly. The LD's I would get from this anchoring method had lengthy durations, full of adventure, and were very stable, due in part from the hand focusing which also doubled as a stabilizing agent in addition to a lucidity inducer. This was all about three years ago, when I was also WILDing and FILDing. Then I started a car dealership with a business partner and the stress of it all but destroyed by lucid dreaming practice. I foolishly thought it would all come back whenever I decided to get back into it. Boy was I wrong! I've had a few LD's since Decemeber 2019, and one OBE-type projection in February of this year...but nothing like before.

Back in 2017 when I was in the beginning stages of the new business (before I stopped completely due to stress) I started getting into dream yoga and cultivating the whole awareness/mindfulness regime. I didn't notice any difference, but in all fairness I hadn't been doing it long. I'd notice instead on the nights I did get lucid mid-dream, it was due to the sudden "aha!" moment, which I so sought to define and capture the essence of once I awakened. I'm very scientific by nature and analytical and one of my passions in life is getting down to and discovering the etiology of things I'm passionate about. So, obviously, the seemingly unprovoked moment which was spurring lucidity in my dreams was becoming of great interest. That moment where you suddenly "feel" this all just might be a dream. And then you look at your hands (already knowing you've crossed over) and see the mutation, the aberration in your fingers and it's confirmed.

I also stopped dream journaling. I've since picked up where I left off and have already filled a new book since December of 2019; the same dreamsigns from three years are omnipresent today: funeral homes, Russia, elevators, a turbulent seashore, old, abandoned Victorian style homes in the country, austere mausoleums and crypts in various cemeteries. I love my dreams, and value them greatly. I celebrate them and express gratitude to my subconscious in manufacturing them. But I would be amiss if I didn't say underlaying it all is a terrific longing, a yearning for lucidity in the midst of them. I've since become very interested in Dzogchen and other aspects of dream yoga and would like to delve in to the deeper dimensions of self-exploration via the portal of dream self-awareness. I can gain this awareness in dream using the time-trusted method of WBTB if I must -- but I hate it. It comes at such a deep cost to me now, to the upsetting of my circadian rhythyms and the threat of insomnia. I can't do the things I used to do to acquiesce dream-awareness without my mind and body suffering. So, illusory mind and body and ADA are especially alluring at this moment, if WBTB can ultimately be precluded from a mindset fostering the consistent generation of dream lucidity. Of course I wouldn't expect nightly controlled dreams (I'm not even sure I'd even want that). But for sure something that would render me more control over them than I have now. The WBTB thing shouldn't have to be obligatory for non-natural LD'ers. Anchoring is one thing: if I can anchor an object like a Tibetan bracelet or my upturned hands, then it should be possible to anchor an entire mindset. But what kind of mindset is the question. Is it a hybrid mindet of meta-awareness and extraneous object scrutinization, or only the former, or the Buddhist illusory mindset, or a combo of all three, or two -- or just ADA. I am ready, but I want to make sure I'm on the right track and not spinning my wheels in a method or thought-pattern which will only replicate the same action in a NLD. Yes, I've experienced that as well LOL!

//Offtopic

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Originally Posted by Occipitalred

Dreams in which I have clear waking life memory. None. I also interpret my lucid moments as being very short: ~1 min. For techniques, I don't recall success with WILD. I DILD. I don't set intentions to lucid dream, but I do set goals. I don't RC. I journal and maintain a relationship with my dreams.

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Occipitalred, if you want to explore the astral, you really need to work on waking life memory and expand your lucidity time to at least 15 minutes, because there will be not much of exploration.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

I've been able to link my hands, which was inspired from Carlos Castaneda's Journey to Ixlan book. I even went so far as to create a visionboard with a several images of two hands being held out, cupped, palms up, surrounding the mantra "When I am dreaming, I am aware that I am dreaming." It worked fabulously about three years ago, when I was averaging 2-3 full-blown lucid dreams per week regularly. The LD's I would get from this anchoring method had lengthy durations, full of adventure, and were very stable, due in part from the hand focusing which also doubled as a stabilizing agent in addition to a lucidity inducer. This was all about three years ago, when I was also WILDing and FILDing. Then I started a car dealership with a business partner and the stress of it all but destroyed by lucid dreaming practice. I foolishly thought it would all come back whenever I decided to get back into it. Boy was I wrong! I've had a few LD's since Decemeber 2019, and one OBE-type projection in February of this year...but nothing like before.

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Have you read others of Carlos Casteneda's works? Have they inspired other techniques that you use?

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

Back in 2017 when I was in the beginning stages of the new business (before I stopped completely due to stress) I started getting into dream yoga and cultivating the whole awareness/mindfulness regime. I didn't notice any difference, but in all fairness I hadn't been doing it long. I'd notice instead on the nights I did get lucid mid-dream, it was due to the sudden "aha!" moment, which I so sought to define and capture the essence of once I awakened. I'm very scientific by nature and analytical and one of my passions in life is getting down to and discovering the etiology of things I'm passionate about. So, obviously, the seemingly unprovoked moment which was spurring lucidity in my dreams was becoming of great interest. That moment where you suddenly "feel" this all just might be a dream. And then you look at your hands (already knowing you've crossed over) and see the mutation, the aberration in your fingers and it's confirmed.

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Do you think this -aha- moment might simply be the natural fluctuation in the wakefulness-sleep balance?

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

I also stopped dream journaling. I've since picked up where I left off and have already filled a new book since December of 2019; the same dreamsigns from three years are omnipresent today: funeral homes, Russia, elevators, a turbulent seashore, old, abandoned Victorian style homes in the country, austere mausoleums and crypts in various cemeteries. I love my dreams, and value them greatly. I celebrate them and express gratitude to my subconscious in manufacturing them.

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And you write about them beautifully. The pervasiveness of your dream signs is really cool.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

But I would be amiss if I didn't say underlaying it all is a terrific longing, a yearning for lucidity in the midst of them. I've since become very interested in Dzogchen and other aspects of dream yoga and would like to delve in to the deeper dimensions of self-exploration via the portal of dream self-awareness.

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I would also be lying if I denied this as well.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

I can gain this awareness in dream using the time-trusted method of WBTB if I must -- but I hate it. It comes at such a deep cost to me now, to the upsetting of my circadian rhythyms and the threat of insomnia. I can't do the things I used to do to acquiesce dream-awareness without my mind and body suffering. So, illusory mind and body and ADA are especially alluring at this moment, if WBTB can ultimately be precluded from a mindset fostering the consistent generation of dream lucidity. Of course I wouldn't expect nightly controlled dreams (I'm not even sure I'd even want that). But for sure something that would render me more control over them than I have now. The WBTB thing shouldn't have to be obligatory for non-natural LD'ers.

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VagalTone recently posted an article here:
https://www.dreamviews.com/general-l...ml#post2236282

It indeed said WBTB was linked with decreased feeling of being refreshed in the morning -unless- more hours of sleep were planned. So WBTB does seem better for those special nights where you can plan for more sleep.

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Originally Posted by AstronomyDomine

Anchoring is one thing: if I can anchor an object like a Tibetan bracelet or my upturned hands, then it should be possible to anchor an entire mindset. But what kind of mindset is the question. Is it a hybrid mindet of meta-awareness and extraneous object scrutinization, or only the former, or the Buddhist illusory mindset, or a combo of all three, or two -- or just ADA. I am ready, but I want to make sure I'm on the right track and not spinning my wheels in a method or thought-pattern which will only replicate the same action in a NLD. Yes, I've experienced that as well LOL!

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I think it's all and none of these answers. I think lucidity is a form of wakefulness during sleep. So whatever good mindset you have, if you are not -awake- during the dream, it will come across as a drowsy and passive experience. That's why I think the -mindset- needs to seek a higher wakefulness-sleep balance. A stable mindset might not do this. That's why I think questions are the key. Something that drives the mind to wake. A will to turn on cognition. Attention, mindsets, that's good. I feel there needs to be something that's inquiring for more. Reality check: What's real? (with no answer, always the question); illusory mindset: what's illusion? (no answer, the inquiry echoed?); attention: What is going on? (not, like taking an inventory, but with an analytical mind), self-awareness: who am I? (philosophically, scrutinizing your own consciousness?)
That's what I'm thinking now, maybe, no?

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Originally Posted by michael79

//Offtopic Occipitalred, if you want to explore the astral, you really need to work on waking life memory and expand your lucidity time to at least 15 minutes, because there will be not much of exploration.

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Yes, I have quite a few goals to practice but one will definitely be to ask myself questions about waking life to practice this and maybe stabilize my lucidity. About the dream duration, it's possible I am underestimating it; my lucid dreams span one to two pages when I write them out, but I still feel as if they happen in a very short time... Probably lack of stabilization and lack of discipline... damn it haha