Thread: ...and the dry spell was finally broken. I hope.

I've been a self-taught LDer since I was 6 years old. Unfortunately, the older I got, the less frequently I would have LDs. Sure, I did still have them, but sometimes LDs were months apart. When I finally would have them, they would be short, unclear, unmemorable, or difficult to control. Prior to last night, I couldn't even tell you when my last LD was.

Yesterday, I stumbled upon a tiny LD website with tips on reality checks and prolonging LDs (obviously I'm not referring to this site). I went to bed with it in my mind. I told myself "You're going to have a LD tonight. When you start dreaming, you're going to remember this and have a LD" (if only it were always that simple!). Lo and behold, my subconscious saw fit to follow my instructions, and shortly after entering REM I remembered that I was scheduled to have a LD! I remembered a tip for making a LD more vivid and said, "clarify," after which the whole dream scene became sharper, and brighter. I discovered the use of verbal commands in dreams a long time ago on my own, but for some reason it never occured to me to use that one. Brilliant and simplistic. I went on to have a brilliant LD and really enjoyed the heck out of it. At some point it started to fade, and I tried to use the clarify command again. It worked momentarily then things started to fade again. I quickly tried to remember the stabilization techniques. I rubbed my hands together... Nothing. I looked at my hands and tried to inspect their details. It got a little better, but I could feel things slipping away. Then I remembered what had struck me as the weirdest tip... Do simple arithmetic. So, quickly I tried it out just as the dream seemed nearly lost to me, "4 + 4 = 8! 16 + 16 = 32!" and so on, and the dream came back into focus! I happily enjoyed my dream a while longer until it started slipping away again, and none of the previous techniques were working. Then I remembered to try spinning in place. Everything quickly went black, and I was upset because I thought I lost it. Until I realized that I was still dreaming, tried to revisualize the scene I had been in, and it all came back with stunning clarity. I continued on until I regretfully had to wake up to pee. Oh, but wait, it gets better. When I got back into bed, I had an... Accidental WILD (I didn't even know this had a name until yesterday). This has happened rarely in my life, and I've never been able to discern what triggers it, but I really hope to perfect this. I went on to enjoy the same lovely dream as before until it came to a natural end at my permission. Long post? Well, yes. It was a long dream. I estimate it was about an hour long in total, or close to it. It has really inspired me to renew my dream life, since it is evidence that age certainly has not robbed me of my ability to have high quality LDs. :-)

...and that's the story of how I came to be here.