Questions from a newby

Just wanted to introduce myself and ask a couple questions.

I discovered lucid dreaming about a month ago and have been working on dream recall and heightening my awareness. I have also been doing periodic reality checks. Before I started, I was lucky to remember 1 dream a month. In the beginning I was writing down 3-4 dreams per night, but now it has leveled out at around 2. Does this sound normal?

Regarding reality checks, how do I need to be ending them? Do I need to conclusively end by saying something like "since I can't breathe through my nose when I plug it, I must not be dreaming."?

Having two dreams each night sounds like a rather OK recall, so yes it sounds normal. Whenever you do a RC, you ask yourself if you're dreaming.

"If I have more or less than five fingers, I'm dreaming for sure, and if I have more or less, I will check again or do another RC" is what you should go for. Whenever you decide to do them, just spam questions and make sure you're very critical to everything around you. As long as the habit of doing them transfers to your dreams, and also the habit of doing then properly, you should be fine.

I'd say its best to think of it as "since I can't breathe through my nose when I plug it, I do not know whether or not I'm dreaming." You can really never know that you are not dreaming because it is posible for RCs to faill. Just do several RCs and always be on your toes. :)

I appreciate the the tips! I am having trouble keeping motivated because I have been at it for a month, and it seems like the last 2 weeks my progress has halted and even digressed a bit. I am doing my best trying to stay positive!

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Originally Posted by djennings1301

I appreciate the the tips! I am having trouble keeping motivated because I have been at it for a month, and it seems like the last 2 weeks my progress has halted and even digressed a bit. I am doing my best trying to stay positive!

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Just keep forcing yourself to practice, I just started on my forth week and it sucks, but I know once I have my first lucid the next one will be easier. It will just keep on getting easier till you get to once a week, and then if only once a week is challenging and starts to piss you off... Then shame on you for being greedy :)

Just keep on telling yourself that flying will be awesome. (or if you are like me, that having huge wars and junk like that will be awesome)

Another question for you guys:

Is it counter-productive to have more than one mantra? Could I have one that I tell myself throughout the day, and then a different one when I am falling asleep?

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Originally Posted by djennings1301

Another question for you guys:

Is it counter-productive to have more than one mantra? Could I have one that I tell myself throughout the day, and then a different one when I am falling asleep?

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I have been wondering the same thing actualy.

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Originally Posted by djennings1301

Another question for you guys:

Is it counter-productive to have more than one mantra? Could I have one that I tell myself throughout the day, and then a different one when I am falling asleep?

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I have many mantras, through out the whole day I plant into my mind that I "AM" going to be lucid tonight, every now and then I keep telling myself that till I get excited bout it and when I'm going bed I lay there and count down from a hundred and say to myself "when I hit 1 I will drift away into my dream and RC straight away" this worked the last time I tried it.
I think if you keep telling yourself you will have a Lucid by using as many mantras as you like to trick your mind and convince yourself that you WILL have one will greatly increase the chances. I hope this helps :)

I appreciate everyone's replies! I have another thing that I noticed last night that I wanted to ask about:

I noticed that I never really remember any of my DC's faces, UNLESS i directly interact with them, or it is someone I know in real life. Opinions on this? Could this mean that I need to be more observant of people around me in waking life?

I doubt your mind wants to draw anymore details for things you're not directly paying attention to. If not that then it means your mind didn't think it was worth remembering the details.

Just my thoughts on this.

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Originally Posted by THREAT

I have many mantras, through out the whole day I plant into my mind that I "AM" going to be lucid tonight, every now and then I keep telling myself that till I get excited bout it and when I'm going bed I lay there and count down from a hundred and say to myself "when I hit 1 I will drift away into my dream and RC straight away" this worked the last time I tried it.
I think if you keep telling yourself you will have a Lucid by using as many mantras as you like to trick your mind and convince yourself that you WILL have one will greatly increase the chances. I hope this helps :)

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What I was wondering atleast was if it is counter productive to try and do autosugestion about different things. For example I may want to have mantras about geting a lucid but also I want to do a mantra about remembering more dreams and another about remembering to do something after you get lucid.

well yeah I do that all the time, I tell myself "I'm going to be lucid tonight" and I also say things like "when I'm lucid I will remember to talk to a DC" and it has worked for me but I haven't been lucid alot so I'm not a 100% on this :P

Need some more advice, so I though I might as well keep posting in this thread. So here is my situation:

In the last week, I have had 2 chances to become aware, but missed them both. The first one, in my dream someone was trying to buy my house for $39 million dollars. I knew that something was odd there, and that I shouldn't be getting that much money for my house, but it never occurred to me that I was dreaming. The second, I was playing in a hockey game, and I kept looking at the digital scoreboard and the time on clock kept changing to random numbers every time i looked at it. I knew that this too was odd, but still couldn't figure out I was dreaming.

I have not had a lucid dream yet. I have been trying for a little over a month, and these 2 situations make me feel like I am getting close. Any tips on how to take advantage of situations like this?

I think you're getting closer because you're at least noticing that certain things are out of the ordinary. The best way to take advantage of a situation like that would be to do a reality check. Just keep in the habit of doing reality checks and asking yourself if you really are dreaming. Do this especially if you see anything weird or odd in waking life.