Not Quite Sure What I Am Doing, Haha.

Ok, so I have had one lucid dream before, and it was during a nap on my couch. I thought I woke up but just to be sure I did a nose pinch RC and I found that I could breathe in. So I got up off the couch and started walking towards the door to the room but I ended up losing control and waking up.

Since then I have continued to try lucid dreaming, with varied results. I never have gotten another lucid dream or made any progress, until recently. I've been waking up and doing nose RCs and they work maybe two or three times a week, however now, whenever they work I feel like the first lucid dream felt, except I can't see anything and I can't get up out of my bed. Also, if I try really hard to get up or move I end up waking myself up.

At first I thought I might just be waking up during sleep paralysis and that the reality checks were somehow not working properly, possibly because my upper airways aren't the greatest due to allergies. Anyway, I thought this is what was happening, however last night I had a successful RC and I was lying on my bed but in a completely different position and when tried too hard to move, I woke up on the other side of the bed and rotated 180 degrees, in my normal sleeping position.

So it seems I am finding some middle ground between dreaming and lucid dreaming and I can't quite make it to lucidity. Does this sound familiar to anyone? And if so, do you have an idea of how to fix this? Thanks.

So nobody can help me?

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Originally Posted by AhThe2nd

So nobody can help me?[/b]

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Patience, young padawan :P

First off, welcome to the forum :) You've come to the right place to learn more about LDing.

Have you tried any other induction techniques besides the reality checks? MILD, WBTB, and DILD are good for beginners. If you haven't already, you should check out the tutorials.

As for reality checks, I like to do them in conjunction with a common dreamsign. For example, I always have problems dialing or using a phone in dreams - this is a common dreamsign of mine. So anytime I fumble the numbers or something weird happens with the phone in real life, which is often enough, I do a reality check.

My favorite RC is comparing my wristwatch with a wall clock because the times never match in my dreams. And it's easy and inconspicuous. But do whatever RC works best for you. A lot of people like the nose RC.

Please let us know if you have any other questions. Good luck and have fun! :D

just a question- when you do a RC like getting up and checking a clock with your eyes open, and it fails,(meaning you're not dreaming) does that mean you are just some looney walking around your house in the middle of the night?

I have tried WBTB but I hardly ever get the opportunity to try it again because my alarm would wake up the people sleeping across the hall. MILD I have tried but I can never recognize my dream signs. I have noticed through a dream journal that there is a lot of drug use going on in my dreams. DILD is new to me so I shall have a look at it. Thank you for your help. Going to bed now, perhaps tonight will be the night.

Well, fell too deeply asleep last night. I think I woke up once and tried an RC but failure followed. Will it be harder for me to LD if I am a very deep sleeper? Because I am.

I'm a horribly deep sleeper and I'm still pretty good at lucid dreaming, so I'm going to go ahead and say it won't be. One thing I had rouble with when starting was dream recall, which at the time I atributed to being a deep sleeper. It's easy to work around though, just keep a dream journal. :)

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Originally Posted by Pengwin64

just a question- when you do a RC like getting up and checking a clock with your eyes open, and it fails,(meaning you're not dreaming) does that mean you are just some looney walking around your house in the middle of the night?
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Now that's something you need to look out for I suppose, my advice is don't do an RC you need to get out of bef for when you wake up, counting your fingers can be a good one to do in thise situations, or else people might think you're just a bit odd. (then again any martners might thing the same if you randomly wake up in the middle of the night, count your fingers and look a little disapointed, then go back to sleep. :P)

I think I have decent dream recall though. I can usually remember 2 dreams a night. When I tell myself to wake up after dreams and write them down I think I remember them and then I don't bother to write them down. Then, in the morning they are hazy and undetailed.

Also, I remember now a while back I woke up and thought my brother was shaking me by the collar and I felt like I was sinking down into the bed. This was the hypnogogic state right?

2nd edit, haha. I just recalled that I recently heard the song "Silent Lucidity" by "Queensryche" which is a song about lucid dreaming and it's benefits. Anyway I then realised that this song was not on my playlist and when I think back I was listening to it in a dream. This seems promising to me. Too bad that didn't clue me in to the fact that I was dreaming.

Well I started seriously MILDing last night I'm getting a Dream Journal on the go and everything. I remembered three dreams last night.

1. I was my psych teacher and in "my" office I had a computer set that was on top of a DVD player with a surround sound system set up, and I turned the moniter around so I could see it. Weird.

2. I dreamnt I saw a scene where a girl I haven't talked to in a year or two was getting intimate with some guy. First they were in a tub and then at some point the tub changed to a bed.

3. The United Church in my town had turned into a summer church camp that I counsel at except the upstairs was the top floor of an old school that is getting torn down that I used to go to. We held a beauty pageant for some of the kids as entertainment and a friend of mine asked me what the bonus track on The Number Of The Beast Enhanced Album was. I couldn't remember so I kept hunting around for my iPod, but then I found my friend's iPod, which I took and then I found a pink flash drive of hers that doesn't actually exist in the real world. I took both of these and then there was something about me stepping on a 7up bottle. Anyway I went back downstairs and I ran into the winner of the beauty pageant which was like a 12 year old girl in a yellow shirt, haha weird. Anyway I continued back down into the church part of this hybrid building and went into the main office where I found my old English teacher from high school and the director of the church camp I counsel at. There were a bunch of unknowns around everywhere and everyone was celebrating. I then woke up.

I copied these down after I woke up from each one. These are in chronological order and I guess the length makes sense because each REM period gets longer as the night progresses correct?

Problem is as I went back to sleep and told myself and envisioned that I would look at my watch after someone asked me the time in my dreams I guess I just feel asleep and it didn't work. I am doing this correctly right?

Also, the song was Total Eclipse haha.

The thing is nothing extraordinarily weird had occured in these dreams. Everything there is plausible except for the tub suddenly becoming a bed. If nothing weird happens, how am I supposed to notice that I am dreaming? Oh well, I shall try again tonight.

Also I guess this topic will become my progress journal. Alrighty.

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Originally Posted by AhThe2nd

Also I guess this topic will become my progress journal. Alrighty.[/b]

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Feel free to create yourself a dream journal thread to update regularly. :)

Ah, ok. There's a specific board for that. Makes sense. Thanks a lot.