Some folks in the chatroom asked for a link on this method by Tholey to get 1 LD a day. Thanks to Stephen LaBerge for finding and refining it:
REFLECTION-INTENTION TECHNIQUE
Plan when you intend to test your state
Choose in advance certain occasions when you intend to remember to test your state. For example, you might decide to ask, “Am I dreaming?” when you arrive home from work, at the beginning of each conversation you have, every hour on the hour, and so on. Choose a frequency of state testing that feels comfortable. Use imagery to help you remember to ask the question. For instance, if you intend to ask it when you arrive at home, see yourself opening the door and remembering your intention.
Practice the exercise a dozen times or more during the day at your selected times and also whenever you find yourself in a situation which is in any way dreamlike, for example, whenever something surprising or odd happens or you experience inappropriately strong emotions or find your mind (and especially memory) strangely unresponsive.
Test your state
Ask yourself, “Am I dreaming or awake?” Look around you for any oddities or inconsistencies that might indicate you are dreaming. Think back to the events of the last several minutes. Do you have any trouble remembering what just happened? If so, you may be dreaming. Read some text twice. Don’t conclude that you are awake unless you have solid proof (for example, the writing stays the same every time you look at it).
Imagine yourself dreaming
After having satisfied yourself that you’re awake, tell yourself, “Okay, I’m not dreaming, now. But if I were, what would it be like?” Imagine as vividly as possible that you are dreaming. Intently imagine that what you are perceiving (hearing, feeling, smelling, or seeing) is a dream: the people, trees, sunshine, sky and earth, and yourself—all a dream. Observe your environment carefully for your target dreamsigns from chapter 2. Imagine what it would be like if a dreamsign from your target category were present.
As soon as you are able to vividly experience yourself as if in a dream, tell yourself, “’The next time I’m dreaming, I will remember to recognize that I’m dreaming.”
Imagine doing what you intend to do in your lucid dream
Decide in advance what you would like to do in your next lucid dream. You may wish to fly or talk to dream characters or try one of the applications suggested later in this book.
Now, continue the fantasy begun in Step 2 and imagine that after having become lucid in your present environment, you now fulfill your wish: Experience yourself doing whatever you have chosen to do. Firmly resolve that you will remember to recognize that you are dreaming and to do what you intend in your next lucid dream. (Adapted from Tholey. 10)
Keep in mind repeated daily practice will produce the tremendous results according to Tholey’s studies. I guess it has to be a super habit – seems like it kind of bridges the gap between the waking and dreaming world uniting them in our minds.
thx for info, seems a lot more effective then me just trying to breath through closed nostrals whenever I think of LDs, (btw the breathing through nostals things never works, i always cant breath but I always realize other oddities whenever Im doing that RC)
Ya I’ve noticed that it takes about a minute or more to kind of run through it. SL recommends doing it like a dozen times a day.
I’ve noticed a pretty interesting “connection” when I’ve done it and since I do RC’s throughout the day as a habit I might as well add it. I really think it works to create LD’s.
I’ve already done it twice today and I’ve been awake about 2 hours.
I know what reyth is talking about. I highly reccomed this technqiue. In reality, it takes me around a minute. 2 minutes tops. In my dreams, I’m starting to question if i am dreaming more
I’ve been thinking to myself how powerful the technique is but I felt that something was missing because I could not see how this technique could lead to 1 LD a day just on it’s own.
I found the following website a couple of days ago:
Notice step 8. It is too simple. In fact it can’t possibly work to get 1 LD a day. But there is something special about it. It is passive and requires no effort and thus will not interfere with falling asleep.
I got the idea last night to link the two together!
I found that the work done with the technique during the day creates the technique for the practice at night!
The first connection is when I tell myself I am going to be lucid in the upcoming dream. I then connect mentally to my rehearsed lucidity practice during the day. At first I might be using the hypnagogic “space” which the technique automatically creates (since it is a visualization) and that is the first stage. The important thing is that the technique runs itself automatically, like a record player. Again, passive. Because I have rehearsed it so many times I don’t have to create the excitement at being lucid and perform the dream tasks – I already did all that during the day!
The second stage is where the technique merges with the hypnagogic imagery which is now provided in real time by your mind. The key here is realizing that the daytime practice has actually created a “dream body” that is portable! All of the mental excitement and the intention to remember then takes place automatically in the real time hypnagogic imagery through the portable “dream body”.
A switching back and forth from telling yourself you will be lucid and experiencing the daytime technique in the real time imagery continues into the dream which will be lucid.
I fleshed this out last night for the first time after a full night of sleep and 2 sleep transfers. I tried to perform the “21 attempts” of the Tibetan dream yoga to get back to sleep and came close but awakened before a dream could manifest with the intention strongly on my mind. I had to give up after 10 failed attempts – my head just hurt too much and my eyes were starting to hurt too. Those yogis are strong…
So I will work hard with this technique and report here what I obtain. I am pretty excited about it. I think 1 LD a day will be easy with this technique. I think it’s better than MILD and any other technique I’ve tried.
