Hi guys. I practiced this method last night. I was defeated by the inabiliy to sleep and hunger… ever since I’ve been trying the WBTB method with an alarm I have been having trouble falling asleep. Any thoughts or guidance on how to fall asleep fast? I did have two fairly vivid ND though .
Read closely the section which discusses the various common causes for losing sleeps after doing the exercise.
Do not stay awake for too long. I suggest starting with 5 minutes. General rule of thumb is: If you find it difficult to complete 2 cycles, then you are not sufficiently awake. On the other hand if your mind does not begin to wander after 4 cycles, then you are too awake. Adjust your WBTB duration using 5-minute increments.
Try some supplement such as 5-HTP or Melatonin before going to bed. These supplements will make you sleep better, and cause REM rebound after a few hours thus giving you large trunks of REM.
Have faith in the SSILD technique. Do NOT over-do it. Just 4-5 cycles and go to sleep. You WILL become lucid sooner or later. If you wake up without getting an LD, simply do another 4 cycles. Chaining the exercise like this will give you a very high success rate (please DO remember reality-checking often upon waking up as the method likes to throw you into super realistic FAs).
I’m not exactly 100% what is the problem. I have been doing research, and I find out phone radiation can cause lack of sleep, (I use my phone for an alarm.) so it may turn out that WBTB may not be the cause, it might be the phone that I used as a alarm! I will test this method out tonight without a phone and a real alarm, and I’ll report the results!
On a side note, I started losing focus on the first cycle lol, it was hard to get through 4 without my mind just completely straying.
Well, I tried it for the third night, but this really doesn’t count because I was tricked by a damn snooze alarm into thinking it was 2:00AM when it was like 11:30PM. Because of that, no Lucid dreams
Okay so I have been looking into SSILD and it sounds very interesting, and promising. But I have one question about the technique, when you are laying down doing the cycles are you supposed to stay completley still, I would imagine you are because movements would distract you from the cycles, but do things like swallowing and moving your eyes matter like they do in WILD. I know that you are not trying to induce dreams from the waked state using this technique but would those things distract you?
I just tried this technique for the first time the other night and I fell asleep while doing the cycles and I didnt get any results. Im really excited to keep trying this tech though.
I posted this on a separate thread but I will repost here: I tried SSILD last night for the first time after about 5 hours of sleep, because I woke up. I got to the 4th or 5th repetition before I went to sleep. But a short time later I woke up(?) with a massive buzzing/vibrating feeling centered in my head. I didn’t know what to do and to be honest I found it quite scary so I think I woke up fully and then went back to sleep. What was this?
Sigh, you just missed a perfect OBE! The sensation is called “vibration”, which is frenqently associated with OBE. It’s nothing to be frightened about, just harmless illusions, and can be very exciting and enjoyable. You apparently did SSILD perfectly in order to achieve this effect. I suggest you read more about this phenomena to learn how to utilize it (Astral Projection people also use it for projecting, but I really don’t suggest going that occult route in terms of both practice and view point. Science with an open mind will probably do you more good in this case).
Forgive me, I’m a noob! I was just apprehensive because I have never experienced it before, I will try again tonight . Should I just focus on the feeling and go deeper?
It’s hard for me to tell without you giving me at least some details on how you did it… even though I think the technique is pretty solid it is not plug-n-play you know… and it comes with no warranty, LOL.
Not requiring you to stay completely motionless is actually a FEATURE of this technique. You should do it in the most comfortable manner. If there is a itch, just scratch it; back feeling stiff? Just stretch a bit. You can always compensate by doing maybe an extra cycle or two.
I woke at 4 last night. Stayed up five minutes. Then I did the cycles. By the end my mind was starting to drift and I was having slight - very very slight - auditory “hallucinations” (the type I get when I drift off to sleep at night or meditate - not like there was someone in the room with me). I lost count of the cycles so guess I did six cycles. I got back to sleep, then had a vague non-lucid.
Sounds like you performed the technique correctly which is the most important thing! I suspect the unsuccessful attempt was cased by one of the followings:
Not sufficiently woken up prior to doing the exercise. Try to adjust it in small 5-minute increment till you find the perfect one for you.
Fooled by FAs. Did you recall waking up after the exercise? Did you RC upon waking up? Did you abruptly get up when you woke? This last item is very interesting because we often wake up at the borderline between an FA and a real one. The transition from one to another can be seamless. You should treat each waking up after the exercise as an opportunity – always RC, and always wake up “delicately”.
Bad recall. Have you been keeping a dream journal? Also try not going to bed after 12.
Keep at it. It will work! I’m always here to help.
That’s the one. Will try 5 minute increments. Incidentally, what do you recommend doing during the 5 minutes? Also, supposing I start at 5 minutes, how many nights should I stick with 5 minutes until I step up to 10?
Definitely did an RC. Was definitely awake.
Yes, I keep a journal. I’m usually in bed by 10pm.
I think it’s always healthy to have a dose of skepticism but…are you…sure?
You should fine-tune the time until you have success and then stick to it. I usually rinse my month and surf the web a bit with my iPad…
As I said, the technique comes with no warranty but it is pretty solid. Many people have mastered the technique and achieved very high success rate. On my personal forum I require each member (the active ones) to keep a personal thread. They use this mechanism to record their experiences, and interact with me at an individual level. This kind of coaching is quite effective. One guy managed to have 400+ LDs/OBEs in less than a year, and even the less amazing ones now average 3-4 per week. Of course there are also people who absolutely cannot succeed, but if you look their stuff closely you realize they either never bothered to read the instructions carefully, or they mix things up and never could approach this in a systematic manner.
One other thing I’d like to mention is the use of supplement. I highly suggest the combination of Galantamine + Choline Bitartrate + Alpha GPC. This is proven to enhance WILD, but it is even better with SSILD. With WILD you have to work a long time (up to an hour or more) to make this work, but with SSILD you just do your 4-5 cycles and go to sleep, then wait for miracles to happen. You WILL have multiple LDs/OBEs after that, and they can last a long time. Try it!
So it’s been about 4 months since I’ve been using the technique. I don’t always use it, usually I start it if I am trying to WILD and I’m not sleepy enough. This, for some reason, gets me lots of DILDs, and many times those DILDs get me into sleep paralysis. The dream would have been going for 5 minutes or so before I snap. If this doesn’t happen, I just go into sleep paralysis. If that doesn’t happen, I just fall asleep.
I’'ve counted the success rate over 3 months and this is what I got:
20% DILDs (10% of which get me into sleep paralysis and fail, and 5% of which get me into sleep paralysis and get me into a lucid dream/obe)
30% sleep paralysis (5% which get me into an lucid dream/obe)
and 50% fails
So the overall success rate is 20%, which is pretty good. I suspect that the DILD -> SP -> LD has more success rate than SP -> LD since I’m in a more relaxed state.
This is what happens when I’m doing SILD:
I relax my body
I proceed as instructed, and usually stop to the sounds or sensations but never at the visuals
Fall asleep or enter sleep paralysis
My only problem now is getting from sleep paralysis to lucid dream. I get confused between my dream eyes and have trouble getting “out of body”.
Thanks cosmic. I think I will give my full attention to the SSILD technique.
Thanks also Kache for telling us your experiences. It is useful to see how others use a technique. Too often on LD forums people “disappear” and don’t report if a new technique is working for them or not.
Very interesting! I don’t supplement so my knowledge in this area is a little weak. I’d sort of been under the impression that galantamine and choline fit best with those who used the WILD method. But my own experience with SSILD is that it generates lots of DILDs (especially DILDs via false awakening.) Is there something special about SSILD that makes it uniquely well-suited for this supplementation or is this the general “lucid dreaming cocktail” that you like the best, regardless of technique?
Also, what dosages and timings do you typically use/recommend for this combo? Is this a “right before bed” thing or “right before you perform SSILD cycles” thing?
Is supplementation you still do yourself? Even though you clearly have no need for supplementation in order to have LDs (as you have thousands!), do you still personally prefer the enhanced clarity and recall that comes from this supplement mixture?