My Method, Your Review

Hello everyone! I'm new to dreamviews as a member, but I've been browsing the site for weeks trying out some new methods. I've decided to jump right into the WILD zone, skipping over the 'newbie zone' for a few tips and tricks, without all the basic stuff. ;) Below is my method I currently use to achieve lucidicy, and I would like your feedback as experts.

I try to WILD more than MILD or other methods because it seems more direct and controllable, while other methods seem to be up to chance, no matter how good you are at them. Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that a MILD is when you realize you are dreaming in a dream to become lucid, while a WILD is where you go into a dream with your mind awake from the start.

Here's my method. First I get a day that I know I won't have to wake up for anything early, (school, etc.), and try to make sure nobody will wake me for other reasons. I set my alarm to wake me about 6 hours after I go to bed. Then, I go to sleep normally, which usually takes no longer than 15-25 minutes, (although occasionally it does take hours, and in those cases I shut off the alarm and give up for that night.) If all goes to plan, I wake up during the REM phase of sleep, and quickly shut off the alarm; (won't stop beeping until you shut it off, I've tested.) Then I get out of bed, do a few stretches to relax my muscles, and then lie down in bed again. (A problem here is that I am a morning person, so I can wake up very early and just stay up without being very tired or longing to get back to bed.)

I get as comfortable as possible, and lay on my back with my arms at my side. I then close my eyes, and begin counting my breaths. On the inward breath, I count ONE, and on the outward breath, I think to myself 'I am dreaming'. As I count, I try to relax my muscles, especially my jaw and shoulders, (tense muscle hotspots,) while trying to think about nothing. Here's where the problems start. Sometimes I simply fall asleep without remaining conscious; an embarrasing failure indeed after getting this far. Sometimes I will not get anywhere after counting for what seems like too long, and give up, rolling over into a more natural sleeping position where I will let my thoughts wonder into unconscious sleep. (Once I realized that this was my body's roll over test to see if I was awake or not, and thoroughly hated myself the next day for it.)

Twice, however, I THINK I got past this part. I was lying still, when suddenly my entire body started vibrating at an intense rate. I saw a wierd, greenish looking eyeball that really didn't look like an eyeball, but I knew it was. The pupil then ruptured, oozing out a little. It wasn't gross at the time, just bizzare. I felt like I couldn't breath, and after getting nowhere for a few moments, I brought myself out of the state a bit shaken I must say. To this date I have never had any other sort of SP sensations, like the ever creepy sounds you can hear or alleged demons that come into your room. The other time the vibrations were much more managable, and lasted only a moment. I thought to myself, 'this is it!' and got really excited. Now I think this might have been more of an OBE than a WILD, (the two, from my understanding, are virtually identical up to the final phase.) Anyhow, I got up out of my bed/body, and started doing stabilization techniques. I rubbed my hands together, and then picked up a cup, which was wierd because I don't have one in my room. I then looked over at myself sleeping for some reason, and everything was 'fuzzy' and not quite clear. I wasn't really looking through my own eyes either, it was more of a 3rd person control. I then lost lucidicy, and went on to have a deam about the bathroom door being broken.

Other times that I realize that I am dreaming mid dream without doing a WILD I end up not knowing what to do, and fail to mainting lucidicy through any/all stabilization techniques I know; (rubbing hands, spinning, pick up and feel objects, feel floor/walls/own body, etc.) That bit right there might be off topic, but the meat this post is about my attempts to WILD above anything else.

That being said, do you have any advice on how I can refine my technique? Stabilization and/or control techniques would be helpful too. I must probably sound like a newb to an expert here, and expect many responses detailling obvious mistakes I am making. I might even get this thread moved to the newbie zone by a moderator before the day is done, who knows! :cheeky:

Anyhow, the wall of text is over. Sorry if I didn't put enough spacing in, I've had compliants before; (well deserved ones too.) So please comment on my method; don't worry, I'm good at taking critisim! :shadewink:

Come on now, 50 views an no replies. :? I don't know if I didn't make this clear enough, but I'm looking for some feedback from experts on my current method, tips on why it isn't working so well, and any critical mistakes I am making. Sorry if I'm being pushy, but I only get to experiment with lucid dreaming on the weekends, so thats only 2 nights a week to get it right. I'm not quite familiar with who are the 'experts' here, but if ANYONE sees something blarringly wrong I'm doing in my method, (there has to be something, I listened to the Lucidology 101 videos,) then please tell me. Thanks!

It sounds like you have a good routine going here. When you first got the bizarre buzzing and oozing eyeball, you were definitely experiencing some full blown HH (hypnagogic hallucinations). Your feeling of not being able to breathe was actually a hallucination. Its best to just try and ignore any unpleasant hallucinations. If you would have waited it out and continued to relax, you likely would have started transitioning into the dream state.

It would probably be best for you to perform some reality checks along with your stabilization. I like to use reality checks to help stabilize as well. My preferred RC is the nose pinch RC. Basically, you just close off your nasal passage by pinching your nose. Then attempt to breathe through your nose. In a dream, you can still breathe even though it is closed off.

If you perform some RCs and stabilization techniques and the dream still seems to be a bit fuzzy, you simply may need to just carry on with the dream and engage in some activity. This also may have been why you lost lucidity on the one where you made it into the dream state. When you are new to LDing, idling around without doing much can cause you to lose lucidity.

For stabilization, I recommend performing some RCs, rubbing your hands together and just observing your dream environment. Try to look around and really implant the fact that this is all a dream. Then try to engage in some sort of activity. You seem to have done a fine job of getting into the dream state. Sometimes, it just takes a moment for everything to settle in. If things are still fuzzy, go to a different room, outside, a different area in your dream. See if things clear up in a different area.

Good luck to you and I hope this helped out a bit. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask!

Thanks a bunch! My current 'dream goal' (I would post it in a signature, but I need to be a member longer) is to meet my DG and ask him/her/it/them some questions. Is your DG the same thing as your unconscious mind? The very mind that makes important descisions and you can 'talk to' through self hypnosis? Also, what would happen if I theoretically killed my DG in a dream? (there's me anticipating an encounter if he/she/it/they give me any riddle answer bullshit :cheeky: )

On the matter of my first encounter, yeah I know it was HH I saw, and HH I keep looking for every time I attempt to WILD. The wierd part about the oozing eyeball, now that I remember it, is that I saw it, and then I kind of closed my dream eyes, making big black shutters squish it kind of, (if that makes any sense.) Sounds wierd, I agree. :P

Ah, everyone's dream guide is unique. They are created by your own mind after all. You will just have to test the waters and find out what yours is like. If you believe your dream guide to be your subconscious mind, then to you, it will be. As for killing your DG, I'm not sure what will happen. I will say that my "dream guide" has only showed up in 1 dream to date, lol. I think I should fire him eh?

Excellent! If the DG, as you say, is as 'self created' as the rest of my dream, then this will be interesting to try out. I'll try to be able to 'call' him/her/it/them up, to allow access to my DG whenever I want in a LD. Is that possible? It should be, considering it's practially just another part of my dream. I'll ask my DG what would happen if I killed him/her/it/them, and tell you if/when I get a response. :D

On another note, I had a success a few nights ago with dream control. It was a DILD (or MILD, the one where i suddenly realize I'm dreaming,) and I wanted to fly across a long stretch of road quickly, (was searching for DG, knew he/she/it/they were at a swimming pool in my school somehow.) I opened a mini garage, telling myself I would find some sort of flying device. I found a boat. :| Anyhow, it had a sort of hang glider on the bottom, which I used to fly with. I don't know if that was an accidental success, or if I really expected a flying boat or what. Oh well, i should have tried to expect my DG. :P It seems in my dreams I make less logical descisions, and no matter how hard I try, the motive for what I want to accomplish in a dream is nearly ALWAYS sex, even if I go into a dream with another intention... god damn testosterone. :furious:

So here's a question for you, (thanks for your advice so far btw.) When I try to enter a WILD at 4:30 in the morning after being awoken, I lay in bed trying to maintain a thin thread of consciousness as I go to sleep. About how long should I expect it to take? (If I'm conting my breaths, about what number should I expect to reach just before feeling vibes?) It seems I lose hope/count after I get into the 80's/90's and either give up, or fail miserably by falling asleep after letting my thoughts drift too far. Any tips on that matter?

Yeah, I will definitely be interested in your DGs response :D! Dreams tend to throw unexpected things at you like flying boats :P. It always keeps things interesting. Yeah, logic is certainly turned way down during the dream state. I suppose its because of how surreal the dream environment actually is. I am also guilty of pursuing sexual pleasure when I could be doing so many other cool things. Its just human nature I suppose :P.

It depends really, but it shouldn't take more than 5-10 minutes to get into SP with WBTB (wake back to bed). You just need to find that sweet spot for how much time you spend awake before going back to sleep. If you seem to be crashing out and losing consciousness, stay awake a bit longer. The opposite comes in to play if you find yourself not being able to fall asleep.

Alright, cool. I'm going to try to WILD this Friday/Saturday night, so I'll tell you how it goes! :) I was going to try every day during spring break last week, but I got SICK, and was dead-asleep (no dreams, none that I could remember anyway) almost every day. I can't begin to tell you how much it sucked. It seems like every spring break of mine is ruined by sickness. 'God', (or whatever force in the universe you want to call it,) really hates me. Wanted to kill me when I was born, once behind a car, once on Christmas morning, and it really, REALLY made me a messed up guy. If you met me in RL, you would know.

Anyhow, back to lucid dreaming. Whenever I try to LD, I try to combine as many methods as possible, so that I can get at least one of them to work. I go to sleep normally with the intention of LDing beforehand, and then WILD. I'm thinking about looking into DEILD aswell. As soon as I post this, I'll look around the forums for tutorials, (I'm not going to flatly ask you here for a tutorial, I'm not that lazy. :cheeky: ) Contradictory to my last statement, is there any tips you can give me really quick, or any tutorials you know of I should check out? (By the time I read your reply, I will have looked it up, and know a little bit about the basic method.) Thanks!

On another note, I think the reason I resort to sex in a LD (even partially lucid dreams, which I think are the only kind I've ever had,) is because I have not thought seriously about any other things to do. I'm going to meet my DG, check. I'm going to ask her, (I think I'll make it a her, so I don't have to keep typing he/she/it/they over and over, and so our 'relationship' can be a bit more...intimate,) about my life in general, such as why I think I'm going crazy, anything she has to tell me I don't know about myself, why I'd rather get a jab in the eye with a sharp stick than get into a relationship with anyone, etc. On another side, I'll ask her for an idea for a new science fiction novel. (I write fanfiction on fanfiction.net, but I haven't been able to think of any ideas entirely my own. That's why I write fanfiction; I embelish on others' stories. An original plot could make me famous/rich, which is what I keep trying for.) Anyhow, do you have any other ideas for goals, or even better, things I should ask my DG?

I'm going to make a paragraph here, that paragraph was getting a bit too big. Anyhow, to sum up the last 2 questions, I'd like DIELDing advice, and things to ask my DG. Hehe, this thread might be getting a bit off topic, but it's fine. :lol: I think this is going to become the Killerblonde newb help from KingYoshi thread before much longer. Alright, thanks for reading all that! I love typing; it's so much easier than talking.

PS: Isn't my avatar beautiful? It's a scene from the end of the movie Crazies. Silluette of a man and a woman holding hands in front of a nuke. Beautiful; says so much. I knew it would be perfect, and I finally tracked down a youtube and took a screenshot.

UNRELATED SMILEY: :awesomed:
There's just so many smileys...

Yeah, having some goals going into the dream is a good idea. I remember my first few lucids I was just amazed at the fact that I was within a dream, but could think about and remember goals I had created from waking life. Not sure why I was so fascinated by that, lol.

DEILD is simple and very easy when used at an optimal time. If you are Lucid in a dream and you feel the dream fading/ending, you can easily go right back into another Lucid Dream with DEILD. Basically, all you do is lay completely still and keep your eyes closed as you are waking up. You will feel yourself waking up and then you will go right back into the dream state. Sometimes there are some hallucinations and sometimes there aren't. You can also do this if you can become conscious as you are waking up. Sometimes, you have those dreams where you realize you are waking up, and you can DEILD from there as well. It is possible to DEILD after waking up, but you really have to catch it early. DEILD is a type of WILD, btw.

Ah, there are so many things you could ask your Dream Guide. I always thought it would be cool to ask it something about the immediate future (like within the next couple days) and see if your Dream Guide can predict the future. I'm a big sports fan, so I always wanted to ask it who would win a certain game or something like that. Those questions you have are pretty good ones. Asking your Dream Guide if they are religious and what religion they follow would be pretty interesting. You could ask the Dream Guide to describe you and see what he/she thinks of you. You could ask him/her "When will the world end?" Oh man, there are just an infinite number of things you could ask.

Yeah, that is an awesome scene. I quite enjoyed The Crazies actually. Of course, I'm a sucker for any type of zombie movie and even though the crazies weren't zombies, they reminded me of the villagers on Resident Evil 4.

Yeah, I don't think my DG has any mystic powers, but I do believe that she would know a lot about me I did not know about myself. I think my goals will be, besides talking to DG and getting an idea for that multi-million dollar science fiction idea, I think I'll explore space on the bridge of a starship, and try to blast some other ships or something. I absolutely love space combat, be it futuristic like Mass Effect, Star Wars, Stargate, etc. or more realistic like it was portraid in BSG. I really don't care what I get, right now I'm still just trying to become lucid! :cheeky: Of course, I'll probably end up :hump: ing someone, but if I can achieve lucidicy at that point, the dream might not be so fast to fade. If it does, I'll just DEILD my way into another lucid dream and go to another goal.

DEILD is pretty much just trying to WILD right after coming out of a dream without moving I take it. Shouldn't be too hard, once I get WILD down. Am I unusual for going right to WILD as a beginner? I think it's just to much more direct and controllable. I hate being not in control, and I'd INFINATELY rather have a lucid dream on a Friday night than a friggin' Monday night where an alarm clock would wake me up before I got a response from my DG. (Of course, I'm going to have an amazing LD Friday night, then my little bro is going to wake me the next morning like the dick he his.) Anyhow, I don't what it to be up to chance, I like being in control even if it is more difficult.

I love zombie movies too, although the whole concept is getting a bit old. That's why you need new twists and differant takes on it, (same goes for a bunch of movies, another example would be machines that turn against their makers.) Hopefully my DG or a DC will give me a new idea for a story. There's always a new idea out there...(or my dark future reality where every single joke and story has been used up and dried out, and entertainment dies.)

Okay, not really much more to talk about. Any additional pro tips would be much apprecieated. I'll keep you posted on any other questions that cross my mind before Friday! You've been great help!

No problem at all. A lot of newcomers like to dive into WILD because of the same reasons you mentioned. Keep in mind that WILD is a finesse process and it really takes good balance between the waking state and dream state. If your heart is set on WILD, don't give up or get frustrated from failures. It really just takes some practice to get the hang of it. One of the biggest keys to LDing is staying confident and not getting frustrated. Spend your day and prepare for your night knowing 100% that you will succeed. If you fail, look at it as experience gained and don't get discouraged. There will be loads of opportunities to become lucid in the future. Just practice and stick with it. I promise it will pay off in the end! Good luck to you!!

Cool, I'll tell you how it goes!

Success! (ish)

Last night, I set my alarm for 5 hours after I fell asleep. I woke up, decided not to wake myself up too much, did a few stretches while laying in bed, and the lie down to begin WILD. I counted to ten breaths I think, then had to scratch my body or something, (something made me stop trying for a moment.) Then, I tried again, and I think I succeeded. The vibrations began, and once they subsided I got out of my body, did a RC and some stabilization, and this time constantly repeated to myself "I am dreaming". I then opened my door expecting something, (can't remember what,) and didn't get it. I looked around for my DG, but couldn't find her. I remember my dream being clearer than usual, indicating that I was indeed lucid. I think I ended up losing lucidicy after not doing much, and went on to dream about shooting some people wearing heavy armor video game style, fought some Combine from the game Half Life 2 including a huge robot I'd never seen before, and got aboard a spaceship which reminded me of the Nimbus somehow. I didn't bother to write down the dream in detail, (wasn't very exciting, and I didn't accomplish anything,) so I just went back to sleep and forgot most of the details. The second, non lucid dream I had was about trying to blow up an old lady with explosive cigarettes. :shock:

Anyhow, I'm pretty happy that I WILDed :banana: , even though I didn't accomplish much. I'm going to try again tonight. Any comments?

Explosive cigarettes....nice! Congrats on your successful WILD. When you aren't really used to lucid dreaming, staying idle can sometimes cause you to lose lucidity. Just try to keep fairly active and remind yourself/acknowledge that you are in a dream. Sometimes, it helps to open the door very slowly as you imagine something behind it. Just keep working at it and practicing. You made some nice progress and successfully transitioned into the dream state. Congrats and good luck to you! Keep me updated :D!

Thanks! Now that I've been registered for a week, I added a signature with some stuff. I'll keep you updated in this thread! (Once I start having interesting enough lucid dreams regularly, I might add a dream journal on this site. :) )

Sounds excellent! That clock idea sounds interesting indeed. I look forward to hearing from you and again, Good Luck!

Well, last night was a fail. :( I woke up about a half hour before the alarm went off, missing the crutial REM period. I didn't even half to look at the clock; I didn't feel right. I figured out that I should feel extremely tired, or else I wasn't in REM. I tried to WILD anyway, but gave up after some time, (i tried for a few minutes at least, and switched positions.) I ended up having a non lucid dream about some wierd stuff, not really worth talking about. Anyhow, tonight is a school night, so its no good to try to WILD then. I'll try in 5 days, and I will keep you posted!

Well, it really depends whenit comes to how tired you feel. The keys to knowing if you are in REM are dreams. If you wake up out of a dream or if it feels like you were recently dreaming, you are likely in REM.

Sounds good man. Good luck to you!

I tried and failed last night; I will try again tonight. One more quick question for you; when I'm trying to enter SP, (and eventually WILD,) should I have my mind focused on counting breaths and saying 'I am dreaming' to myself silently in my head, or should I let my mind wonder as if I was really trying to fall asleep like in your method, while focusing on an anchor or something? Thanks!

You will likely have to experiment and see which way works best for you. I find that when I focus on counting breaths, I keep myself too active and I'm not able to fall asleep. That is why I let my mind wander. For some, the wandering mind will cause them to lose consciousness too easily and they need a more solid anchor like the counting breaths or silent mantra. My anchor is purely visual. I observe the darkness and any visual hallucinations I get. I suggest you give both methods a shot and see which feels more comfortable to you.