Oh man, I wish I could fall asleep by counting to 5.
That would be the life…
I should clarify that I have an alarm clock to wake me up after about 4.5 hours of sleep. That’s when I try the counting tech or if I happen to wake up at any other time. That’s why I fall asleep so fast 
It usually takes anywhere from 20 minutes to 1 hour to fall asleep when I go to sleep at night.
FixingFlare…i didnt know LaBerge had this tech…i dont have his book yet. And…i named it Bendrummin58’s Method…because i didnt want people to get it confused with the Third Eye method. that is also called CILD…its like charka or something.
I can get that ghostly sensation at will, I think you were just imagining it happening, not dreaming, there is a small difference. At least that is how I do it, only with more concentration and tell myself it is actually happening.
I sort of got this tech to work last night, but I did get a little help. As usual I had counted to about 10 when I stopped for some reason and I was just laying there on my bed when suddenly a zombie like person said something to me. I got up and realised that I was dreaming. I’m thinking that whenever one looses count and/or stops counting for some unknown reason. Then you should to a RC, I will keep trying this tech 
i got my first LD this month with this. i tried it three times i think before it worked (well, i always did my rc before 400)… the first and second rc’s (i just press the backlight button on my watch, it works miracles) i was still awake, the third one my whole arm started flickering (it was really funny)… very vivid though, i think one of my most “life-like” dreams ever.
i got way too excited though and i couldn’t even move (i tried getting up but i felt paralyzed)… so i just woke up within 10 seconds or so.
i’ll be trying this more (i read about this technique somewhere else before, cause i’ve been trying it for a long time now… i don’t remember if it was in “Exploring the world of lucid dreaming” or these boards somewhere…)
I think the variation was to count to 50, and add 50 more to your count (and start over, of course) after each reality check. so you count 0-50, RC… then 0-100 RC, 0-150 RC and so on.
this seems very interesting, because i think that’s when i was doing my rc’s… i usually lost count at around 200 and did an RC, thinking 200 was long enough for me to fall asleep…
I’ll try that too.
yep, it worked again… this time i had a really long LD and I didn’t lose lucidity until I woke up.
I don’t know exactly what I’m doing, but i do know I stop counting several times each try, trail off in other thoughts, then start counting again then wonder what the hell is happening… do an rc and yaay, i’m dreaming. it’s really weird, but it somehow seems to work for me.
im glad that it works for you MeusOpusMagnus 