Playing-Dead Induction of Lucid Dreams?

[SKA]

This is not so much a said N done method, but rather an experiment based on an insightfull lucid experience that I hope will lead to such a method. Last night I briefly became lucid. Only for less than half a minute, but the way I got there completely contradicts any previous notions of and approaches to Lucidity I had before. I was just falling asleep and, having had my usual wintertime insomnia all winter, I was glad to just be sleepy enough to sleep at all. I didn't even briefly think of Lucidity. Totally wasn't my intention to attain lucidity last night. I was lying on my right side, turned around and saw it was very dark in my room. This gave me the creeps. An eerie feeling. So I sat up and tried to switch on a lamp next to my bed; It didn't work. I first thought: "oh no, power must be out" And then immediately, memorising a previous dream in which the lights failed to work and I had reason the same power-out, I thought "wait a minute...am I dreaming?" So to test it finally I jumped out of bed into my room to test the gravity. As I hovered down to the ground I noticed Gravity had severely changed and concluded I was dreaming. I wanted to stabilise myself to get ready to travel around in my dream clearminded when, for no appearant reason my eyes opened again and I was awake. It seemed that Dreams start sooner when I "play dead". That is to say: when I make NO efforts at all trying to stay conscious, totally allowing myself to drift off to sleep. I had always thought focus was essential, but found out I have a much better chance if I just drift off and then regain consciousness while I suddenly find myself in a dream. So My idea to build an ILD-method from this would be: Drift off effortlessly, without focus, be completely off guard. Dreams start ALOT faster and there seems to be no transition at all this way. Just suddenly a Dream. Like hunting; Play dead, drift off and when you find yourself in a Dream, concentrate on it and get your focus back up. Sneaky huh? I will be trying this every night from now. Any folks would like to join me to test this, develop this further and post back results in this Topic that would be great. Any thoughts?

[Mariano]

mm, it's a good idea, but it's a little difficult, because ¿if you enter to the dream and you are unable to Check reality or something? mmm, I don't know...

[eppy]

Worth a try. I feel like I would RC way too much and waste all the time I had spent just laying there.

[SKA]

mm, it's a good idea, but it's a little difficult, because ¿if you enter to the dream and you are unable to Check reality or something? mmm, I don't know... Actually I, and many others, never experience any Transition. To me it's just: The one moment I'm awake trying to fall asleep in bed, the next moment I sit up and try to switch a light on and it turns out I'm dreaming. The transition is seemless. I have spent well over an hour awake on my many previous attempts using Conscious/Focus-ILD methods and no signs of a Dream. Now serveral times I got into a Dream Lucid, pretty much within 15 minutes after hitting the pillow, while just dozing off to sleep not focussing on anything at all. So the whole point of this is to let yourself just fall asleep, off guard and totally unaware of the Transition phase. To me it seems: The lower my awareness, the sooner I am in a Dream. Bottomline:To be off guard all the time you're falling asleep and to suddenly regain consciousness when you are just in the beginning of a dream. To regain Consciousness suddenly you need a trigger of some sort. The trigger is to frequently check if your lamps are working while in bed, morning or night, to make it a habit as strong as nicotine-addiction so that you condition yourself to do that and that one of these check-ups will be in a Dream, making me Lucid like it did last night. Also setting a lucid Intention in your memory, before alowing yourself to fall sleep with low awareness, could also help serve as such a trigger. As a back-up Trigger, might the Lamp-RC fail. This will need some tweaking before it can be called a real ILD-method, so help me out with your thoughts. I think it'd be best if some of you guys joined me in experimenting with this and then we could evaluate and see what needs to be changed and finetuned.

[night_watcher]

It would seem to me to be a DILD....I fail to see the difference. But, I do like the idea of testing the lamp as a RC. I will gladly help you out by testing it, but it seems to just be a new type of RC.

[Xaqaria]

This is the only way that I WILD. Sometimes the transition is accompanied by a low pitched throbbing in my mind and a sinking feeling (first time I felt it I thought I was dying; kind of like shrinking inside of myself) but most of the time it is a seemless transition.

[SKA]

It would seem to me to be a DILD....I fail to see the difference. But, I do like the idea of testing the lamp as a RC. I will gladly help you out by testing it, but it seems to just be a new type of RC. How is that a DILD? I thought DILDS were Dream Initiated Lucid Dreams, where a Dreamer who just awakes from a Dream, stays motionless and stays Aware while he/she falls asleep into the next Dream again. Perhaps physically you play dead, but the point of my Play-Dead-method/idea is to play Mentally dead. The Point is to NOT focus and so to be off guard and to allow yourself to drift further and further to unconsciousness and to regain Awareness suddenly JUST before you're totally asleep and unconscious, when a Dream begins. I think I'm gunna illustrate this method and scan the drawing to give you a better idea of what I mean.

[SKA]

What I want to make clear is that this method is most of all intended to make the Dreams start ALOT sooner than usually. I usually try to fall asleep concentrating on breaths, hypnagogic imagery, my Lucid intentions, or otherwise trying to stay aware of something. This night I wasn't thinking about anything at all, but I was letting myself fall asleep with the kind of surrender I find hard to describe. This very Calm, Entranced state of surrender made the onset of my Dreams Appear ALOT sooner than usually. Within 15 minutes instead of the usual more than 30 minutes it takes me. And I didn't even sleep beforehand. I fell into a dream, before I fell asleep at night with no prior sleep. Basically an unintended, accidental, non-WBTB, nighttime WILD. In my experience the Consciousness gradually fades out when we fall asleep. Lasting about 15 to 45 minutes from the time we hit the pillow till the time we are unconscious. Because of this entranced state of "minding nothing, letting thoughts flow, total surrender" I incidentally got into my Dreams started so soon that my Consciousness hadn't even faded out yet. And this got me to enter a dream with "still some consciousness left" whereas usually I'm already unconscious by this time in the process. It's this rather peculiar, hard to describe, detatched state of surrender I found out by accident that is the key to this method. It's much like properly trying to imagine and play/act out falling unconscious; You are still Conscious, but you behave like an unconscious persion would. Totally nonresponsive, Physically and Mentally, thoughts flow through your head yet you don't feel responsible for them, physical itches occur yet "you're unconscious" so you don't respond, mental itches/psychic excitement occurs yet you stay non-responsive. Acting as if totally knocked unconscious. As if you're totally not there. That's the point, because you actually ARE still there. It's much like the thread of "fooling your mind into thinking the body's gone to sleep", but then more like Fooling the Mind itself into thinking IT has gone to sleep. And doing this I found that this mental passivity, being conscious & "acting" as if one's unconscious, makes the Dreamstate start a whole lot sooner, when you're still conscious enough to be significantly aware when a Dream suddenly starts. And this way they start Really Sudden and Really Soon.

[SKA]

I'm disappointed in you guys at dreamviews. Seems like no one has the patience to follow through with this, or any LD induction method. No wonder this forum is cluttered with a million topics on ILD-methods of which non are followed through untill any conclusion or results have been reached. By that time a good topic/ILD-idea will be washed away by a million others ILD-topics that await the same fate.

[Bosco]

That happened to me once...what i mean is i was just laying there let go of my thoughts go and then bam i open my eyes and i was in a dream. No transition or anything It was wierd cuz it usually takes me a hour to go to sleep but this one time i just pretty much started meditating and when i opened my eye i was meditating outside of my house and i got so "dream sick" cuz the transition happened so fast i threw up in the dream and then really did wake up

[yuriythebest]

I actually think there is a logic to this. In one of his posts the revered BillyBob once said that the reason it's so hard to WILD is that back in the stone age when we were hunters and lay silently for hours waiting for prey it would be mighty inconvenient if our bodies were to suddenly go into SP. http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...ad.php?t=62282 The reason you have never been able to WILD is because of the system evolution set in place to solve this "passing out" problem. The first step to learning to WILD at will is understanding the system. What is the system? Like all good evolutionary solutions to problems, it is elegantly simple. "Do not enter REM/sleep-paralysis when you are waiting for something to happen."

[SKA]

I'm going to give this another shot. It worked for me before. I hope I can get some DV members to experiment on this with me so we can get some more conclusive results. Anyone want to play dead with me?

[Zval537]

I think I know what you're talking about; I'll give it a shot.

[Black_Eagle]

I'm going to give this another shot. It worked for me before. I hope I can get some DV members to experiment on this with me so we can get some more conclusive results. Anyone want to play dead with me? I'll do it. When I attempt WILDs I usually don't experience this thing called Sleep paralysis. I only experienced vibrations once. Despite this, I have had several lucid dreams resulting from these WILD attempts by just falling right into the dream. One moment I'm awake, another I get a vague disembodied feeling, and then I literally feel like I fall into the dream. What is the exact procedure you wish for us to follow?

[Hazel]

How is that a DILD? I thought DILDS were Dream Initiated Lucid Dreams, where a Dreamer who just awakes from a Dream, stays motionless and stays Aware while he/she falls asleep into the next Dream again. You're probably thinking of DEILD. DILD is when you are already dreaming (non-lucid) and you suddenly realize you are dreaming. Anyway, this method sounds pretty interesting. I'd like to give it a try, but I'm doing so many other techniques right now... It's definately on my list, though.

[Black_Eagle]

Seeing as it's been several days since I've posted a reply and SKA has been active most of those days, posting replies to other threads, I'm going to assume he no longer cares about this thread. I'm still going to go ahead with trying this "surrender" thing (as I have been the last couple of nights). I'm unclear as to how the methods SKA was talking about are to be performed so I don't think I'll get the best results, but whatever. In a couple of days I'll post my results. SKA: If you do still care about this thread, then hurry up and check it! Edit: Heck, I'll just pm him.

[SKA]

yeah I'm down. I understood and realise my initial description was rather vague. It's because I find it difficult to explain this state, but I'll do my best to explain it again more clearly in a nutshell: Usually we tend to be engaged in our thoughts and feelings: We "hitch a ride" along with our spontanious, subconscious thoughts and feelings, by having interrest in them and actively responding to them with conscious thoughts. Now instead of doing this, like we usually do, see these subconscious thoughts and feelings more as though they aren't your own and just happen to pass through your being. Let them flow through in a relaxed way, not engaging in/reacting to them with conscious thoughts. Don't focus on them. Let them pass through without response or engagement or interrest. Passive like a Coma-patient who couldn't even react to them, even if he wanted to. This method is similair to, but different from others as this is a completely passive, non-WBTB kind of WILD. I found that I ended up in a (Lucid) dream withing 15 minutes, without prior sleep. That's right. No WBTB, just go to bed at night and dreams will start faster than your Awareness takes to doze off completely into unconsciousness. very buddhistic approach to Lucid Dream induction. It has worked about 5 times for me sofar. I'm going to give it another shot tonight. I will report back results (or lack thereof) tomorrow and I was hoping some of you guys could do the same.

[SKA]

Last night an old friend visited me and we had a long long walk and chat and I ended up in bed at 4 in the morning. Also this conversation brought about alot of emotions and old memories so my Mind was rather over excited. This made it extra difficult for me to "play dead". My thoughts were very jumbled and chaotic and I couldn't find this state of trance, but I perceveared and after a while I still attained this peacefull trance state somewhat as I fell asleep. No Lucid dream, but the result was nevertheless a very intense, clearminded dream that was very well remembered. So my awareness wasn't high enough to become lucid but it was high enough to bring me a very highly aware, well remembered dream. A dream defenitely of much higher awareness than most of my random, non-lucid dreams. This method has my faith Anyone else tried this? Please report back results(or lack thereof). If you've tried this but have trouble understanding this trance state, or have trouble attaining it; Let me know and I might be able to help.

[Arcana]

i tried ur method after some melatoning and about 200g of b6 althought it did help me fall sleep sooner id did not help me dream in fact i dont remember any dreams i had last night i will try it again without the melatonin or b6 since i noticed that i keep waking up when i have melatonin

[Black_Eagle]

Lately I have been having clearer dreams and I have been going to sleep sooner while trying your technique. I have not experienced any dreams as I initially fall asleep, however. I've re-read your description and am going to attempt to follow it more strictly. I'll be back in a week or so with my results.

[SKA]

I too had remarkably clear and well remembered dreams this past week. I need to get more seriously involved with more discipline on this to achieve with it what I only once achieved with it. But the time I succeeded I also used my lamp as an RC every now and then while falling asleep. Maybe I should try this again.

[SKA]

Tried this method in combination with Kola Nut Tea just before bedtime. Great success. All night lucid dreams/nightmares.

[SKA]

I know this works for me so I will keep doing it. Too bad none of you took the time to even try and report back their experience with this. Makes me wanna find another LD-forum, where people have more patience and interrest in Trying & Testing LD-methods. Good LD-forum Anyone?

[Black_Eagle]

I've been trying it, but I've had a bit of trouble sleeping lately and also going to bed at a decent hour.

[SKA]

Okay well that changes everything off course. I, periodic wintertime Insomniac, know like no other. Sleeping in the first place has priority over trying to dream lucidly. But whenever you sleep sound again let me know how it goes. Allthough my method has proven to be very successfull in making me fall asleep MUCH faster than usual. Just wonder why there's so little enthusiasm and curiousity to try a new LD approach. I remember times DV members used to scientifically experiment and document new ILD-methods. It's like most people on this forum don't even take the time to put their minds together on the subject of Lucid Dreming anymore. It sucks. You, Black Eagle seem to be the only one interrested. It would help alot to have at least abt. 5 people experimenting together on this. For me it's jackpot, cause it works like a charm and I have had another 3 lucid dreams this way. So good for me, but I was hoping to share this with others too.