New member + questions

**essbee** · 03-22-2012 04:03 PM

Hello there,

I've recently found about lucid dreaming and I'm highly interested in it. While being a bit skeptical about these kind of things, I want to try it myself.

I have some questions I hope you guys will be able to answer:

Obviously I got to start at the very first step and that is to start remembering my dreams. I tried it last night and I wasn't able to recall my dream. The problem is that I rarely remember my dreams. I may need help on being able to frequently remember them. I tried repeating myself to remember my dream but I think somewhere before my sleep I stopped doing so and that's maybe why it didn't worked. I'm quite confused about how this work.

I've read through some people experiences saying that it took them 6 years to get into real lucid dreaming. That seems to be extremely long for something that I'm not even sure that is worth it. I mean, is it really that amazing where you can do anything and feel it like it was real life? If yes, how can you handle real life after that, how can the real world be exciting after such an experience?

Also, what is the difference between lucid dreams and OBE? I know OBE is for out of body experiences but what's the real deal between the two? This website seems to be about lucid dreamind so I guess lucid dreaming is more enjoyable?

And finally, I'm also confused about how all this work together. I mean, can you really train your brain to actually be able to lucid dream? Like you would practice anything else? That's quite fantastic if so. And it seems to be a mix of remembering your dreams, being able to know that you're in a dream and then put this together to be able to eventually get into lucid dreams and knowing what you're doing. It really is hard to believe since I don't think that many people know about this. If it was really that amazing, why haven't I heard about this before? And why don't we see many news talking about this or people in every day coming to you saying that he's able to lucid dream and suggest you to do it? Lucid dreaming seems like a pretty unknown phenomenon which fascinate me but keeps me skeptical because of all these reasons.

Anyway, I hope some of you will be able to thoroughly answer my questions.

Thank you and have a nice day!

**Matte87** · 03-22-2012 06:15 PM

Hi and welcome to DV!

To improve your recall you need to start writing your dreams down, lie completely still when you wake up in the morning and try to relax. This will trick your body into thinking you're going back to sleep and your "dream memory" will be accessed. Once something pops up, try to "probe" that image or fragment. It'll end with you recalling an entire dream. Try to rewind those dreams in your head as far back as possible.

It doesn't take six years. Perhaps to master LD'ing, but it takes only a few days or weeks at most for most people to attain their first lucid dream. It's not that hard really. It can feel like real life yes. All senses can be felt and experienced in a dream. Some are even more enhanced if focused on, but it's not as "solid" in a dream as in real life. Lucid dreaming is never a substitute for real life. It's just like an awesome computer game. Remember that dreams are built upon waking experiences. If you just ignore your life and try to live it out in a dream, you'll end up with nightmares and depression and all sorts of nasty stuff.

OBE's are not scientifically proven to exist. There's theories that they are indeed real, but nothing has been proven. It's when your "spirit" leaves your body somehow and you can travel around in the real world, observing things happening nearby your house for example.

Ofcourse you can train yourself! It's all about awareness. When you're dreaming the logical centre of the brain is inactive. If you train yourself to activate that (meaning start thinking logically) you'll get lucid. Question your surroundings and real life in general. This will carry over into your dreams. Why people haven't heard of this is because sadly lucid dreaming is at the edge of the catogory of "crazy people's hobbies." Luckily Inception changed a bit of that. Another reason why people don't care is because it does take alot of effort to get good at, and since you only have a few tries at most per night, it's harder to stay dedicated than when practicing a sport for example.

If lucid dreaming became world known and accepted, the entertainment industry would have a hard time convincing people to play their games instead of going to sleep

Lucid dreaming is 100% real. An entire community with 50k+ members wouldn't exist if it wasn't. Remember that confidence hugely affects your chances of getting lucid. So believe in yourself and know you can get lucid tonight if you want to.

I hope that answered them all

If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Keep on dreaming!

**Bimpo** · 03-22-2012 06:42 PM

Matte pretty much answered all of them, and even if he didn't, i do not have that much experience in LD to answer them, but I want to add a few things on the last question, there are many amazing things that are not world known
for example the Voyager 2, if you dont know what that is you might want to look it up, it's amazing but it's not really well known. There is also the Golden Ratio, again it is something AMAZING, but not really well known.

My point is that, anything that is fascinating or "out of the world" is not always exposed to all the people, the news mostly talk about politics and such, and if they have some time to waste, they might
put up some scholarly research now and then, which to be honest not a lot of people care about.

**essbee** · 03-22-2012 07:32 PM

Wow thanks to both of you.

A little question for Matte87: You say that it takes only a few days or weeks (to lucid dream) but later you point out that it takes a lot of effort to get good at. If you can lucid dream in short time, why does it take that much effort? Maybe I misunderstood your point and you're just saying that to start getting better, like having a lucid cream each night, you really need to put effort into it and it gets much longer?

All in all, I'll keep at it. I don't mind starting slowly by just trying to remember my dreams each night and go from there.

**Arch** · 03-22-2012 11:39 PM

I know you directly asked Matte87, well the more effort you put in the better results you get, to achieve your first lucid usually only requires afew days because most people want it really bad, then it usually takes a fair bit of effort to start getting them consistently because it starts to come down to changing your daily routine.
Hope that makes sense.

**essbee** · 03-23-2012 01:19 AM

Ok yeah, that's what I thought. Thanks a bunch for your answer.

**redboyryn** · 03-23-2012 01:38 AM

a really important thing is to believe in yourself, never doubt yourself, anything is possible if you believe you can do it

**Quietus** · 03-23-2012 01:07 PM

Originally Posted by essbee

Hello there,
I mean, is it really that amazing where you can do anything and feel it like it was real life? If yes, how can you handle real life after that, how can the real world be exciting after such an experience?

It's good to be skeptical and question things. I had the exact same thoughts when i first started trying to LD. But when i had my first lucid dream I understood exactly what it was all about. At the time it all feels real, (i remember actually commenting on how real it feels). But when you wake up, you realise that it is still just a dream. You look back on them after you've awoken, and they still feel like dreams. If anything the excitement that comes with lucid dreaming gives you something to look forward to when you go to bed, but as Matte says, the experience can never really replace waking life.

Also depending on how experienced you are at lucid dreaming, you don't always have full control over your actions. My advice is to give it a try =]. All DILDing requires is for you to improve your recall by creating a Dream Journal and perform reality checks throughout the day. Good luck!

**essbee** · 03-23-2012 04:09 PM

I believe I'll eventually be able to do it.

As for reality checks, I understand it's goal but I find it hard to understand how are you supposed to make these checks during your dreams if you are not lucid. I mean, I'm not really controlling myself right now in dreams so I'm not really able to do what I want therefore I can't really make these reality checks, no? And should I try to reality check at the same time I'm trying to improve my dream recalling, 2 things at once?

My experience so far:

This night I tried again to be able to remember my dreams. I put my alarm 30 minutes earlier than normal and when I woke up, I instantly closed my alarm and immediatly went back to sleep. But when I had to wake up for real, I was able to exactly recall what happened during that 30 minutes. Sadly, I was just able to remember a few seconds from another dream that night so I thought that mybe I need to wake up more often during the night then go back to sleep to remember these dreams? If I do that, will my brain become more used to remember dreams and I'll eventually be able to recall them even tho I don't force myself to wake up multiple times during the night?

So far: No dreams recalled in day 1, 1 and a half dreams recalled in day 2.

Thanks a lot to all of you, I really appreciate all your replies. Cheers!

Edit: Oh and is it ok if I do my dream journal on a notepad on my computer? I mean, if I do it here, there isn't any interesting things going on right now and I think it's easier to do it on notepad.

**Matte87** · 03-23-2012 04:41 PM

Yeah, if you want to improve your dream recall really fast you can set an alarm every 1½ hours so that you wake up in REM, but that usually leads to you lacking in sleep after a while, you shouldn't do this for a very long time. You will still be able to improve your recall alot by just trying to recall dreams in the morning.

Only the knowledge that you can be lucid in a dream is enough to become lucid. It's like I said all about being aware of your surroundings. With practice you will get better at it and remember to check if you're dreaming if you see something weird. My DILD's are often spontaneous though and nothing special has to happen for me to realise I'm dreaming.

Ofcourse you don't have to have your DJ in here

**Robot_Butler** · 03-23-2012 04:46 PM

Your dream recall should improve as you build the new habit of remembering and journaling. Make it a priority to write in your journal immediately every morning. Even if you don't remember any dreams, still write something. The goal is to train yourself to make dreams the first thing you think of every morning.

I use a pen and paper notebook to record my dreams. I find it is the easiest and most immediate solution. Sometimes I transfer my favorite dreams to an online journal to be able to share them with others. It is fun to get input from other people.

If you are not remembering dreams first thing in the morning, try waking up throughout the night. We wake briefly after every REM cycle throughout the night, then immediately go back to sleep and forget about it. You can train yourself to notice these awakenings and take advantage of them. It is much easier to remember a dream when it only happened 8 seconds ago.

**essbee** · 03-24-2012 02:34 AM

Okay, thanks to both of you. I'll try to wake up after each 2 hours or so. I can do it during weekends and during the week I might do it less often so I don't lack on sleep. I'll try this from now on.

**Matte87** · 03-24-2012 08:06 AM

The cycles for each person is around 90-100 minutes each, with REM at the end of every cycle. You don't spend much time in REM in the first three though, so if you want to set an alarm here's the times I would suggest: "4,5 hours into sleep, 6 hours into sleep, 7 hours into sleep." After 7 hours you'll be spending alot of time in REM, so set the alarm to ring every hour and after 9 hours you can set it to ring anytime you want. This is all ofcourse based on the presumption that you can fall asleep quickly after waking up. I have recalled 10+ dreams in a night by doing this.

**gab** · 03-24-2012 08:48 PM

Originally Posted by essbee

As for reality checks, I understand it's goal but I find it hard to understand how are you supposed to make these checks during your dreams if you are not lucid. I mean, I'm not really controlling myself right now in dreams so I'm not really able to do what I want therefore I can't really make these reality checks, no? And should I try to reality check at the same time I'm trying to improve my dream recalling, 2 things at once?

This was something I really didn't understand when starting out. How am I gonna look at my hands (my form of reality check) in a dream, when I have never ever seen my hands in dream before.
Well, in my first lucid, I suddenly, automatically asked myself "whoa, am I dreaming"? And as I was saying yes, to my greatest surprise, my hands jumped up infront of my eyes and that was my reality check. So, first, out of the blue you realize you are dreaming, and then you do a reality check, just to comfirm.

RE: why is lucid dreaming not well known - try to tell 10 of your friends about it. 8 of them will think you are nuts, or into occultism, or you talking bs. 1 of them will be interested, maybe he will look it up, but that's it. And maybe 1 of them will look it up and start practicing. People just don't believe in it, or they think, we shouldn't mess with our dreams. (that's not what we are doing, by the way)

Some people believe in OBEs (forum Beyond dreaming).

You train your brain to lucid dream by transfering behaviour from daytime into your regular dreams. If during daytime you stop what you doing for a minute and ask yourself "am I dreaming?', you will start doing this in your dreams. Excellent tutorial on daytime awarenes technique.
You practice that, do reality checks, write in your dream journal, say some mantras,be VERY excited about the whole thing and believe in yourself, and in no time you will start having lucid dreams.
Happy dreams