As I read it you have made it a habit so ingrained to wake up as soon as you realize you are dreaming. Somehow you have developed a fear to be dreaming, and when you realize you are in the dreamworld - wham you wake up.
Some things that might help:
Firstly, i would work on that fear of dreaming. Tell yourself it is OK to dream. Work on that auto-wake-up trigger you have devised for yourself. As soon as you realize you are dreaming: say:ok, i’m dreaming, it’s ok to be dreaming, let’s do something relaxing so i get some rest.
things you could do to be passive instead of active all the time, maybe watch a movie in your dream or a tv show, something you don’ thave to think, you can just watch.
Have you ever tried going to sleep in a dream?
Have you tried to ask yourself not to have a LD before going to sleep, but just a passive dream? (this works to have LD’s maybe it works the other way around too)
Think of something that relaxes you IRL and do that in
your LD.
have you ever called for help in your LD? And ask for a LD free period?
You are so right about my auto wakeup. I started it in my teenage years because my dreams were so scary. I would wake a hundred times a night it seemed, as soon as I was asleep I would instantly wake up. I had a surgery when I was 16 and they put the meds in my IV and knocked me out in seconds but it only lasted for a few seconds. As soon as the nurse tried to put the O2 sensor on my finger I flung it off. My hands were the only things I could move, I couldn’t even open my eyes because of the meds. The doctor quickly developed a hand movement for yes/no questions. He asked me some questions then told me that he couldn’t do the surgery until I was asleep. He told me I had to go to sleep and wasn’t allowed to wake back up until he was done.
I thought that the habit had eased up a bit, but I was wrong. I don’t usually share my dreams, write them down or anything because of course doing so seems only to cause more. This is exactly what I don’t want. Spending so much time here yesterday triggered the fireworks in my mind last night. I have been exhausted for weeks now, I am always tired, so much so that I was planning to tell my doctor about it. Well now I know why. My auto-wake hasn’t seemed to ease I think I was just not remembering them. Last night was miserable. I dreamt I found a pair of glasses on my kitchen floor! I realized it was a dream and WHAM, I woke up. When back to sleep and saw a man in white lean down and pick up a pair of glasses, nope just a dream most likely related to the glasses I found in my other dream WHAM I woke up. I did this all night long. Just before my alarm went off I had a dream that I was at my computer and that someone had posted a reply on this website, the alarm woke me up. I hit snooze and laid back down wondering if I should go check that response. I went straight back to the dream and was looking at the computer and told myself NO NO NO. Don’t do it. That is that BTsomething they talked about on that website. I told myself I spent years trying to get out of the dream world and if I check that response I will be playing around and things will get out of control again. So I just kind of shut the dream off and woke up.
I seem to always be at one extreme or another. Either I immediately wake or I get stuck in my dreams. I feel terrible to today. I am soooo tired. I will definitely work on that auto-wake and I think you are right about the passive dreams. I will try to convince myself to not wake up (in RL or my dream) but to go to a passive dream. Thanks for the advice.
I’ve been having lucids/obes for 15 years, but would really like some of your problem to rub off on me and trade some of my unaware dreaming time hehehe
I was wondering, are you a stressful person in everyday life? I know you feel stressed about not getting satisfactory sleep, but how do you deal with everyday life? Are you laid back, or the opposite?
Also, how much of your waking life do you think about your dreams?
I just remembered another part of my “fireworks” display last night. I had the same dream 3 times with just one variation. In the dream a woman kept repeating the letters of a word to me and had me repeat them back. She wanted me to remember the word when I woke up and she was afraid if she just said the word I wouldn’t remember. For example if the word was ‘lucid’ she would keep saying over and over again L-U-C-I-D and then have me repeat them. She told me to promise her I would remember the letters when I woke up. I was frustrated in each dream because it seemed I had heard the letters and repeated them enough times that I would remember them forever. So after the first time, I told the lady that I would remember and told her goodbye that I was waking up now. I woke up in RL and repeated the letters to myself but they didn’t form a real English word. I went back to sleep and it happened again. We repeated letters to a different word again and I told the lady that I would remember them just as I had the first time, but I told her the first letters she gave me didn’t make sense when I woke up. So I once again told her I was waking up and would remember. I woke up in RL repeated the letters to myself and again they did not form a real word. So then I go back to sleep again and the lady comes to me again. I was getting frustrated I told the lady that we had already done this twice and the letters she was giving me didn’t make sense when I woke up. She told me this time they would. I remember asking her “Are you SURE, because this is the third time now? She assured me that when I woke the letters would make sense. So we repeated the letters to the third word. I told her I had them memorized and that I would remember them. I woke in RL, repeated them and again it was not a real word.
But I had almost forgotten the dreams altogether and I don’t remember any of the letters she told me.
These are just the dreams I remember waking up from, I can’t imagine how many more times I must have woken up last night but just don’t remember the dream.
Thanks for the advice. I will read up on them and see what exactly they are and how they work.
Aelfrede
No, I am not a high stress person. Actually I am the complete opposite. It takes a whole lot to get me upset and I actually avoid high-stress, high-strung people. I like things peaceful and quiet. I spend more time reading then watching T.V. and I have a bachelors degree in psychology. So as far as I know, I’m not crazy yet!
I usually don’t try to think about my dreams at all, but sense I joined this forum yesterday I’ve been thinking about them a lot.
i you want to get rest in a LD just bring yourself someplace peaceful like an island or you could go to your own bedroom if you want…then just lay down and go to sleep in your dream
When I can do that, I do. I have spent many of nights just floating above my bed wishing I could just have a normal sleep. But I don’t feel like I’m resting when I’m lucid and floating. I don’t feel like I am getting the rest that I need. Fortunately, sometimes when I’m floating around just being grateful for sleep even if it is lucid, I will fall into a non-lucid sleep, but not always. A lot of times I just end up waking in real life.
Ummm, don’t know. When I wake in a floating dream and don’t actually end up automatically waking in RL, I guess I just go with the flow. If I’m floating, oh well at least I’m getting some sleep even if it’s lucid. I guess next time I can try to just lie back down in bed. But if laying back down wakes me in real life then I will just have to stick to going with the flow and be grateful to be floating, yet sleeping.
what you say makes sense from others like you I’ve spoken to. They all said they are not highly stressed people. A friend of mine normally gets lucid in about 70% of her dreams. She is a laid back person, and doesn’t like to make a big deal out of anything. Keeps pretty cool, tempermentally. She also thinks about her dreams about 70% of the time. She’ll be washing up and suddenly a memory of a dream will come, sometimes from ages ago. But the key point here is how often dreams are coming into her waking inner dialogue/mental space. I think these are the two major things I’ve noticed, having a laid back personality and how much attention goes to dreams. In a way I was hoping you wouldn’t say you were highly stressed as it would blow my thoery You say you normally don’t think about your dreams much, but I presume there is quite a lot of internal attention going to your disturbed nights, even if it’s not totally obvious (as in dialogue about it) there must be a pressure within caused by the disturbed nights, that certainly has the attention of your brain on some level of awareness.
I do think there are other influencing elements on how often someone gets lucid. And for those who want to change the frequency of our lucidity, whether that is an increase or decrease, it is of great interest to us to get to the bottom of it (I’m not saying you should now go out your way to be a stressed out person LOL)
Do you mind me asking, did you have a stressful childhood or was it easy going?
“What you say makes sense from others like you I’ve spoken to”
aaahh, happy to hear there are others.
Could you ask some of those “other” people if they ever feel rested, like they actually did get a good night’s sleep? Please.
(2muchLDing laying on black leather couch)
Yes, I do get popping dream memories. But I don’t pay much attention to them.
I think my childhood environment could be considered stressful but I was not a stressful child.
2muchLDing, i think it would really help you if you started writing down those fireworks/dream memories etc. Just to have it out of your mind. Then just leave them there in the book, don’t reread or anything, just put them there. It might help to put you at peace.
Nothing else has worked so I guess it can’t hurt to try. I’m just afraid that after so many years of making it a point to not think about them and certainly not write them down, that if I start now I may open a Pandora’s Box. I will try it tonight though and see how it goes.
it can get worse the first days you try, but keep it up, and just write down, like you don’t have to keep it in your head and then force yourself not to think about it - now you write them down and if you notice yourself thinking about dreams, send those thoughts inside your dream-book. Good luck, let us know how you progress.
Could you ask some of those “other” people if they ever feel >rested, like they actually did get a good night’s sleep? Please.
I’ll ask when I next speak to them and let you know
Yes, I do get popping dream memories. But I don’t pay much >attention to them.
Can I ask where your inner dialogue goes? I presume you’re not the personality type to waste time with the horrible dialogues that play out scenarios, such as those that revolve around concern what others think of/treat you. Like for instance, if someone’s approach to you has upset you at work. Is this true, that you are not bothered by such things? You just take things in your stride and petty concerns don’t get to you, is that right? If it is, do you mind me asking you to do a little experiment and see where your inner dialogue time goes? Where is your attention going in waking life? Or maybe you don’t have much dialogue and just inner silence? Do you have a busy waking life schedule? I ask this as I’m looking for patterns that influence lucidity. The answers might not just help others get lucid more, but work out a way for you to get more consistant sleep.
Are you ever lucid long enough to try any pre-planned lucid missions? Have you thought of doing some affirmations as soon as you get lucid? Something like “I sleep all night and feel rested on awakening”. Although affirmations said in waking life can be powerful, I’ve never known anything so powerful as when I used them when lucid. I used them to help me with a very stressful life event, and the outcome was incredibly powerful.
I think my childhood environment could be considered >stressful but I was not a stressful child.
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Yes I see, your personality type has formed to one that does not seem to focus much on stresses. I think this stress free approach is very important for lucid dreaming (however, I’ll say again that I don’t think that means your answer is to become a stressful person ).
I’m not too sure about the inner dialoged thing. I’m a big venter, if someone at work ticks me off then I will usually just talk to a friend. Tell them what had happened vent whatever anger I may have and then be done with it.
Right now I have too much free time. I just graduated in May. I was going to school full-time and working part-time as a single parent for the last 5 years. So I guess now is a good time to explore my dream problem. But I have to work this weekend so if I don’t get some decent sleep by Friday I’ll be taking a sleeping pill.
Oh and I’m bringing a notepad to bed and am going to try to convince myself to stay asleep in RL and in my dreams.
I wrote down some dreams in a notebook last night as you suggested.
No Lucid dreams last night, (yippy!!). At least if I did I don’t remember them. But something REALLY freaky happened and I woke up this morning more tired then when I went to bed (but that is not the freaky part).
I brought a notebook to bed with me last night. Actually IN the bed with me not next to the bed and as I would dream and wake, dream and wake I would write down each dream. I did this for about an hour I wrote down the times. After each dream that I wrote down I looked at the clock and wrote down what time it was. I was so tired last night I went to bed at the same time as my daughter, 7pm. When I woke I had no memory of lucid dreaming I did remember that I stopped writing in my notebook at about 8pm because I was just too tired to keep coming fully awake and writing instead of just falling back asleep. When I woke I thought I had wrote about 5-6 dreams down before I gave up on writing. I looked in my notebook and was surprised that it was actually 14 dreams that I wrote down between 7pm and 8:13pm. But here comes the really, really strange part. I read through each dream and remembered having each of them as I read them. BUT at 8:13 I recorded my last dream and put notebook and pencil on the night stand next to the bed. OMG!! After my 8:13 entry, at the bottom of the page written at an angle is a word that I have no memory of writing. It is at a strong slant that looks like I must have leaned over and wrote it while the notebook was on the night stand. My stomach got sick, I was absolutely stunned when I saw the writing. I have no idea what the word says the hand writing is terrible and if it is a real word I don’t think it is English. This is the best I can make of it FUO possibly a V some other stuff I can’t figure out then looks like DIO at the end.
I must have written this sometime last night but I have absolutely no memory of doing so. I think in the future I won’t be writing down any more dreams I will just leave the notebook on the night stand and check it in the morning to see if I left myself any notes.
