As I said in my newbie introduction post, I have been having semi-lucid dreams all my life. I guess you would call them low-level lucid dreams. I'm aware that I'm dreaming, but 99% of the time I never attempt to gain any control, because I don't realize I can.
So finally I decided to try doing a WILD. I was a little scared (completely scared out of my mind, contemplating not even trying it) at first, because the violent vibrations, horrible sounds, SP (SP has always been a phobia of mine) and all that. I was a little bit tired, so I lay down for an afternoon nap. I had counted to about 10 when I started twitching slightly, something that I almost never do. By 40, my eyes wanted to open quite badly. By 70, I started seeing all these neat green swirls and felt the vibrations. They weren't nearly as violent as I thought they would be. In fact, they felt kinda cool. At 160ish, I couldn't keep my eyes shut any longer, so I opened them. The vibrations of my eyelids had stopped, but I had the largest urge of my life to just open them. First thing I did, look at my hands. I'm completely unable to count my fingers. I think there might have been only 5 on each hand like normal, but every time I'd look at another one, the others would sorta shift. Probably dreaming. Plugged my nose and put my hand over my mouth, definately dreaming.
So I look around. I'm still in my room. The books on my shelf look a bit different, but it's my room. One thing I wasn't prepared for is how REAL everything looked. In my dreams, it's sorta like watching something off in the distance. In this, if not for the fact that I could breath through a plugged nose and I was completely incapable of counting my fingers, I would have thought I was awake.
So I attempt to get up.
BANG
Parents come home with a portable AC. Slam the door against my wall. I looked at the clock, it's 15 minutes or so from when I layed down. It didn't take long at all. There goes my LD. Just to make sure it's not one of these FAs I've been hearing about, I check my hands. 5 fingers. I look at the clock twice, same time. I'm awake. But, I proved that I can do it. It wasn't hard (at all), it wasn't unpleasant. I never heard any sounds aside from the cars outside and the fan in my bathroom, and both of those gradually faded out.
I'm going to attempt it again tonight. I had a LOT of questions about the experience before I did it, so I'd like to answer those for other newbies. However, I want to do it again to make sure these things weren't 1 time only.
