Pickman's Workbook

Again, still no luck last night. I seem to be sleeping more heavily and not waking up as close to the REM phase as I used to. I'm still recalling my dreams, but they seem duller and the recall seems patchier. I wonder if it has something to do with listening to those binaural beats as I drift off to sleep, as I didn't have this problem before.

I turned in close to 1am and I woke up again at 2:45am after the recording finished and my iPod had moved on to another audiobook which woke me up. I attempted a WBTB. I stayed up for about ten minutes, but I felt so tired and I couldn't remember any dreams to write down. Then I switched the light off and fell right back to sleep, sleeping through until 8:30am. I woke up feeling really tired.

At first I thought it was just a winter thing, but I've only recently had this problem, so I think it has something to do with the binaural beat recording. The only time it really worked is when I had eaten that heavy, high-fat meal about an hour or so before turning in, so I've developed a pet theory that I'd like to test: perhaps eating something with high fat content might provide my brain with the fuel it needs to stimulate lucid awareness during dreams. I've been reading a lot about the paleo diet recently, and about how fat is the preferred energy source for our brains rather than refined carbs. I'll have to test this out.

So I haven't updated over the weekend, but that doesn't mean that I haven't been active. Instead of giving a night by night account of what I've been doing since Friday, I'll just summarize what I did.

I noticed a pattern with the binaural beat recordings and how my dreams respond to them. Whenever I fell asleep while listening to them, I had the same problem as I had in the above post - sleeping heavily, not being able to remember my dreams, etc. But if I managed to keep myself from falling asleep and listened to them for about half an hour before switching them off and going to sleep naturally, my sleep routine went back to it's usual pattern where I wake up closer to the REM phase and seem to have a greater chance of gaining lucidity.

So since Friday, I tried listening to the binaural beat recordings in bed, but in a way that kept me at least semi-awake. I would listen to it while lying on my back with the duvet pulled down, or something else like that, that would keep me awake. After about half an hour, I would take out the earplugs and just go to sleep as normal.

This seemed to have an interesting effect on my dreams. I did not wake up in the night after a REM cycle like used to, but my dream recall increased. On both Friday and Saturday night, in my dreams had the vivid quality of a lucid dream. However, instead of realizing that I was in a dream, I always thought that I was in a futuristic videogame that allows all of your senses to be immersed in some kind of alternate body within a virtual reality simulation. So I had the same sense of being able to do (almost) anything, like in a lucid dream, even though I didn't know that I was dreaming.

This stopped happening last night, but my dream recall was better than it has been for a while. I'll keep this going, and see where it takes me.

I turned in at 12:45am and tried to listen to the binaural beats recording for half an hour before turning in. I think I actually dropped off this time, despite my covers being pulled down - maybe I'm getting used to it? I woke up at around 2am to the audiobook that followed after it.

No lucidity, but my dream recall was still pretty good and my dreams were very vivid and strange. Always a good sign. Better luck tonight I hope.

That's a very interesting observation. The futuristic game dream must have been awesome too! :)

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Originally Posted by NyxCC

That's a very interesting observation. The futuristic game dream must have been awesome too! :)

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Actually it was a bit rubbish, the graphics were blocky and dated - it was like being stuck in a game from the late nineties like Quake or something. If I knew it was a dream I could have made things more interesting.

The night before last was more of the same - turning in after the binaural beat recordings had finished and having very vivid and strange dreams with good recall.

Last night was the same, except I may have achieved something in the way of lucidity - I'm not sure. I have a vague recollection of interacting with a DC (who looked blocky and pentagonal like a late nineties videogame character) like I would have done as if I were lucid. But I don't remember being lucid, and my dreams certainly went non-lucid afterwards. It was strange. I woke up at 7am and attempted a DEILD, but I just fell asleep again until 8am.

So last night I had another lucid dream success!

I turned in at around 12:45 and did the usual thing with the binaural beats. I fell asleep and had some weird and vivid dreams, and then woke up at 6am to go to the toilet. I thought I would try out a WBTB for 10-15 minutes, so I switched the light on and sat up, writing down my dreams. Then I tried to get to sleep, but it seemed to be difficult. I felt like I was still digesting a heavy meal from earlier in the evening. It was one of those nights where I wondered if I would be lying in bed awake until I had to get up anyway. But I lay still and just waited for any dreams to come.

I found myself getting out of bed in the middle of the night to see a supporting pillar made of steel had suddenly appeared in my room. I touched it, and it was certainly there, and I knew that I was dreaming. I walked around my bedroom and I tried to look at myself in the mirror (in the dark). All I could see was a blurry mass, although usually I can see something because of the streetlights that come in through my curtains.

I went downstairs in the dark and I switched on every light on the ground floor. The fact that I succeeded in doing this freaked me out - I always thought that switching lights on in dreams was not possible, something to do with how the brain works. At this point I started to question whether or not I was dreaming again. I headed upstairs to take another look at that metal pillar, but as I walked I woke up. I think I actually wanted to wake up just to end my confusion at that point.

So that was definitely a success, but I completely forgot to practice the dream control and stabilization techniques.

That's fantastic! Congrats! I can't remember if lights are always supposed to malfunction?, but I think it's a big success turning all lights on. I recently had to struggle to bring some light in the room and it was frustrating. So, it seems you have good dream control actually! :D

Handling dream darkness: I've rehearsed IWL a technique of turning up an imaginary light knob in the palm of my hand using my other hand. Have yet to try it out in dreams that go dark. Also, putting on night vision goggles. Mostly I just stand there stupidly thinking of what I should do until I wake up. Once I yelled "LET THERE BE LIGHT" in a dark (but not black) room, and I got a little bit more ambient light. The other thing I want to try is patting down my dream body with my dream hands (my main stabilization tech) to see if I can bring my dream body back into the "light."

^^Those are some good ideas. I have tried candles with limited success, also a flashlight. :P

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Originally Posted by NyxCC

That's fantastic! Congrats! I can't remember if lights are always supposed to malfunction?, but I think it's a big success turning all lights on. I recently had to struggle to bring some light in the room and it was frustrating. So, it seems you have good dream control actually! :D

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Oh, so I've nailed the dream control bit then? Brilliant! I guess I just have to work on stabilization before I graduate this course.

Normally in dreams, if the lights are off, turning switches on makes no difference, which is why this lucid dream confused me so much. I have had a fair amount of dreams that were just me running around a dark house trying to turn lights on and wondering if a fuse has blown.

Not much to report from this weekend. I think I was just recovering from the previous week when I wasn't sleeping very well. Normally I would go to bed and sleep through until at least 8am, still with reasonably good dream recall.

This my update for the past couple of nights, since they were both pretty much the same. I turned in at a reasonable time of around 12:45, and I woke up in the early hours to attempt a WBTB, but with no luck - I fell asleep both times. I think I need to wake myself up more during WBTB sessions, since they only ever succeed on those nights where I think I'm not going to be able to fall asleep again.

Indeed, extending the time out of bed or at least increasing alertness while in bed and maintaining it for a while, and of course having the expectation of lding in mind when falling asleep greatly boosts ld chances.

I tried the same thing last night, I went to bed at the same time and woke up at 4am. I increased the time spent awake to 15 minutes, but I didn't hold on to that expectation of lucidity while falling back to sleep, which maybe why I didn't have a lucid dream. Better luck tonight I suppose.

I seem to be sleeping more heavily recently - maybe my body is working overtime to process the junk I've eaten over the past couple of days, or maybe it's a winter thing, I don't know. I turned in at around 1am and slept right through until 8am. Dream recall was patchy, and I didn't wake up in the night to attempt a WBTB.

Nothing to report for this weekend - my sleep was rubbish and dream recall has been patchy, possibly due to stress. I guess I was also recovering from a week at work. Better luck this week I suppose.

I don't know if you can relate to this, but I have recently noticed that my sleep and my recall suffer greatly whenever I over-indulge surfing the net/watching movies from the tablet before bed. It's no big secret that this decreases melatonin levels, but it took me a while to figure out this was indeed responsible to a great extent for the disturbances.

Anyways, lots of energy and awareness to you! :)

I certainly can relate to that - usually I'm good with my sleep routine, but lately I ended up letting blogs and the odd videogame encroach on my time before bed. It doesn't seem to completely prevent me from having lucid dreams, but it cannot do my sleep any good.

Last night however, I did have a lucid dream success. I decided that I needed to be more disciplined about my sleep routine, so I made sure that my PC was off by 11:30. I turned in at around 12:30 and fell asleep, no binaural beat recordings or anything like that.

I woke up at 3:30am and attempted a WBTB, staying up for 15 minutes to write down my dreams. My dream recall was really vague, I could just about remember dreaming about people I knew and that was it. I think I only woke up because I needed the toilet, and the REM cycle was long gone. So I spent the rest of the time just reading a magazine.

I went back to sleep and I did end up having a few lucid dreams - they were quite long too. I remember interacting with various DC's, but I completely forgot to practice the stabilization techniques or the February TOTM. Hopefully if I keep up the discipline with my sleep routine then I can achieve lucidity more frequently, giving me more opportunities to do what I set out to do.

Oh, that's a really good progress, congrats on the lds. :bravo:Sounds like they were pretty stable even without extra stabilization. And yay for the discipline! Must keep it up like that myself!

Thanks NyxCC - unfortunately I wasn't able to repeat my success from last night, even though I went through the same routine as the previous night.

I turned in at around 12:45, after an hour of non-PC or other screen-based activity. I woke up at 4am and attempted WBTB, but I had no dream recall whatsoever. After fifteen minutes I went back to sleep and woke up at 7:45am with very patchy dream recall.

It's only been two nights into my routine, but I'm wondering if my lack of dream recall is because I waking up further away from my usual REM cycle. Perhaps when I was up on the PC right up until I turned in caused me to somehow wake up closer to the end of my dreams. Perhaps my sleep cycles may adjust to my new routine after a while, I'll see how it goes.

I didn't have the time to update yesterday, but last night and the previous night were pretty much the same. I turn in at around 12:45, still keeping up the 'no PC/TV for an hour before bed' routine, and then waking up the early hours of the morning. I performed a WBTB for 15 minutes and then turned in again.

No lucidity, but my dream recall is definitely getting better. The notes I'm making during my 15 minute WBTB sessions are practically essays. Perhaps the issue I had in the last post was just a blip, maybe my body was just settling into a new routine.

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Originally Posted by Pickman

No lucidity, but my dream recall is definitely getting better. The notes I'm making during my 15 minute WBTB sessions are practically essays. Perhaps the issue I had in the last post was just a blip, maybe my body was just settling into a new routine.

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Having detailed recall like that is great, I look forward to getting back to my previous highs. It takes waking up directly from the dreams I believe. I had one long (probably my second longest, continuous scene to scene (about 8 transitions)) one just a few nights ago, it was really great to remember all that.

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Originally Posted by FryingMan

Having detailed recall like that is great, I look forward to getting back to my previous highs. It takes waking up directly from the dreams I believe. I had one long (probably my second longest, continuous scene to scene (about 8 transitions)) one just a few nights ago, it was really great to remember all that.

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Definitely agree on the need to wake up directly from dreams in increasing recall. It is always during my phases of increased recall that I get lucidity.

Last night I had good recall, although that was probably because my sleep was constantly interrupted. I couldn't get a decent night's sleep last night, so I attempted a WBTB at 4am. No lucidity, but my recall was pretty good.

On Saturday night I had another short-lived lucid dream success. I turned in at around 12:45 and I woke up in the early hours of the morning after a dream. Instead of doing a WBTB like I normally do, I ended up DEILDing straight back into it, and I was lucid for a brief period of time before waking back up. Perhaps if I'd remembered to practice the dream stabilization technique I might have lasted longer.

Last night was not so eventful. I turned in a bit later at around 1am, and I woke up at 4am. I attempted a WBTB, staying up for fifteen minutes. I couldn't remember any of my dreams. When I went back to sleep my recall was pretty good until I woke up at 8am.

That's great! You seem to be having lds pretty consistently recently! Congrats on the DEILD! :)

Yes, dream recall certainly seems to be picking up. No success last night though - I woke up at around 5am and attempted a WBTB. No luck this time, I just fell back to sleep, but my recall was pretty good.