Thread: Sakata Gintoki's Workbook

That really is awesome! Congrats! I know what you mean when you say that words don't do it justice at times like this. Must have felt amazing to experience all the detail. Good job dealing with flying too. I'm sure with more practice you'll put any flying worries behind.

Hey pal, you might be wondering where I've been so I thought I'd tell you
I've been sleeping with the window open, which means the shutters stays up, which means I eat all the sunlight during the juiciest REM periods, which means I get no lucid dreams But it helps me fall asleep and I want to make that trade-off.

Hey Ginsan! If you want you can try sleepying with a sleep mask or just a T-shirt or something of the sort to help block the light.

I never thought of that xD I think a T-shirt will be annoying but a sleep mask might be brilliant! I'll look into it.

I don't understand why, but I am suddenly excited to lucid dream again!

I have been having lucid dreams regularly for at least the past month, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was the last 3 months, I think once a night on average. I can often do some flying, some magic, they last for 5-15 minutes, which is a very rough restimate, and I am not very clear headed, barely aware of the possibilites. I'm proud of this Even as I say it, I'm amazed that I have this consistency with 0 effort. I don't record my dreams, I don't reality check, I rarely think about lucid dreaming. Although I never stopped being mindful and trying to maintain a clear head.

I'm going to set my alarm for WBTB and I'm also going to record my dream in the morning. I'm very excited and I also really optimistic that I'm going to really really improve over the course of the next few weeks and if I keep up my efforts I think I'll be reliably having pretty cool lucid dreams within a month

Oh, I'll also do some reality checks every now and then, and remind myself of stabillization techniques after the RC, and I'll meditate a little bit more.

And I don't have any particular goals. Even though there are are 100s of things that I really really really want to do. I mean, really! All the hundreds of things But I don't have the skill and, for some mysterious reason, I am patient about this. So my plan is to just breathe, become aware of my bodily sensations and surroundings, and then at the start of the dream I'll just hang around and see what I feel like doing. I think it would be best to focus on clear headedness and awareness and staying lucid as much as possible, because I have a feeling that especially for beginners, actually remaining lucid somehow does more for your skill than anything else. I feel like I'm gaining experience points for every minute I am lucid I'll probably try out lots of crazy things just because "But what if it works?!!", but I'll try to focus my attention to remaining clear headed and aware of my surroundings.

edit: Good to talk to you again, my friend = ) I love your new picture, it made me instinctivaly stretch my lungs, eager to fill it with sweet, fresh air.

edit 2: I'll also keep refreshing the letters "L" and "D" on my left and right palm (LD on both palms), I have a feeling that this will serve as a good reality check, it gives my palms an extra special look xD

Sounds like a breakthrough moment for your lding skills Ginsan, congrats!

Apart from not doing anything ld related, have you been doing something else - meditation perhaps, that you feel might be contributing to your current hot streak?

So, you have written L and D on both your hands? That's a really cool way to RC and remind yourself about lding!

I'll add a short version, because I went on for quite a while, it's mostly ranting xD Basically it says, it's probably more a very gradual improvement than a hot streak, but I will have a very hot streak very soon because I'll be meditating more and also taking supplements. And hopefully the hot streak will extend into a huge blazing inferno of nightly awesomeness, only dying when I die. I also eat lots of fruits and veggies, and I think this is recent, so this may be helping too.

Here is the long version.
Well, a lot of little things I would guess. I have been valueing mindfulness for at least the past 2 years, even if I never meditated much. I sometimes listen to talks about meditation. I've also always been fascinated by the possibilites of dreams, I also just sleep a lot, and make sure I sleep comfortable, I'd neglect everything down to my hygene and friendships, but sleep is one of the very last things I can let go but I'm not sure if it's a hot streak. I think it's been either lingering or improving extremely slowly and gradually, with the usual ups and downs. I've also always been fantasizing about LDs, so I think that it's not likely to be a hot streak.

I may get an extremely hot streak though, one burning with the fire of a thousand suns!! I have some money again and I'm going to spend it very wisely. I bought an mp3 player and a headset had overwhelmingly good reviews. I can put guided meditations tracks on it, this makes it almost unnecessary to have any discipline, in my case, so I'll be meditating more. Now I can also do this in the privacy of my room, whereas usually I'd have to wait for the house to be quiet and listen downstairs, on the computer. But when the house is quiet I want to do other things on the computer So now I just have more opportunities to meditate with a guide. I can also go outside, sit in a park and meditate, walk, enjoy music. This will help my dreams in several ways, exercise (good for anything you can think of), fresh air (good for everything), and I'll have a much more peaceful and clear mind while meditating and also the rest of the day.

Now comes the explenation for the thousand-suns-hot-streak: I'm going to buy supplements = D I'm going to do some internet researching on several things, on my research list is now Calea, Galantamine, Chlonine and Zinc. I'm pretty sure I'm going to buy Calea and put it inside by capsules, because the taste is apparently horrible. I remember reading on bodybuilding forums that Zinc is awesome for higher quality sleep, and I remember from 1 person that Galantamine boosts recall, I also know from DV that Galantamine and Chlonine are popular.

Supps, high quality sleep, a clear mind induced by meditation, dream journaling, tons of ideas for LDing, the only thing I need now is to CHILLLLL, because if I can't keep my excitement at a moderate level, I might die from insomnia before having a single dream again xD I set my alarm to up after 6 hours of sleep and I was sleep deprived for 3 days, so I assumed I could go back to sleep, but I was way too excited about these new developments to sleep. Even now, 4 hours after waking up, I'm still feeling a buzz and tingly in my stomach xD After waking up I was giggling because I was so excited about all the thins I could be doing in my dreams within a month from now.

I'll let you know how it goes and I will probably also open a thread in the Supps category

Spoiler for The last notepad entry in my phone after waking up, before going downstairs. Yes I typed it in English, even though it's the 3rd language I learned xD:

I found the perfect formula. I take a mdoerate amount of Calea, a moderate recall boost, fueled by a dream journal, meditation, quality sleep, time and patience, and I'll be having the most amazing dreams within no time. I can use Vraad sorcery, I can ride Darkhorse *2 figures from the book series Legends of the Dragonrealm*, I can go to the Bleach universe, become Halibel's friend, fight Ulquiorra, learn tech *sword tech^^* from Yamamoto and Kyouraku, from Dante, fight Vergil, give Zaraki the fights of his life. *Dante and Vergil are from Devil May Cry, a game where you slash up demons and the rest are from the Bleach anime* I can visite different kinds of civilisations, I can become a giant bird and *whoosh* though the most amazing landscapes *those *'s of the whoosh were in the original notepad*, I can sit in the mountains, breathe the most beautiful air, I can visit Paganini, Vieuxtemps, Enescu, Toscanini, Wieniawski, Menuhin, BEETHOVEN, hear the most beautiful music. *Toscanini is a conductor, Enescu and Menuhin are dead violinsists, of whom I have recordings, of the other 3 violinists no recordings exist, they died too early, you know Beethoven..* Dude..... There is so fucking much I can do. A great journey!! Starts... With but a single step. If I am always this excited, I might die from insomnia, and then I will sleep forever, without tasting the glorious depths of my mind. I can become a dragon.

I am confident that I could write 10 times as much text as that, that is just a taste of all the things I want to do. Please note that, as horny as I am, there is no sex there. Those things are all better than sex = D

Spoiler for Ranting about Legends of the Dragonrealm:

That book series, Legends of the Dragonrealm, contains probably about 15 titles now and I am now reading the 6th book. It has arrogant, savage dragons, huge armadillo-like creatures, aggressive and savage bird-people who communicate by sending jumbles of images/feelings/sensations/thoughts to each others' minds and use medallions filled with magic to fight, but even without medallion they are powerful sorcerers, they are also very cunning and deceptive, and even have powerful muscles, talons and beaks to tear into probably anything but dragon skin. They are also fast... Scary, huh? The dragons can shapeshift into human forms, where they seem to wear armor but it's actually their skin, the dragonhelm is part of the face, they occasionally let a few hisses slip when talking, their faces are obscured by the dragonhelm, because they don't actually have much of a face (I don't understand their faces), their eyes are glowing orbs, in human or dragon form. And that transformation process is described in amazing ways, when I think of the transformations, the memory is almost as vivid as if I had seen a video of it. There are beings that are of the human race, but not much like humans at all. You have the wolf-raiders, who are wolf-men with powerful sorcerous abilities. The Vraad, the near immortal beings who change their faces, hair, stop aging, illness, conjure up food, teleport, build gigantic citadels that can shape itself according to their masters' desires, ofcourse they have insane offensive and defensive spells, all of that through their god-like sorcerous abilities... Imagine me becoming one of them o.0 And there is so much more to this world, so much things to do in a lucid dream by taking ideas from this book. There are countless other races, I haven't been introduced to them.. Yet And every race has its own powers, personality, type of civilization, history, most of the major races almost as deadly and fascinating as any other. All of this is vividly stored in my head, I think you'd agree that if I was a skilled lucid dreamer, I could have so much adventure... So much fucking adventure! Also, beside the major races there are also minor drakes, wyvers, those creatures that look you in the eye and turn you to into stone, and all drakes are slightly different, depending on where they live, were born and they also differ from drake to drake.

edit: I consider myself a fairly light sleeper and I have trouble keeping a sleep schedule going, so I won't take Galantamine. Zinc seems to be a solid supplement and Calea, doesn't seem to be as reliable as Galantamine, but I'm still going to try it at the very least 10 times. It's still one of the most popular supplements. Melatonin is dirt cheap, like Zinc, so I'll be taking those 2 for sure. I'm not sure about Calea and Choline yet. I'm going to work within a few hours and when I'm done, the stores for Zinc and Melatonin may be closed, but I think I will be able to buy Calea in time. I'll also be quite sleepy so I may get lucky tonight, because I'll sleep a lot.

edit 2: Dude,.,... Lady!! I just realised, I could watch some nature videos and turn into any creature I want! Seriously... How is Lucid Dreaming not the most popular thing in the world?

edit final: I bought Melatonin, Zinc, and omega 3 fish oil (overall health), and 100 grams of Calea Tonight I will wake up after about 4.5 hours, so that I can be sure that I will be able to sleep again. I also bought a capsule machine, so in the night, when everybody's sleeping (my parents wouldn't approve of this, the tight asses...), I'll make some capsules and hopefully enjoy some vivid dreams!

I did not get amazing dreams.

The Melatonin seemed to help put me to sleep, I don't know if the zinc helped, I have no reference point. I did a 40 min guided meditation before sleeping, after 4 hours woke up, drank some the tea of 3 grams of calea (the taste is not bad at all, I didn't even use any honey or sugar or anything), then I did the same 40min guided meditation and afterwards I couldn't sleep, for at least 90 minutes Eventually I did sleep, for 7-8 more hours I remembered more dream content, and I did not have anything amazing, all random, forgettable, trivial events. Except for the first part, where I kept being woken up by something or someone scary and I was too scared to move or even talk, then I woke up again with the same thing, this happened 3 or 4 times, the last time was another FA but without scares and I had some boring things with my brother. After that I remembered fragments, during this 8 hour sleep period I woke up.went back to sleep I'd guess 3-5 times. Too many factors were at play here, so I can't really say anything. Even the strong sleepiness after taking Melatonin I can't attribute to Melatonin. Too many people are too quick to draw conclusions, not me, nah-uh As the guy in the shop said, I'll take about the same amount of Calea 4 days in a row, and then rest for 4 days, and repeat this twice (so 3 times in total), and then I'll double the amount for another 3x cycle. I'll probably be able to say something about the effect of this particular dose of Calea after 24 days.

The new headset is great, btw

Also, I have a strong suspicion that the supps really helped me sleep, and it was a very beautiful 11-12 hours of sleep, but I'll be able to see if this is true or not within a few weeks.

Love all the motivation Ginsan! I think this will help you get a lot of lds! Great idea about the nature videos and animals! Why don't you try to incubate this as a dream and possibly turn it into ld? I had a very weird (for me anyways) shapeshifting nld couple of nights ago that was almost lucid. It happened by accident but I can defininetly see how one can watch favorite movies, do some visualization during the day and before bed to help dream of anything one wants.

That's too much effort, I don't have enough motivation to do that

You never know until you give it a try! At some point I realized that I was incubating my dreams anyways before going to bed. But what was I incubating - thoughts of negative events of the past day or worries for events that may or may not happen. And then guess what I was dreaming of? Now, when I go to bed I know not to think about those things and think of something pleasant instead. Well, most of the time.

Mehh I'm still not convinced If I want something pleasant to think about before sleeping, I can just read Legends of the Dragonrealm, which I very often do.

Today I couldn't sleep at all. I slept for about 4 hours, I think, and the rest of the time was spent mostly awake and sometimes falling asleep for a few minutes. It was extremely irritating. I didn't take Calea, because I couldn't sleep.

My alarm woke me up after 4 hours of sleep, I remembered the last part of a dream, wrote it down, went downstairs, made some Calea tea and drank it. Again, it was bitter but not horrible. It's almost tasty. But I couldn't sleep, again. I was awake for 3-4 hours, spent some time listening to music and reading Legends of the Dragonrealm, nothing I did worked. I did some mindfulness training while lying down. My mind was tired, because I couldn't think straight at all, like when you're very sleepy, but my body was very much awake, even energetic. It's an extremely irritating experience, to lie down for hours and not be able to sleep, even though I really really want to. I did buy a capsule machine so I can make it into capsules and not have to make tea every night, which is way too time consuming, the bitterness wakes me up, and I don't want my parents to find out that, even though I have no income, I'm spending significant portions of my money to have better dreams.

But I'll have to find a way to pulverize the dry leaves, so I can make Calea capsules. My parents are away and will remain away for at about an hour, probably, so now is a good time to find out how to pulverize these leaves I hope I will then be able to take in Calea and actually fall asleep afterwards

I'm no expert in this supp, but if it helps with lucid dreaming, I think it may indeed be the reason for your excessive wakefulness. Can you decrease the amount you take?

I'm taking the recommended dosage, but the guy in the shop said that it is not stimulating and will not keep me awake. I'm pretty sure it's the tea. I have to go downstairs, wait for the water to boil, then take it upstairs, wait for it to cool down, throw the leaves out of the cup and then drink it. It takes about 45 minutes, after which I'm not sleepu at all anymore. I also looked around quite a bit via Google and nobody mentioned anything like it waking you up or keeping you awake. I can't get the coffee grinder to work, strangely. If I did, I'd have 4 bags of dream powder by now... I can always go back to the shop and ask them to grind the leaves for me. It'll take a few hours and 10 bucks for the train rise, but that's alright.

edit: I actually got a bag of 1 gram of an extract of the Calea, which is 10 times stronger per gram than the leaves. 3 Grams was the dosage the guy in the shop recommended, so I could go 3 nights with this. Because the stuff is in small enough chunks, I can put all of it in probably 1 or 2 capsules. I'm extremely tempted to take all of it in 1 night, because I've been failing for 2 days after being so excited (for months, actually) about Calea and I'm also sleep deprived, so I should have a great, long sleep. I think I'll make 3 capsules, and if I get sleepy rather late, I'll just take them 1 by 1. But if I get sleepy early, meaning there won't be any noise and light around the time I wake up, I'll take 3 capsules Or maybe I'll take 1 anyway, just to prevent myself from getting so excited I stay awake again. I dunno... I'll say what happened tomorrow xD

I couldn't find the capsules, which is really really strange. 1 Possibility is that my parents found them in my bag, along with the Calea and in order to test me they hid the capsules. So if I ask them about it, we can talk about why I bought all those leaves, but if I don't, they will suspect that I am hiding the leaves and capsules and that they're things I don't want them to know about. Far-sought? May be, I think it's quite likely.

But I didn't want to make tea again, because it kept me awake twice, so I went without Calea. But I woke up in the middle of the night, without alarm, after about 4-5 hours of sleep, went to pee, back into my bed within 2 minutes and couldn't sleep again. After laying in bed for 30-90 minutes, I listened to some music, read the book, and here I am watching Tenascious D videos. I hope that this won't go on. Yesterday I was sleepy enough to fall asleep around 8 o clock, without melatonin, whereas 2 days ago I fell asleep around midnight. If the pattern continues, I'll fall asleep in the afternoon, sleep 4-5 hours, wake up, go downstairs, and repeat this pattern. It wouldn't be bad if I just slept less and dreamt less, but my mind is also fuzzy, I can't think straight, I'm not in a good mood, I'm impulsive and have even less motivation to do anything that requires effort.

When the shops open I'll go buy some new capsules, but I don't know what to do about my inability to sleep. I actually do know, but I just don't want to. For example, I can start going to the gym again and start preparing for my university entrance exam. Both are very important in themselves, and now that I can't sleep it seems almost like I have no choice but to either suffer from sleeplesness or go to the gym/do homework.

Out of impulsivity, and because there was nobody home, I used the remaining 15-20 grams in the bag (I have 3 more bags) and made tea from it. I'll soon go to sleep and after 4 hours I'll wake up and drink the tea. I actually needed 2 cups to stir it, because it was way too thick. It barely looked like tea xD So now the tea is ready and within a few hours I'll wake up and drink it = D Yes I'm being impulsive instead of smart and thinking for the long term.

I'm going to make some journal entries, because I only need 49 more points to get that sweet glowing username = D

Also, I couldn't sleep again, this time I only slept 3.5 hours. After taking the Calea I almost fell asleep 3-4 times and every time I noticed my awareness shifting away, I was so excited by being able to fall asleep and dream after 2 days of not being able to do it and after having drunk 5+times the amount of recommended Calea, I woke up every time. I guess I'll have to start making myself tired...

You're probably recognizing a pattern here. Motivation for a short period of time followed by a usually much longer period of lack of motiviation. I'm in the probably short period of motivation now. Because of the competition, I thought "Alright, let's at least journal some dreams, even if they are not awesoem". And my recall is improving slowly, maybe I'll get lucid one of these days = )

Also, I started practicing on the violin and also juggling (I'm pretty close to mastering 4 balls xD), just 15-30 minutes a day per activity. It may seem insignificant, but I also often watch lectures by scientists on Youtube, and I read books from that awesome series Legends of the Dragonrealm. So it adds up to my fatigue, allowing me to become tired and properly fall asleep and stay asleep. I might do WBTBs again if my motivation for juggling and violin paying remains intact.

Good to hear you're in a good mood for ld and violin, Ginsan! I have to say, I have ups and downs as well. Sometimes I can't even decide what to do in my next ld and that is usually automatically tied to my motivation.

I got a 20-25 minute lucid dream the night before last night and I had about 15 minutes of lucidity last night. What did I do? Enter the competition, start journalling my dreams, and I repeat a mantra. I repeat to myself over and over "if I see a girl, I am in a dream". I am confident that this works because I always see girls in my dreams and I NEVER see girls in real life. The strange thing is that those 2 dreams I did not become lucid upon seeing a girl. This may seem far-sought, but I think that just by repeating the mantra and thereby being confident that I will become lucid and also by constantly saying it, 10-15 minutes before sleeping my mind is filled with this mantra of becoming lucid by seeing a girl and being confident that I will become lucid and thinking about how I'm going to relax and observe my surroundings and have a stable and long dream.

About the first night, it was really boring. The only interesting thing about it was that I was slipping out of the dream and once or twice even came back to my FA bed but I was somehow able to will myself back. This happened 3-5 times I think. For the second night, here is the link to the journal entry: Pretty cool lucid dream, though probably boring to read Only the last 2 paragraphs are relevant, even to my mentor. = )

I just realized that I am not getting very excited about 2 wonderful successes, I mean... About 40 minutes of lucidity in 2 nights!! But I think it's a good thing that I'm not getting too excited, I am excited enough to keep journalling and doing mantra's but not so excited that I can't sleep or will prematurely end a dream. So let's hope that I keep it cool

Also, I am not planning on doing crazy things in dreams, yet I just want to remain calm, stabilize and lengthen the dream, and I think I will know when it is time to go crazy in dreams. Maybe it's precisely because I have so many things I want to do (just think of post #108), I want to go slowly and gradually and make sure that I will get there some day, even if it's not soon. I have so many things planned that it's just impossible to do it haphazardly. So maybe that's why I'm able to remain calm. Or it's just that I have been at this mediocre level for at years and I have learned my lesson in a very bitter way and that's why I want to go slowly and securely.

edit: I just made some Calea tea with 3 times the recommended dosage of the extract. I don't have a systematic way to ingest the stuff (I can't pulverize it and put it into capsules) that's why I put in so much and I am going to sleep within 4-5 hours. It appears that it's not necessary to take it after 4-5 hours of sleep, so I'm going to try it.

edit2: do you remember this thread I made? LD Control chamber / Ultimate god mode I read through it and it's pretty fun to see the excitement I had 2 years ago. I wonder what kind of a person I was 2 years ago.. It seems like I have become rather boring, if that thread and that excitement is an indication of what I was like This made me want to start writing in the waking journal on DV, so that later on I can read my own stuff and find out what kind of a person I was. It also gave me a wake up call, telling me: "Hey!!! You freakin' idiot!!! You can't live on like this, your soul is dying and it has been dying for who the hell knows how long! Do something that excites you instead of living like a freakin' zombie!!"

I'm going to attempt WILD tonight. I'm going to read some stuff about it and then try doing it. I hate it that I am not getting lucid as often and as long and as lucid as I want and I am getting impatient. So I'm going to go ahead and WILD. I was always afraid of the transition, because it would get loud and body sensations would be weird and things like that but now I'm willing to go through a highly unpleasant experience. I also realized that if I get good at this I can do this pretty much every night with a high success rate and it seems much more than DILD.

How did the WILD attempt go?