Thread: CAT research

Plan of Action:
Phase 1-
@ Fix up my sleeping schedule
.. @ Start to sleep at 11-11:30pm.
.. @ Wake up at 6am(Work)

Phase 2-
@ Wake up 90min earlier than 6am for one week
.. @ Keep brain very active during this period
.. @ Do RCs(hand, palm, nose and possibly watch) every 5min

What has been done so far?
@ Working on phase 1-
.. @ Got some of the waking up part already done.
.... @ Been waking up at that time 4-5 times a week.
.. @ Have slept sometimes around 11:30pm
.... @ Just need to maintain that for longer

Relieving sleep deprivation:
@ This method will involve some sleep deprivation which could be countered using two options:
.. @ Sleep 45min earlier than set schedule
.. @ Have a 20-30min nap after work.
Neither of these two options would mess up with this method and they will be used ONLY as a last resort in the case of sleep deprivation.

Other thoughts:
@ This should be interesting, since, I'm pretty confident that this method will give me some good results along with helping me set limits for my sleep and improve my dream recall. Talk about a bargain

Very good idea! I struggle with having to wake up early for work also. I should try this. I will be observing how it goes for you!

I'm probably going to try this out of desperation....I'll keep a watch out on how it works for you.

Originally Posted by Dannon Oneironaut

Very good idea! I struggle with having to wake up early for work also. I should try this. I will be observing how it goes for you!

Thanks. ATM, WILDs aren't working since I can't get SP or fall back asleep and I'm finding it hard to do RCs during the day because it's hard to do them at work plus I'm lazy when I get home I think everyone struggles to get up early for work. After I finished uni, I was sleeping till 11 or so everyday, glad that I had no more early morning labs or classes, so, working early shifts is a big change for me I won't have this job forever but based on this research, it would give me a good idea on whether the CAT method should be pursued when I moved on to my next job, higher education, etc....

Originally Posted by EspadaInMyCloset

I'm probably going to try this out of desperation....I'll keep a watch out on how it works for you.

I would stick with DILD mostly because this method has some sleep deprivation involved and if you are in school, then you can't afford that since it might affect your reactions and judgement

Day 1:
@ Went to bed at around 11:05, couldn't sleep till around 11:30 or so
.. @ Woke up very briefly twice during the night
@ Woke up at 5:45am and stayed in bed till around 5:55am or so

Thoughts: Not bad for the first day, getting the 11:00 sleep part will be the harder one since I've had good experience waking up at around 6am and they have some interesting shows around that time If I'm not mistaken, I think the most important part of CAT is waking up, not sleeping(still important though) since they recommend that you sleep 45min earlier during the depreviation week

Day 2:
@ Went to bed at around 11:15, slept around 11:20 or so
@ Woke up at 5:50am and stayed in bed till around 7:00am or so
.. @ Might have had a micro nap or two from around 6:15 to 6:45 or so

Thoughts: Slept faster than last night, definitely a plus. Wasn't too happy with the whole micro nap thing but it happened and it's too late now. Just gotta remember that I should get out of bed when I put off my alarm.

How about with an uneatable schedule? Most Wednesday I have to wake up at 5:45, tue, thur, fri and sat around 8-9... sun and mon at 8:15... however, some random days I might too wake up at 06:00 too... (i must drive my wife)

Originally Posted by PercyLucid

How about with an uneatable schedule? Most Wednesday I have to wake up at 5:45, tue, thur, fri and sat around 8-9... sun and mon at 8:15... however, some random days I might too wake up at 06:00 too... (i must drive my wife)

Uneatable? What do you mean by that? Do you mean that you can't eat during a certain time? What matters the most about the CAT with the stable schedule probably has to do with the wake up part as in if you have an unstable one, you probably won't get as much benefit, since, your mind won't necessarily awake before it's supposed to If you can set your wake up schedules to all around the same time, then you could probably give it a try.

Day 3:
@ Went to bed at around 11:45(evening shift)
@ Woke up at 6:15am but accidentlly slept again till 7:29am

Thoughts: Well, slept past my alarm(put it off and decided to lay there eventually going back to sleep). Probably better to get up next time. I might have to start going back to those naps if I find it hard to wake up at 6 again. Will try to get back onto 6 tommorrow and get to bed at 11 or so tonight. Don't plan on having one day set me back Having said that, I do believe that if I was to start phase 2, I would see some benefits after it's done, since, I've been doing 12-6 or so for a while before I started this research and feel confident of my abilities

Yeah, unstable... sorry for the confusion... and yes... I though it would be bad for me. I'll stick to WILDs then

Day 4:
@ Went to bed at around 11:30
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed

Thoughts: Could have went to bed around 11pm, but, was reading an interesting thread on here, it's all Aquanina's fault Anyways, fixed the waking up part, just need to maintain for another week or so and then I plan to start phase 2. No need to delay it

Day 5:
@ Went to bed at around 11:10
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed shortly after

Thoughts: On track now, just need to maintain it Interestingly enough, I would feeling refreshed, so, it's possibly my body has started/gotten used to waking up at ~7hr of sleep

Day 6:
@ Went to bed at around 11:05
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed right away

Thoughts: Just more maintenance needed

Day 7:
@ Went to bed at around 11:15
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed

Thoughts: I think I've gotten into this schedule now. I just need more maintenance. Soon enough, I wouldn't even need an alarm clock to wake me up

Day 8:
@ Went to bed at around 11:20
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed
.. @ Went back to bed at 6:25am and ended up having some micro naps till 7:30(2 5min ones and 1 20min one)

Thoughts: Not happy with the micro naps, but, I was pretty tired when I got up this morning. I still got up at 5:50 and did a couple of things, so, technically I didn't deviate from my schedule In a couple of days, I plan to start phase 2

Day 9:
@ Went to bed at around 11:25
.. @ Slept about 30min from 10:40 to 11:10pm beforehand
@ Woke up at 5:50am and got out of bed
.. @ Went back to bed and tried some dream recall 20-30min later but didn't fall asleep

Thoughts: I'm thinking of starting phase 2 tonight. I've already went through 9 days of staying on schedule fixing my sleep to be around 11pm and did pretty well on the waking up parts. I was already waking up for a good couple of weeks before I started CAT, so, that should be good. My schedule will be going haywire in a couple of weeks, so, I would much rather take a chance now than miss my opportunity with CAT. For those who are interested in re-reading phase 2, I re-typed it below:

Phase 2-
@ Wake up 90min earlier than 6am for one week
.. @ Keep brain very active during this period
.. @ Do RCs(hand, palm, nose and possibly watch) every 5min or so

To keep my brain active, I plan to give reading a try, possibly meditating about a certain subject of focus(gotta be careful not to fall asleep), playing some games, etc.... Anyone who has any ideas is welcome to post

Phase 2 started today:

Day 1:
@ Went to bed at around 11, couldn't sleep till 11:20 or so
@ Woke up at around 4:10am and got out of bed
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose RC as many times as possible at no specific rate(Twice in 3 min, once in 7 min, etc.....)

Thoughts: I was wondering if I will have a problem waking up after about 5hr of sleep, but, woking up feeling fine. Just need to rinse and repeat for 6 more days to reek the benefits of CAT if applicable Only complaint is that this will reek havoc with training my dream recall

Day 2:
@ Went to bed at around 11:05, slept around 11:11 or so
@ Woke up at around 4:10am
.. @ Decided to stay in bed for a couple of minutes trying to recall any dreams
.... @ Unfortunately, I ended up dozing off for about 30-40min more, so, woke up again around 4:50am
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active for those remaining 60min or so
.. @ Did nose RC as many times as possible at no specific rate(Twice in 3 min, once in 7 min, etc.....)

Thoughts: A bit disappointed that I dozed off and lost about 30-40min or so from the 90min, however, considering that this is only day 2 and there are 5 more days left, I can still redeem myself and make up for it if I stick to my schedule till the end of phase 2. Also, I still woke up albeit a bit later and had about 1hr left, so, I doubt this will have any major effects on my CAT. Anyone want to add anything or disagree with the above statement(s)?

Day 3:
@ Went to bed at around 10:41, slept soon after
@ Woke up at around 4:10am
.. @ Did some dream recall while sitting in bed for a couple of minutes
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose RC and some hand, palm RCs as many times as possible at no specific rate(Twice in 3 min, once in 7 min, etc.....)

Thoughts: Definitely went better than my Day 2. I was able to recall some dreams even though they weren't the longest and was able to remember to RC once I got out of bed incase of any FA from future LDs. Just 4 more days of this madness For anyone wondering how I've been beating sleep deprivation, I've been finding myself taking a nap of 1-2hr the last two days. I've been off those days, so, today will be interesting since I have work

Day 4:
@ Went to bed at around 11:00, slept soon after
@ Woke up at around 4:12am
.. @ Did some dream recall while sitting in bed for a couple of minutes
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose and clock RCs at no specific rate

Thoughts: 3 more days left in phase 2. I'm gonna try to take no nap today like yesterday and just go to sleep around 10:15 or so, likely getting a REM rebound. I might even try and WILD before bed, but, that's still to be determined

Day 5:
@ Went to bed at around 10:43, slept around 10:55 or so
@ Woke up at around 4:12am
.. @ Tried some dream recall with no success
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose, clock and hands RCs at no specific rate

Thoughts: My 5th day already. Amazing how fast time can pass by. Pretty excited to see the end results, but, gotta wait and make sure I do everything well so that the results work out. I recently decided to get back into the WILD research thread and tried WILDing before bed ONLY if I feel something coming on, since, I don't want to mess this research and I got to a vibrational state a couple of days back in bed when I was pretty relaxed

Day 6:
@ Went to bed at around 10:47, slept soon afterwards
@ Woke up at around 4:12am
.. @ Tried some dream recall with no success
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose, clock and hand RCs at no specific rate

Thoughts: One more day left, hooray! But, seriously, these 1.5hr of sleep do take their toll on the body, because, you are losing 10.5hr of sleep for the week, that's more than a day of sleeping(avg 8hr). Once I get Day 7 done tommorrow, I'll be moving on to phase 3.

Phase 3-
@ Extend my sleeping hours
.. @ Start to sleep at 10pm.
.. @ Wake up at 5:50am.

The main reason for this is that ATM, I'm sleeping 6:45hr on a daily basis. According to LaBerge, one doubles their chance of lucidity by sleeping 2 more hr(6hr to 8hr sleep). I'm trying to take advantage of this idea since you have longer REMs as you sleep more. Other purposes include getting more sleep to be well rested since I've been finding myself tired even on normal days and since, I've been waking up at 4:12am, it means that if my brain wakes up at those times when I'm asleep which it technically should since that is the purpose of this one week adjustment phase(phase 2), I'll be able to catch a much longer REM period in comparison to sleeping at 11pm at night

Day 7:
@ Went to bed at around 11:25, slept soon afterwards
@ Woke up at around 4:12am
.. @ Tried some quick dream recall with no success
.. @ Read forum posts and posted myself to keep brain active
.. @ Did nose, clock and hand RCs at no specific rate

Thoughts: Last day FTW! It's gonna be great to go back to normal sleep ON the bright side, I almost WILD'd two days ago when I took a small nap around 7 in the morning, unfortunately, I couldn't repeat that yesterday Tommorrow, I plan to start sleeping 10:30pm or so till 6am. Then once I'm used to that, I'll move my sleeping time to 10pm. This will give me a nice 8hr of sleep with hopefully plenty of dreams and a higher chance of LDing

Phase 3 has started:

Day 1:
@ Went to bed at around 10:15, slept soon afterwards
@ Woke up at around 4:30am naturally
.. @ No LDs unfortunately
.. @ Was able to recall 2 dreams with ease
.. @ Wasn't able to get to sleep easily afterwards

Thoughts: Well, it was nice to go to bed early however waking up at 4:30am wasn't good. I mean it was great recalling 2 dreams and one might have been a precognitive dream(see DJ for more details) but my logical center was supposed to get activated while I am asleep making for a vivid and possibly getting me a LD which didn't happen. I'm hoping that over the next few days I will be able to get some LDs, even one or two would make CAT worth it so far since I don't have much luck with WILDing and haven't been doing many RCs lately(started doing more last 2 days though). One more note to make is that tonight I have an overnight shift, so, I won't get the opportunity to see if CAT worked for tommorrow since I will be awake very early in the morning, but, I'll keep doing RCs and I'll make sure to keep awake till 10pm or 11pm at night before I go to bed so that I don't mess up my sleeping schedule

Day 2:
@ Went to bed at around 11:10, couldn't sleep till 11:30
@ Woke up at around 2:50am
.. @ No LDs for obvious reasons
.. @ Not much dream recall easier(something about drive-thru)

Thoughts: Not much luck last night due to the lack of sleep(~3.5hr) due to an overnight shift. I am excited for tonight though and I have been doing a decent # of RCs during the day, so, lucidity here I come