An Introduction and My Frustration

Hello all, I'm new here (as obviously stated by the title ;)), and I'm glad I found Dreamviews because it's a very nice, friendly site where I can learn more about lucid dreams.

In the past, before I knew what lucid dreams were, or that lucidity was even possible, I had two lucid dreams (where I only controlled a small part of each). When I first read about the idea of being awake in dreams, I counted myself to sleep and found myself dreaming, counting, and saying "I'm dreaming." I woke up soon after I heard myself counting, though. My fourth lucid dream was the first night I watched the Lucid Dreaming Subliminal Video. I didn't see myself, but knew I was dreaming, and very quickly woke up since I didn't know about stabilizing dreams.

I really started my dream journal on July 9th of this year, and have been trying different techniques ever since. I tried binaural beats, drinking orange juice or green tea before bed, WBTB, DEILD, intention, and even completely failed at MILD even though I had several chances in the dreams to check my reality. I have been doing reality checks (lightswitches, digital clocks, looking at my hands, clothes, all sorts...) almost every day since I started the quest for lucid dreaming. I've bought and rented books, listened to CDs, mp3s during REM...No success. The only thing is, I saw my watch I check once in my dream. The time had changed, but when I picked it up, it went back to 'normal.' (The watch I wear is like my totem like from Inception.)
I am seriously ready to have at least one lucid dream after a month and a half of trying. Am I trying too hard, or what? :bang: My mom suggested I forget about it all for a week and see what happens.

Any thoughts on my predicament?

I'm still very new too, but who knows a break might help. I had a couple lucid dreams without even trying before I joined the forum. Then I joined and tried to have them and got no results for awhile. So I kind of gave up for about a month or so. This past week I sort of came back to it, and already last night I had a very short lucid dream. So who knows maybe a little break could help you too. I of course kept my DJ during my break, I just kind of stopped with the RCs/DILD etc.

Alright, I think I'll try taking a break for a while. I think I'll still keep my awareness and RCs up, though. I'll report if anything happens. :)