Hey everyone on Dreamviews!

Hey all! My name is Nicholas, I am currently 17 and will be 18 at the end of August this year. I have been an aspiring lucid dreamer for a few years now. Since roughly 2008 I have had moderate successes with around 10 or so semi-lucid dreams. It definitely has been a very enlightening few experiences, but I feel I have lost it and have been on the longest dry spell yet.

I made an account here a few months back but have not posted much, tends to be that way for me on just about every other forum. I also have been on ld4all for a while and have made a few posts.

Although I have had several lucid dreams, I am definitely no expert, far from it. I still seem to have to relearn everything as my mind just gets so cluttered with thoughts from the day and what I must do, at night it usually takes quite a long time for me to fall asleep and it is difficult for me to get into a lucid dreaming mindset. Visualizing and the desire to have a lucid dream are very strong for me, but I can't seem to hold on to it and follow through for many of the techniques.

I have definitely attempted many of the techniques, particularly the WBTB and WILD combination, but many of my prior successes were completely random, and almost spontaneous, very strange.

Anyway, before I ramble on for far too long, I will try to become active here on this forum whenever I can. I definitely hope to succeed and learn as much as I can. Thanks.

:bigteeth: Welcome to to DV! :D

Hey you joined the same time I did, welcome back!

It's not uncommon for people to have that spontaneous, random success with LDs. You're probably over-thinking the process, since it takes you a while to fall asleep. Having a cluttered mind will do that to you :P

I recommend continuing to read up on LDs throughout the day, but try to forget about all the technique when you actually go to sleep. You don't need to focus that hard on getting a LD, it will just happen naturally if it's on your mind. DILDs are usually much easier to have success with, especially when coupled with a WBTB. WILDs take a lot of finesse, and are pretty damn hard to have consistent success with as a beginner.

Thanks for the welcoming!

Yeah, I definitely know what you mean. It seems that the WILDs that I attempt end up with me laying there getting uncomfortable and my eyes starting to strain. I would get up after maybe 5 or 6 hours of sleep and only stay up no longer than 5 minutes. I would usually lay on my back and try and relax and count or do something relatively passive so I can slip into a dream.

Oddly enough, my successes with previous lucid dreams have been me giving up on a WILD and just rolling over not caring really, it is strange but it felt like an intense rushing and bam! I am in, but it is just so sporadic and unpredictable. That has happened perhaps 2 or 3 times and it seems like the sure fire way to get a lucid dream. The vividness was lacking and I didn't feel like my rational mind was fully there, but it was a start. Thanks for the tips.

Some of mine were the DILD, about 4 or so, very odd they were. A problem I have is getting out of that watching a movie with no control state of dreaming. My mind just seems off, I cannot seem to even think for myself. On rare occasion I will have a thought, but I can't seem to bring it around and control it to do a reality check or ask if I am dreaming.

I will definitely work on it more starting tonight! Thanks again!

Welcome back to DV :)
You probably won't have too many problems getting back into it if you've had some already. Like Raph said you don't have to focus TOO hard, just know you will LD. If you get too frustrated about it you wont succeed. That's the worst thing to so so don't get stressed about it. If you're having trouble try taking a few day break. :) Try to lay off on WILDs for a while, try to WBTB and MILD for now :) just focus on DILDs. You're gonna be back in the loop in no time. Good luck!

Thank you very much erible! That is what I am leaning towards now, as much as I'd like to do WILDs and see them potentially succeed, they take a lot out of my sleep and there seems to be a lot of preparation necessary for it.

I will admit, I am going to sleep very late being summer and all, past midnight and it also doesn't help that I am constantly in front of a computer screen or TV. I do a lot of research on various interests and tend to get really carried away with it and spend my entire day just looking things up and then I usually have a hard time thinking of anything else.

I will work more on the MILD and DILD techniques, I have noticed how autosuggestion works with waking me up about 2 or 3 minutes before my alarm clock, during school days, it always happens. As if the routine is already embedded into the subconscious. Thanks for the advice!

I'm in the same boat with you haha, when I go to bed it's around 2-4 most night because it's summer , so I wake up from 10-12 usually. And I'm usually on the computer a lot too xD But I mean I don't think the computer really hinder me (I don't really watch tv but I keep it on when falling asleep) at least they don't anymore.

And as much as WILDs seem appealing, they are usually difficult, especially and obviously for beginners. They rush into WILDs only to fail and then give up. I mean it's great to try them every so often but also along with other techniques. I rarely WILD, besides DEILD.

Anyway, it looks like you're off to a good start. :goodjob:

I sure plan to keep my momentum up though, I had a rather uneventful night though. I need to definitely also work on my recall, I used to be able to remember my dreams very well, but now it seems I cannot remember even little bits of anything. I also have a problem with getting uncomfortable really fast when I try to sleep and that tends to be very distracting.

My concern with DILD is that it can be so random. I haven't remembered a normal dream for longer than a month or so and the nature of a DILD seems difficult to obtain. I here and there read through my old dream journal for inspiration and will go online and read information, it doesn't seem to stick at night however.

It could be the fact that I am up playing video games and chatting with my friends very late. I wonder if I held off doing that and started going to bed at a relatively decent time, maybe my results will improve.