Was This Lucid Or Control?

I apologize for the length of this thread, but there is a bit of a back story / story first.

I forget where I originally heard of lucid dreaming, however a few months ago after some really intense dreams, I decided to google the term and see what it brought up. That’s how I stumbled upon this site, and soon after, this forum.

I don’t actually dream that often, and that’s unfortunate because I really love dreaming. I used this site to familiarize myself with lucid dreaming, and then started attempting it. At first I worked on my recall; woke up from an alarm every REM so that I could process and record my dreams. This ultimately helped the ratio of my dreams increase. I did this for a whole, but I was unable to perform any RC’s while dreaming, and attaining any lucidity was lost. I then gave up trying, as I was discouraged.

However, randomly last night, I managed to attain lucidity. Well, as the title states, I believe it was lucidity, but I’m not positive so that’s why I’m asking you guys for some help.

Anyway, there was someone or something that I saw in the distance that I wanted to confront. While I don’t remember what it was, I remember an ill or negative feeling towards it. My method of getting over to this “thing” was flight, however, I flew right past it even though my intent was to stop right before it. That’s when I thought to myself: “this is a dream, and I was supposed to stop way back there, what the…?”

Anyway this faded and I immediately got caught in the process of another dream. I’m sitting at my desk, with my laptop. I believe it was a chat that was on my screen, and I remember wanting to type a response to the chat and when I did, I looked at my screen, it was someone else’s response, not mine. That’s when I again thought: “wait, I thought I just typed… hmmm… this is a dream, I’m dreaming.” That’s when it hit me. I knew I was dreaming, but since I gave up intentionally LDing months ago, I totally forget to do an RC. But I remember thinking while I’m sitting there in front of my laptop dreaming: “I have to work in the morning… I can’t be lucid; I haven’t been lucid before… I don’t know if I will sleep through my alarm, or what…” that, and I’ll be honest, there was a bit of fear about finally being lucid, just because it was so unexpected and not attempted. So, I guess this was an RC maybe, but I intentionally reached out and closed my laptop. I did it successfully, and then panicked, told myself I had to wake up, shook my head and there I was. Laying in bed… thinking, wow, that was amazing… I’ve never had a dream that realistic or vivid.

Well, do you guys think that would classify as lucid or was it only control?

No one wishes to offer anything?

I certainly sounds to me like you were lucid, even if it was only for a few seconds. Any time you know you are dreaming, you are lucid. :) Congrats! :D

Ya, don't be under the impression that doing an RC is a requirement for lucid dreaming. Once you realize it, you're lucid. What you do after that is what really matters though. :)

Thanks for the help guys! Looks like I was lucid! Too bad I panicked and blew it...