This happens to me all the time. I’ll dream that no matter how much pressure I apply to the brakes, I’ll still be slowly rolling down my driveway. I’m just surprised that it happens to other people as well.
Anyway, you say you’ve been doing reality checks for a month now, and they’ve never come up in your dreams? I wouldn’t dismiss them all together, but perhaps you can change the way you’re doing them - or increase the frequency. Most of the people I know had their first LD by doing the classic “digital time” RC several times per day.
Here’s an important question: How much sleep do you get each night? I ask, because these days it’s pretty common for people to be getting only 5 or 6 hours on the average night. With that length of sleep, in all honestly, your chances to LD are virtually diminished. Just remember, with 7 hours of sleep, you’re about 5 times more likely to LD than with 6. Also, with 8 hours, you’re another 5 times more likely to have an LD than with 7. This keeps going until you hit 10 hours, at which point you have the maximum likeliness.
There are several reasons which validate the above effect. Firstly, REM sleep is cumulative, meaning each additional 2 hours of sleep practically doubles the amount of REM sleep you experience. At 10 hours, your REM periods are at their maximum length and frequency. If you can afford to, try to make sure you get at least 8 hours of sleep per night. Not only will this give you a suitably high chance of having a lucid dream, but you’ll also feel significantly more revived the next day.
Next, try to wake yourself up a few times during the night. Contrary to how it might seem, this doesn’t actually ruin the night’s rest. If you wake up for a few minutes, write down a few words to describe any dreams you remember, tell yourself that you’re trying to LD, and return to sleep, absolutely NO sleep is lost, and you won’t have to start again with your REM cycles. I find doing this encourages the best dream recall, as it allows you to record a few details of the earlier dreams which are commonly forgotten by the time you wake up in the morning.
I use an alarm clock to wake me up after 5 or 6 hours of sleep (depending on how much I expect to get, and whether I have work the following morning). When I wake up, I write down anything that I can remember, think about lucid dreaming, maybe read the horrible random scribbles that have appeared all over my journal during the night (I have a nicely tuned routine ) and then return to sleep with the intention to LD next time I find myself in a dream.
Recently I’ve also been experimenting with external sound induction techniques. I set a CD to play on repeat while I’m sleeping, which every 5 minutes or so says: “Is this a dream?” and various other useful messages. If you haven’t heard about external induction before, you’ll be absolutely amazed at how effective it can be. Provided it’s not so loud that it wakes you up, the sound should influence your dream (you’ve probably noticed movies and other sounds do this) - and you should be reminded to check whether you’re dreaming or not.
Good luck, and let us know how you’re going.