New / Becoming Lucid

Heys guys, ive been a pretty big fan of this site for awhile and have been reading the tutorial section alot and trying some stuff out. Ive become lucid only a few times (with a very large span apart), and i woke up shortly after each. I never had complete control obviously and i know it takes alot of practise and patience to get there. The problem is my dreams have some sort of "plot" you could say, like with the main character, and certain set, certain ppl along with a certain idea. Its like im following a storyline or something and im the villain or a side character that just gets killed of. Some of the time i can realize its all a dream and i can do whatever i want but it still refuses to let me become lucid. First question is are all dreams like this, or just yourself standing in like an open field or something lol. This makes it exceptionaly hard for me to become lucid. Next question im asking is if there are any type of mind training methods i can use during the day to help me during the night, to become lucid more often and maybe stay dreaming a little while longer. I realize there are tutorials and posts on this as well but i thought if i made a post asking for help from the public, personal ideas will come in. Thanks in advance :banana:

Hey there, welcome to DV.

My dreams often play out in plots like you say, the way I got over it was simply reality checking whenever anything out of the ordinary happened to me. Now I tend to be more likely to become lucid in thhose dreams.

Feel free to post around; we're a nice community. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Here are some standard answers:

To get better at attaining lucidity in dreams, do frequent, purposeful reality checks during the day. E.g. pinch your nose closed with your fingers and try to breathe through your nose - and don't just breeze through it, make a conscious effort to test your reality. Doing that often during your waking hours will increase the likelihood that you will automatically do some reality checking during your dreams - and if an RC fails in a dream, you'll hopefully be able to recognize that it IS a dream. If an RC fails during waking hours, see your psychiatrist. :)

There are also several levels of lucidity, according to some people around here. Sometimes, you can recognize you're in a dream, but can't get control of much of anything. Sometimes, though, you can change everything around you at will. Deepening lucidity takes practice and dedication, too. Search around the forums for ways to increase lucidity - there are many suggestions.

Another good idea is to start a dream journal, and update it every day (if not after every dream during the night). You'll likely improve your dream recall significantly, and this is important. A lucid dream isn't worth much if you can't remember it the next morning.

Ask questions, read everything you can find, do reality checks. Good luck!

thank guys, yea i started a dream journal awhile ago actually and its filling up nicely. When you talk about a RC, you mean just out of the blue..as in right now on this chair like pinch myself or breathe threw the noise? I used to say This is only a dream 20 times throughout the day, i heard it worked. Is that pretty much the same thing as what your saying?

Basically, yes. If you get into a habit of doing a reality check every time you look in a mirror, or everytime you see a car drive by, or just every 30 minutes, eventually it will become more-or-less subconscious. Then, hopefully, that behavior will carry over into your sleepy time, and you'll do a reality check during a dream. The idea is that your RC will fail in the dream, and it will signal you that you're dreaming.

Another connection between the RC and the dream journal is that, through your dream journal, you can potentially recognize common objects, people, themes, or settings that occur in your dreams. These are called your "dream signs." Say you notice that your dreams very often have a blue car in them. Start doing RCs every time you see a blue car during your waking hours. If you condition yourself to do that, when you're dreaming and you see a blue car, you'll automatically do an RC, and it will fail (hopefully), and you'll be able to recognize that you're dreaming. Once you are aware that you are in a dream, you are, by definition, lucid. This is called a Dream-Induced Lucid Dream (DILD). Notice that this doesn't guarantee that you'll be able to control the dream, but there's a good chance that will happen automatically or come soon after.

Saying "this is only a dream" might work, but how do you confirm that it really is? I'd go with purposeful reality checks.

awesome, ill start the RCing asap then. So this will help me become lucid more often, and becoming lucid more often will slowly help me become more and more controlling of my dream?

Also, is there any type of technique of some sort i can do before i sleep to make sure or raise my chances of actually dreaming? Or realizing it for that matter.

The intent of the RC regimen is to increase your chances of realizing your dreaming, which makes the dream a lucid dream. More time spent lucid in your dreams will give you more practice in exercising your will within them. So, I guess the short answer is, yes, exactly. :)

As for your last question, I'd check through the tutorials, and maybe browse the other Lucid Dreaming forums for suggestions on improving your chances of having good, vivid dreams. There are some mental techniques, some physical accommodations, and even some supplements people recommend.

NOTE: You dream every time you sleep. The general agreement is that REM sleep is dream sleep, and you have an average of four to six REM periods every night (depending on your sleep physiology, how long and how soundly you sleep, etc). The goal here is to take advantage of the dreams you're normally having anyway, and to remember them afterward.

If you haven't already read through the main DV website, do that. There's a lot of good general info to build your knowledge.

thanks, and yea that brings up another good point. My dreams tend to be a little blurry you could say, they lack detail. Is it possible to improve the vision and make it more reality like? And if so would it be more of a challenge becoming lucid since it seems more real?

As I understand it, you shouldn't be limited by the realism of a dream as far as attaining lucidity is involved. I mean, your blurry dreams probably seem real when you're in the dream, and you still don't normally question whether it's a dream or not (unless you're one of us, anyway). I don't think it's an issue of having more trouble becoming lucid, but still a matter of being in the habit of doing RCs a lot, or else just "knowing" you're dreaming.

Read around, there are some good articles and threads here about improving vividness and clarity in both lucid and non-lucid dreams. It might just be that your recall is fuzzy, not the dream itself, so improving that will improve the dream retroactively.

ahh never thought of it like that (the recall is fuzzy). allright thanks a million, ill do some forum browsin :cool:

Good sharp detail and realism is always the most satisfying, but it's possible to be completely lucid with very little detail. I once had a lucid dream where I was temporarily almost blind... I could only see very vague shapes in a monochrome reddish orange.

yea mine tend to be somewhat like that as well, i only realize until the morning though lol. now that i think about it.. like i dont even understand how i get from place to place alot of the time hahah