Bharmo's Workbook

This should be the first post of page two, so let's see how things are going:

- Enrolled at the DVA since July 25th, so that's… two weeks and a half!!! So I'm quite close to my goal of one LD per week!! :D Well, the truth is very little time has passed since I started, but hey! let's keep positive!!
- Both LDs where MILDs, one with an accidental WBTB.
- My dream recall averages one per night, which is the bare minimum for a LDer.
- As many other times my motivation was really high when I started LDing again and then went down in around a week, but this time looks like I'm keeping it at a satisfactory-enough level throughout the second and third weeks. Thanks DVA!! :thumbup:

Updated "checklist":

Reality Checks:
- Nose pinch
- Finger through hand
- Digital watch (never used this RC in a dream)

Dream Signs:
- Conventions and other indoor crowded places
- Public bathrooms

Dream Signs (Only in dreams):
- My hometown / neighborhood / parents' home
- Wrath / Losing temper / Regret-Shame
- Fictional characters (from comics, games, etc)
- High school / seminars

Short-Term Goals:
- Consolidate a good night-time routine (review DJ, daydream journal, MILD including dream stabilization rehearsal)
- DJing everyday, even if it's only outlines (let's make it easy for now)
- Practice Awareness/RC regularly (including dream stabilization rehearsal)
- WBTB once per week minimum (this is a difficult one)
- Exploring the dreamworld

Longer Term Goals:
- LD once per week
- Improve awareness, memory, and length of dreams (some of this may come with experience, I guess)
- Flying
- Phasing
- Summoning objects
- Summoning people
- Teleporting
- DEILD
- Two LDs per week

To CanisLucidus and/or anyone else reading this:
Do you have any thoughts on...
1- What do you do with DS that happen only in dreams and those that happen also in real life? I would appreciate your personal experience with this.
2- When to start working in DEILDing? I mean, I've started trying DEILDing in the past but it did not work, in part because I was confused as to what to do when waking up in the middle of the night: RC for FAs, WBTB, DEILD? Probably I should wait a little bit before trying DEILD, until I get the basics and have more experience, right?
3- Any suggestions that come to mind after reading the previous post?
Thank you in advance!

First of all, great job keeping up with your workbook! You are a very good student! :goodjob2:

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Originally Posted by dreambh

1- What do you do with DS that happen only in dreams and those that happen also in real life? I would appreciate your personal experience with this.

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For dreamsigns that happen in real life, I recommend the basic step of making sure that you're not dreaming. Immediately and seriously consider the possibility that you might be dreaming. Reality check if that's practical. Allow yourself to feel happy and pleased with yourself for remembering. Mentally reward yourself for noticing this dreamsign.

For the ones that are exclusive to dreams, perform the same steps as above any time you think about them during the day. Give yourself a little jolt, thinking, I'm dreaming. I have to remember that I'm dreaming when I see/encounter <dreamsign x>. Also consider rolling these into your MILD practice. If your MILD includes any kind of visualization, try placing one of these dreamsigns into the scene you produce and imagine yourself noticing it and becoming lucid.

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Originally Posted by dreambh

2- When to start working in DEILDing? I mean, I've started trying DEILDing in the past but it did not work, in part because I was confused as to what to do when waking up in the middle of the night: RC for FAs, WBTB, DEILD? Probably I should wait a little bit before trying DEILD, until I get the basics and have more experience, right?

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There are several approaches that work. If you have a very short lucid dream that kicks you immediately back out into wakefulness, always try to DEILD. Convertin micro-lucids into full lucid dreams is something that DEILD is awesome for and the primary way that I use it. Start here! Those short little lucid dreams are sometimes just the beginning!

Beyond that, perhaps consider only performing DEILD after you have completed your WBTB. One common result of a failed DEILD is to just fall asleep. That can of course make you miss your WBTB. :)

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Originally Posted by CanisLucidus

For dreamsigns that happen in real life, I recommend the basic step of making sure that you're not dreaming. Immediately and seriously consider the possibility that you might be dreaming. Reality check if that's practical. Allow yourself to feel happy and pleased with yourself for remembering. Mentally reward yourself for noticing this dreamsign.
For the ones that are exclusive to dreams, perform the same steps as above any time you think about them during the day. Give yourself a little jolt, thinking, I'm dreaming. I have to remember that I'm dreaming when I see/encounter <dreamsign x>. Also consider rolling these into your MILD practice. If your MILD includes any kind of visualization, try placing one of these dreamsigns into the scene you produce and imagine yourself noticing it and becoming lucid.

There are several approaches that work. If you have a very short lucid dream that kicks you immediately back out into wakefulness, always try to DEILD. Convertin micro-lucids into full lucid dreams is something that DEILD is awesome for and the primary way that I use it. Start here! Those short little lucid dreams are sometimes just the beginning!
Beyond that, perhaps consider only performing DEILD after you have completed your WBTB. One common result of a failed DEILD is to just fall asleep. That can of course make you miss your WBTB. :)

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Thanks, Canis! I've read quite a lot about lucid dreaming, but you are able to bring new light even on basic stuff like dream signs. I take good note of that advise!! :goodjob2:

Regarding DEILD, I think I will keep it in mind for short lucids, as you said.
It is hard when you are learning to LD, and are craving for more lucids, to stick to a method and not grow impatient and jump around trying every acronym at the forum! :nono:

For the past three or four days I've been waking up naturally or accidentally during the night, and performing MILD at bedtime and at the WBTB, without leaving bed. No lucids, of course.
I've been having poor dream recall, as well. I believe this is caused some days because of stress, and some days because of having gone to bed later, and woke up later using a lot of "snooze" which kills my dream recall (6.00am? 10 more minutes, 6.10am? 10 more minutes, etc) Need to be more disciplined.
:embarrassed:
From today on, things should go back to normal, more or less.

Another bad night... :disconcerted:
No lucids, no recall. Went to bed doing MILD, fell asleep quite fast. I remember waking up because my wife was having trouble sleeping, but didn't want to contribute to her problem getting up for a "proper" WBTB so I just turned around and tried to do MILD but I guess I just fell sleep straight away. This morning I did again the snooze thing for 20 minutes, so got up with zero recall. I feel so LAZY!! :embarrassed:
ok, looking for causes/solutions:
- I wonder if my sleep cycles are messed up because of having altered my schedule on the weekend, althought it was not really a big change. Maybe my wife is having more problem sleeping than I remember and I'm not resting properly.
- My wake up alarm is Inception's song "Time" which used to wake me up gently and remind me of my intention to DJ, but these days I feel like I don't wake up completely before hitting the snooze, so I may have to try another alarm that wakes me up at once, so I dont fall to temptation of snoozing and lose my recall.
- I have to try to get up before my wife does (she has no problem with that, actually she likes it because even though she wakes up, she can go back to sleep straight away because she feels like she is sleeping in) This way I can use this time that I'm alone to focus in remembering my dreams. But this means reducing my amount of sleep, obviously, as I usually cannot go to bed earlier at night.
I'll keep thinking what else I can do. BTW, I'm not doing bad on the RC day practice, 5 to 10 per day.

No lucids, but I feel better today.
I woke up remembering a long dream, with some interesting personal stuff in it, after 7 hours of sleep. Did the silent ninja trick and it worked: moved silently and swiftly to the toilet, and could use 10 minutes to take note of the dream. Realized I had only 30 more minutes to sleep, so had to go back to sleep wondering if my wife would notice if I stayed longer (it as happened in the past, I believe her subconscious knows I woke up to go to the toilet and if I stay too long it wakes her up) I considered if I could have a DILD in less than 30 minutes, but I was excited about the dream so I decided I wouldn't have time to fall sleep, start dreaming and notice something weird. As I have been reading "Are you dreaming?" decided to do the 'Impossible Movement Practice' until I either passed out or had an LD... I passed out after like 20 minutes.
This night I had set up my alarm 30 minutes earlier and with a more powerful alarm, so I avoided the snoozing thing.

SLEEP CYCLES
If I woke up after 7 hours of sleep having just had a long dream, that means my sleep cycles were not the typical 90 minutes cycles (which by what I know is a big generalization anyways). From now on I'm taking note in an excel sheet of when I wake up from my dreams to gain some insight on my dream cycles.
Something different I did last night was having a big glass of milk before bed, I wonder if that could affect my cycles, like producing some mild REM rebound or something.

Quote:

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I woke up remembering a long dream, with some interesting personal stuff in it, after 7 hours of sleep. Did the silent ninja trick and it worked: moved silently and swiftly to the toilet, and could use 10 minutes to take note of the dream. Realized I had only 30 more minutes to sleep, so had to go back to sleep wondering if my wife would notice if I stayed longer (it as happened in the past, I believe her subconscious knows I woke up to go to the toilet and if I stay too long it wakes her up) I considered if I could have a DILD in less than 30 minutes, but I was excited about the dream so I decided I wouldn't have time to fall sleep, start dreaming and notice something weird. As I have been reading "Are you dreaming?" decided to do the 'Impossible Movement Practice' until I either passed out or had an LD... I passed out after like 20 minutes.

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Ha ha, nice... here's dreambh from this morning: :ninja:

I'm glad that this worked out without causing your wife to visibly wake up. As you've probably gathered, it sounds like this WBTB time is a little on the late side for you. If you can manage to gradually scale it back into the earlier morning, hopefully you will find your personal sweet spot.

By the way, I enjoyed "Are you Dreaming"! I thought there was a lot of good material in there. I remember the "Impossible Movement Practice" sounding interesting. I've done WILDs and DEILDs with repetitive motion before but the idea of using some impossible motion was an interesting twist. Let us know if that works for you!

Last night was quite similar to yesterday. Woke up at same time, with good recall of one dream, sneaked out to the bathroom like 15 minutes, took note of the dream, did some RCs, and went back to bed. Automatically my wife got up to the toilet as well, so if I stayed longer probably I'd had problems. :panic: Today I was waking up a bit later so I did MILD when going back to sleep. Woke up one hour later with no recall.

There was one good thing: While doing WBTB I remembered that at some point during the night I wake up (don't know if it was real or FA) and I was evaluating if a dream I remembered had been a proper lucid or not, and concluding it was not and going back to sleep. Maybe I was lucid and I have forgotten, but most probably I wasn't. But the important thing here is I'm getting close again!! :D
I've been working on awareness as well, so I'll get another LD soon.

Another bad night, no lucids, no recall, in spite of having done another ninja mini WBTB as usual.
I was going to write a post wondering if I'm working too hard and getting a dryspell because of that, and how I may need a rest, etc, etc, then realized it's only one week since my last LD :chuckle: so it's not that bad, actually.
This night I could not go back to sleep after the mini WBTB, so I've lost some sleep. I might forget about WBTB for the weekend.

Well, I am almost hesitant to mention this, given how you have been only a week without an LD, and thus will likely do better than me! But have you considered joining the competition: http://www.dreamviews.com/general-lu...read-14-a.html - it's fun, and if you are at all competitive, it can be a very effective way to improve LDing.

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Originally Posted by JoannaB

Well, I am almost hesitant to mention this, given how you have been only a week without an LD, and thus will likely do better than me! But have you considered joining the competition: http://www.dreamviews.com/general-lu...read-14-a.html - it's fun, and if you are at all competitive, it can be a very effective way to improve LDing.

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Thanks for the suggestion JoannaB! I'm just leaving home now, I'll check later in the day!

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Originally Posted by dreambh

This looks like lots of fun and motivation!!
Sign me in for the lower league, please!

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I'm in for Competition #14!!

Yay! So I saw. I bet you will enjoy it. This will be my third time participating in the competition, and I really look forward to it. :)

Thanks for letting me know, JoannaB.
I heard about it in the past, but did not understand very well what it was, and did not know there was a lower league so that newbies could participate!

Awesome! Good luck in the competition, dreambh! :goodjob2:

After a weekend "rest" (only kept up with RCs) and bad recall I gotta get back on track with LDing. This week is going to, wait... My wife just smashed a finger on a wall, and was telling me about going to the hospital, not to check the finger but why she is always smashing accidentally walls and furniture so so hard, she said she wants to check if she has super-human strength or something. Just had to check my reality :chuckle:
Ok, so this week is going to be very very busy for me, and the other one much more calm.
Anyways, I can only remember one fragment from last night, but it's very vivid: A big communal bathroom, which includes my lots-of-people and public bathrooms dream signs. Obviously then, if I work harder on my dream signs following CL's suggestions, I can get lots of LDs.
Let's keep that in my mind: DJ and DS!!

Owww!! I hope your wife's finger is okay, although that super strength sounds like it will come in handy!

Just spend the next few days constantly considering your reality and asking yourself the question of whether or not you might be dreaming. Train yourself to have it occur to you all throughout the day. As you build this habit, you will have it occur to you during dream time as well. And when you do, you are headed for a lucid dream! :goodjob2:

:banana:
Just woke up from what felt like a 20 minute LD! Got it outlined in my smartphone, later I'll type it here.
:banana:

And seems like I performed some kind of DEILD at the end of the dream as well!!
:banana:

So yesterday I went to bed a bit later than usual, and feeling I would not LD as was concerned by some personal issues. Anyway I performed MILD and fell asleep.
I woke up 5 hours later, I remember something fell down (a toothbrush in the bathroom) and woke me and my wife up, I know I didn't get up immediately, but not sure if I fell asleep before getting up or not. Well, I got up, went to bathroom, wrote a title of a dream fragment I remembered, RCed and looked for odd things (as I did through the day, thanx CL!) and MILDed to sleep reminding myself of the importance of intent and confidence. So another silent ninja mini WBTB + MILD :ninja:
Woke up one hour later, after a quite long LD!! So happy and excited, took note of it, and decided to repeat mini WBTB + MILD, where I remembered another non-lucid prior to the lucid, and maybe related. The second WBTB+MILD did not work but I woke up this morning with headache because of (mild) sleep deprivation :chuckle: Oh, and had a dream about helping Will Smith and his family, who were lost in Spain :lol:
I'll try to get the LD here in my dream journal at noon, and share about a weird DEILD at the end of the dream, which I don't know if was for real or just dreamed that I did it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dreambh

So yesterday I went to bed a bit later than usual, and feeling I would not LD as was concerned by some personal issues. Anyway I performed MILD and fell asleep.
I woke up 5 hours later, I remember something fell down (a toothbrush in the bathroom) and woke me and my wife up, I know I didn't get up immediately, but not sure if I fell asleep before getting up or not. Well, I got up, went to bathroom, wrote a title of a dream fragment I remembered, RCed and looked for odd things (as I did through the day, thanx CL!) and MILDed to sleep reminding myself of the importance of intent and confidence. So another silent ninja mini WBTB + MILD :ninja:
Woke up one hour later, after a quite long LD!! So happy and excited, took note of it, and decided to repeat mini WBTB + MILD, where I remembered another non-lucid prior to the lucid, and maybe related. The second WBTB+MILD did not work but I woke up this morning with headache because of (mild) sleep deprivation :chuckle: Oh, and had a dream about helping Will Smith and his family, who were lost in Spain :lol:
I'll try to get the LD here in my dream journal at noon, and share about a weird DEILD at the end of the dream, which I don't know if was for real or just dreamed that I did it.

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Awesome, dreambh!! Congrats on the lucid! :breakitdown: It sounds like you did everything right... a nice chunk of sleep, ninja WBTB :ninja:, then MILD. You mix that with good daytime practices (constantly reminding yourself that you have to be sure that you're not dreaming) and you get yourself a lucid dream!

20 minutes is a nice length, too, man! Mine have been a little shorter the last couple of times, so I can appreciate one that's got a little more heft to it. I'm going to be working on length, myself, so hopefully you'll inspire me.

Great work!

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Originally Posted by CanisLucidus

Awesome, dreambh!! Congrats on the lucid! :breakitdown: It sounds like you did everything right... a nice chunk of sleep, ninja WBTB :ninja:, then MILD. You mix that with good daytime practices (constantly reminding yourself that you have to be sure that you're not dreaming) and you get yourself a lucid dream!

20 minutes is a nice length, too, man! Mine have been a little shorter the last couple of times, so I can appreciate one that's got a little more heft to it. I'm going to be working on length, myself, so hopefully you'll inspire me.

Great work!

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Thanks CL, you know, had this lucid right after your advise!!
Actually it felt 20 minutes but a half that time was wasted walking around and I don't remember it well, but anyways, for me is an achievment.
Here's the lucid: http://www.dreamviews.com/blogs/drea...-museum-49958/
I don't want to think how many points this night was worth for the Competition#14 as it has not started yet :bang:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dreambh

Thanks CL, you know, had this lucid right after your advise!!
Actually it felt 20 minutes but a half that time was wasted walking around and I don't remember it well, but anyways, for me is an achievment.
Here's the lucid: http://www.dreamviews.com/blogs/drea...-museum-49958/
I don't want to think how many points this night was worth for the Competition#14 as it has not started yet :bang:

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Cool, man, I'll be sure to check it out! I'm really happy for you! :happy:

As for the competition, yeah, I guess it started with last night's dreams...? Double check just to be sure! Anyway, you'll just have to have a bunch more! :goodjob2:

The Competition has motivated me to try hard on my practices, and I've set some personal goals for the competition that can be seen at my signature. I don't not what it will do with my lucids, but is already helping me with my recall.

On the other hand, I'm taking 3 or 4 days off for some rest on some "cabañas" by the sea, so may not be posting during that time. Lets see what happens, I hope I don't relax too much and lose my critical thinking / awareness!