Split from Links and short descriptions to all new and known techniques and moved to Gen Luc
I’m reading these techniques on here as well as other sites like Reality Sandwich (where I found out about this) and have tried the past few days and nights to try them but frustratingly to no avail, they just become dreams. I haven’t tried ALL of them, just a few, and all they seem to do is just distract me. Now I’m not a novice by ANY means, I’ve have had lucid dreams for as long as I can remember with flying/astral projection/OBE/premonitions being the main themes. What I was trying to do was gaining some sort of control to where I can have these kinds of dreams at will but I believe that I’m forcing the whole issue by using some of these techniques. Even I told myself the other day that I’m trying too hard and I think the stress of that, among other events in my life at the moment, cre8ted some anxiety-induced dreams, something that I despise. Although within the past month I’ve experienced some lucid dreams (2 were flying-related), I would like to do more with them. I’m just trying to figure out how these techniques have worked for you people or at least how long have you been practicing them because the more I’m thinking about it the more I’m beginning to tell myself that it’s not for me–the techniques not the dreaming in of itself.
The idea of the techniques is to create a certain mindset and good habits. If you already have that mindset and those habits, then the techniques are worthless. If you don’t have them, then the techniques are helpful. It’s that simple!
I truly believe and stand by reality checks with use of any other technique, but reality checks should always be there no matter how you try to lucid dream. Reality Checks are just there to make sure that you are truly dreaming, and is unlikely to actually induce a lucid dream (but possible)
The thing is with reality checks you have to believe that they are going to work. If you have your mind set to default and believe that when you look at your hands there HAS to be 5 fingers, well, by golly there will be five fingers in a dream or not. but if you believe that “my hand is going to look different than normal” and truly believe in it you will trick your dreaming mind into making your hand look different. it is all about effort and will. Best of luck lucid dreaming
Thorn–EXACTLY. Seeing that I’ve already got myself in this mindset it’s pointless for me to try these techniques because they seem elementary. It was the dream yoga article I read that made be interested in trying this stuff but I’m just going to keep doing what I’ve been doing–sleep and analyze my dreams and if I perchance to have a lucid dream start working at controlling it or making something happen.
Nicklebrick–The thing with the hands make no sense to me, that’s what I’m getting at. The LAST thing I’m thinking about is my hands in my dreams but then again so much is going on that I don’t bother to think about them. Maybe what I should concentrate on is when I dream about a dead person is asking why they’re alive when they should be dead or at least reminding myself that they’re dead THEN I’ll know I’m dreaming. One such person is someone that I shouldn’t be dreaming about which is my asshole stepfather. For whatever reason he seems to be a reoccuring person that pops up every now and again in my dreams and that’s the LAST person I want to be talking to. Hopefully when I’m “lucid” enough to realize this and confront him he probably won’t return.
How long have you 2 been experiencing this phenomenon and what turned you on to lucid dreaming let alone this website?
Sometimes when you find yourself in front of to many choices it’s hard to choose and when you are trying little bit of this and that you make a mess…
I agree with what guys said but I would add that even though you have the right mindset having a technique that provides certainty and stability is always a win/win situation.
You don’t have to choose from the techniques that are provided by the lucid dreaming community, whether this one or any other. It certainly won’t hurt to read about them and maybe take some time and dig into those techniques and study them theoretically.
After that you’ll have data and information which you can use in your way, take this or that from specific technique and at the end make your own personalized technique. Of course if anything from the provided is suitable for your ways of doing things…
With time and experimentation technique will become a way of doing things
dB-FTS–Yeah it wouldn’t hurt to study them which is what I was doing. So what you’re saying is basically to keep those things in mind just in case I do have a lucid dream so I can be 1 step ahead of things. There is some truth to repetition being the mother of learning so one night I might have something that’ll sink in which might help. Thanks, that’s something to consider.
I think the various techniques out there was a bit overwhelming and is what frustrated me. I wasn’t trying to do ALL of them at once but tried a technique one day then another the next that I found interesting that I thought could work but yet again I’m going back to my instincts telling me how it just seemed too forceful and to allow nature to take its course.
Yes, learn about new things and they might get useful one day, right?! Only problem with lucid dreaming and almost with everything else theoretical knowledge is just not enough so that’s why when I wanna give a shot to a specific technique I gave myself time - symbolic one week period of time. If I see that’s something is happening then I would take even more time and put even more work into it but if nothing happens I would gradually stop doing this specific technique…
Many of them. But only few I use now combine into one, well like I said it’s about personalization at the end.
I started with MILD - LaBerge’s way of doing MILD. It worked partially.
Then I started experimenting with pure WILD. At the beginning didn’t work at all.
Then I started using meditation hoping that everything will become more stable and concrete. - it helped a bit.
Then I stumble upon EFT(emotional freedom technique) awesome thing, it worked and it made me feel really good.
Then I used SSILD - also worked.
In the meantime I was practicing WILD even though initially I didn’t had too much success. With time I started to have some success, at least I was experiencing what I read about in WILD tutorials. Few times I had luck and I menage to pull out DEILD. After that I worked more and more on WILD and DEILD and that’s what I use today in combination with visualization from MILD as using the targets from LaBerge’s MILD tech, doing RC’s, sometimes I do EFT before sleep, meditation, LL and ADA and much more.
It’s really at the end the combination of all experience. I see now what works for me and what doesn’t. I take things that work and eliminate the things that don’t work so I have this one technique which isn’t really only the one tech… But you can say that I mostly do WILD…
You see, that’s what I’m getting at, some of those techniques just seem so far-fetched and silly to me, I can’t wrap my head around a technique like WILD and SSILD not to mention LL. They don’t make any sense to me. Trying to convince yourself that life is a dream and all that is ridiculous. I do admit there have been moments in my life where I have wondered that in my wakened state but that was because something brought those thoughts about, more than likely some deja vu moment (another dream theme that I’ve experienced more than I can count), which has me going crazy most of the time. Having to try and convince myself of that everyday by saying it aloud just makes me look like a nut–why should I have to do that? To convince myself? Sorry, I just can’t do that, I’ll just be trying too hard in my opinion which is something I don’t want to do. If anything like you suggested I’ll have to cre8 my own method to these techniques that might work, the way they’ve been described seem too absurd to me. But they seem to work for you and others which is why I’m not completely knocking them.
I can understand that you don’t like idea of convincing yourself that WL is a dream and by doing that striking a chance in becoming lucid. I don’t do that either but WILD and SSILD is nothing more then knowing how to consciously fall asleep.
With SSILD you keep focus on your body and sensations you get, WILD is almost the same only you go through hypnagogic state. Also LL, well the idea is to keep a consciousness on higher level then usual. One good example is routine. How we get caught up in routine. It’s a killer for conscious living, well to better say routine is product of unconscious living…
Once you break routine in WL you will break it in dreams too, being on an automatic mode is product of unconscious living. There are so many examples and things you can change in your waking life in order to live a conscious live.
Some jobs for example are killers too, I’m happy with my job. I’m all day on the road, constantly moving, I always have to question myself where am I, what I’m doing now and what’s my next move. Keeps me active and conscious. Implementing LL in this way of daily life not only raises my chances of becoming lucid but it also makes my life more alive. Quality of life is higher…
the part about prospective memory seems very interesting seeing that my memory is pretty good and it’s something I do most of the time. Some people write post-it notes to remind them of things, some tie strings around their fingers–I just try to remember. It’s the same as convincing my body to wake up at a certain time for some important appointment even though I also have my alarm clock ready just in case I oversleep. I tried this yesterday, telling myself to remember that I’m dreaming when I’m dreaming in my wakened state. Needless to say that didn’t work but I’m going to keep at it.
Another thing that bothered me is the past couple nights I barely remembered my dreams, just bits and pieces, and the parts I do remember I didn’t like about the dreams to begin with. This is the stress-inducing trauma I was discussing since I’ve been experimenting with lucid dreaming/dream yoga last week and why I’m wondering if it’s all worth it and just go back to letting it happen naturally. Then again I’m going through other stuff right now so that all could be tied in together.
Training memory for MILD is essential. Having good memory is great. When it comes to DR it is the most unstable component in the whole lucid dreaming story.
Sometimes there is reason and sometimes there isn’t for sudden drop in dream recall. Why and how to fix it I really don’t know. I’ve noticed that keeping it “cool” and worrying as less as possible is going to help with DR.
It seems that dreams always fade as we stumble upon some other problems in our waking lives. Like they are not a priority and they just get put on the shelf for time being by our brain and I get that but it can be very frustrating. So that’s why time is essential. If you give yourself time and techniques something will work at the end.
If you get more lucid dreams when not trying them maybe that’s your cue, I don’t know but it’s learnable skill and when you are pushing yourself in achieving this you are probably confronting yourself with different problems and situations which you didn’t experience when you are getting LD’s by not trying. I don’t know the magnitude of your knowledge about dreams but if all those techniques and ways of doing thing are new apart from lucid dreaming itself then it’s not a surprise that you are experiencing some difficulties…
Also about what you dream. I always look at dreams no matter whether they are scary, beautiful, intense or something completely else as something I need to embrace. So each and every part of the dream is something that needs to be look at, analyze and then you will find even more about yourself…
