How can you tell?

[RetroReality]

Ok I am pretty confused here. Alot of people say when they dream, they notice something out of the ordinary, then RC to realize there dreaming. For me, Im never able to do that in my dreams so far, I always just go with it and it never comes to mind that something is out of the ordinary. So does this awarness come over time or is there something I should be doing to increase an awarness in my dreams.(I do alot of reality checks during the day.)

[Naiya]

Hi Retro! When it comes to RCs and awareness, there does seem to be a certain trick to them. I made a longer post about it here: http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...2&postcount=27 But basically, if you RC a lot during the day, and have been consistent with it for more than about six weeks, you might want to consider adding another technique or two to your day. MILD is an easy one to begin with that doesn't take much time out of your day, for example.

[RetroReality]

Thank you very much. I just read that and it clears somethings up for me. Yes I have also been trying my hands on with the MILD technique. Now I will put alittle more questioning into my reality checks from now on.

[Naiya]

Good luck to you. It can be frustrating when you're getting all these things to be habit and they haven't crossed into your dreams yet, so just keep at it and don't give up.

[Sotik]

A good tip is through out your day do RC often when things happen that don't always happen. If you find your self at a place you are not commonly at then do a RC, if a good looking girl smiles at you, once she walks away do a RC, if you parents call or come over, do a RC. What you want to do is get into the habit of doing RC's when things happen that don't always happen to you every day. What happens is that when you then go to sleep this habit will carry over into your dreams. Also hopefully you are getting into dream recall and writing down your dreams in a DJ. The more you practice this, and the more you write them down the more vivid your dreams will become, the easier they will be to remember and the more detail you can write about them. Once you are at a point where you have good DR you can then go over your dreams to look for reoccurring things, for example in every dream you have, an old pet of yours is always with you. It is something you become aware of and when you dream you will notice it and then it becomes "Hey wait, that's my old pet, this must be a dream, time for a RC."

[TheWeirdnessSymposium]

I disagree with that strongly, Sotik. When a good looking girl smiles at you, you go over there and get her number.

[RetroReality]

Thanks for the tips everyone. I have fairly decent dream recall(I recall atleast 1 dream a night, usually 2). I have also been reality checking frequently throughout the day. So again thanks for the tips. Oh and good looking girls usually dont smile at me, but if they happen to do so a reality check would come in handy there.

[Robot_Butler]

I disagree with that strongly, Sotik. When a good looking girl smiles at you, you go over there and get her number. I was going to say the same thing. Don't scare the girl off by pinching your nose or checking your watch a million times. In general, by the time I notice something weird, I am normally already lucid. A lot of the time, I can't tell whether the reality check made me lucid, or I reality checked because I was already lucid.