Hi,
I thought it was about time I started trying to initiate some lucid dreams so here I am. Loads of fascinating posts on this forum so I thought this was a good place to start.
I thought by way of introducing myself to the forum I would share my experience so far. Its only recently I’ve been thinking more and more about lucid dreaming but I’ve talked about my experiences especially as a child all my life when the subject of dreams pops up in conversation. Most people are either fascinated or clearly don’t believe me.
As a child I constantly experienced lucid dreams although I thought it was normal and didn’t talk to people about it. I don’t remember controlling my dream environment except in one respect that was always the same. I every lucid dream I had I would quickly realise I was dreaming and tell people in my dream that “we” were dreaming (never “I” am dreaming). As the dream progressed if I wanted to wake up (and this is the weird bit) all I had to do was find a vintage car (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang era) lie down underneath it and bang! wide awake. The car was always there if I needed to wake up but the lucid dreams stopped as I got older. It’s a shame I didn’t realise what was happening.
Anyway as an adult I still naturally have lucid dreams but very infrequently maybe only once a year at least they are the only ones I can remember, the last one I had I managed to fly which I have never done before.
I also suffer from sleep paralysis or to be more accurate waking paralysis where I want to wake up when I’m dreaming but cant. Its hard to describe but I know I’m lying in bed and if I “struggle” I cant wake but I can fool myself into thinking I’m awake and even standing up out of bed or walking around the house when I suddenly realise I’m dreaming, panic and start shallow breathing and twitching at which point my wife has to shake me to snap me awake. I can wake myself up if I relax and jerk myself awake. As I write this I’ve never spotted the fact that I know I’m asleep and maybe I should stop trying to wake myself up but the feeling of paralysis is very scary. Now I think about it I’ve suffered the paralysis as long as I can remember (I’m 38 now) but its worse when I’m stressed.
Anyway that’s me, I’m reading about how to induce lucid dreams and I’ll let you know how I get on.
Any thoughts on what the heck is going on with all the paralysis stuff would be appreciated. 
Hello, welcome to the forum! (gets it right this time).
Sleep paralysis is very normal and is not a disorder.
In fact, dreamers who use the WILD technique welcome it.
It occurs when your body has fallen asleep and you mind still hasn’t.
That paralysis is what prevents us from jumping through windows while dreaming.
Basically, if there was no sleep paralysis, we’d be in trouble.
So, that’s going on. Your mind awakens before your body does.
This is how you might stop it:
You must know what you are suffering from and that it is not as dangerous as you think. You should calm down, like WILDers.
You might break the paralysis by calming down and focusing only on moving your toe or finger. And little by little, you are free.
Also, just a side note. Sleep paralysis supposedly occurs mostly when people are lying on their back. That probably why I don’t get it. Actually, now when I think about it, the last time I got it (and I got it maybe 2 times in my lifetime) I was lying on my back, maybe even the first time.
Oh, and it’s wonderful how you were a natural lucid dreamer.
Enjoy the forum, I hope this helps 
Welcome 
What I do to break paralysis (and I regret later because I can never seem to remember to enter a lucid dream from it) is I start breathing quickly. I read someplace that this is a way for the body to see that the mind is awake. After I start breathing like this I’m usually free after a bout 5-10 seconds. I’ve never tried the toe thing, sounds good too 
I tried MILD and later on WILD last night. Didnt have a LD but I did experience paralysis at some point in the night and managed remember not to freak out but my wife heard my fast breathing whilst trying to calm down and woke me up.
The WILD attempt was cool but kept falling asleep, I’ll try both again tonight.
I also realise now that I have good dream recall, never really thought about it before I just assumed everyone could remember their dreams…
Good thing you have your wife there to wake you up 
Good dream recall is good! As you might know. I also had good dream recall, sad I never realized how amazing dreams are. Got close to realizing once though. Oh well.
Good luck tonight.
I trust that was sarcasm! Funny thing is I’ve been aware during sleep paralysis since childhood and I’d developed a good way of waking myself up by relaxing then kind of jolting my body awake until I met my wife who is a very light sleeper and now she wakes me up at the first sign I’m breathing differently. I don’t know how it feels during WILD but I am definitely not awake during SP but I’m not dreaming properly I do have recall of images during SP and interestingly if I don’t wake up properly I can go straight back into SP in a matter of seconds after closing my eyes.
Sorry I don’t know your history, I take it you lost your ability to recall dreams easily. If so that must be very annoying, I can’t imagine not remembering dreams. I’ve been talking to my 5 year old son about dreams recently as he has always had quite a few nightmares (just like me as a child) and it appears he also has pretty good recall.
Hallucinations are common during SP. Maybe that’s what you’re experiencing? And it’s good if you can get back into SP right after closing your eyes! that means that WILD should be very easy for you if you can stay focussed. next time you experience SP, try WILDing. it shouldn’t be too difficult. Usually getting to SP is the hardest part for me.
I’m going to try WILD next time I have SP, I tried to relax last time but its hard not to stop myself form doing the old snap out of it trick as I’ve been doing it for years.
Hi yall,
I’m back from my adventures in the dreamworld!
Since I last posted I’ve tried MILD, WILD, keeping a dream diary and reality checking.
The thing I’ve found more useful for me than anything else is reality checking. I use the nose pinch and it never fails to kick me into becoming lucid. I stopped keeping a diary and trying MILD or WILD and stopped RCing in the day but I still become lucid fairly regularly. However, these techniques definitely increase the number of LDs I have. I guess I’m just lazy!
The thing I find hardest is staying lucid for any length of time, running around shouting “increase lucidity” or “i am the dream master” help but you cant keep shouting or you don’t have time to do anything else.
I’ll do a bit of forum searching but if anyone reads this and has a suggestion I’ll give it a go.
I’m LDing more often again these days as I’ve been doing the odd RC in the day and trying MILD if I wake up in the night. I had an amazing chain of LDs a few days ago only broken when I had a FA and didn’t realise DOH! My fault for being lazy with the RCs.
I wasn’t very clear. I just meant that having someone to “save” you from a scary SP should be useful 
) But the more you dedicate yourself the better it gets. I mean, people that usually remember no dreams at all have a harder time having their first LD