Well ok here is my problem…
I have tried WILD (and HILD) and they just don’t seem to be working. I was always under the impression that I fell asleep quickly, but every time I try WILD I stay up for 30-60+ min because I’m trying to stay aware. I know if I didn’t do anything I would probably fall asleep in a matter of minutes.
I can’t stay aware without staying up! Is there a way around this or should I finally give up on WILD and try MILD or just RC’s?
Any help is appreciated.
HILD?
And about WILD, it takes a while to master 
You need patience. But, of course, if you want to stay with RCs and MILD it’s also ok They work too.
HILD or FILD, is something old I found the other day. Basically you wake up when you are really tired and move your hands as you fall asleep. After about a minute you do a RC and you will be dreaming about moving your hand. Course it didn’t work for me.
You say WILD takes a while to master, but I can’t help but feel I’m doing it all wrong if I end up staying awake for an hour or more. I am very sleepy, but doing WILD keeps me up. I don’t exactly know how to go through WILD any more relaxed without not doing WILD and just falling asleep.
I get to a point of deep relaxation. My arms and legs are tingly and hard to move (but not impossible). I don’t really see colors or patterns. I do kind of think about random stuff and see that, but it never develops into dreams. Counting from 100 or 300 or whatever, normally I am still awake when I get to 0.
Do you see my problem? I’ve never done MILD before and figured I would give it a try unless I can figure a way of getting through my problems with WILD.
*Also FIY: The reason I picked WILD as a technique was because in my mind I wanted a surefire way to have lucid dreams. To me, MILD only was the intention to have them, and could come and go. I felt a master of WILD could have lucid dreams every night.
Same for me.
Can’t get it to work. 
Usually I do just quit it after the first few hundreds as that is getting pointless.
However, the first few times I’ve almost succeed (this was me that decided to end WILD at the very last point because of the sleep paralysis actions - the feel of shaking, etc).
I don’t think there is something more to it. Practice does the job.
Think of relaxation as a spectrum. You have to find the balance between being relaxed, yet being awake, to induce a WILD succesfully. The balance is there, and finding it may be very difficult. However, with practice, you will find that reaching that point of balance becomes easier and easier.
A technique that works for me is to allow my mind to drift for a few minutes, after I program my awareness to come back after a few minutes. I don’t know if that makes much sense, but I am basically suggesting to myself that after roughly 5 minutes of letting my mind wander, my conscious awareness will return strong, while my body is still falling asleep. As soon as my awareness kicks back in, as I have programmed it to, I simply repeat the process. I continue doing this until I begin to see colored images forming in the darkness front of me. From there I just take on the perspective of a detached observer and remain uninvolved with the images, seeing them only as thought forms. As soon as this expands to other senses such as smelling the air or feeling the wind in the dream, I remain calm and begin to grain the thought into my head that it is all a dream. I hold onto this thought until my subconscious has forced me into the dream. Do not attempt to jump in as this will make the imagery fade. Just wait for it and you will find yourself conscious in the dream. This technique works very well, because suggestion is a very powerful thing.
That’s a good reason. I’d also like to add that mastering WILD is better, because you can do it any time you can make yourself go to sleep. Not just at night.
Thanks Darxide! I will have to try that. I was about to start MILD which I only want to do as a last ditch effort.
And yes, I understood what you said about wondering and coming back.
Thanks again!
Glad I could be of help.
I am exactly like you, Fwump! Except I think with practice I can do this, it’s just going to take me a long time because most nights I fall asleep too fast so the nights I actually get to practice lying there remaining aware are few and far between. So for me the formula is practice + lots of time = WILD (eventually, I hope!). I refuse to give up and don’t care if it takes me years to master, I know I’ll get it and it’ll be worth the wait.
Darxide, can you explain what it feels like being a detached observer and then finding yourself conscious in the dream? Is it a feeling of slowly (or quickly) being pulled in or is it like when you switch scenes, movie-like, in a dream, where one minute you’re at work, the next minute you’re home (for example)? One second you’re a detached observer, the next you’re conscious in the dream?