Hey DV!

As you can see, I'm a novice at this forum and I'm also a novice dreamer. At least consciously

When I started reading about lucid dreaming, I decided to take up meditation too as a step to help me calm down my mind and body. And I must say, I have no idea why I haven't done any of this before! It's so de-stressing and blissful However, I have a long history of struggling with falling asleep. My problem has always been that I can't turn off/zone out from my mental chatter and monologue. This has caused many sleepless nights, where I just lay in bed for hours. Not one or two hours, I'm talking five to seven hours with no sleep and just thinking constantly. It's pretty exhausting.

Without a doubt, the meditation and techniques I have adopted with my dreaming have absolutely helped! But I still do experience ruining things for myself. Especially when I'm attempting to WILD, or even just trying to sleep. I get to a point where I am, let's say 85% off to dreamland and just have to drift off to sleep. Then I suddenly think "It's working! Oh wait, now I'm thinking. Quick, what was I visualizing? Was I in a garden? Fuck, I don't remember. Why can't I stop these thoughts?" and before I know it, I'm back to my bodily self. I struggle with leaving my body behind and going to sleep.

BUT! I do know that I'm not a special case, I just need to unlock my key of silencing my chatter. I know I can do this, it's only a matter of time. If any of you have any tips, exercises, mantras etc. that could help me, I would be so thankful!