My first [Low Lucidity] LD Experience - Nice!

Hey everyone,
I have been experimenting with LD for the last 7-10 days roughly. I have had a bit of a rough time with WILD as I find that I can't get past the SP stage and the feeling of panic just overtakes me and that's no fun. I should say that in the last 12-13 months I have been experiencing high anxiety IWL as well as very vivid nightmares, so I guess I sometimes don't look forward to going to sleep necessarily. Which is just why I got into LD - as a way to control my dreams, explore my subconscious, have fun and hopefully solve some internal questions.

Anyway, here goes.
I am asleep on the couch in my lounge [I previously had a couple of missed FAs which all occurred in the same location] and I hear a noise outside, I am scared so I fight the grogginess to wake up and go investigate. As I wake up, I perform a RC (nose pinch, don't know why but the watch one didn't happen] and realize I can breathe - so I tell myself 'wow, I must be dreaming' and then the whole scene crumbles around me and I wake up!

The same thing happens a few minutes late. FA in the lounge, I pinch my nose and realize I can breathe out of only one nostril [upon waking I realize one of my nostrils was actually blocked!]. I try to stay calm. I should have engaged more with the scene, but didn't. Instead I fly away through my lounge and out of the back door. Unfortunately everything is pitch dark [the lighting in my dreams often is] - so I imagine I am flying through the stars, which sort of gives me something to look at. Then I start falling [this reminded me of a LD shared by Stephen Berlin in his youtube channel yesterday] as well as spinning around myself - and decide there is no need to fight this as I'm going to be all right.

As I stop falling I remember one of my dream goals is to speak to my late grandfather. I cannot make him appear, but I ask him questions. At the stage I am starting to sort of doubt I have lucidity or that he is even there, but we have a nice brief conversation where he reassures me everything in my life is going to be all right. I wake up feeling a bit unsatisfied, but with a nice feeling of calm.


So, upon reflection I think the whole experience was very positive. I was a bit scared about what would happen in a LD as my dreams have been so negative of late. Nothing bad happened and I was able to have some control over what was happening. I think I should have 'grounded' myself into the scene and observed more my surroundings and interacted with them. I should have turned on a light or make it morning or something and I should have been a bit more creative. My aim for the day is to look at pictures/videos of beautiful scenery so I can picture myself being in those beautiful places next time I am LD.
Another thing I'd like to note is that DILD happen spontaneously. For the first time in a few days, my dream goal upon going to bed was 'to have a restful night and perhaps explore a LD' rather than something more specific. This afforded me more freedom when I woke up as I didn't have to prime as hard or concentrate too much on what would happen next. I think this is very important as it took away the 'stress' factor (e.g. I want to LD NOW otherwise when I wake up I'm going to be disappointed). Happy to see that my work on Dream Signs is paying off and that I was able to spot a FA.

Very happy indeed that I woke up with that nice calm, relaxed, sort of 'I'm in control' feeling. This is something I want to experience more and more as I explore the world of dreams!

Any feedback on this would be much appreciated
:wink:

thanks!!!

Congratulations on your first lucid dream! :D I think what you said about visualising pleasant scenery etc. before you go to sleep is a really good idea. I also often have frightening or disturbing dreams (sometimes I end up snapping awake shouting "No!" while I think something grim is still happening), and I find imagining calming scenes and places of relaxation generally helps to make my dreams calmer, assuming I can get to sleep within a certain time-frame after beginning the visualisation, and assuming I can maintain the visualisation effectively. Otherwise, I try to imagine that there is a person whom I trust in the room with me (not necessarily someone I know, but just an abstract trustworthy figure) to act as a sort of "Dream Warden" to help ward off bad dreams. As for your dream goals, I also have a dream goal to speak with my late Grandfather, who I unfortunately never knew, but have heard enough stories about him and seen enough photographs of him to perhaps generate a somewhat accurate representation of what he was like.

I haven't actually had a full lucid dream yet, but my first lucid experience was in August of last year; I came to an impassable bridge in a dream (the midsection had crumbled away) and thought: "I'm in a dream. I can just jump over." and so I did, however, I was not really aware of the moment of lucidity, and the dream seemed to use it more as a practical tool against the dream environment, rather than letting me use the lucidity myself, if that makes sense.

Keep it up!