Some Background:

I first began to experiment with lucid dreaming after mentioning to a counselor that in almost all of my dreams I am with a boy. The same boy. My counselor was so intrigued that she explained the basics of how to achieve lucidity to me and two weeks later I was lucid. At the time I had paired my RCs with my watch, so that whenever I checked the time, I would be reminded to perform a RC and every time I performed an RC I checked my watch. When I was in my dream, I felt the need to check the time (because when you're robbing banks generally you have to move on a schedule). At the same time I subconsciously performed a reality check and discovered lucidity for the first time (the whole dream experience can be found in my DJ). After that first experience with lucidity, I tried a few more times to become lucid, but became frustrated after three nights with no lucidity and gave up all together. I wrote it off as a once in a lifetime opportunity and moved on.

Since then I had occasionally tried keeping dream journals off and on but never stuck with it--the failure of that first time still weighing me down. But this last Christmas my mother surprised me by purchasing me a book, "A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming." I guess I never realized that one experience had so much of an impact on me that I still brought it up every now and then. After reading the first few chapters I began to aspire once more to reach that alternate reality. And so I am back. Hopefully this time with more success.

Methods Being Practiced (with moderate success? and much failing):

1. MILD (& DILD): I mantra every night before I go to sleep and I change what I say each night in hopes of improving results (by switching it up I keep it fresh and reduce the likelihood that I consider it routine). I have also been using reality checks on a regular basis but I don't have a watch anymore and I feel like with nothing to tie my checks to they seem rather random and therefore non-committal. I would like to find a way to improve my RCs so that my DILD attempts are more feasible. I changed up my RCs for today and made sure to do a check whenever something odd happened (as was suggested in the intro guide). Some of the events I checked for were:
When I woke up (because why not?)
When I realized I was running 30 minutes late (because I haven't been late in months).
When I walked into work and saw an entire Indian tribe had set up a convention in the entry.
When I walked into physics and my Professor was melting balloons in liquid nitrogen.

2. WILD: I read (in one of my 5 books that I'm currently alternating between on the subject) that sleeping on your back increases the likelihood of lucidity, and twice a week I try to WILD while on my back. This is really difficult for me because I am a night-time side-sleeper and a nap-time face-sleeper. I have trained my brain to sleep deep when I'm on my side, and wake me after 20-30 minutes if I'm lying on my stomach. This essentially means my body doesn't know what to do when I sleep on my back. Idk, maybe it thinks I'm reading or watching a movie. The point it, that the first three times I tried to WILD I just laid in bed for two hours before I rolled onto my side to sleep. But last night, something different happened. For the first time, when I WILD I actually fell into a near sleep state, and began to feel like my body was actually falling through my bed. It was strange, and weird. But I was still too conscious of what was happening to actually sleep. So after two hours, I rolled over.

3. WBTB: I try this technique on nights when I'm not trying WILD because I can only loose so much sleep a night. This, even though it is said to increase lucidity by 60%, seriously only makes me want to kill myself 3 different times. First, when I'm setting my alarm for 5:way-too-fucking-early o'clock in the morning; second, when my alarm goes off at 5:way-too-fucking-early o'clock in the morning; and third, when I wake up and wonder why I ruined a perfectly good night of sleep for absolutely nothing at all. Because nothing happens. I am a really deep sleeper, and I honestly think that it is because I sleep so hard that WBTB doesn't work. I'm so tried by being woken up, that I sleep even deeper when I go back to sleep. I swear.

I've been doing this or two weeks with minimal results and could use some advice to improve my results.

-Bamb