Not sure if I'm dreaming

I’m a very light sleeper and I find it really “challenging” to fall asleep if I wake up in the middle of the night (only bad thing about LD :sad: ) But what will happen is I will doze of and I will feel like I’m on the edge of sleeping, like if i just push myself ill fall into sleep but I’m not actually able to. At this point I start to loose my logical thoughts and my imagination will become more vivid and I will thinking about stuff. Eventually I will kind of “wake up” and it feels like time hasnt passed much. and I wil look back at my thoughts and they will seem like a dream but they dont feel as real as a dream. Just kind of wondering if anyone has this happen and If I might be dreaming or not and also If there is some sort of technique to getting LD from this or just a way to fall alseep from it.

I think you are talking about the state, which is between being awake and being in a dream. It’s called the hypnagogia state. During this kind of very light sleep, your consciousness will slowly start drifting away and your thoughs will start appearing as hallucinations. During the transition from awake to dreaming, it’s common to see these hallucinations, hear imaginary sounds, feel effects of sleep paralysis. Sometimes, especially when falling asleep in the evening, you will experience hypnic jerks, which cause you to suddenly wake up. It’s like a shock, similar to the one, when suddenly waking up from a nightmare. All these things happen in the hypnagogic sleep state.

If you want to induce LD’s using this state, you will have to practice a technique called WILD. If done correctly, it will let you keep your consciousness during the transition to the dream state. You will consciously go trough the hypnagogia state, which will result in a lucid dream. There are a few nice guides on WILD on this forum. This technique is usually done after 4-6 hours of sleep. At this time, it is easiest to reach the dream state. This technique, however, may be difficult for those, who can’t fall asleep easily. Though, with enough effort and motivation everyone can succeed.