Thread: Booney's Workbook

Week 05:
It has been a slow week for me and recall made a drastic drop.
But I know why! Which I guess is a step in the right direction. I think I've finally found out what my ideal sleep schedule is.
At first I thought my inconsistent working schedule would cause my LD attempts to fail, I thought I needed routine and stability.
But for me, I found out this is not the case, what works best for me is to attempt LDs during a natural sleeping cycle.
I came to this conclusion after two weeks of stable working hours. I thought it was perfect, finally I could focus and adjust to my regular bedtimes but no. Recall dropped and so there is no way of knowing if I had any LDs these last two weeks.
I did have one very vivid flying dream and made a mental/physical note of how it felt for future reference.
Also after reading a thread here about bending the elements I ended up bending air I was a full fleshed airbender, again made notes of the sensations.

So even though at the end, the dream recall came back and my dreams became more vivid it didn't come as easy as it used to be.

Next week I'll be back into my prefered working schedule which fits my natural sleeping schedule.
I expect great things then. Because I know I can, I've done it once, almost achieved it two weeks ago. It's just a matter of time and that time is soon.

Great to hear you'll be getting back to a better schedule. And even better to hear, airbending!

Yeah it was really fun controlling elements I'm definitely going to do some more of that in the future.
I was airbending one of those air spheres the ones Aang rides on sometimes. First I created a small airsphere between my hands which felt like the resistence you feel when you hold two magnets close to each other when the same magnetic poles point to each other.
The first few times it just blew up in my face, literally. Untill finally I was able to controle it, make it bigger and ride it for a bit. A great dream.

Had one of those dreams that ruins your day last night.

It was about a girl I met last summer on vacation.
We really hit it off back then and I kept in touch through facebook just chat every few days. I even had plans to visit her while I was in the neighborhood. But then all of the sudden she stopped replying.
I remember being pissed off about it, because I didn't understand it and still don't but I'm over it now.

In the dream I'm sitting in some loungey room. She's there with her cousin (who was also with her that summer)
I probably asked her the question of why she never talks to me anymore before my memory of the dream takes over.

She talks to me about why she doesn't talk to me or anything, and her cousin then acts surprised about the answer since it's not what she has been telling her all this time.
So I look at her again but she avoids eyecontact clearly her cousin was telling the truth.

But I just let it go, I tell her that even if her cousin i telling the truth I have moved on anyway which leads to her reaction all defensive which again I don't understand.
The whole dream felt like a messy break-up.

Bleh, feelings.

Week 06: Succesfull WILD!

I decided to give WILD a shot yesterday.

Slept for about 4 hours did a WBTB for 5 min and went back to bed.

I was imagining creating matter out of thin air, mind you I was still awake at this time.
So I was imagining creating a small sphere which I then tried to transform into a cube. I pictured how the points and edges of the cube would feel to my fingertips. Then I tried to make it larger, first with just my thumb and indexfinger.
But I wanted my cube to be bigger so I used my arms to make it even bigger.

I think it was here that I might have gone into a dreamstate.

A random thought just popped into my head; I could never lift this in the real world.
My sight went from first to third person for a second, I saw myself struggeling to keep my gigantic cube in the air, by now it was the size of a normal sized house, it was also more detailed.
When creating the matter it was just an unknown grey ball/block. The thing I was now lifting looked like solid rock, crumbling and with moss on it, like a piece of rock that came from an ancient temple out in the rainforest.
I told myself I was dreaming and I threw the rock up in the air.
As I watched the rock fly up in the air I pointed my finger at it and made it explode.
At this point a memory of the TotM came to me and the exploding rock became the Northern Lights.
But unfortunately it faded away very soon and now all kinds of different sized rocks came falling down from the sky, I knew I wasn't able to dodge them all and as a reflex I closed my eyes and turned.

Then I woke up.
---

It was weird to just go from a daydreaming state into an actual dreamstate without realizing it.
I guess when things started to happen out of my controle I attained lucidity.

During this week I will continue tweaking my WBTB routine and also I will continue with my Reverse Dreamjournaling.
The Reverse Dreamjournaling hasn't been working as I want it to but I do believe it played a big part in attaining lucidity last night since it makes me experience lucidity while awake in my mind.
I feel like I'm rambling now so I'll just stop typing. Can't wait for tonight after this little taste of actual lucidity.
Have to stay calm though.

Week 07 Day 1 Lesson IV:
Well, finally after six weeks I had an experience I can call a lucid dream.
I want to use this post to summarize some of my findings, things that have worked for me for future reference.

During these weeks I have tried almost every technique, DILD, MILD, DEILD, WILD.
- DILD; This one has been kind of working for me. By practicing ADA and using personal RCs, I have created several opportunities to become lucid.
It has worked for me to achieve it for a few seconds, but during the transition from dreaming to becomming aware the dream tends to stir things up which then breaks my train of thought, leaving me back in the dream unaware.

- MILD; You could say that most beginners at lucid dreaming are practicing MILD, not a day goes by without thinking about it, remembering past dreams during the day. But the mantra's and thinking involved right before going to bed doesn't work with me it feels a bit forced. But that's probably because I'm doing something wrong.

- DEILD; This one got me as close as I came to lucid dreaming before I attained my first LD. But this could also have something to do with what happend during the initial waking up. I hurt my hand and this pain came with me in the dream like an anchor to the real world or something. For what it's worth it was the most powerfull RC I have ever had.

- WILD; Combined with WBTB for about 5 to 10 minutes has brought me my first lucid dream and so I will stick with this technique.
That moment of realizing you're in a dream, amazing.

So, after trying several techniques for a few weeks and attaining my first LD (woohoo! still so happy I made it!) I will now focus on keeping this up and move on to Lesson IV!

Dream stabilization

I think this will be my biggest obstacle in sustaining a lucid dream.
Like with my first lucid and also with non lucids my dreams tend to build up as they go in everything.
What I mean is that my dreams begin very boring and mundane no emotion, than real life situations happen with normal emotions, then strange things happen and emotions get stronger (point where lucidity can be attained).
After that third build up I reach a fourth stage where everything stops making sense, bright colours, most amazing sounds from big orchestra's to eerie crashing trains and emotions so strong they stay with you even after waking up.

My goal will have to be to try and keep it at the 3rd stage.
I'll name these 4 stages the stages of dream intensity.
- Stage 1, little colour, no sound or emotions
- Stage 2, real life environment with realistic emotions.
- Stage 3, things stop to make sense, randomness laws of the real world do not apply, the average dreamworld
- Stage 4, Oh my God this is the most amazing thing ever I can't believe this happening what the fuck! Chaos everywhere and emotions are kept after waking up.

Dream Control :

I don't expect this to be a big problem for me. In non-lucids I show having a good deal of controle and I also took controle in my first lucid when the giant rock nearly made me collapse.
Well maybe when I reach stage 4 of dream intensity and chaos takes over, yeah that might get difficult.

As I'm writing this I remember a dream I had a few weeks ago, I believe I also wrote it in a DJ-entry.

I was being chased and I remembered a technique I read about in a LaBerge book. It was the one that says to close your eyes and spin around.

This technique works very well for me, have to remember that one and focus on it when I start to lose controle or when things start to happen that I don't want to.
---



Well I hope to get a lot of lucids from here on out. The holidays are coming which makes it easy for me to go back to me most profitable sleeping schedule.

I will now update my goals and what not in my first post and also make a new entry about my first lucid. My description of it in my earlier post isn't that accurate and was written on a whim.

Yeah! Congrats on that WILD Booney

That feeling of slipping from awake and day dreaming, to a lucid dream without a break is pretty awesome ain't it. And now that you've done it you'll be able to remember the feeling of the transition, and repeat the process again. So I agree you should definitely stick with that technique. Well done, it took me 8 years to get WILDing down. What a great student!

Thanks Opheilia.
I forgot to metion it, but even though it's an individual achievement, everyone here at DV certainly made it easier to obtain.
Just reading about other experiences made me realize just how delicate lucid dreaming is and also a personal thing. You just can't copy a guide or tutorial and expect it to work.
A mistake I made when I first started a year ago.

Week 07 Day 4 Lesson IV:

My dreams have gone mad! Tonight recall was way up there, I couldn't even write it all down and it was all so vivid and detailed.
I got licked on the cheek (don't ask) and the detail of the experience was so real, I could feel the wetness and how that little area on my face felt cooler as the breeze past me. I was at a park at the time and I could even smell a little of the trees.

During two dreams I was on the verge of attaining lucidity again(DILD), but it felt to real too act on it. I have to put more trust in my reality checks.
It's difficult because I'm a thinker and overthink a lot of things. I still haven't found that sweetspot of awareness but not think to much and wake myself up.

I also had another semi-succesfull WILD this morning.
I was daydreaming/visualizing myself in a field just walking. Then I started running as I noticed to lose the feel of my body about to enter the dreamstate. I started to jump as hard as I could to start flying and I did! I looked down and saw the field I was running in, the forrest surrounding this huge field and further down I saw a little suburb.
But unfortunatly this all happend in the few seconds of still getting in the dream, and I guess I could still hear things, so the noise of my father walking around in the living room woke me up again.
I can't imagine what that dream would be like if it went on. Conditions were perfect, I was relaxed at the latter stages of sleep so long REM.
Next time!

It's funny though. I found my way to lucid dream, but I realize the fun is now just beginning The real deal hasn't even started yet, exciting stuff.

Great great progress, Booney! I know how you feel when you say the dreams are too crazy that you dont even write some of them down anymore. Happens to me a lot too Anyway, good to see you're getting the hang of WILD, and it shows in your attempts. Good luck!

Thanks Paig!

I just noticed I didn't mention it before but last night was my first with a big glass of applejuice during the WBTB, if that's what's responsible for the vividness I'm definatly going to use that some more in the future.

Still can't get over the fact that I had 2 freaking WILDs in just 5 days, madness I tell you!
I'm kind of worried about losing it though, I'm working nightshifts again which haven't done much good in the past.
But I can't let those thoughts keep me busy, must stay positive.

Awesome jobs on the WILDs. Those can be tough to get the hang of. It seems like this is a good month for a lot of us. I understand the fear there. I try to stay positive even if it feels like I am lying to myself.

I noticed that too, about a lot of us making big progress. Maybe it's because a lot of us finaly get some time to truly unwind and relax this time of year?

I notice a change in my own environment as well, non lucid dreamers having better recall then usual.

Nice observation. My wife has been telling more dreams than usual. Hmmm interesting.

Week 07 Day 6 Lesson IV:

My previous lucids are still leaving traces in my dreams.
Last night I had a very long and vivid dream and I kept zoning in and out of it.
During some parts I did come to the realization that I was dreaming, but it didn't really sink in if you know what I mean. I have this all the time and it's such a shame because I let so many DILDs go to waste this way.
Anyone have an idea how to tackle this problem?

I can also tell that this weeks shift in my working schedule is having an effect on my sleep. I always use my natural wake ups for WBTBs but I just sleep in one go right now. I know I could use alarms and such but I don't want to, I want my lucid dreaming to be as natural as possible. I believe in the end this will make it easier if I don't rely on alarm clocks or lucid aids. I know I've used applejuice once and I'm glad it worked but now I won't use it untill it's neccesary, I don't want to have to depend on it in order to sustain a certain vividness.

This has been a rule for me ever since I started, I want to do it myself or not at all.

The only form of help I take in is all the info on this forum which I need to utilize again today!

Naps! How do you do it?
I want to explore the world of lucid naps during weeks like I have now with nightshifts.

So I want to know how you take a nap and which methods and techniques you use to induce a lucid.
Maybe I'll make a seperate thread about it but for now I'll just see if any of my classmates have anything to say about it.

A little sketch that I edited in PS.
I want to try and do this with more interesting LDs in the future, this one is about my first induced lucid dream.

Wow that's great, Booney! It really gives us a visual aspect of the dream. I'm definitely looking forward to reading more of these

Thanks, it's also much easier to give people some visuals to bring them a bit of the feel of the dream you know?

Week 08 Day 3:

I've had my focus on recall these last few days since my schedule wasn't suitable for my WILDing and WBTB.
Starting today that has changed so starting now I will begin with the more serious WILD attempts.

My non lucids are still showing an increase in vividness and all around me people seem to recall more dreams which I think is pretty interesting.
I don't talk much about lucid dreaming or dreaming in general out in the real world, so it's not like I'm making the people around me more aware of their dreams, it's really something that is happening now.

Last night I had one of those dreams that felt like it contained a deeper meaning of the subconsious or something. I had two conversations with DCs that really got to me.
Might update my DV journal with them.

Week 08 Day 4:

I'm finally back in the schedule that gave me the best results so far which gets me excited.
It led to a very long and vivid dream last night, lots of details and characters. It was fun to see all these people in my dreams.
I'm not sure if I ever mentioned it here on DV or in my personal DJ but I was getting bored with the lack of social interaction in my dreams. For weeks I was alone in my dreams.
But these last few days all kinds of people and crazy characters have shown up, which makes my enjoy my non-lucids more but on the other hand distracts me from achieving lucidity.
So far DCs have been the reason my DILDs fail, but that will be solved in time.

My plan of action for the next few weeks will be to start the real development of my island.
It is a set location in the dreamworld I first mentioned it here in this entry; Becoming a new citizen in the dreamworld. - Dream Journals - Lucid Dreaming - Dream Views

There are lots of worlds I've visited in my dreams over the years and the more interesting once need a revisit.
Now lots of people create an antire world but that's to much. I try to create a small floating island way bigger than the island I mention in the DJ entry but it's not huge either. I guess about half of the Skyrim map in the last Elder Scrolls game.
As a base I will use places I've visited many times in my mind which come from a fantasy story I started writing a few years back.
It's perfect for these kind of things because it is a very plain world. I will not bore you with the details of this story though.
Another plus to this idea is that I might spent some more time developing some characters. I'm thinking about implementing the protagonist of the story into this island. Someone to take controle when I'm not there. Or my mental back-up memory file.
Don't confuse this with tulpa's or dreamguides though, I don't believe they exist. It feels harsh that I need to point that out so specifically but I want to make it clear how I few the dreamworld.
To me the dreamworld is identical to the world in which the stories I write take place, pure imagination. Non-lucids or regular dreams are just the imaginative world run on autopilot.

To summarize for myself what I want to do and accomplish.
1) Create my own island in the dreamworld
2) Develop my default DC named Rutger.
These two things will help me with attaining better dreamcontrole and I'm hoping a world you consiously create will be easier to stabilize.

This is also the best way for me to stay focused and excited about lucid dreaming.

Your idea sounds great! In ETWOLD Stephen Laberge describes under the Chapter "Creative Problem Solving" How one could "build" his own "lucid dream workshop". Since I read this I have an similiar wish to yours, I want to build my own dream house with a specific landscape around (I don't want to go into depth here it is your Workbook after all), that I can easily access later through incubation, or if lucid changing the dream scene to it. Anyway, I wish you great success with your Island, hold me up-to-date The idea with the waterfalls is great! I will probably try something similiar when the moment has come, though probably with simple doors. Also I will probably try to develop two DCs in my dream base who I hope will always be there when I visit it, a Butler and a creature.

I am excited to see if this works, but if you say you know from others who created similiar things before and even Stephen Laberge writes about it for solving creative problems, I believe that it is possible to create such places.

It's funny how LaBerge mentions it in Creative Problem solving. Since a big part of building this is to interact with my stories in a new way, to help me with new ideas and solve writersblock.
As for the portals, doors are a very wise decision, waterfalls are a bit over the top. But I'm creating this world having attained advanced lucid controle and stability in mind. I'm aware that it will take a while to incubate this detailed world into my dreams or even while lucid it's probably not going to be easy to get there. But I've got time. I can wait.

Sounds like you have been working on this for a while also. Be sure you'll also keep us up to date with your progress.

Week 08 Day 5: At last a DILD!

I finally broke this curse I had with DILDs and got to close the circle. It was probably the most boring lucid dream I will ever have but also the most amazing so far.
My first two WILDs were amazing, no doubt. I mean, you don't get to fly everyday or explode giant rocks by pointing at them which turns them into the Northern Light.
But even though they are fantastic dreams they were kind of fuzzy and dark, like a layer of shadows was covering it up.
Not this lucid though.

I was at home at night time, I'm lying in my bed and something troubles me. So I decide to get out of bed and go downstairs to go to the toilet.
While I walk down the stairs I decide to slide on on the railing (haven't done this since I was a kid) when I'm almost down I make a jump and land in the hallway. And here's the important part, when I land I go through my knees to ease the landing, as I get up I kind of jump or float up slightly. But I didn't think about it.
I go to the toilet and sit there for a while and I recall my jump and how weird it was. Then this thought popped in my head; I'm not lucid dreaming am I?
In waking life before I do reality checks I observe my surroundings, the feel temperature, sounds all that. Back to the dream.
So I had this thought, I looked around in our toiletroom (it's a very small room just the toilet) I touched the wall in front of me and thought no, this can't be a dream this is real.
But I start to think back, where was I before the jump? The bedroom I came out of wasn't my room like it is now. Nothing made sense, but the wall was so real!
Finally I do the nose plug RC and I'm shocked. I can still breath!
I touch the wall again look at the lamp above me, it's all there, just in real life, nose plug RC still breathing.

So it's true, I am lucid dreaming and am overwhelmed with this euphoric feeling. But I try to stay calm.
Still once I look at the wall that looks so real I doubt it once again, the RC could be wrong if this was a dream I could float around. I then look at my legs, and see I still have my pants down, but that doesn't matter.
I look down and try to make myself go up, and I do!
Slowly I feel my cheeks seperating from the toiletseat and I drop back down. I'm now completely baffled and just sit there for a moment with my hands to my face in disbelief.
I try it again, I lift up very stable to my surprise, and make a 360 degree turn and sit down again.

Now for the dumbest part. I wanted to get out of the restroom, but then I was thinking about wiping.
So I wipe, float around a bit and wipe again which causes me to lose lucidity.

---

This experience has made me doubt my first two experience at first, but now that I look at how the initial feeling of this particular LD is also fading away I'm sure they were lucids too.
The only difference is that this DILD was so real! It was exactly like the restroom at home, it's crazy.
Also the way I attained my first DILD here makes it clear why they are so hard to attain for me. Constant doubt and uncertainty. But I don't think it's a bad thing.
It looks like once I know it's a dream for a 100% sure it's on. I even did some stabilizing techniques but they felt useless as in they didn't help anything the dream was stable allready.
I wonder if this will apply to other dreams in the future?
Since this one was very easy to keep stable, but it was a very small room.

I laughed through that whole dream. 3 cheers for toilet flying!

It's so interesting that DILD was a more elusive way to achieve lucidity for you than other ways. I'm the opposite: I always DILDed just on accident, and then DILDed even more after finding this site and improving recall and awareness and such. Took me 8 years after joining DV and trying different stuff to finally WILD. My DILDs are usually clearer and more realistic than WILDs as well, which seems to be the opposite of everyone else. Weird.

But anyway, congrats! I know that feeling is awesome, when you realize "DOH! I'm dreaming!"

Well I still can't believe it to be honest. As a matter of fact I came to this forum being very skeptical about lucid dreaming.
I only came here to be proven wrong, and the only way that would happen is if I would experience this myself. And now after this DILD I'm almost rid of all doubt.

The WILDs were just lucky I think. The DILD is what really got me in this thing now.
LDing is real, it's fucking weird and I want more haha.

I'm really happy for you, Booney! To be honest, all people can really do is tell you about lucid dreaming, and give you advice, and motivate you. But it is indeed a completely different experience once you do it yourself and explore your own mind in your dreams. Words can never live up to how it feels, even after many successes. Hopefully you get many more lucids to comea, good luck and congrats.

Thanks Paigeyemps!
It really is hard to explain isn't it. Especially if you want to describe the difference between non-lucids and lucids.
Sometimes I'll mention lucid dreaming with my friends but then it always ends up in telling stories of these crazy dreams they once had.
They're cool stories, but I can tell they don't have a complete understanding what lucid dreaming actually is.

Week 09 Day 1:

Last night was a bit like the night before, just some fragments. A guy I know from highschool popped up again. Gotta look out for him as a dreamsign.
I was also attacked again, some guy tried to chop me in half with an axe! He said he was part of the Tile Gang, which is very funny because I know how the subject of tiles got in the dream but that's to much to explain.
In the end this old highschool friend turns up and saves me.

The strange thing though, the place where I was attacked looked like some kind of public square, it could very well fit the designs of my Island so that's interesting.

---
Today is my last day at work before the holidays. I will spent the first nights increasing recall again, since I kind of let it go.
Awareness, awareness, awareness or the knowing that I'm a lucid dreamer is the next step.

I also love how this forum and its members still give me new ways to look at lucid dreaming. I swear my view has changed almost every week since I started actively being on here when I started this workbook.