Thread: Kjarva's Workbook

Hey kjarva, welcome to DVA! We'll get you LDing again in no time

Reality Checks:
I really need some help with this one. I work from home, so don't really see any weird stuff on a daily basis. In fact, I'm failing to think of one thing that could trigger a reality check during the day

Dream Signs:
- Noticed that I have dreamed of lightning several times before. This may be a dream sign, so I'll keep an eye on it!

Short-Term Goals:
- Have a lucid again!
- Work towards a few lucids a month at least
- Figure out if I have any dream signs, what they are and also what to use to trigger a reality check.

Long-Term Goals:
- start participating in TOTM each month once I start getting lucid again.
- I'd really love to try messing with the physics in a dream kind of like inception. I remember thinking that just after the movie came out but never got round to trying it.
- Fly some more! I've only flown once (jumped insanely high in another dream) and would love to do so again.

Lucid/Dream Recall History:
- Dream recall is patchy at best at the moment. I've restarted my dream journal though, so hopefully that will improve the next few weeks.

Current Technique:
Attempting WILD and DEILD this time round. I did have some success with WILD ages ago and I know once you nail it, it's pretty reliable. DEILD has always been challenging for me because I always move or open my eyes when I wake up. Challenge accepted and I'm going to make a concerted effort to not move!

How are you progressing?

Well I only just started back at dreamviews so right now I'm just working on my dream recall. Once I've got that back to the degree I used to have, I'll start down the long road of WILD/DEILD. The only reason I'm choosing these two methods is because I did have success with WILD consistently but life kind of got in the way! If I can get that back it will be ace!

Day 2

Well today I have been trying to remember to do reality checks and mostly failing. I've managed to do 3 today which is a start I guess! I decided to take an afternoon nap to try to WILD, it had been about 6 hours since I woke up but unfortunately I just fell asleep.

Did have pretty good dream recall from the nap though, it was only a short nap and I think I remembered all of the dream. I definitely need to improve on RC's however I didn't want to set some kind of visual or auditory queue, because I thought what would be the chances of that popping up in a dream. I could be wrong though!

Welcome to the class, kjarva. Good luck with the WILD/DEILDs they are my favorite way of getting lucid as well. I haven't got to the consistent that I'd like but it seems really easy when I get it. I understand the life-getting-in-the-way thing. It's happened to me several times. Let me know if I can help. I hope to learn from each other.

Originally Posted by Xanous

Welcome to the class, kjarva. Good luck with the WILD/DEILDs they are my favorite way of getting lucid as well. I haven't got to the consistent that I'd like but it seems really easy when I get it. I understand the life-getting-in-the-way thing. It's happened to me several times. Let me know if I can help. I hope to learn from each other.

Thanks Xanous!

Day 3 - Developed a way to consistently enter Sleep Paralysis!
Well last night was a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand I managed to enter sleep paralysis twice but I think due to painkillers I took last night I have absolutely zero dream recall. I do remember the hpynagogic images from the sleep paralysis though. One of them was a huge cruise liner, sailing silently through the ocean on a really dark night, with the full moon behind it and the light reflected off the waves. Another was a police station line up, but everyone there had a head like Arnold from Hey Arnold!

So I think I now know how to consistently get into sleep paralysis to WILD and it may or may not help other people, it depends if they have the same weakness as me! I am pretty mathematically challenged, unless it's programming math i.e. base 2 or base 16. My biggest problem has always been to keep my mind awake while letting my body go to sleep, so I decided that doing maths in my head was the answer because it's something I personally find hard. I decided to count off a fibonacci sequence (1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144 etc.) in my head, which, for me at least gets a lot harder the bigger the numbers get. This kept my mind sufficiently occupied that I entered SP no problem both times - I kind of freaked myself out the first time, second time I was so focused on the addition I managed to ignore the freak out.

I just don't have any dream recall due to painkillers - argggh! I will not be taking any tonight and hopefully will be able to report back on an afternoon nap today

Day 3 cont.

Well I had an afternoon nap but just dropped off to sleep without staying conscious. I had a non-lucid that I added to my dream journal but I think I may have spotted a dream sign. The dream I had this afternoon had a lightning strike and it occurred to me that in several old dream journal entries here and several more just in my diary I'd noted lightning in dreams at least 5 times. Now because I've only just started my dream journaling back up, I'm not sure how reliable this sign might be so I'm definitely going to keep an eye on it. Dream recall is obviously back, hopefully I will have a bit more success at bedtime tonight.

Hey kjarva, glad to see your recall picking back up. A couple questions about your sleep paralysis: What do you ordinarily do, or have you done in the past, to achieve a lucid dream from the SP stage? Are you able to just think about the dream you want from that point?

Originally Posted by OpheliaBlue

Hey kjarva, glad to see your recall picking back up. A couple questions about your sleep paralysis: What do you ordinarily do, or have you done in the past, to achieve a lucid dream from the SP stage? Are you able to just think about the dream you want from that point?

Hi OpheliaBlue, I don't do anything special to actually get into the SP, I lie in my normal sleeping position because lying on my back always seems to trigger muscle spasms about 20 minutes in, as if my body is trying to trick me into revealing I'm still awake! As I said previously, my biggest problem has always been keeping my mind awake while my body goes to sleep and into SP. What I have done before from there is watch the HI until they are pretty intense, then try to use all my senses to insert myself into the image I'm seeing.

What I tried to do last night when I had the scenery of the cruise liner was to feel the cold of the night, feel the cold breeze on my skin and smell the sea air. Unfortunately I didn't get that far that I remember but hopefully with practice that will come back. At that point I used to just find myself inside the dream.

Ah ok. Next question, when you're in SP and/or seeing that HI (like the cruise liner), can you still feel yourself in your bed?

I can at first but then something shifts. It's really hard to explain, it's like a total perception shift where until it happens I'm still in bed although unable to move but then when I truly get into the HI I'm actually there. It's a really hard to describe feeling, it's like that horrible falling feeling you get sometimes when falling asleep at night, only it happens in the blink of an eye. One minute I'm totally aware I'm in my bed but looking at nice images, the next I get this shift and suddenly I'm there.

Probably a totally useless explanation but the best I can do

Day 4

Well not much to report I'm afraid. Very little dream recall from last night, so nothing new.

Originally Posted by kjarva

Day 4

Well not much to report I'm afraid. Very little dream recall from last night, so nothing new.

Meh it happens. May tonight's dreams be epic!

Nice to have you here kjarva!

The way you enter SP is awesome! That has really encouraged me to attempt WILD some more. It seems to be the trickiest technique for most people including me.

Ive found that if you are having a recall rut, you might try a mantra, or what I like to do is recall the days events and even a few days into the past. It tends to increase my recall quite a bit..