Hi Dreamviews!

Hello,
My name is Alfie, and I heard about lucid dreaming from my best friend. I decided to find out more about it and alas here I am! I'm keen to learn, as he's told me such amazing stuff about what's possible. However I'm a complete newbie, and I struggle to remember my dreams anyway, so I think I'm gonna need some help...

Anyone got any tips on how to better dream before I begin becoming lucid? Like how many hours of sleep should I get? What's the best sleep position? Should I keep a journal?

Anyway, I hope to be posting here often, and thanks for providing what looks like a great community! Can't wait to become a part of it. :D

Hello, EagleHawk, and welcome to Dreamviews.

While I cannot assist in attaining lucidity, I am aware that maintaining a dream journal shall help you with remembering and recalling your dreams.

Welcome Alfie! Thank your friend for us, it's always nice to see people sharing the word :D

Let's get to the key points shall we?

Sleep

Aim for 8-9hours. This isn't only healthy, but it's a good amount of time to give you loads of long dreams. With dreams (and lucid dreams), one more hour of sleep can make a huge difference. If possible, try to be as regular as you can: go to bed and get up at the same time every day. This helps your body to regular your sleep cycles much better, and will make you better at remembering your dreams through the morning. Don't worry about sleep position: sleep the way you most feel comfortable. Don't stress about anything as well: lucid dreaming is very healthy because it promotes sleep hygiene, so don't plan on adjusting your schedule for anything but to increase a few hours (if you sleep less than 7).

Dream journal

A big tool, that despite everything, can be a big hassle for you. I must warn you, keeping a DJ is a matter of hard-work and habit. The fact of recording your dreams will not only improve your dream recall, but also give you an extensive amount of data regarding your dreams, which you can later use to find patterns, re-ocurrent dream signs, and another disparities that happen during your adventures. Never underestimate the importance of a dream journal! If you normally dream about trains, you just need enough practice to get several lucid dreams once you get used to being focused on questioning your reality whenever you see one. Some mornings you won't recall dreams, and others you will recall many of them. Variation occurs (due for example a bad quality sleep night), but practice is the key (as in the majority of things about lucid dreaming).

The basics

This post isn't meant to be a tutorial (you can find plenty of them in here), so I'll focus on the main points:

- Awareness (especially self-awareness) is crucial if you want to get lucid, and lucid often. You need to start building the habit that at any point of your life you may be dreaming. Even at this very moment, you cannot be completely sure. When we dream, even the most weird things seem natural for us, so don't get fooled, and learn to question yourself during the waking life. Why are you at home now? Who's that animal besides you? What time is it? Why are you standing there? Where are you going tomorrow? What have you done in the past 15 minutes? It's not a matter of focus though, so don't burn your mind trying to spend every single minute of your waking life questioning yourself. It's a matter of awareness: being able to be conscious of what surrounds you, having a sense of your circumstances, and most importantly, having a sense of self. Allow me to demonstrate it for a few seconds:

http://rlv.zcache.co.uk/you_are_now_...1en8ks_216.jpg

Now, what can you do to be sure that you're not dreaming? Reality checks. Many actions can be a reality check, like trying to breathe with your nose and mouth covered, like sticking a finger through your palm, or even reading text to see if it changes. The most important part is not doing these actions automatically, but truly questioning your state. Be serious when you perform a reality check, or they will become mere mechanical actions. You can do them whenever you remember, or also by associating them to cues. For example, whenever you feel anxious (a common theme in people's dreams) you can do a reality check. The more you do (consciously!) the better. It's all about the habit: it may take some months, but at some point you'll be getting extra lucids because of these small steps.

The technique

Techniques are like clothes. There's some that are more fit for you than others. You need them to go out in the street, but they do not define you (remind me to copyright this :cheeky:). Recent scientific studies show that combining techniques increases chances of lucidity, so you can try and get the best of each one and make one yourself. During your travels around Dreamviews, don't be surprised if you see people disagreeing about a certain technique: some work for some people, others work for the rest. This is because lucid dreaming is a mental process which can be achieved by many ways: a strong memory, strong association, awareness, prospective memory, etc. Some people have a lucid dream in their first week, others take a month or two. The key? Consistency and positivism. You're the only one who can open the gates. Check this tutorial to find a suitable technique and practice for some time. Remember, a lucid dream can happen at ANY night, so don't go out thinking you'll never have one just because it's been 1 month.

Any questions, feel free to post, everyone is a beginner at some point. Good luck!

Hello Eaglehawk and welcome :welcome:to DV! You have come to the right place to learn about lucid dreaming. There is lot of information here to help you get started and what is more you have a dedicated team of lucid dreamers that will answer any questions you encounter on the way.

As a very first step I would recommend keeping a dream journal. You can also begin reading about different techniques and tutorials to find out which suits you best. See you around and...sweet dreams! :)

Yo and welcome. :)
To add to what zoth00 said, i suggest visiting dreamviews academy and it's intro class: Intro Class , it's a pretty good place to start out. :peek:
Good luck on your journey into lucid dreaming!

Thank you everyone for your help! I had a really intense dream the other night, and I think it's down to reading these forums! I'm going to start creating my dream journal, and shall let you all know how I get on. :)