Dream Views Manual (Part 1)

Help With Acronyms For Complete Beginners

Welcome to Dream Views! I have put together a simple list you can refer to when you run into acronyms like WILD, HH, or RC. The concepts are kept extra basic on purpose. All of the induction techniques end with ILD which stands for such and such Induced Lucid Dream.

• LD: Lucid Dream
• IRL: In Real Life, could be IWL in waking life.
• WILD: lucid dreams that you enter after having been awake, as you fall asleep, or using some method like visualizing or deep trance like meditation. The W stands for wake, as in awake, so just remember that.
• DILD: lucid dreams that happen because you figure out that you are dreaming and become lucid in the middle of a normal dream. The D stands for Dream.
• MILD: Any mental trick that helps someone have DILDs. A DILD may often be called MILD if the dreamer did something to encourage it. (don't worry about the M for now)
• DEILD: a lucid dream you get by laying still when you first wake up and trying to return to the dream you were just having. The DE stands for Dream Exit.
• RC: Reality Check. This is when you stop and try to find out if you are dreaming or not. People who use RC are hoping to have it help them achieve DILDs. That makes RC a form of
• MILD: The idea is that if you question this during the day enough, then you will start questioning it during a dream.
• REM: Rapid Eye Movement is a state of sleep where many vivid dreams occurs. Named for rapid eye movements that happen during it.
• nREM: any state of sleep that is not REM. You can still dream in nREM but it is less common.
• SP: Sleep Paralysis. Waking up and not being able to move, or something similar. Often talked about in WILD threads because some people experience it when trying this type of lucid dream. Uncommon.
• REM atonia: Experiencing the same chemical effect that causes people to stay still when they dream. Easily broken by concious effort. Experienced sometimes in WILD attempts. SP is often caused by something going wrong with REM atonia, but that is uncommon.
• HH: Hypnogogic Hallucinations. Any wierd stuff that takes place in your head when you are half asleep. This may be voices or vibrations or colorful images, or many other variations. Also may be called HI for hypnogogic images.
• WBTB: Wake, Back to Bed. This involves waking up anytime after about 5 hours of sleep on purpose, with the intent of going back to sleep while focusing on lucid dreams. People do this because they have a better chance of being aware in REM as the night progresses.
• FA: False Awakening. It is common to lose a lucid dream because you dream that you woke up. It is always a good idea to question if you have really woken or not, if you wake from a lucid dream. You may still be dreaming, but be fooled into losing lucidity.
• DC: Dream Charactor. Any of the people or animals you interact with inside a dream.
• DJ: Dream Journal.

What is a Lucid Dream?

Being lucid means knowing that you are dreaming while you are still within the dream. This is the only requirement for a lucid dream.

"False Lucidity"

False Lucidity is a term that gets floated around DV from time to time, referring to dreams where the dreamer is not sure if they were truly lucid or not. There is no such thing as a false lucid dream. This is not a term used by any dream researcher, and it often used by dreamers to express frustration at a dream which did not live up to their particular expectations of a lucid dream. To clarify:

• You do not have to intentionally induce a lucid dream for it to be lucid. Many lucid dreams are completely spontaneous.
• You do not have to be lucid throughout the entire dream for it to be a lucid dream.
• You do not have to have ANY control over the dream whatsoever for it to be a lucid dream.
• You do not have to be able to think as clearly as you would in your waking life for it to be a lucid dream.

Here are some examples of lucid dreams:

You do a reality check in a dream, and you conclude that you are dreaming. However, you get so excited that you wake up. This is a lucid dream, but one in which the dreamer did not have enough stabilization technique to keep the dream going.

You have a false awakening, do a reality check, and conclude that you are dreaming. You run off to explore the area, but you get lost in the dream plot and completely forget that you are in a dream. This is still a lucid dream, but one in which you have lost your lucidity.

You realize you are dreaming and decide that you want to do the Dreamviews Task of the Month. You can't remember what it was, so you decide to log onto your computer to find out. It does not occur to you that your dream computer will be inaccurate. You do the task you find on your dream computer and wake yourself up so you can record the dream without forgetting any details. This is a perfect example of a lucid dream with very low clarity of thought and illogical thinking, also known as a low-level or low-quality lucid dream. Being lucid does not always guarantee that you will think clearly. This is why it is very important to keep thinking logically even AFTER a successful reality check. You may have a poor awareness of your surroundings, but you still know it's a dream.

You recognize one of your dream signs and realize that you are dreaming. You decide that you want to try a classic--flying. You run to your balcony, climb up and jump. Only to fall flat on the ground. Even thought you know it's a dream and that you should be able to fly, you just can't seem to get up in the air. This is a lucid dream in which there is little or no dream control.

Control vs Lucidity

Dream control is one of those difficult things for most people. Some are better at passive control, while others are better at active control. Some people just need to get more ideas; it is different for everyone, so if your control wasn’t perfect, or not even present, again, that’s just normal. A lot of people I know that have had a lot of lucid dreams still have problems with control. It doesn’t mean they weren’t lucid, just that they were unable to control the dream. Why? Well, that’s up to the dreamer to find out.

Are there "levels" to Lucidity?

Generally, you either know you are dreaming or not. If you are aware on some level it is a dream, but not conscious of this, you may be pre-lucid, but you are not yet fully lucid. The level of lucidity is defined by the quality of the lucidity and clarity of thought. While you may know you are dreaming, you may not always have clarity of thought.

For example, you may know you are dreaming, but when you see a UFO, you fear that the aliens will be able to hurt you physically. Or you may meet a dream character and assume that they are their real-life counterpart. This is a lower quality lucid--while you know you are dreaming, you may not be aware of all of the implications of this knowledge. This is why so many lucid dreamers will stress the concept of awareness--it is very important to teach ourselves to constantly be aware of our surroundings and think logically.

The most confusing when it comes to lucidity is likely awareness. For example, in a dream you may say something like “Yeah, it’s like that because we're dreaming” to a DC. It is one thing to say something, and another thing to understand it. Here you may not have been aware of what you said, so it meant nothing. If it meant nothing, then it was NOT a lucid dream. But what if you did understand it? In this case, you were lucid, whether you were able to change the flow of the dream, have good clarity or not, is not important to this; you may be able to next time. It is difficult to explain to people how to differentiate if they were aware of what was said or not, so this is completely up to the dreamer to decide.

Another problem with awareness is that people sometimes take for granted what the dream tells them, like when you treat a DC as you would treat a real person when you didn’t intend to (Or at least not once you wake up). For example, let’s say your dream mom, asks you to wash something, and maybe you live with your parents, maybe not; but even so you still will see this as an obligation and do it, right? That you weren’t aware of the fact that it was only a dream and it didn’t matter whether or not you did the action means your awareness wasn’t good, but won’t change the fact that you were lucid. This I think, goes hand-to-hand with the logic problem, but should be treated separately from being lucid, just as dream control is.

Are there Lucid Nightmares?

Yes. Since being lucid does not mean you will always have control or be able to think logically, there may be times where you know you are dreaming and you are unable to overcome your nightmare through dream control.

The Beginner's Guide to Lucid Dreaming

Welcome to Dreamviews, a site dedicated to lucid dreaming and other sleep-related topics! You must be here because you want to learn more about lucid dreaming, and perhaps get started on preparing to have your first one. The whole lucid dreaming endeavor can be pretty intimidating, but you can breathe now. This guide puts all the basic info on lucid dreaming (LDing) into one page, with links to different guides and resources, so you don't have to look all over the place to find what you're looking for.

Intro (FAQ)

What is a lucid dream?: A lucid dream is any dream in which the person is aware that he or she is dreaming. In other words, they are conscious of what's going on around them (unlike in an ordinary dream). Check out Naiya's guide here for more information.

Who can lucid dream?

Anyone can lucid dream if they are dedicated to trying it out.

Why lucid dream?

Anything is possible in a dream, even more so in a lucid one! You can travel to different places, fly, talk to people you'd never otherwise meet, and alter the dream environment itself. The limit is, literally, your imagination - if you can think of something to do, you can do it in a lucid dream. Lucids can also be a source of inspiration for creative people; there's no telling what your mind will come up with, and in a lucid dream you have a first-row ticket to observe concepts and ideas forming right in front of you. You can be productive and do things you wouldn't be able to do in waking life, during a period of time where most other people will simply be "sleeping".

How hard is it?

Achieving lucidity can be done with fairly little effort for the easier techniques (such as DILD); other techniques (such as WILD) may require more effort on the dreamer's part. If you happen to have issues with something related to lucid dreaming, the users on the Dreamviews forum are happy to answer any questions you have.

What do I have to invest for successful lucid dreaming?

Nothing except your determination and belief that your first lucid is right around the corner. There is no need for fancy gadgets or lucid dream-specific products.

How do I get started?

As someone who is interested in lucid dreaming, you first must take into account your ability to remember (or recall) dreams. Dreams are formed during a period of deep sleep called REM. Everyone dreams each and every night, but sometimes they don't remember anything they dreamed about. Because of this, some people believe they don't dream at all, but this is not the case. One simply has to practice remembering their dreams and eventually they could remember upwards of two or three a night, maybe even more. Even if you hardly ever remember your dreams, you can work your way to recall just like anyone else.

How to remember your dreams:

• Alcohol suppresses REM sleep, which is when dreams are formed. As little as one glass could stop recall in its tracks. Avoid drinking if you're trying to remember your dreams.
• Upon waking up in the morning, relax and try not to move around too much. Allowing your body to relax helps keep your brain in "sleep mode" for a few minutes, which helps you remember your dreams better.
• Avoid watching television or being on the computer at least an hour before bed. The bright lights can make it harder to fall asleep, mess up your internal sleeping pattern, as well as harm your ability to recall dreams.
• Taking vitamin B6 supplements has shown to improve recall.
• Drinking a glass of apple juice two or three hours before bed can help, while foods such as tuna, bananas, chicken, and turkey are good sources of vitamin B6 which you can try if you don't want to take the vitamin in pill form. Chocolate has also been reported to work, although not as effectively in some cases. Find what works for you and stick with it!
• Tell yourself that you will remember your dreams. Repeating "I will remember my dreams" or something similar to yourself will help prepare your mind to recall what you dreamed about that night, and serve as a type of placebo effect. The mind is powerful, and in the case of lucid dreaming, there isn't any harm in bringing it to its full potential.
• Have confidence that you will remember your dreams! Belief is an important aspect of lucid dreaming, for recall as well as controlling your dreams (but we'll get to that later).

It's important to record your dreams. Keeping a dream journal is critical because physically writing or typing down your experiences in sleep allows you to flex your dream memory - as with any muscle, your memory becomes stronger with exercise. A few select people can bypass journaling and simply recall their dreams in the morning, but the majority of people need a system to help practice remembering their dreams.

Why is dream journaling so crucial to lucid dreaming? If you cannot remember your normal dreams, you may not be able to remember your lucid ones. Just because you are aware in a dream, it doesn't mean you'll be able to recall it any better; all dreams are remembered in the part of the brain that processes dream memory. Lucid ones are also processed in this way, and not in the waking memory area.

[Transcriptor note: Feel free to do this if you want to or find it useful. Don't make a big deal about journaling, you don't have to record every single thing if you don't feel inclined to do so: A bunch of keywords with a identifiying title will do. What's important is to remember. And as far possibilities goes, "recording your dreams" in your mind will eventually be more than enough.]

Once you can remember at least one dream per night and have a nice dream journal going, you're ready to move onto the next step: learning about dream signs and reality checks.

Dream signs and reality whats?

A critically important part of lucid dreaming is, well, knowing how to confirm that you're dreaming.

Dream sign - a telltale sign that you're dreaming, which can be something present in the location of the dream, an anomaly regarding your own actions (you're more confident than normal, for example), or another obvious signal that you're not awake at the moment. A flying pig, being in an unknown location, or being on the run from a person you've never met all scream "you're dreaming!"
Reality check - a quick action on your part that allows you to confirm whether you're currently dreaming or not. If you become aware in a dream, you need something to make sure you're not awake, or you could end up losing your awareness. There are certain things that work differently in real life than in dreams, and these are deemed "reality checks".

List of reality checks:

• Plug your nose - this can be slightly awkward to do in real life, but it may be the most reliable RC yet. Plug your nose and try to breathe through it; in real life you'll feel pressure in your nose and chest, and obviously won't be able to breathe. Here's the catch - in a dream, you won't feel any pressure, and the air will rush into your lungs as if nothing was blocking it! Be sure you know this reality check because it rarely fails!
• Count your fingers - Look at your hand and see if you have the proper amount of fingers. In a dream you can have less or more fingers, as well as fingers sprouting off of other fingers... Quite a sight to behold.
• Digital clock - Look at the time on a digital (not analog) clock and see if the time is unrealistic, like 1:98 or 8:62. You can also look at the clock, look away, and check the time again to see if it's changed; it may even change before your eyes.
• Reading - Sometimes in dreams, writing can be distorted or nonsensical, and change when you look away and look back again.
• Push your finger through your palm - Try pushing one of your fingers through the palm of your other hand. It may take a bit of effort, but if you're dreaming it will may go through as if you were a hologram or made of jello.
• Lights - Turn a light switch on or off to see if the light levels change. In dreams, the switch may not do anything, or the lights in the location could be dim.
• Location - Where are you right now? Can you remember how you got there? In a dream you can have no memory (or false memories) of how you ended up in a certain place, or you may be somewhere you shouldn't - such as on mars.
• Gravity - Expect yourself to float upwards and see if you do or not. Or, simply see if you can feel gravity acting on you right now.
• Grogginess or lethargy - In dreams, sometimes you're groggy and do things without really thinking about it. Sometimes you can feel tired like you do when staying up late at night.

The next step? Choosing the right technique(s) for you!
Be sure you have a couple of the reality checks above memorized, most importantly the nose-plug one, and put them in your LDing toolkit. You're going to need them once you become aware in a dream.

The different techniques

LDing is all about awareness; because of this, some consider it a form of meditation since you are developing internal and external consciousness. The very definition of lucid dreaming stems from the word "lucid", which loosely means "to have a rational and conscious awareness of one's surroundings and actions". In this case, you will become aware that you are dreaming, hence the term lucid dreaming.

There is a medley of different induction techniques available, the majority of which require a certain level of awareness from the individual. Here is a list, description, and links to tutorials of the most popular lucid dreaming methods.

If you're still unsure about where to begin, check out Mancon's guide to choosing a technique.

1) DILD - "Dream Induced Lucid Dream"
As the name implies, the person becomes aware when they are in the dream. Often the dream has already commenced and lucidity is triggered randomly in the dream's duration, be it near the beginning, in the middle, or at the end. DILDs are often spontaneous and you cannot necessarily predict when your next one will be. The main way to induce a DILD is to practice waking awareness, by means of questioning if you're awake or not, analyzing your actions, and developing an awareness of what's around you.

When the person becomes conscious in the dream, they usually stop what they're doing and may ask out loud, "this could be a dream!" or "I'm dreaming!". They then perform a reality check or two.

2) WILD - "Wake Induced Lucid Dream"
The person goes directly into the dreaming state from a waking state. This involves relaxing to trick your body into falling asleep, while you consciously observe the dream formation process and its stages. You often experience hallucinations and might even experience some paralysis (not required) as the dream forms, which are typically not observed because the person is usually unconscious by the time they happen - however, the point of a WILD is to remain conscious while your mind creates a dream, so you get a front-row seat in this process. The person is aware as soon as they enter the dream. WILDs can be done on demand and there is no randomness in when you will have one, since you are purposefully inducing one yourself. They also tend to be more vivid than DILDs.

WILDs are difficult to achieve without prior sleep that night; therefore, it's best to combine it with the WBTB technique (see below) and do a WILD after 5 - 6 hours of sleep, or during the day with a nap.

• Thet term Sleep paralysis (abbreviated SP) has been misused and the real term for paralysis in REM is called REM Atonia. It is the total or near-total paralysis of one's body during REM sleep, which is a safety mechanism to prevent the person from acting out their dreams. It can sometimes be accompanied by feelings of "rushing", vibrations along the body or in isolated areas, whispering, thumping noises, and other auditory and visual hallucinations which may be rather frightening at times. It is all produced by the mind so it is totally harmless, but it helps to read up on other peoples' experiences so you know what to expect before trying the WILD technique out. You don't need to experience any paralysis for the WILD attempt to be successful and you shouldn't view it as a stage of sleep you aim to reach, but rather see it as a cue that you're on the right track if you do get any sensations.

There are three outcomes in a WILD:

1. the dreamer may become too focused on any hallucinations they're experiencing or become overexcited, and snap out of the dream transition prematurely which negates the attempt.
2. the dreamer will be thrown into a dream scene - success!
3. the dreamer may believe they failed the attempt, but are actually in a false awakening, or a dream in which the person only believes they've woken up. If they perform a reality check and discover they're dreaming, success!

Once in the dream, or even if they think they may have failed the WILD, the person performs a reality check.

3) DEILD - "Dream Exit Induced Lucid Dream"
A DEILD is a WILD without all the preparation, relaxation, and (for the most part) the feeling of being paralyzed which may be too uncomfortable for some to experience. The person wakes up from a dream and doesn't move or open their eyes. They continue to breathe normally. As soon as you woke up you were not in sleep paralysis anymore (since you were no longer dreaming). The objective is to trick your body into think you are still asleep, so it re-initiates the sleep paralysis and therefore sends you back into a dream, consciously. The whole process, if done correctly, can take as little as ten seconds. The dreamer can speed up the process by actively visualizing a dream scene when they wake up, and imagine auditory or tactile (sense of touch) sensations.

4) MILD - "Mnemonic Induced Lucid Dream"
This technique is relatively simple and possibly the easiest technique. It causes DILDs through the power of suggestion. It relies on the person telling themselves that they will have a lucid dream and being as certain as they can about it, which acts as a placebo effect on the mind. One could even act that they "know" their next lucid will be that night.

5) WBTB - "Wake Back to Bed"
It involves the person waking up after five or six hours of sleep, staying up for a brief period of time (often 10 - 50 minutes, but sometimes more or less) and then going back to bed. One may also do some simple logic puzzles or math problems. It is thought that waking up at night also wakes up the logic center of the brain, which may make it easier to induce a lucid dream (this makes it a precursor to the DILD technique, as using WBTB causes a lucid dream in the same manner as DILD). It is an effective way of inducing LDs but can prove difficult for people who can't lose sleep, such as those who have to get up early for work or school.

Lucid dreamers often combine the WILD technique with this method, since it's difficult to achieve a WILD without waking up in the middle of the night (or during a nap).

6) CAT - "Cycle Adjustment Technique"
This induction method relies on your internal sleep cycle and "REM rebound" to produce lucidity. The dreamer uses an alarm clock to wake up 90 minutes earlier than they normally do for at least a week, so their body becomes used to being aware and awake during this period of time. After this, the person does not set their alarm clock and continues to sleep. At this time, they have a good chance at becoming lucid because the mind was expected to wake up, but the person is still asleep and in a dream. The mind waking up while in a dream = lucidity. This method is essentially the precursor (or supplement) to a DILD.

More techniques to consider

The following are techniques that are unique (but successful) variations of the above methods! They are created by users of the Dreamviews forum who have experience in lucid dreaming.

• FILD - Finger Induced Lucid Dream (variation of WILD)
• CANWILD - Custom Alarm Induced WILD (variation of WILD)

I got my technique down. Now what?

Your first lucid dream... Congratulations!

When someone has their first LD, they may become excited by the sheer feeling of freedom that comes with the knowledge that they can now do anything they want. If this is the case, relax and breathe deeply. Say out loud that you're dreaming, and pay attention to your surroundings.

Stabilization
When you become lucid, you want to spend more than just a few minutes in the dream, so it's important to extend the dreamtime as much as possible. Grounding one's self in the dream is referred to as "stabilization". You can easily accomplish this by doing the following...

• Touch things - the walls of buildings, objects, and anything else that happens to be nearby. Doing so will make your brain work to imagine what the object(s) will feel like, therefore taking your attention away from your physical body and drawing it towards your dream body.
• Rub your hands together - this works the same way as touching objects.
• Dream spin - slowly spin in a circle, looking around you and taking in all the details of the dream location. This too helps keep your mind engaged in active dream formation by filling in previously-empty "patches" in your location.
• Say that you're dreaming - simply shouting out "I'm dreaming!" or repeating it to yourself will help stabilize the dream, but it's best to pair this method up with one of the above ones.
• Don't think of your physical body! this is a big no-no, because you can end up focusing too much on yourself sleeping in bed and kick yourself out of the dream. If you find yourself going this route, quick touch an object and tell yourself that you're dreaming. Distract yourself until the thoughts go away.

Dream Control

Possibly the most exciting (and sometimes intimidating) aspect of lucid dreaming is the ability to alter the dream itself. Since you are aware within a dream that you know isn't real, and is only the product of your mind, you can take control of the dream itself. Dream control is relatively simple, and rests on one thing - expectations. Believing strongly and as fully as you can that something will happen or work a certain way is the best technique for dream control, although there are two distinct types.

1. Active Control
This type of control involves the dreamer commanding a certain action to the dream, such as "increase lighting conditions!" or "my friends will be around the corner". The more confident and assertive the dreamer is in commanding something, the easier it will be to control the dream. Using this method makes it easier to maintain lucidity, because what you say helps to maintain a sense of control in the dream.

2. Passive Control
This type of control involves the dreamer putting on the persona of an actor and simply "knowing" something will occur. They passively observe changes in the dream without commanding anything, and act as if they're in a movie they've seen a dozen times over. For instance, the person may "know" that someone will walk around the corner, or "know" that the moon will collide with the earth. This can be easier to do than active control, but you also may lose lucidity quicker unless you can keep reminding yourself that you're dreaming every few minutes.

Both types of control rest on belief. To a certain extent, they also rely on visualization. If you expect someone to turn around the corner and walk towards you, don't just blindly command them to and let the dream do the rest. If you don't visualize what they look like, which becomes easy with practice, the dream will fill in the missing details and the person may look "off", or something about them may not look right. This goes the same for changing locations and other dream control activities.

List of common dream control activities and examples of ways to do them:

• Teleportation - going to a new location in the dream. One can walk through a mirror and fully expect a location of their choice to be on the other side, while visualizing it at the same time. Another method is simply opening a door if you're inside a building and knowing that location will be on the other side. Again, visualization is important here. A final technique commonly used is dream spinning (it's not just for stabilization) - spinning faster in a circle while visualizing a change in your location can work, but don't lose focus on what's around you, or you could wake up.
• Summoning dream characters (DCs) - a lucid dreamer will most likely want to try making a person of their choice appear in a dream, whether it be a crowd of people or a single person. You can always search for the dream character in a place you think they might be, but this can waste precious dream time. Instead, simply turn around and either fully expect them to be there, or even say out loud, "[name] will be here when I turn around". Visualize them as you do this. Or, walk around and use the same method to make them appear around the corner. You can also pretend that you are meeting someone at that very moment, and that they're never late for meetings (this way, they will be sure to appear as soon as you decide to summon them).
• Flying - another entertaining and commonly-used dream control activity. Saying "I will be able to fly" in the dream, or fully knowing you have the power to fly is key in achieving liftoff. Different ways of getting off the ground include taking a running start and jumping with no fear that you'll fall back down (there is no spoon), flapping your arms as if they were wings, summoning a jetpack or other device to assist with flight, or drinking a magical potion that will grant you the ability. There are many other ways but that is just a few. Feel the acceleration as you pick up speed in your flight, and don't pay attention to the fact that what you're doing just isn't possible. You're not awake, so it shouldn't matter! Another technique for flying is knowing that you've always had the power to do so, and that it comes naturally to you. You can also use this for other special powers such as pyrokinesis, breathing underwater, etc.
• Shapeshifting - Changing form into that of an animal, other person, or other creature is an intriguing but sometimes complicated process. There is the active approach, where you can see yourself changing shape (this relies heavily on expectation and visualization), and there is the passive approach. The passive approach simply involves the dreamer already knowing they've shapeshifted into something else, or knowing that they've always been in that certain form.
• Other special abilities - There is no limit to what someone can do once they're in a lucid dream. Pyrokinesis (controlling fire) and the control of other elements, telekinesis (controlling objects with one's mind), super strength, invincibility, and invulnerability are all possible, but those are just a few things in a vast array of different skills you can use in an LD. Your mind will make it happen if you believe in it! And don't forget to visualize that wave of fire exploding from your hand, that bullet ricocheting off your body, or that car being lifted off the ground!

On the Dreamviews (DV) Forum

Right when you join the Dreamviews forum, you'll be able to ask any questions and receive knowledgeable answers from other lucid dreamers. The forum is very active so you should get a response relatively quickly, if not immediately.

A big part of the forum is its list of acronyms, or abbreviations. Since we're a bunch of lazy typers, we've shortened some words and terms to make reading and posting go along smoother.

List of commonly used acronyms:
LD - lucid dream
DV - Dreamviews
CAT - cycle adjustment technique
DC - dream character, a person present in your dreams
DJ - dream journal
DEILD - dream exit induced lucid dream
DILD - dream induced lucid dream
FA - false awakening, when the person dreams that they've woken up and are back in their bed, but are actually still asleep
HI - hypnagogic imagery, hallucinations present during sleep paralysis
MILD - mnemonic induced lucid dream
PM - private message, a message you send to someone on the DV forum
RC - reality check, an action that confirms whether you're dreaming
REM - "Rapid Eye Movement", the period of sleep where dreams are formed, and often involves the quick movements of one's eyes (hence the name). Sometimes this occurs during sleep paralysis.
SP - sleep paralysis
WBTB - wake back to bed
WILD - wake induced lucid dream

Acronym List

Glossary: This is a list of the most frequently used dreaming related vocabulary compiled for the aid of the people browsing the Dream Views Forum.

AP - Astral projection

The act of separating the astral body (spirit or consciousness) from the physical body and its journey into the universe. Astral Projection is the intentional act of having the spirit leave the body, whereas an out-of-body experience happens involuntarily (such as while dreaming, or in a near-death experience).

DC - Dream Character.

A dream character is commonly used to describe the people in your dreams.
What a dream character represents can be rather opaque. Many believe it is just a manifestation of your subconscious, playing out a role in your dream and nothing else.
Others believe that a dream character is a manifestation of yourself. Not necessarily having to be a person either. But all being some form of ones self. Another case is the character as being of someone or thing that has it's own separate identity. Whether it be in form of a past life a dream sharing partner or an alien - meaning one of which we were not acquainted with. All in all, you yourself will have to decide what you feel a (DC) is to YOU. The possibilities are not confined to an acronym list.

DJ - Dream Journal

A dream journal can be any medium where you write down dreams you remember - whether it be a computer, an old exercise book or little post it notes. They are usually used to improve your dream recall.

DS - Dream Sharing.

Dream Sharing can be thought of from many angles. It is the act of sharing a dream or a dream experience with another individual or DC.
Since some studies may have suggested such an event they have all been rather inconclusive to this point. There are also many variables to how people feel that they can achieve this experience. Whether it is premeditated or by chance and when and where it happens.

DEILD (Dream Exit Induced Lucid Dream)

DILD (Dream Initiated Lucid Dream)

A DILD is where you are having a normal dream, induced simply by sleeping, and then come to the realization that you are in a dream, and thus becoming Lucid.

EEG (electroencephalographic machine)

Records & measures brain waves of the neocortex

EWLD - Exploring The World of Lucid Dreaming

EWLD is a book about Lucid Dreaming wrote by Stephen LaBerge, a psycho physiologist and leader in lucid dream research. EWLD is commonly used in place of its real name.

FA - False awakening.

A false awakening is just that. An experience where you may believe that you are awake but you realize that you are in another form of consciousness. Most widely excepted is waking from a dream. You wake up IN your dream and an occurrence in the dream tells you that you are in fact still in a dream state -hence, False awakening. Some feel this state can be reached trough other realms of consciousness as well, for example: an Out OF Body Experiences, Astral projection and or meditation. Some may have had other altered states of consciousness as well. But for all intent purposes it is generally what it says it is. An awakening that is not real.

HH - Hypnagogic or Hypnopompic Hallucinations

This is closely related to Sleep Paralysis. When a person wakes up with Sleep Paralysis, it is sometimes accompanied by Hypnopompic Hallucinations. An example hallucination would be sensing an "presence" in the room. It is not an uncommon thing, with 30 to 40 percent of all people experiencing it in their lives.

HI & HS - Hypnagogic imagery and hypnagogic sounds.

These are images or sounds that come as impulses during the onset of a hallucinogenic state. Usually before or after sleep. Sometimes through meditation. These images & sounds are random and can sometimes lead to HIT. The Hypnagogic Imagery Technique. *Look below.

HIT Hypnagogic Imagery Technique

LD Lucid Dreaming/Lucid Dream

A Lucid Dream is a dream where you are aware that you are dreaming.

MILD - Mnemonic Induced Lucid Dream

A MILD is a Lucid Dream induced with the aid of your memory.

OBE - Out of body experience

An OBE is the subjective perception that one is no longer in their body. A separation usually considered an involuntarily act. Opinions on what it is caused by and where you are and the states of consciousness about it, are greatly subjective.

Oneironauts Explorers of the dream world.

The word oneironaut was coined by Stephen LaBerge, and first used in his book, Exploring the world of Lucid Dreaming.

PHS - Post hypnotic suggestion

This is when a suggestion is given whilst in the hypnotic state that can be used when not in hypnosis. You cannot make somebody do something they don't want to with PHS (e.g: kill somebody).

RC - Reality Check

A reality check is a test used to see if you are dreaming or in "reality", as we know it. An example test would be to pinch your nose and see if you can still breathe through it.

REM - Rapid eye movement

REM is phase during sleep where (usually) the most vivid dreams occur. During this stage, the eyes move rapidly (hence the name "Rapid Eye Movement").

SD - Sleep deprivation

A general lack of the necessary amount of sleep. A person can be deprived of sleep by their own body and mind, as a consequence of some sleep disorders, or deliberately. Some examples you may find discussed regarding sleep deprivation

• REM rebound - (When you are sleep deprived you lose out on two types of sleep, REM and NREM (non-REM). Typically when you have a chance to fall asleep after sleep deprivation you have a tendency to get more REM sleep than you would normally get. This is your body's way of trying to catch up on its REM sleep.)
• Sleep deprivation therapy for depression
• Symptoms [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_deprivation]
• A method of interigation

SP - Sleep paralysis

Sleep paralysis consists of a period of inability to perform voluntary movements either at sleep onset (called hypnagogic or predominately form) or upon awakening (called hypnopompic or postdromal form). Sleep paralysis may also be referred to as isolated sleep paralysis, familial sleep paralysis, hypnagogic or hypnopompic paralysis, periodontal or postdormital paralysis

• A complaint of inability to move the trunk or limbs at sleep onset or upon awakening
• Presence of brief episodes of partial or complete skeletal muscle paralysis
• Episodes can be associated with hypnagogic hallucinations or dream-like meditation (act or use of the brain)

Traumdeutung - The interpretation of dreams

Many people believe dreams hold messages; and they attempt to interpret dreams to find out what the message might be (a dream about an dove you are trying to catch, for instance, could mean you want peace but can't get it).

WILD - Wake Initiated Lucid Dream

A WILD is lucid dream initiated from wakefulness, using a combination of methods to enter a dream state, already lucid.

Find out What Technique is Right for You!

Don't know which technique to choose? Can't decide? Hopefully this thread will help!

First of all, if you don't know what all the main techniques for lucid dreaming are click here. It will describe all the main techniques. When you look these over ask yourself: does any technique stand out? You should choose a technique that appeals to you the most and works best with your lifestyle.

DILD - If you don't feel like waking up in the middle of the night for lucid dreaming this might be a good technique for you. This technique involves doing reality checks/being aware throughout the day so that the checks/awareness carry down into your dreams and make you lucid!

Are you good at reminding yourself to do certain things during the day? Are you generally aware of things around you and you wouldn't be bothered by doing reality checks (like pinching your nose) in public. If you said yes to all of the above, DILD would be a good technique for you. Do you have a common object/person/theme that always appears in your dream? This is called a dream sign. People that have a lot of dream signs or one specific dream sign would also like DILDing.

WILD - If you are the kind of person that randomly wakes up in the middle of the night/doesn't mind getting up in the middle of the night you might like WILDing. WILDing is good for people who can easily be relaxed, can stay still, and are patient. V-WILD is another variation of WILDing. If you are good at visualization and can imagine things easily, check out my VILD guide below!

WILDing is best with a WBTB, but can also be attempted while napping. So if you are a person that naps during the day...WILD!

MILD - MILDing is good for people with a busy lifestyle. It only requires a few minutes before going to sleep. If you are confident, good at autosuggestion, and can remember your dreams well - MILD!

Things You Should be Aware of:

• Don't expect a technique you choose to start working right away. It can take a few months or even a year to have your first lucid dream. It really just depends on the person. DO NOT give up after just a couple weeks of trying a technique. You have to stick with it!
• There is no technique that is "the best". Different techniques work better for different people. It all just depends on you.
• A lot of newbies tend to choose to WILD when they first start out. This is fine, but when you WILD you need patience. It doesn't work right away and you need to keep practicing to get better at it. WILDing is often recommended for people who are more experienced.

DILD - Dream Induced Lucid Dream

DILD: Basic Tutorial for Beginners

What

DILD is one of the two main induction methods that you can use to get a Lucid Dream.
The main difference between DILD and another main induction method called WILD:

• DILD - you go to sleep normally. Then when in a dream, you realize you are dreaming.
• WILD - you let your body fall asleep while you keep your mind aware, until dream is ready and you enter it without losing consciousness.

How

As I mentioned above, you have a DILD, when having a regular dream and you suddenly realize that you are dreaming. In order to realize that, we have to teach our minds to ask a question "Am I dreaming?" when in a dream. This is done by asking the same question during day. While doing this, believe that you are in a dream.

• During the day, no matter what you are doing, stop and ask yourself "Am I dreaming"?
• Look around. Examine your surroundings. Does everything look the way it should?
• Ask yourself how you got there. What have you been doing 5 minutes ago? And before that?
  • Now it's time to do a Reality Check (RC), and a mantra (simple phrase that you repeat).
  • There are many different RCs and mantras that you can chose from, or you can make your own.
  • For this example I will use the classic "looking at hands" RC with mantra.
• Bring your hands up to chest level and look at your palms.
• Examine them. Do they look as they normally do? Count your fingers. Don't presume how many you have.
• Say "Next time I'm dreaming, I look at my hands and realize I'm dreaming."
• Put your hands down, bring them back up and repeat RC with mantra a few times.
  • It doesn't really matter how many times you do it. What matters is that you believe that you could be in a dream, you just don't know it yet. Don't, at any point, think to yourself "No, I'm not dreaming."
• Repeat above steps when you are sitting on your bed ready to go to sleep.
• As you are falling asleep, repeat your mantra only.

It would be best if this mantra is the last thought you have just before you fall asleep.
If it keeps you awake, start falling asleep normally and say your mantra when you are close to falling asleep. Or say it a few times, then just go to sleep normally. Pretty soon this behavior starts happening in your regular dreams and you will gain awareness and become lucid. How soon, that's different for everybody. It could be tonight, or in a few weeks or in a month. It really helps if you are excited about the prospect of having the greatest adventure you can imagine, and if you know that you will, without any doubt.

Additional RCs you can add to/replace the "looking at hands" RC. It's good to do at least 2-3 different RCs at the time. Pick your favorites or make up your own.

1. Looking at hands + Counting fingers
2. Nose plug
3. Thumb/palm
4. Gravity
5. Try to change something
6. Switches
7. Reading
8. In Waking Life (IWL) Look at your hands, palms up and notice details. Count your fingers. In dream, look at your hands. Do they look normal (color, shape, size, can you make your finger longer?) Count your fingers. Do you have the right amount? This is a good RC, because your hands are always there, IWL and in a dream and you can practice this discretely.

[Note: Waking Life: Waking life is a movie that was made in 2001. It was directed by Richard Linklater and is a digitally-enhanced, live action rotoscope film.
The film focuses on a lot of abstract ideas and different philosophies. There is a lot of mention of lucid dreaming, and a lot of people have been introduced to lucid dreaming through this movie. Other ideas that it covers are free will, reality, existentialism, posthumanity and a vast array of other thought-provoking philosophies.]

2. IWL - pinch your nose shut with your hand and try to breathe. If you can breathe, you are in a dream. Also a good RC, because your nose is always there, little less discrete to practice.
3. IWL - Try to gently push your thumb through a palm of your other hand. Pay attention to the sensation. Anticipate, that it will go through. In dream, do the same. If it goes through, you are dreaming. Good RC also because you don't have to go and look for them and quite discrete to practice.
4. IWL - Say, "If this was a dream, I could levitate" and expect to float up. Do the same in a dream. Good RC, you can do it anywhere and totally discrete.
5. IWL - look at something and say "if this was a dream, that [something] would be [something else]. You can think of an item being some other item, or try to change color, size, movement... It's fun and it transfers into your dream very well. Don't forget to use emotions when doing it - be sure you are in a dream, so the thing will change.
6. Try to turn on a light switch. In a dream, flipping a switch usually won't do anything. But people do report that they can turn on lights in a dream. And if there is no light switch near in a dream, you would have to look for one and waste your time.
7. Try to read. In a dream, you can read, but when you take a second look, it will say something different, or gibberish. Also time on a clock may have letters instead of numbers. But it can also look correct. And you have to find a clock in a dream before you can do RC.

What you just read is a basic practice, that is perfectly capable to give you a LD tonight. You can of course read more and expand on your knowledge and apply your own ideas, so it works for you the best it can.

All Day Awareness, A DILD Tutorial by KingYoshi

KingYoshi's DILD Tutorial

So, I already have a WILD tutorial, but now it seems I am getting a lot of questions about my DILD method, all day awareness, and proper RC technique. I've decided to just go ahead and break down my entire approach to DILD. So, sit back, fire one up, and learn to DILD...the Yoshi way!

General Keys to Success
With any induction method/technique there are three keys to long-term success.

1. Effort - Aside from the handful of natural lucid dreamers out there, the rest of us have to put forth the effort and work toward lucidity. Without that drive, you aren't going to have the kind of results you are looking for.
2. Confidence - This one is as simple as the first. You need to be confident in your abilities. I don't care if you just joined yesterday and literally have no clue what you are doing. EVERYONE can lucid dream regularly.
3. Experience - You don't even have to do anything special for this one. Every single thing you do while practicing lucid dreaming, works toward experience. Just keep practicing and gain experience from every success as well as every failure.

All Day Awareness
So, what exactly is a DILD? DILD stands for Dream Induced Lucid Dream. It is a lucid dreaming induction technique where the dreamer becomes aware that he/she is dreaming, from within the dream itself. DILD success is all about awareness. I practice a technique known as All Day Awareness (ADA). I first heard/learned of the basic concept for ADA from another Dream Views member here on the site...Naiya. For those of you who don't know Naiya, she has practiced lucid dreaming for many years and has a Lucid Count is well over 1,000. In a nutshell, All Day Awareness (ADA), is noticing and paying attention to the subtle things in life that most people ignore or take for granted.

Lets take for instance, you are walking your dog down the street. Be aware of everything around you. Hear your footsteps against the pavement, feel the cushion in the sole of your shoes contract with each step. Feel the muscles working in your legs as you stroll along, see your eyelids blinking, hear the sound of your breathing, feel your lungs expanding and your chest moving as you breath in and out. Smell the air as you travel through the neighborhood. Does it change? Does every breeze smell the exact same? Feel your tongue as it casually rests on the bottom of your mouth. Every structure around you has a shadow...do you notice them? Hear the pitter patter of the dogs feet, do you hear him panting? Most people hold the leash and walk down the sidewalk completely lost in their thoughts. Most don't even notice the control they are using to power their own legs.

You are sitting at the computer doing math homework. Feel the keys below your fingertips, notice how effortlessly your fingers fly from one key to the next without even having to think about the upcoming letter/keystroke. While you were reading the previous two sentences, did you take for granted the blinking process. What all sounds have you heard while you have been reading this tutorial? What does the air smell like? You shouldn't have to smell right now to answer the question. Have you noticed the shadows of everything around you? How about your lungs? Have you noticed them expanding and your chest moving. Have you noticed the air traveling up through your windpipe, across your tongue and passed your lips?

These are just a few of the millions of small details that the average person takes for granted or doesn't even bother to notice. It is almost like everyone is sleep walking while they are awake. If you don't have good awareness in waking life, how do you expect to have good awareness in your dreams? In about 90% of my Dream Induced Lucid Dreams, I have known I was dreaming or suspected I was dreaming before ever performing a RC (reality check). The RC is used mostly to confirm that I am dreaming. That lowly 10% is from obtaining lucidity due to a particular dream sign or performing a random RC while thinking I was actually awake. (these percentages are estimates and I likely was too generous with the 10%).

At first, you will have to force yourself to be completely aware of your surroundings. The idea, is to try and become aware of absolutely EVERYTHING around you. After practicing ADA for a while, you will start to become aware of theses subtleties without forcing yourself. As you practice more and more, you will notice the subtleties being noticed quite naturally with little effort. Eventually, you will get to where you are no longer practicing All Day Awareness, you are actually living it. It will become natural for you. Once you have reached this level of awareness, the dream itself becomes your dream sign. Every thing you notice within the dream will become you RC. Every dream you have will be a lucid and you have reached the pinnacle of lucid dreaming.

Not only does awareness help strive toward lucidity, but it also helps with recall. As you continue to practice ADA, it will start to carry over in your dreams. Even if you aren't getting lucid yet, you will start paying more attention to the dream environment. Making mental notes of what you see, hear, feel, taste, and smell. This will help make dreams much easier to recall upon waking up from sleep. It will also help you recall more details from your dream. Soon you will be having detailed journal entries that read almost like a story as opposed to a scattered series of events that jump around from place to place.

Getting Started
Thanks everyone for the valuable feedback. I forgot just how overwhelming ADA can be when you first start practicing. I then realized, I had left out a key point in the tutorial. There are so many things to notice that it can get in the way of your daily activities, possibly causing stress. Stress is not good at all for lucid dreaming. I recommend that all beginners start small and work your way up.

Pick out certain times throughout the day, when you aren't busy, and work on ADA. Take 5 or 10 minutes to notice everything you can. Do this several times during your day. Some days you may be able to practice a lot, and others you may not get as much practice in. Go ahead and perform some RCs during these ADA sessions as well. Once you get more used to the process and it starts getting easier, you can become more frequent with your sessions. It is very hard to keep up the awareness all day long when you aren't used to it. Even now, I am not able to keep it going at all times. I'll get lost in thought, or something else I am doing and realize I was "day walking" again . Performing ADA in sessions will still help loads with your awareness and you can work your way up at your own discretion. Be sure not to overwork yourself. If you start feeling mentally exhausted, take a day off from training. Everyone needs their rest.

When I first started practicing ADA, I did it in sessions like I described above. I worked my way up until it started becoming natural. Even now, I still take sessions to make sure I really notice absolutely everything. Something else I should add...don't forget about the clothes you are wearing. Feel and notice them at all times.

Dream Signs and Reality Checking
Now, picking out dream signs and performing RCs still play a key role in the DILD process. Humor me for a moment.

A live flamingo hat is definitely a dream sign. Even though it has showed up multiple times in your dreams, it isn't even going to be in the majority of your dreams...let alone all of your dreams. If you rely solely on a dream sign for lucidity, you are only going to be able to take advantage of the dreams it shows up in. If you happen to miss it, you never know when it will return. However, if you have pointed the hat out as a dream sign, you have identified a recurring element in your dream. This familiarization with the dream world has added an extra boost to your awareness. Not to mention, when it does show up again, you will have a chance at recognizing it. The better your awareness, the more likely you will be able to recognize dream signs within the dream.

I mentioned earlier that RCs are used more for confirming that you are lucid, as opposed to actually creating lucidity for you. The key function of a RC (reality check) is actually increasing awareness. Whenever you perform a RC during waking life, don't just go through the motions. Prior to performing your RC, take a moment to become aware of your surroundings. Even if you know that you are awake, pretend that everything around you is actually a dream. Finally, perform your RC and see if you are actually dreaming. A quality RC is a RC in which you question your reality.

From above, "pretend everything around you is actually a dream." Whether you truly believe this questioning of reality or not, is irrelevant. The fact that you ARE questioning it, is good enough. The idea is, if you are able to question your reality during waking life, you will do the same in your dreams. Like I said earlier, 90% of the time awareness makes you lucid, not the RC itself. Practicing quality RCs like these, will boost that awareness level greatly.

Dream Journal & Recall Enhancement
Last, but certainly not least, is dream journaling. It is key that you write down every dream that you possibly can. Once you wake from sleep, try not to move much. Just lay there and recall/recap your dream in your mind. Once you have went through the dream, immediately write it down. Keep a notebook and pencil/pen at your bedside. Keeping a dream journal will also help build up your dream recall. If you wake from sleep and only remember bits and pieces, write down those bits and pieces. If you wake up and don't remember anything at all, write down, "Couldn't remember any dreams." Its important that you do this. It will help train your mind to literally WANT to write down something. This will help toward recall as well.

If you want to immediately enhance your recall, you can set alarms throughout the night. The idea is that you wake up either between REM cycles or toward the end of an REM cycle and write down your dream then. Since you are waking up right after they happen, they won't be forgotten as the night progresses (even if they are...you wrote them down ). The REM cycle generally takes a few hours to get started. Once it does get started, REM will cycle through every 90 minutes or so (on average). I started out by setting my initial alarm for after 4 hours of sleep. The next alarm is for two hours later (after 6 hours of sleep). Then i set alarms in 1 hour increments until I wake up for good.

Technique Results
Ever since I first learned of All Day Awareness, I have been practicing it. Twice I took relatively long breaks from DreamViews and simply didn't train for lucid dreaming, but the rest of the time I have been practicing ADA. I have 107 DILDs recorded on the site, but counting the DILDs I had during my time away from DreamViews I am at 150+ DILDs. Like I mentioned before, only a handful of them were because of a random RC. The rest were simply due to my awareness. I am hovering around the 22 lucid dreams per month mark, but I am certain that if I had stayed in ADA practice my entire time, I would be averaging a lucid dream per night by now. I truly believe that with enough practice, ADA is a legit technique for accomplishing lucidity in every dream.

MindGames
Also I have something to contribute to your tutorial. I think that if you were to be constantly aware of your environment in the context of whether or not aspects are dreamlike, it would be more effective in producing nightly lucid dreams. This would train your mind to focus primarily on dream-related aspects in your environment, thus increasing the effectiveness of your awareness. This would allow you to effectively be constantly performing a reality check, in the sense that your mind is constantly questioning if your environment is a dream, rather than just primarily paying attention to your environment. Awareness is key to all DILDs, but how you use it is also important.

Naiya's DILD & WILD Secrets

Lucid Dreaming Overview

This is my LD tutorial. It will cover both DILD and WILDs. Since everyone is at a different knowledge and skill level, I'm going to begin with the basics and get deeper into the more technical stuff as I go along. So if you're already fairly knowledgeable, you're welcome to skip right to the good stuff. The ideas expressed here are based both on my research and heavily on my own experiences. Although I welcome other ideas, I personally think it's pretty silly to argue since every person's mind is unique and what works in one person's dream may not work in another person's.

For lucid dreaming, the two main things you need to succeed are CONSISTENCY and PRACTICE.

For dream control, you need good visualization skills, you need to UNLEARN the rules of the real world by understanding that ALL types of reality are subjective and can be changed by your thinking, most of all the dreamworld. Having faith in yourself is important--you MUST be able to imagine and EXPECT success. And of course, you've got to PRACTICE dream control too!

Dreaming 101
An Oneironaut is someone who explores the dream world via lucid dreaming, also known as conscious dreaming. A lucid dream is a dream in which you are aware you are dreaming while you're still dreaming. There are many theories about what our dreams mean, where they come from, and why we have them. Freud and Jung believed that our dreams were messages from the unconscious mind, a theory which is still popular today. Jung also coined a few important terms in dreams which you may want to remember. An archetype is a dream person which represents a being that everyone in the world understands and relates to. There is a Mother Archetype, a Hero archetype, a Mentor archetype and so on. In your dreams, you may often meet a certain member of the opposite sex. If you are a man, this entity is referred to as your Anima; if you are a woman, your Animus. Your Anima/Animus is often the representation of your masculine or feminine self. Many Oneironauts insist that integrating with your Anima/Animus will result in a feeling of wholeness and completion.

As an Oneironaut you may experience what is known as sleep paralysis. This is a state where a person feels a pressure or force holding them down during sleep. It usually occurs during the sleep-wake transitions, and the person usually knows where they are. Basically, our mind wakes up before our body does. It can be a very frightening experience for one who doesn't know what's going on. If this happens to you, a good way to get out of it is to focus on shaking your head. This is sometimes refered to as "the old hag."

Sleep paralysis can often lead to an Out-of-Body Experience or OBE. This happens when the dreamer feels detached from their body during the dream. Sometimes they can even look back and see their own body. It occurs most often during surgery and sometimes leads to a near-death experience, but it also happens during normal sleep. Once you are able to have a lucid dream, you may start experimenting with dream control. This is fairly self-explanatory, although many aspects are left out. Most Oneironauts picture dream control as flying like superman or battling with spells, but dream control can also include more subtle things. Here are some types of dream control:

• Steering: Most dreams involve some kind of plot, however strange. When the dreamer wants the plot to go a certain way, they can sort of will it in that direction. The point is that no action (think things you can do in real life to change things) is is needed to change the dream plot. This usually involves doing that Jedi thing where people do what you want them to. You can also control events that you wouldn't be able to awake.
• Environmental: Probably everyone's favorite. This involves stuff like flying, teleporting, going through walls, transforming objects and/or making objects appear.
• Total/Superlucid: This is the the most rare. It's when the dreamer is able to control the dream plot, chracters and environment. I'd like to point out that complete control over every detail may not be possible. Think of trying to mentally reconstruct every detail of each room/field of vision every time you turn around. It's extremely hard to keep the environment stable.

Note that it's completely possible to have both steering and environmental control at the same time. However, I wouldn't count this as total control, since the dreamer is usually only changing SOME, not ALL, factors in the dream. Lucidity does not equal control. Not all dreams are made equal! Some dreams will be easier to control than others. If you are having trouble with controlling a certain dream, ask yourself if this dream is trying to give you a message that you should be paying attention to. That being said, your biggest block for control is almost always your own uncertainty. Like Morpheus told Neo, free your mind and let go of your fear. If you believe that gravity exists in your dreams, then it will hold you down. Have faith in yourself and you'll be able to do almost anything you can imagine.

Improving Dream Recall and Understanding A lot of people don't remember their dreams all the time. I have a few pointers for remembering, recording and understanding dreams. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know and I'll update the list. Good dream recall is the first step to lucid dreaming! This is the foundation. If you remember less than one or two dreams, try some of these methods to help your recall.

Tips For Remembering
If you can remember absolutely nothing at all when you wake up, take a few minutes to stay in bed and try to remember.

• A good way to do this is to slowly think of people, places, and things that are familiar to you. Go through each thing at a time. Was my mother in my dream...? Was my dream about work...? You'd be surprised at how often this works. Just today, I remembered a whole dream because I saw pigs on a TV show. There was an adorable piglet in my dream, and remembering that one little thing brought a flood of information. Sometimes all you need is that one "key" to remember your dream.
• Many people can remember at least the last moment of their dream, but nothing else. This best way to remember the rest of the dream is to simply go backwards, just like you would in remembering something in your childhood. Take your time in doing this. Ask yourself, "What happened right before then?" "How did I get to the train station?" Just keep slowly backtracking. Sometimes you may even be able to remember dreams that you had earlier in the night this way.
• When you wake up in the morning, try to get out of the habit of immediately remembering what you have to do that day. Basically, your dream memories will fade instantly if you replace them with something else in your short-term memory.
• The best thing do to is to wake up with an empty mind and allow yourself to stay in bed, relaxed and without thought, for a few minutes before getting up.
  -Above all, don't give up! Good habits take time to form. It may be months before you start to remember your dreams consistently. You just have to stick with it.

Tips For Recording

• To get started, keep a small journal next to your bed so you can write down your dreams when you remember them. I like to use the little spiral journals because I can stick my pencil on the side instead of fumbling around for it on the night-stand.
• Keep the journal close to you so you don't have to get out of bed. For some reason the dream memories just fall right out of your head once you've gotten out of bed or moved around a lot. So try to keep still.
• If you wake up before morning, write down what you remember before you go back to sleep (or before you go to the bathroom).
  -It's always useful to write down the times you go sleep and get up (especially those of us in college, whose sleep schedules are erratic). If you remember more than one dream in the night, you can make note of which dream occurred at which time. This may be useful for those of us who sometimes have prophetic dreams or mutual dreams.
• Once you have a dream journal started, you may notice that some dreams have a lot to do with what you did the day before. To help you understand your dreams, you may want to also make notes of what you did during the day (movies you saw, things on your mind, problems at work or people you were with).
  This helps a lot when you get a little more advanced, because you'll start finding things in your dreams that connect with your waking life. For example, you dream of an old friend who calls you out of the blue, and a couple of days later you run into them. Now you have personal proof that your dream premonition came true! Pretty cool, huh?

Tips For Understanding

• The most important thing to remember is that the meaning of a dream is subjective. While other people and books can give some good insight, the best person to interpret your dream is you.
• That said, you can gain some understanding by asking for an interpretation by one of our fellow members. We may be able to pick up on something that you hadn't thought of. Also, some dreams are very common and have generally accepted meanings to them.
• Dream dictionaries can be helpful, but be wary of the simplistic meanings. For example, to Person A, a snake in her dream may mean an enemy, liar, or traitor. But for Person B, the snake might mean reincarnation, connections with the earth. or medicine (like the snakes on the EMT uniform). It all comes down to where the dreamer is coming from. The dream dictionaries can give some insight, but as always, believe what feels right to you.
• This one helps the most if you use it along with your journal. When remembering your dream, think about how you were feeling at the time. Feelings and emotions can give us the most telling clues about what our dreams mean.

Lucid Dreaming Disclaimers, Dream Control and Nightmares

A lot of this is based on personal experience, but as always, in matters of the mind (and soul) things are different for everyone. If you are thinking about learning to induce lucid dreams and dream control, you may want to read this first. There's a lot of misunderstanding about lucid dreams and dream control. Even some of the experts get it wrong. Part of this is because so little research is done in the first place. Not only that, but there are a lot of frauds out there.

Lucidity
A lucid dream is simply a dream where you know you're dreaming while you're still in it. For most people, it's triggered by something. For example, you may see a pot morph into a chair, or floating objects. Your logical self realizes that these things are not possible unless you are dreaming, and that's when the dream becomes lucid. There are different levels of a lucid dream. Sometimes you are completely aware that you're dreaming, and other times it's just a vague feeling you have. Complete lucidity all night every night is very rare. The highest kind of lucidity is when even the other people in the dream know that it's your dream. Which leads me to the next point. Lucid dreams are much more common in the early/late morning. Usually, the first part of the night is that total blank state, with a few fleeting images, sounds and sensations. Since dreams get longer as the night goes on, there's a bigger chance to increase awareness. Basically, while you dream, you feel emotions and experience things much more intensely. In a lucid dream, you tend to feel things even more intensely than in a regular dream. I have found no information that explains why that is. Lucid dreams and dream control are closely related, but they're definitely not the same thing. You can be lucid and not control the dream, and you can control a dream and only be dimly aware that you're dreaming at all.

Dream Control
Which brings us to dream control. Like a lucid dream, there are different levels of control. Most of the time, you need to know that you're dreaming on some level for this to work. I have found that there are at least three kinds of control, which I've already explained in the first post.

• Steering
• Environmental
• Total

It's completely possible to have both steering and environmental control at the same time. However, I wouldn't count this as total control, since the dreamer is usually only changing SOME, not ALL, factors in the dream. Again, lucidity does NOT equal control on any level. Some dreams are easier to control than others. That means that you will still have dreams which you cannot control. Some dreams will drag you through and no amount of lucidity or attempt at control can stop it. If this happens to you, think carefully about the dream. There's one thing you can be sure of, and that is that whatever message the dream is trying to get across is important enough to override your conscious mind.

On Ethics and Nightmares

This is where I get into a the rant portion of the post. There are some scientists and psychologists out there who say that lucid dreams and dream control will "cure nightmares." Gah! I could go on for hours about how totally wrong that is. Using these tools to face your fears in your nightmares CAN make reoccuring nightmares go away. But if you use them to "change" all your nightmares into something pleasant, you're just in denial about the issue that's actually causing the nightmare. Deal with the issue. DON'T make the dream into a Care Bear ending. Use the lucidity to find out what is causing the nightmare. Sometimes all that means is just facing the dream adversary and asking them why they're in your dream. If you happen to be in a lucid nightmare and you are unable to control it, there's not much you can do besides wake yourself up. Lucid nightmares, like dreams, are more intense than both waking and regular dreaming experiences. Most of the literature says that it is impossible to have a nightmare and a lucid dream at the same time. I can tell you from personal experience that this is just not true. And you know how your mommy always told you "dreams can't hurt you"? Well, that's a bunch of crap, too. Because anything that convinces your brain that you're hurting is the same as being hurt for real. The only difference is that you don't have any actual physical damage. So dreams can hurt you just as much as your boy/girlfriend dumping you.

For example:

"Ha! You can't hurt me. This is just a drea-Ow! Hey! Wha-ow!"

You get the idea.

Among all the science journals and books at the college's database, there was only one tiny mention of lucid nightmares. It said that lucidity only "cures" something like 80% of nightmares, but never goes on to mention anything about the other 20%. Which...I mean...I think that's kind of important. But oh well. While these nightmares are only a fraction of all lucid dreams, I think my point here is that lucidity and control won't make everything magically easier despite the praises of certain scientists. So if you want to learn these techniques, please use them with care and responsibility. When all else fails, do what you feel is right to you.

Having a Routine The most important thing that will help you have more lucids is consistency. In order to become good at anything, you have to practice. A few lucky people have enough talent to get by without practicing, but the rest of the population will never get anywhere unless they are consistent with their routine. You need to come up with something that is going to actually be enough to give you more lucids, but is also practical in that you won't just blow it off on a regular basis. For beginners, ten minutes is probably the most you'll really be able to force yourself to do every day, especially since you won't be getting results for a while and that's discouraging. Always stick to a routine for at least three months before abandoning it for a different one. If you feel stuck in a dry spell, try adding to your routine, but DO NOT take away from your original plan. It takes a long time for things to be internalized, so you have to be patient.

Here's a sample routine:

Morning routine:
Set a second alarm about ten minutes after your first one. When your alarm goes off the first time, try to make a habit of not moving at all--even rolling over (I know it's hard). Again, don't immediately think about the day ahead. Just relax and think back to the last thing you were doing in your dream. Then think about where you were and what you were doing before that, and so on.

Try not to immediately think about the day ahead. Just lay still and try to recall the last thing that happened in your dream. then just slowly ask, "what happened before that?" If you remember nothing, slowly ask yourself if your dream involved any common people in your life, or places or themes. When you've remembered it, write it down immediately. If you don't have time in the morning just jot down some notes/key phrases and fill it in later. That should help improve dream recall. You may want to keep a little notepad near your bed to jot things down on. Personally, I don't need to write out every detail to remember it so I just jot down a few key words and phrases to refresh my memory later.

Daytime routine:
Do reality checks. Base them on something that pops up a lot in your dreams. When you do your RC, ask yourself, "Where was I before I went through this door? Is my environment logical? How did I get here? What was I doing last before coming here?"

It's really important to consciously think about this, and very important that you answer your questions either by saying them or thinking them out in their entirety. I know it's a pain but I really think that this would give you the quickest shortcut to more LDs. Also, if you have idle time during the day and you're bored, just think about your dreams a little bit. The more you pay attention to them, the more interesting they will become. Or if you want to, just do a random RC. Look around you, ask how you got there, and ask if your environment/circumstances make logical sense.

Nighttime routine:
Try to get at least 8 hours of sleep a night! If you can sleep in on a day, 10 hours would be really great. You'll get much longer dreams if you sleep a little longer than usual. Of course, generally speaking it's unhealthy to sleep too much all the time, but most people have jobs and/or school to prevent that.

When you get ready for bed, give yourself about 15-20 extra minutes. Spend the first part of it clearing your mind of all the crap that's gone on throughout your day. Some people find that it helps to imagine setting all of your problems in a little lock box next to your bed. Personally, I used to tell myself, "The best thing I can do for myself and everyone around me right now is get a good night's sleep." So I sort of made up a rule to never bring my problems with me to my bed. I imagined putting them on the side of my bed to be picked up in the morning when they needed to be dealt with. This is where a regular journal is useful because if you are someone who can't let things go, you can write them down and THEN be able to forget them guilt-free.

Once you've cleared your mind, you'll want to do a little autosuggestion. First of all, if you have a specific task or dream or thing you want to do in your LD, now is the time to give yourself that suggestion. Basically, all you're doing is daydreaming of what you want until you fall asleep. Eventually your mind will get the hint and the suggestions will begin to actually show up in your dreams. The second thing you need to do during this period is an affirmation--"I WILL have a lucid dream tonight." Believe it as much as possible.

This is partially why I think most people normally have dreams about their daily life--all they think about is their daily life before they go to sleep. Definitely try at least one WBTB (Wake Back To Bed) a night. You really don't need to do much more than get up and go to the bathroom or get a glass of water. When you go back to bed after waking up, clear your mind again and do the same autosuggestion technique. This time you'll probably fall asleep a lot faster so you really don't need to give it an exact time. Just allow the clutter to leave your mind and reaffirm that you will be lucid as soon as you are dreaming.

Other:
Try your hand at meditation. It helps you learn how to calm your mind and let go of little stresses and things that clutter your mind and often even your dreams. If you let go of that stuff on your own, your unconscious will have more time to give you dreams with deeper meanings.

Getting Started with DILDs

There are a few things that give you a better chance of having a lucid dream. First of all, lucid dreams usually occur early in the morning. In other words, the longer you sleep, the better chance you'll have of becoming lucid. The reason for this is that, as the night goes on, your dreams get longer and longer after each sleep cycle. The longer you sleep, the closer you get to waking up during each dream portion of the sleep cycle. This is exactly what you will learn to take advantage of. Generally, before you go to sleep at night, you want to be ready to sleep without any thoughts, worries, or negative emotions hanging over your head. So before you go to sleep at night, you may want to do a short energy cleansing and meditation.

You should already have a journal next to your bed, so if you have any thoughts, worries or things you need to get done, write them down first. Then you'll be reminded in the morning, and you have no need to remember them when you should be sleeping. If you start to feel guilty or anxious for letting those things go, tell yourself "The best thing I can do for myself and everyone around me right now is get a good night's sleep so I can be alert and healthy tomorrow."

Lastly, as you are falling asleep, tell yourself that you WILL have a lucid dream. Don't think you will. Know you will.

How Long is This Going to Take?
The answer is, as always, it depends. If you are already good at recalling dreams, and you've had a few lucid dreams here and there by chance, you will probably be able to lucid dream a lot faster than someone who started out not even remembering many of their dreams.

Even if two people start out at the same skill level, you have to take into account the fact that we are working with our own minds, and every person is different. There are really no concrete reasons for why some people pick up lucid dreaming faster than others when they seem to start out at the same skill level. Regular (nightly) lucid dreaming takes AT LEAST a couple of months before it even starts working--that is, WITH a lot of consistence and work. If you aren't consistent, you have almost no chance of becoming lucid regularly. Lucid dreams come from habit and skill. Most people average several months to a few years to be able to lucid dream every night.

Ways To Lucid Dream
Each of these methods, if practiced every day for several months, should get you frequent lucid dreams. Not every method works for every person, so you may want to try more than one at the same time. The MOST important thing is consistency. I can't stress this enough. You've got to be patient and have the discipline to keep at it every day. The following are the most common things people do to have lucid dreams. As always, if you find that something completely different works for you instead of these things, go for what works best for you.

Visualization
In this method, all you really need to do is set aside 10-30 minutes before you go to bed. First, be sure that you have done a cleansing and that you won't be distracted by your daily thoughts. Sit on your bed and decide what you want to dream about. It helps if you try the same scenario consistently each night. It doesn't have to be something serious--in fact, the more crazy your scenario is, the more likely you'll notice it isn't real when you dream it. So concentrate on the dream scenario you want, and visualize it panning out. Imagine yourself becoming lucid, and imagine the things you want to do. KNOW that you will lucid dream. In fact, you may want to repeat "I am going to have a lucid dream tonight." to yourself out loud until you believe it. This method may seem silly at first, but it is the very method I used to learn, and I now have at least a few lucid dreams every single night.

Reality Checks
Reality checks are very simple and easy to do. There are infinite possible reality checks, so you are only limited by your imagination. The easiest reality check is to simply make a habit of asking yourself "Am I dreaming?" several times a day. Eventually, your habit will bleed into your dreams, and you will ask yourself the question while you sleep. Once you question your reality, you will notice some of the things in your dream that can't be possible in the real world. Normally, you accept the weird things in your dreams, but once you question them, you will realize that they are out of the ordinary. I have heard of people doing reality checks such as throwing up little objects and trying to make them float, or looking at their hands or feet (for some reason, hands and feet are easily distorted in dreams, but I don't think that this is universal so I wouldn't rely on it).

Reality checks are good, but it depends on the kinds of dreams you have. For example, when I was a kid my mom taught me the "look at your hands" RC. It never worked because, while I see my hands all the time in my waking life, I never saw them in my dreams. When you do a RC, don't just blankly ask "Am I dreaming?"-- a lot of people complain it doesn't work, and I believe that is because they don't actually consider this question, they just ask it without even thinking about it. When you do a RC, really look around you and think about whether or not your environment makes logical sense. The RC that worked best for me was the "Where was I last? What was I doing?" You may be surprised that you'll answer "I went to bed!" and of course conclude that you must be asleep. So these things help with DILDs.

Reality Check Addendum
The problem with RCs is that a lot of times, people just mindlessly go “am I dreaming?” and without even considering it, they think “no,” and then totally forget about it. This does absolutely nothing to help you get lucid. When you do a reality check, don't ask if you're dreaming. Assume that you ARE dreaming. Now ask, “why do I think this is real?”

Example of a GOOD answer: “I think this is real because I remember waking up, getting dressed and driving here. I can remember in detail what I had for breakfast. When I toss a pen into the air and try to make it float, I can't do it.” This works because you are testing you surroundings and memories against LOGIC. Not only that, but you're physically testing reality. If you want, you can try the classics such as looking at your hands or holding your nose to test reality.

Example of a BAD answer: “This feels real.” While you'll never confuse your waking life with a dream, ALL of your non-lucids will always “feel real.”

Dream Signs
For this method to work, you absolutely MUST have a good dream journal going, and have a good understanding of the repeated symbols, scenarios, and themes in your dreams. Many of us will have certain people, places, objects, or situations that are repeatedly in our dreams. These things are NOT in our waking life, but they appear at least once a week in our dreams. These are what I am talking about when I mention dream cues. Once you have a good understanding of things which exist solely in your dream world, you can focus on seeing them at night before you go to sleep via the visualization method above. This isn't necessary, but it will increase the chances of having your dream cues more often and becoming lucid.

Eventually, while you are dreaming, you will recognize one of your dream cues and become aware of the dream.

Or You Could do it the Easy Way...

Okay, here's my biggest secret. You really don't need any techniques at all to have a lot of DILDs! (I bet some people who read all that stuff are gonna be mad now. Haha. Sorry you guys.)

Even if you're not a natural, you can teach yourself to think like one. If you can do that, you'll have LDs all the time without really trying. The thing that works best is simply awareness. And I really mean awareness. Most people go through their days thinking about where they need to be going next, and what they need to be doing, and wondering where they should be eating. They spend very little time being truly aware of their surroundings. This is where that meditation stuff really helps, by the way! Meditation teaches the kind of awareness I'm talking about. The easy way to LD is a state of constant awareness. Make your day one big long reality check. Only instead of a specific RC, begin to question everything around you at once. Quiet your mind, and simply be aware of your state of consciousness. Be aware of the FEELING of LIVING and being AWAKE. It's a much different feeling than being asleep or even astral projecting.

I believe that many natural LDers do this unconsciously. They just "know" when they are dreaming because they know it feels different. This also may explain why naturals have a hard time explaining exactly how they get lucid. They don't really GET lucid...they ARE lucid every moment of the day and night. Also, during the day, remember that reality, too, is subjective. In a way we human beings are always dreaming, because our minds are always interpreting what our senses are gathering, trying to make sense of what's around us. Is reality objective, or is reality simply the interpretation we get in the end? Human beings are truly unable to examine the objective world completely. By the way, if you already have problems distinguishing reality from a dream, or have schizophrenia, or any other serious mental conditions I DO NOT advise you do this, because if your mind is unstable the last thing you should be doing is questioning reality or considering reality a dream.

The best way to learn about awareness is to pick up a book on meditation, Buddhism, or Taoism. Meditation is a tool that can teach you what true mindfulness feels like. The real trick to getting lucid is to keep that feeling of awareness going on all the time, even if it's not always completely conscious.

Awareness Addendum:
The key to constant awareness comes from the fundamental idea that all reality is another facet of a dream. Time is illusionary. Today will soon fade and cease to exist. Everything you know in this world can be changed in an instant, at any time, for any reason. This is just the same way your dreams are. This is what Dream Yoga teaches. All things are illusionary, all things change, and all things fade. This is the reality of existence.

• Everyone has some ideas as to what they want to do in their lucid dreams. So think of a lucid dream that you want to have tonight.

Got an idea? Now that you've thought of a good dream, try visualizing it. It helps to use real memories....for example, imagine that you're tasting the chocolate, and at the same time remember how chocolate tasted the last time you had some. Decide what the buildings look like, who will be there, what you will do, and make it all as detailed as possible. Basically, daydream.

• Remember that every moment today passes, becoming nothing but memory, as a dream. All things are illusionary, and all things in constant flux.

Keep in mind that right now, this reality, is only another form of dream. Keep this in mind as often and as long as possible. So when you do reality checks (hopefully frequently, since RCing a lot during the day can help ease you into a constant state of awareness), try to think about some of these things.

How to WILD

A lot of people have asked me how I have WILDs, and since my way of doing it is a little different than most, I thought I'd explain how I do it here. The first and most important part is the WBTB. For me, it only needs to last about 30 seconds. I wake up naturally between dreams/sleep cycles so it's pretty easy for me. If you never wake up at all during the night, you'll have to set an alarm. Try to set it for about 4-6 hours after you first fall asleep. While it is possible to WILD before sleeping at all, generally I've found it a LOT easier when you're already somewhat rested. So it works best either during the day for a nap, or after about a half night's sleep or more.

So in your WBTB, you want to be drowsy, but your want to keep your mind alert. So just get up out of bed, write down any dreams you had so far, go to the bathroom, get a sip of water, ect. Try not to watch TV or read--you want to keep your mind in sleep mode and it may be harder to fall back asleep. Be sure that when you go back to bed, you're not in the same position you woke up in. It helps a lot to be in a position that you don't normally sleep in, so for example if you sleep on your side, then lie down on your back for the WILD.

This is where meditation really helps. When you lie down, first you want to keep all your normal daily thoughts from popping up. If you start thinking about the day ahead, or what your friend said to you or what project you need to finish at work, you will not be successful. So be sure to clear your mind of any intrusive, distracting thoughts. Remember--don't try too hard to force them out. Just like with meditation, let yourself finish the thought, and then redirect your attention to being aware of the environment.

White noise really helps. I usually have a fan on all night. Try to focus your attention to the white noise. As you're falling asleep, do you notice any strange distortions in the sound? I usually almost hear faint music, or sometimes whispers. This is passive HI. What you want to do is actively control it now. This will get your mind into the state of lucidity AND dream control before you're even really asleep.

So when you start to hear the weird little distortions, think of something to change them into. For example, it sounds like creepy faint whispers. Make them more audible and make them say funny things instead. Or change it into music. Remember to be constantly and actively changing what you're hearing. This should also help keep you from having those horrible attacks of random itchy spots that will jolt you awake again and ruin the whole WILD. After a while, you should go into some kind of sleep paralysis. When you do, it'll be pretty obvious. Remember not to try to jerk your limbs to see if you're in SP, because even if you are asleep this action could wake you up again. Gently try to move a finger, or a hand. You'll likely start hearing loud ringing or roaring sounds in your ears. Don't let the SP scare you. You need to keep calm, and not let it drag you into unconsciousness.

Keep in mind that you may not always go into SP! If it's been several minutes and you've been focusing on the sounds you're creating, move on to the next step. So now that your body is asleep, it's time to segue into your lucid dream. So instead of focusing on changing the sounds, now you want to start visualizing yourself inside your lucid dream. At first it'll be like watching it happen on TV, but very soon your mind will accept it as the dream and you'll jump right into it naturally. This is what's known as a mental WILD.

Before you ever go to bed, you may want to decide on what dream you want to have in your WILD. The crazier it is, the better. Visualize yourself having the dream during your WILD. During the day, imagine yourself in the dream and imagine what the environment will be like, the characters, and what you want to do in it. This will make it much easier for you to visualize the dream when you want to WILD.

You may see your dream in a sort of tunnel vision at first. This happens sometimes. Just try not to focus on the fact that the vision is limited. Just stay relaxed and be aware of what you CAN see, and eventually it will begin to get larger. Don't stare at it too hard, or it may disappear. Keep your eyes relaxed and watch it grow in the same way you watch someone go by in the corner of your eye. Once your dream is starting to become realistic in your eyes, be sure to remind yourself again that it IS a dream, and allow the environment to become the dream instead of trying to control it anymore. Your subconscious will keep it more or less, stable, allowing you to move on to the fun stuff you're planning on doing.

Dream Work and Dream Control

Common Problems in Lucid Dreaming
One of the biggest blocks people complain about is waking up just after becoming lucid in a dream. the reason this happens is that, when you are lucid, you are already extremely close to waking up. So when your consciousness jolts, your brain wakes you up.

The only real way to get past this is to just practice and try not to get overexcited once you become lucid. Once you are lucid, theoretically you should be able to go straight to dream control. Tell yourself, "I'm going to fly!" and just do it. The majority of you won't need any further help than this.

However, some people may have to take some time to "unlearn" the restrictions of their waking life. This is much easier to do if you have some kind of spirit guide to help you, as it is with astral travel. Again, it just takes practice. You may want to start with small things, like morphing objects. Since objects often morph or mutate on their own in dreams, this should be fairly easy.

Common Problems in Lucid Dreaming
Once you begin having lucid dreams, you can start practicing dream control right away. There really isn't a right way to do this. All you need to do is practice and try different things. In this state, you are literally only limited by your imagination.

Here are a few things you can try:

• Flying--Everyone's favorite. If you're still having trouble with blocks, try jumping from a tall building and gliding or slowing your descent.
• Lights--This is a simple form of control, but it's actually very hard to do. Turn out the lights. Now turn them back on. It's harder to get the lights back on, isn't it?
• Marbles--Create a small bag of marbles. Take them out, name the colors that you see, and then mutate the marbles into objects of that color. Congratulations, you have now just proven that dreams are, in fact, in color.
• Explore and Alter the Environment--Once you've got the hang of creating things, start with even bigger things like buildings and dream characters. Create a pool, an amusement park or a mansion. Relax and just enjoy yourself.

Dream Healing
Lucid dreaming can be very therapeutic. When you are asleep, the part of your brain that restrains your emotions essentially shuts off. This may explain why we are so very emotional in our dreams.

If you have a current issue or problem in your life, you can try to work it out through your dreams. There are a number of books of the subject, and the idea is becoming more and more popular among therapists. If your problem deals with a specific person or situation and you have an idea of what you must do, you can create the problem situation in your dream. Once you have that done, you can try to do some role-playing with your dream characters. This way, you can practice resolving the situation in a realistic setting. Try not to influence your dream characters to act out of character. While it may help your ego, once it's time to deal with the problem for real, you won't be very prepared.

Another thing you can do is ask your subconscious mind directly. In a dream, every person you see is you. Talk to one of your dream characters about our problem and ask for their advice. You may be very surprised at how helpful their answers are. If you are especially intuitive, your dream characters may even make accurate predictions about your situation.

Confronting Nightmares
One of the most popular uses of lucid dreaming is the "curing" of nightmares. I have already done my rant about this in the original dream thread, so I won't bore anyone by repeating it here. In any case, studies show that with lucid dreaming you can cure up to 80% of your nightmares. Now, if you have a repeated nightmare, it probably means something. So while you can use your dream control to change the plot, I don't suggest you do it just because it's the easy way out. However, some nightmares are about fears which need to be overcome. In this case, I encourage you to empower yourself and defeat your dream adversary. It is a good idea to refrain from destroying a dream adversary right away. After all, it is there for a reason. The best course of action is to disarm your foe, and then start asking questions.

"Who are you? Why are you here? What do you want?" The dream adversary will usually be very candid. It exists to get your attention after all, and now it HAS your attention. It can send its message directly to you instead of scaring you into remembering the dream.

WILD - "Wake Induced Lucid Dream"

Wake Initiated Lucid Dream: Basic tutorial for Beginners, by gab

WILD stands for “Wake Initiated Lucid Dream.” The goal is to pass directly from a waking state, to a state of lucid dreaming, without ever losing consciousness. Where DILD is passively reliant on memory and habit to increase the dreamer’s chances of becoming lucid, WILD is a meditative process in which the dreamer actively witnesses the onset of sleep. WILD is often seen as the most direct path to lucid dreaming, but also one of the most elusive.

Preparation Chose a good night for your WILD ahead of time, and make it an event. Think about it during the day, and set your intention to succeed. You will need a peaceful environment, free from distractions. If you share a bed, you may want to consider moving to a guest room, or the sofa for your WILD. Comfortable ear plugs and a sleep mask are helpful to block outside distractions. Proper timing is critical for a successful WILD. Most lucid dreams happen during REM sleep, when brain activity is high. Time your WILD so you will be falling asleep as you enter a long period of REM sleep.

At night, the best time for WILD is normally in the later hours of your sleep, when REM cycles are close together and last the longest. You can easily chart your REM sleep by noting the time when you wake to record a dream journal entry. People have a natural brief awakening after every REM cycle throughout the night. Your natural mid-night awakenings will fall at the end of your REM cycles. Begin your WILD approximately 20 minutes before your next REM cycle. For example, If I knew I normally had vivid dreams between about 4:30am to 5:00am, I would begin my WILD at about 4:00am or 4:15am. Afternoon naps are also a good time to make an attempt, since most people have a REM cycle in the late afternoon or early evening. When you nap, pay attention to the time when your best dreams occur. This time of day is your target.

Attempting to WILD when you first go to sleep at night is not recommended. You can do everything right, but there will be no dream available for you to enter (or at most, a brief and unsatisfying dream).

Relaxation Begin by closing your eyes and lying in a comfortable position. Your goal is to become so relaxed, you lose track of your body altogether. You are going to coax yourself into a deep trance-like state that will, effectively, let your body fall asleep while you maintain some awareness. If you have experience with meditation, use your favorite relaxation method. If your thoughts are racing, calm your mind. Let each thought pass through your mind, recognize it, and then let it go. When your mind is settled, tell yourself firmly that the next thing you see will be a dream. The next thing you experience will be a dream.
Bring your attention to your breath. Breathe slowly, comfortably, and evenly, counting each breath on the exhale. Imitate the breathing of someone who is sleeping. Move your attention to your feet. Feel them relaxing and gently sinking into the bed under their own weight. Now move your attention to your head and face. Feel the muscles in your face relaxing. Relax your neck, and let your head sink gently into the pillow under its own weight. Do this for any part of your body that feels tense or uncomfortable. When you feel loose and comfortable, start to imagine your body swaying side to side, or rocking back and forth. Imagine you are swaying loosely to the rhythm of your breath and your counting. If you feel any annoying itches or twitches, scratch them, then go right back to what you were doing.

Falling Asleep - Mind When you feel relaxed, and your thoughts are beginning to wander, it is time to fall asleep. Roll into your normal sleeping position, if you are not already there. It is time to divert attention away from your body. It is relaxed, comfortable, and ready for sleep. You don’t need it anymore. It is time to move into the space of your mind. The goal, now, is to forget about your body altogether. Continue to count, but instead of focusing on your breath, imagine each number, visually. Try to see what it looks like in your mind’s eye. If you like, imagine the numbers on a clock, or drawn on a chalk board, or something similar. Try to see them changing. If you lose count, just start at the last number you remember. Losing count is a good sign that you are starting to fall asleep.

If you are not fond of counting, you can use a mantra to keep your mind aware. Mantra is a short phrase that you repeat. It can be something simple like "I'm dreaming". Your thoughts will start to stray. You will catch yourself thinking of strange things, or witnessing unbidden snippets of dreams. If you get lost in these images and let them play out, you will fall asleep. You need to remain aware, with your intention set while this happens. Remind yourself that this is a dream. Picture yourself performing your favorite reality check over and over again.

If no dreamlets are forming, you can induce them yourself. Imagine a recent memory that comes to mind easily. Chose something familiar and tactile. You want to engage your sense of touch and movement in the memory. For example, you might Imagine walking through your house, running your hands along the rough walls, grasping the cold door handles to open each door. Try to make it feel as real as possible. Stay patient and confident. You are trying to hold yourself on the edge of sleep until your next REM cycle begins. Hopefully you timed things correctly, and you won’t have long to wait. Keep picturing yourself performing reality checks, and reminding yourself that the next thing you see is a dream.

Transitioning When your REM kicks in, you may experience some hypnagogia. You may see visual hallucinations, such as faces, geometry, or lights. Some people hear sounds such as voices, loud bangs, or buzzing. Sometimes the hallucinations will be more physical. You may feel pressure on your body, powerful electric vibrations, or the feeling of motion and speed. These hallucinations can be convincing and startling. You are witnessing yourself falling asleep. If something startles you awake, just calmly return to what you were doing. It is part of the process, and will not ruin your attempt. You will quickly return to your trance-like state of mind.

Entering the Dream. When you fully enter REM sleep, a dream will begin. One of your induced visualizations may suddenly feel completely convincing. One of the dreamlets or images in your mind may expand into a full dream. For the first few seconds, remain calm, and engage with the dream. Become a participant in the scene, so it becomes your new reality. Touch whatever is closest to you. Investigate your immediate surroundings. Look down at your hands, or rub them together. You want to become physically present in the dream. Stomp your feet, touch a nearby wall, or kneel down to touch the floor. If characters are present, talk to them.

If you do pop out of the dream, don’t give up. Just close your eyes, imagine the scene you just left, and it will return. Sometimes it is a clean transition, other times you might bounce in and out of the dream a few times.

Often times your dream starts in your room. This is called False Awakening - FA. Learn to do Reality checks each time you get up from your bed to catch these FAs.

Common Mistakes Trouble Swallowing
If you have problems swallowing, try a different sleeping position. If you are on your back, try propping your head up with additional pillows, or tucking your chin down towards your chest. You could also try lying on your side in a fetal position. If that doesn't help, take care of what's bothering you. Scratch, adjust position, swallow. If you do it without getting upset over it, without paying any attention to it, just as you do when falling asleep when not WILDing, it will not ruin your attempt. It may set you back a few minutes, but just keep going and you will be back on track.

Twitching Eyes
Some people notice their eyes moving or trying to open as they enter REM. If this is a problem, try wearing a sleep mask. The light pressure on your eyes can help keep them closed. You could also try sleeping on your side.

Unable to Focus
Sometimes stress can distract you. It is hard to focus if you are worrying about everything you have to do the following morning, or the next day at work. Write down any distracting obligations in your dream journal so you can stop worrying about them and focus on your intention to lucid dream. If your mind is racing, try a meditative exercise to calm it. For example, you could imagine placing each bothersome thought into a large box, and closing the heavy lid. If you having hard time calming down and falling asleep because you are excited about WILDing, start falling asleep normally and continue with WILDing when relaxed and closer to falling asleep.

...This guide describes only one way to achieve WILD. There are countless mental exercises that can help coax you to the proper state of mind. Everyone is different, and no two WILD attempts will be the same.

Sageous' classes on Wake Initiated Lucid dreams.

WILD Session 1: Mental Prep Part A

Though it is the most difficult aspect of WILD (and LD’ing in general) to master, mental prep is by far the most important step toward success. In a sense, lucid dreaming is nothing more than a state of mind, and that state -- constant waking consciousness, regardless of physical conditions -- is manifest most clearly in the practice of WILD. So the primary step in learning WILD is that of preparing your mind with the fundamentals (self-awareness, memory, expectation) so that when you lie down and do your thing, you will know that that thing is happening and that you can participate and really enjoy it. Because of that mental prep merits discussion in at least two of our sessions: first here in terms of building self-awareness, and later in terms of visualization, setting intention, and keeping memory turned on. Discussion of expectation will happen often later, especially in the Physical Sensations and Organizing an Entry sessions. Also, if during the course of the class I get feedback that indicates still more discussion about mental prep needs to be done then don’t worry; I’ll go there. But first:

Self-Awareness

The root of WILD is that you are able to maintain waking awareness while your physical body drops into sleep mode around you. Though the concept is simple, and seems to make sense, the act of doing it can be very difficult. This is because your entire nature is geared toward abandoning waking consciousness in the name of sleep. A powerful tool for confounding nature and staying awake while falling asleep is self-awareness.

Self-awareness is nothing more than knowing that you exist, that your existence effects everything and everyone around you, and is effected by everything and everyone around you. Seems like a no-brainer, I know, but most people -- hell, almost all people -- don't so much as consider this concept, much less make it a part of their daily life. Self-awareness rarely happens in waking life because it is much easier to wander through existence unaware of your place in it (as long as there’s food, friends, and video games, who cares, right? Right.). Yet if you were to master self-awareness, WILD’ing would be easy; literally second nature. It’s that simple. DILD and MILD, for that matter, would be easy as well. So would things like getting along with your loved ones, and coping with the challenges of waking life. That is the power of self-awareness. How do you develop self-awareness? There are many ways, and we’ll likely talk about others during upcoming conversations, but the exercise I’ll offer today is simple introduction to the practice, sort of a Reverse Reality Check (RRC):

Here’s what to do: At random intervals during the day – at least once an hour but no more than three times in that hour – stop what you’re doing and wonder. Just hold still for a second and remember where you were a few minutes ago, imagine where you’ll be in a few minutes, and know that everything you’re doing right now has an effect on everything and everyone around you, and everything and everyone around you has an effect on you – even if you don’t realize it. The important part here is to think deeply about your place in all the stuff that’s whirling around you at any given time, and to really think about what all that whirling is doing to you, and what you might be doing to the whirling. During waking life, you might find yourself very often assuming that there’s not much whirling about at all or that there’s not much of an exchange of effect going on. There always is, whether you can feel it or not. Think about the fact that there is an exchange of atoms between your feet and the floor you’re treading: in a sense you’re changing reality itself, if ever so slightly, just by standing there! It is therefore extremely important to take a moment and remember that you exist, and your existence matters – even if you don’t think it does. [Edit: Your focus during this questioning period should be on your interaction with your local reality -- things/people your presence has influenced, are influencing, and will influence, or things/people that have/will do the same to you. You should avoid getting too metaphysical or galactic, as that atoms example above might imply. For example, perhaps you were just sitting on the couch in your living room 5 minutes ago, doing nothing... sounds like nothing to wonder about, unless you think about the dent you left in the couch, how it will still be warm for the next person in the room, how your comfortable situation on the couch caused you to ignore an important phone call from your boyfriend; the list can go on and on, if you look).]

You don’t have to recite all those questions every time; that would be annoying, and the process of reciting all that might diminish the effect. Basically you should put it all into a single quick thought that means something to you, and allows wonder to linger after you’ve resumed moving through your waking day. It will be difficult at first, but with practice you won’t be using words at all when you pause, as the questions will have become second nature. Be very careful that the questions never lose their wonder, though. If they become rote -- just a bunch of words you say whenever your iPhone app goes off -- then you will have lost the point of doing the exercise because you will not be acknowledging your self. If you successfully add this exercise to your waking life, you may already be well on the way to successfully WILD’ing. Indeed, if you can master this exercise, meaning that you can truly realize the presence and importance of your existence at any given time, then holding on to your awareness while falling asleep will be a snap. This might not make sense to you right now, but that’s okay. The way humans are currently wired, it is not supposed to make sense. Just do the exercise above, or something similar, and learn to make self-awareness a part of your waking life.

Here’s the really good part: when you are in (or approaching) your dreaming world, the exercise you’re practicing will translate into something altogether different. This is because when you’re dreaming, you’ll know, for sure, that everything around you is caused by you, and that it is all entirely a reality of your own invention. This new perspective will open doors to creativity and exploration, and allow you to pay attention to things in the dream world that you may never have known existed…Oh, and if all those folks who say so are correct, you will also be much more able to recognize with certainty that there’s someone or something in your dream that probably should not be there.

There are of course other methods for building self-awareness, among them meditation and All Day Awareness (ADA).

Meditation is always an excellent tool for awareness, but it can be difficult to master and, in my opinion, tends to build goals unto itself that might obscure or supersede your LD targets. That is of course my opinion, and serious practitioners of advanced meditation have regularly begged to differ with excellent arguments. So, if you are already a proficient meditator, and see an easy conversion of the Reverse RC I described above into a meditation routine or mantra, then go for it! Also, if you are interested in exploring meditation as it directly relates to LD’ing, then I suggest you sign up for Sivason’s Dream Yoga class [https://rentry.org/3u942m8e], if you haven’t already. Sivason has a real handle on this stuff, and I believe his class and method are both excellent for learning Dream Yoga and for WILD, which is in truth just a form or reflection of Dream Yoga.

I was originally going to suggest that you do ADA, and that is certainly a good thing to do regardless, but after some thought I had misgivings. My problem with ADA is that its practice tends to diminish the “self” as it amplifies the power of environment. With ADA you spend all your time observing and noting everything around you, but you take little notice of your self, and your interaction with everything. Think about it: Animals, especially prey, practice ADA by nature. A fish or a mouse is a master of ADA: if they’re not paying attention to everything all the time, they could wind up being someone’s dinner. But I wouldn’t consider either a candidate for lucid dreaming anytime soon, because all that awareness is driven by instinct rather than sentience. Sure, they can pay lots of attention and have true mastery of the input from their environs, but they have no idea they’re doing it, or that they’re even involved.

So, though ADA is a handy exercise for strengthening your sense of place in reality, it does little to define your interaction with reality, an understanding of which is critical in dreams, when reality is you. Perhaps if you can add a letter to ADA and make it ADSA -- All Day Self-Awareness, then it not only would it make sense, but then you would largely be doing the reverse RC I described above. Again, if you are already successfully practicing ADA, or wish to add it to your waking life experience, don’t stop because of my words. ADA is an extremely valuable mental tool, and can serve as a foundation for self-awareness. But as I understand ADA, it simply isn’t focused directly on the tools we need to LD. If you think I’m wrong about this, feel free to explain why in the Q&A section -- maybe I missed something!

I’m rambling already. Time to wrap up, I think…

Okay, so the first lesson was a bit on the dry side... I guess that’s because I chose to begin with the most vague aspect of all this, even if mental prep is the most important. It will be more fun later when we get into the nuts and bolts of WILD, but for now I hope you’ll bear with me and truly attempt to build, or at least consider, your self-awareness. As I said, I will be going back to this throughout the course, and I’ll be delighted to answer more specific questions in the accompanying Q&A thread (assuming I remembered to add it!). For now, though, look to adapting the exercises I noted above, and if you’d like further reading on what I’ve got to say about this, then look at my Lucid Dreaming Fundamentals thread, as it covers in greater detail what I’m trying to say today.

Lucid Dreaming Fundamentals

In a recent PM Darkmatters, in response to some of my fairly incomplete posts that hint at my experience and slightly different path for LD’ing success, asked me to share with the forum “How I did it,” and maybe create a thread in which other dreamers could ask specific questions I might attempt to answer. Normally I’d pass on doing this, since my methods and perspectives don’t always mirror the general consensus of what works, and I feel no need to intentionally stir the water around here (something I seem to do all the time anyway -- sorry!). Also, a voice somewhere in the back of my head regularly asks, “Who the hell are you to assume to know more than they do?” Good reasons to keep my trap shut, all; but, as I’ve been at this for well over 30 years with some real success, and Darkmatters insists, maybe there is something worth sharing. If you don’t think so, just move to another thread. If you’re curious about what you would ask me, then read on…

First, a little history: I’ve been doing this LD’ing thing intentionally since the 1970’s – long before PC’s, smart phones, and the Web itself. Even books on the subject were scarce and often misguided. Nobody I knew understood what this was, or really gave a crap if I dared to describe it. By the early ‘80’s I had done it all dream-wise: flown, traveled through space (my version, I’m sure), controlled every aspect of dream schema, chatted with all manner of DC, died, had what felt like OBE’s and shared dreams, etc, etc, etc. I even wrote waking-life novels (mostly much later) about it all, building their plots around my actual dreams. But there was something missing: I wanted to use LD’ing as a tool for transcendence, as a way to move my consciousness toward spiritual and physical experiences that humans are not naturally meant to have. But all the stuff I did hadn’t been helping. In fact, it seemed that it may have served as a block to my seeing what I needed to see -- the excitement and adventure inherent in low-level lucidity reduces interest in doing hard work to expand to higher levels.

I was on my own until the ‘90’s when Stephen LaBerge’s EWOLD fell in my lap (it came with the Dream Light I had ordered from a catalog). From it I learned that there were terms for what I’d been doing for decades, and that I wasn’t alone. I discovered that I had not just been aware I was dreaming all that time; I had been experiencing Lucid dreams. And I was inducing them with what apparently were called WILD and DILD induction techniques (before that I just called them “Lying there until the dream starts”, and “waking up in a dream,” respectively). To give the experience a name did help, but only to define, not improve, my experience.

By the early 2,000’s, after trying just about everything, including hypno-tapes (yes, tapes), machines (that Dream Light cost $1,200, BTW), and guru-based dream camps, I came to the conclusion that all the “stuff,” including supplements like gallantamine and vitamin B6, cleverly named techniques like WILD, DILD, and MILD, really did nothing to further push my LD’ing envelope. In time I realized -- mostly on my own but also by picking the brains of very experienced LD’ers while I moderated the Lucidity Institute’s forum for a couple of years -- that it wasn’t the stuff that made even the weakest LD’s tick; it was careful attention to the fundamentals.

In a sense, LD’ing is a 3-legged stool. The first leg is the state of dreaming itself, and the second and third legs are self-awareness and memory. The absence of any one of these legs means the stool topples and poof! No lucidity. It’s that simple. All the machines, gurus, techniques, and supplements in the world would do nothing, I knew, until I mastered these two things.

Of course I haven’t yet mastered either; that might never happen. Although I -- and any successful LD’er, I must assume -- had some grasp of these “legs,” my hold was far too tenuous to seek the things that I knew I should be able to find. But the act of finally making self-awareness and memory a priority elevated my LD’ing experience from one of enjoying the wonders of my dreams as supplied by my dreaming mind to one of real control, creativity, discovery, and growth. Since improving my self-awareness, some of my dreams, I think, have been downright transcendental in the last few years, and I believe it is because I simplified my quest. Now, for those still with me, the fundamentals:

Self-awareness is nothing more -- or less -- than being aware that you are here, that you have an effect on everything around you, and everything around you has an effect on you. This sounds like a no-brainer, but it’s a lot harder to master than it sounds. Most people are content to live their entire lives without a moment of self-awareness, content to let the events of their world wash over them and to remain unaware of how the things they do and say touch those events…sort of living life like it’s a dream, I suppose. Perfecting self-awareness is simple: pay attention! Unfortunately, humans are naturally wired to not pay this sort of attention, so it takes a lot of work to stay focused and not lapse back into the easy strides taken by those who travel life without ever once checking the path.

Memory is more of a physical issue, because it is inaccessible, or effectively “turned off,” during sleep, naturally out of reach of dreamers. This is why so many things in your dreams seem so normal and obvious, but in reality are impossible. Turning memory back on is not easy, but it can be done. Indeed, there are many mnemonic techniques available that will help you, but suffice it for now to say that if you can’t remember during a dream that your waking life body is sleeping right where you left it, you might never be able to step above the lowest levels of lucidity. And yes, your dreams are certainly filled with “remembered” images; but these images are awash in a matrix of archetypes and powerful long-term memories. Short-term memory, and active long-term memory (the thing that reminds you that cows really can’t fly), are naturally inaccessible. [Edit: I went on a bit further about memory on a separate thread here, if you are interested]

Since developing self-awareness (or a powerful sense of Self) and memory are very personal, often difficult, long-term projects that are done during the dreamer’s waking life, I really think you need to carve your own path toward a goal of achieving them, in terms of method (ie, Lidybug’s Clear Light perspective thread shows her wonderful method for developing self-awareness). Be advised, though, that doing so will take a while, and likely require some real sacrifices and discipline on your part. If someone offers you a magical shortcut to higher awareness, assume that they are wrong, or lying. All the machines, techniques, etc, are certainly helpful (if you’re interested, I’ll be happy to share what I found works best -- just ask), but they will never get you to high-level lucidity – only your own hard work will.

Memory: the Forgotten Fundamental

I’ve noticed that as the waves of techniques, tips, and testimonials regarding lucid dreaming pass relentlessly across these forums, one fundamental of LD’ing seems to be consistently untouched by the flow: Memory. The other two fundamentals -- self-awareness and expectation/intention -- are talked about often, but somehow memory gets, well, forgotten. So I thought I would start a thread about memory, in the hopes that some productive discussion emerges about it. That discussion could be scientific, philosophic, psychological, or even mystical, I don’t care -- just as long as we’re making some effort to have memory gain its place on the pantheon of what matters in LD’ing. Here, to start things off, are a few of my thoughts, which may or may not include a few things to discuss:

First, you might assume that memory mentioned regularly, in the form of dream recall or prospective memory in MILD -- and it is -- but those are only functions of memory, and not memory itself. In the simplest of terms, memory in the context of lucid dreaming, and this thread, is the same as memory in the context of waking life: the storehouse of a lifetime of information, sensations, experiences, relationships, emotions, images, and everything else that combines to form, ultimately, an individual. Memory defines who we are; without it and its context we cease to exist. Our physical forms might still be here, but without memory we are little more than waking-life dream characters. And of course, without access to memory in dreams we are no more than dream characters, period. Given all that, the role memory plays in LD’ing becomes obvious. Yes, for lucidity it is important to be self-aware in a dream, but that self-awareness has minimal meaning or spiritual volume until a dreamer is also able to tap her memory. In other words, a person who is self-aware in a dream but who cannot access memory can do little more than realize that she is dreaming – this is very nice, sure, but it only represents the tip of the iceberg of LD’ing. In order for a dreamer to be fully lucid, to have her entire being in a dream, memory must be accessible. But those are just words; let’s get a bit more practical:

Again, the memory I speak of here should not be confused with dream recall. Dream recall is certainly important, but that importance lies in adding to memory rather than accessing it. In the case of memory as a LD’ing fundamental I'm talking about accessing your waking-life memory processes when lucid; remembering, during the dream, that you have a waking-life existence, that you consciously stepped away from that existence a few minutes ago, and that you still have a sleeping body right where you left it. This might seem a little silly at first glance, but it is critical toward drawing your waking-life awareness into your dream. This is the case for two major reasons (and plenty more, most likely):

First, the core of non-lucid dreaming consciousness, the basis of your dream-character “you,” is that the DC “you” cannot remember that the dream started a few minutes ago (most non-lucids have a built-in assurance – thanks mainly to absent memory -- that the current dream scene is both real and has always been there), and that you are sure that your DC body is the real thing. It is not that your mind is addled or your so-called “dream logic” is flawed, as it is popular to believe; no, your cognition is working fine in dreams. What is missing, or rather what is inaccessible during NLD's, is your storehouse of experience and knowledge from which you could gather that there really are, say, no swimming pools on the moon. Remembering those things I said above, like that your sleeping body is right where you left it, should help re-attach your consciousness to your core memory and allow your self-awareness to assert itself with proper waking-life awareness. This action will redefine the “reality” of the dream, the rules of the dream, and perhaps even the dream itself. So, you cannot have true -- and certainly not strong -- waking-life self-awareness in your dream if you do not remember that the dream-character body you are currently occupying is not your physical body.

Second, once you’ve passed this initial hurdle, you likely will have switched your brain’s memory-access circuits back to the “on” position, from the “off” position to which they are naturally set during sleep. This will allow you to remember your current dream goals, prolonging techniques, the waking-world histories of the dream-characters populating your dream (giving you opportunity to wonder/explain what they’re doing there), and a host of other things. Basically, you will be truly awake in the dream when memory is accessed, and waking-life self-awareness (aka: lucidity) will have opportunity to prosper.

Again, it is certainly possible, and quite common, to have low-level lucid dreams without memory access switched on, but you will never get much further than that initial feeling of “knowing” this is a dream. For instance, you will still be surprised by events around you because your dreaming mind is still in control, you will have difficulty doing things like flying because you still believe your dream-character body is real, and you might for the same reason have a tendency to believe that the other dream-characters around you are the real things, and not just avatars of people you know (or don’t, as it were)... now for the dream-sharers and astral-projectors out there, there’s no reason not to believe that those avatars represent actual people trying to contact you, but you must remember that they are just representations and not the real thing; there is a difference. It is also possible, with memory absent, to have a non-lucid dream during which you think you are lucid. I used to get these "False Lucids" all the time, as my dreaming mind obliged my expectations and gave me all the things it assumed I wanted to fulfill my current lucid fantasy. So I did all the cool stuff without a grain of waking-life awareness or actual control, all because I failed to remember my true nature and condition -- and the fact that the dream world I was in was created just moments earlier.

Here is one quick hopefully helpful hint to ease that effort: it is a good thing to always include some mention of memory during your reality checks and when you set your intention before sleep. For instance, when practicing reality checks during waking life (and everyone should be doing that!), don’t just confirm that the clock didn’t change, or that your hand still has five fingers, but, when you're done checking your state, take another moment to remember exactly what you were doing say, fifteen minutes earlier. And when you set your intention at bedtime, add a simple “I will remember” to your stated plans.

tl;dr: the memory I speak of here is, I suppose, nothing more -- and nothing less -- than the memory you access during waking life. It is the experiential, foundational background that defines your individual self. That memory must be present during a LD seems to me to be a no-brainer -- while I’m awake. When I’m asleep, and memory access is turned off, the story is much different, and it can take real effort, and strong self-awareness, to access waking-life memory.

WILD Session 2: Timing

Our second session is about a category often overlooked by other instructors, but to me its importance is paramount: timing. When, during a night’s sleep, should WILD be attempted?

Though I may be burned as a heretic for saying so on this site, it is true that WILD is no better or worse than DILD, the other way we transition to lucidity. Though the techniques used to induce them seem to favor DILD on paper (with MILD being the technique of choice for DILD, though it is a good thing to learn for WILD mindsets as well), in the end -- after you've properly developed your lucid state of mind -- the only real difference between WILD and DILD is defined not by difficulty, but when you plan to initiate your LD.

For instance, if you expect to have LD’s during your regular night’s sleep, you should not be attempting WILD when you go to bed at night. This is because it is extremely difficult to maintain your waking awareness through the quiet of delta sleep, which is the first phase of regular sleep and has its longest period right after you fall asleep at night. There is negligible REM (Rapid Eye Movement) during delta, and, though arguably some very interesting dreaming may happen during delta, it is not the sort of dreaming that accompanies REM or easily accommodates lucidity. Also called NREM, delta is the period during which your body and mind get much of their restoration done, so it’s not a terrible idea to let it occur without interruption anyway. It is better to practice DILD in this case, because with that technique you intentionally abandon waking consciousness for a time, since DILD’s are triggered within the dream.

There are of course exceptions to this: if you are an accomplished practitioner of sleep (not dream) yoga, or “suffer” from narcolepsy, WILD at bedtime might be just the thing for you. Of course, I would imagine an expert at sleep yoga would have no reason to attend this class, so that might not matter. But if you are narcoleptic, you might have a tendency to slip right into REM upon falling asleep, so WILD at bedtime would be perfect for you.

I read much of people setting their alarms during the night for arousal after a few hours of sleep. This to me is not the best of ideas, for a couple of reasons:

First, alarms can shock you out of sleep and trigger your reticular system with a bit too much gusto (the reticular system is your natural mechanism for shutting off sleep and waking you up very quickly, a primitive reaction inherited from our distant ancestors’ need to leap out of the way of approaching predators, or put out the flames because their bearskin shirt was too close to the fire). This triggering – even if the alarm is from one of those pleasant “Zen Alarm Clocks” – could cause you to both lose track of the dream you were just in and make it difficult to go back to sleep. Also, setting an alarm means that you are forcing yourself awake at a specific time that might not agree with your regular sleep cycles, so doing so might cut short needed delta sleep or screw up your REM cycles. Better to gently rouse yourself after you’ve woken naturally following several hours of sleep. Everybody wakes up naturally several times during the night, even if they don’t remember. If you pay attention for a few days, you should be able to discover the times you drift into consciousness during the night.

Okay, that’s when not to use WILD. When, you might ask, is the best time to use it?

I would say that the very best time to use it is during Wake-Back-To-Bed (WBTB) after at least five hours of regular sleep, with a return to bed in less than 45 minutes or so after initial rousing. This will have you waking up when REM periods are closer together than they are at the beginning of your night’s sleep, and thus and more likely to be encountered with WILD. Sleep cycles vary, so you might need to do some experimentation to find your optimum time to first rise for WBTB. That 45 minute maximum is important, because it means that you might get back to bed while your dreaming mind is still idling, and not completely shut off. So if you find yourself awake for an hour or two before lying down again, you might want to take a closer look at your schedule. More on WBTB in a minute…

Another time, if slightly less optimum, for WILD is during napping, if that napping occurs well after your regular sleep cycle (over 12 hours since you went to bed the night before). It is less optimum because naps often occur with no REM or very discordant REM/hypnagogic imagery, and you could have trouble piecing together a dream, much less maintaining awareness. This of course varies as well, so if you have awesome dreams during naps, then by all means try WILD during them!

Finally my favorite time to use WILD is during sleep, without ever fully waking up. This is apparently known these days as Dream Exit Initiated Lucid Dreams (DEILD). With DEILD you use the momentum of your current dream, be it non-lucid (NLD), lucid, or false awakening (FA), to carry your awareness through a very brief state of near-consciousness back into a dream state without losing track of the last dream and with the awareness you picked up during that moment of wakefulness. All without the annoying physical sensations encountered during regular WILD’s, save a brief nod to SP, if you’re paying attention. If you are exiting a LD, then the moment would simply amplify and maintain the awareness you’re already enjoying. If anyone is interested, we can discuss DEILD more later, after we get through the mechanics of WILD, because it really does work best if you already know how to WILD “normally.”

Now back to WBTB:

Timing-wise, WBTB seems fairly simple. That’s because it is. If you can find a time during late REM stages (again for me that’s after at least five hours of sleep, but it could be different for you), then all you need to do is get up, maybe have a glass of water, maybe a light snack, and think dreamy thoughts for a while before going back to bed and starting up a WILD. There’s really no more to it.

Seriously; no more! What you should NOT do during WBTB are things that distract you from your upcoming WILD. That means NO TV, video games, texting, phone calls, or even vigorous physical activity. If you must do something during your wait (it’s only 45 minutes max, for God’s sake), try reading a book about dreams, or listen to music that is suitably dreamy. If you are a sort who meditates, this would be a good time to do so, again as long as it is done with dreaming in mind. Bottom line here is that WBTB is just a brief period of your overall night’s sleep; try not to attach daytime activities to it, as they will tend to send your dreaming mind into remission, which won’t help your WILD attempt at all.

There. As you all no doubt assumed, timing is a fairly simple subject, though it can prove difficult to make happen properly. I probably did not need to dedicate an entire session to it, but I felt it that important, and I am confident that it is that ignored in the standard “Lie down, hold still, and wait” tutorials.

WILD Session 3: Notes About the Noise

This week’s session is the most difficult for me, both because you guys probably “know” more about it than I do, and because I am obliged to try to convince you in a couple of paragraphs that the “noise” experienced on the waking path to sleep, including Hypnagogic Imagery, Sleep Paralysis, and Vibrations, have very little importance to successful WILDs -- indeed, they are at best just mileposts to watch for as you make your dive to the dream, and at worst (and very commonly) major distractions that can nullify your WILD attempt. Either of those things makes me very disinterested in talking about the noise. But, given the pedestal the noise, Sleep Paralysis in particular, has been placed upon by LD’ers these days, I guess I’ll have to say something. So here we go:

First, some (extremely) basic facts:

Hypnagogic Imagery (HI): As you are first falling asleep, and occasionally during semi-conscious moments between late REM cycles, you are in a state of mixed drowsy wakefulness and light sleep, and you will experience vivid, brief dreamlets called HI. That’s it; there’s nothing more to it.

Sleep Paralysis (SP): In brief, SP is your waking consciousness noticing REM Atonia, which, according to DV, is “The shutting down of neurotransmitters in the motor system, preventing a sleeping person from acting out their dreams. Often confused with Sleep Paralysis, REM Atonia only occurs during the REM phase of sleep, and happens every night for people without any REM disorders.” In other words, SP is simply your awareness of an action your body takes every night to prevent your sleeping body from acting out events unfolding in your dreams. That’s it; there’s nothing more to it.

Vibrations et al: I lump the rest of the popular stuff into a “vibrations et al” category because physical sensations you encounter can vary dramatically from person to person, be they vibrations, sounds, twitches, tingling, flashes of light, or other random sparks of sensation. Most of this is variation of HI, some is a brief hyper-sensation of physical activity like breathing, muscle activity, or pulse, and some may simply be your taking notice of stray neurons firing as your body prepares itself for sleep and REM. That’s it; there’s nothing more to it.

Now, why these things are/are not important to WILD:

HI can be used as a tool for starting LD’s, because you may be able to draw upon the schemata those brief images represent to “build” the dream into which you’re heading, which we’ll be talking about later, and which I will not recommend because using HI like that can cause a loss of lucidity. (Schemata, BTW are the mental blocks from which you build your reality, and we’ll talk more about that later as well). HI is also a handy marker for you to note as you are falling asleep, because it reminds you about where you are headed, acting as a sort of reinforcement device to hold your focus on self-awareness during the WILD -- in other words, you can note the pretty colors or listen to strange voices and say to yourself, “almost there,” which is good because HI tends to occur right when you are about to give up on the whole holding still bit. Again, more later.

HI is not spirits talking to you, cosmic energy, messages from your unconscious, or any of the other things noted here and elsewhere by breathless dreamers who encounter HI unprepared. It is simply random images that are produced as your body settles into sleep and REM mode.

SP can also be used as a tool for WILD, particularly in DEILD form, where it is more often noticed, because it gives you an opportunity to metaphorically “step out” of your “paralyzed” sleeping body and into your dream body and the dream itself. I’m not a big fan of this technique either, because that sort of metaphor is a mite too close to an astral projection (AP) or Out of Body Experience (OBE) image, and there is an excellent chance that a dreamer will get caught up in a “Hey, I’m doing AP!” moment and lose lucidity to the excitement of doing something “supernatural.” In other words, it’s a major distraction with little reward because you are very likely going to dream you’re in AP or OBE, and not really be there (before anyone objects to this or begs to clarify: don’t worry, I’m not dismissing or promoting AP or OBE here; I am simply stating that if you have done all your prep work for a LD and suddenly “find yourself” in AP or OBE, you’ll likely lapse into a dream because those were not the states for which you prepared).

SP is a fairly weak milepost for classic WILD, because you generally do not sense it during the WILD dive. This is because SP occurs after you’re in REM and have settled into a dream state, so if you are in SP, then you are also already in your dream, and have already left your body behind. On the rare occasions SP does happen during WILD, it tends to be a major distraction because you have to fight off the primal terror (meaning you can’t do much about the fear because it is buried deep in your genetic memory) that comes with discovering that you are unable to move. So, ironically, you really don’t want to encounter true SP during classic WILD. On the other hand, if SP lingers after REM, you might have an easier time doing DEILD because you are literally holding still upon waking, and might be very interested in getting back into the dream to leave the SP behind. Again, there will be more on all this later.

SP is not a mystical or unusual event by any measure because REM Atonia happens naturally every time you are in REM -- it must occur, or else we’d all be flailing about in our beds, or sleepwalking, or shouting, or … well, you get it. That you are consciously aware of it because it remained switched on a bit too long or switched on early does not make it special, unless you consider your ability to defy nature and notice it something special -- which is a pretty cool thing, I suppose.

SP is also not a goal in WILD. Let me repeat that: SP is not a goal in WILD. One more time for the back rows: SP is not a goal in WILD! You should never, ever, be trying to “achieve SP” if your ultimate goal is lucid dreaming. To do so is to elevate a normal condition of sleep to a point where it is all you pay attention to, and then, invariably, your chances of LD’ing will fade behind the empty excitement of SP. Again, if you’re attempting AP or OBE, then SP is important (though it also shouldn’t be made too important in those disciplines, either), but we’re not talking about AP or OBE here.

It is critical for WILD that you understand that SP is not dangerous: it is not an invasion by monsters, or your body failing you, or a break from reality, or any of the other things noted on the forums by breathless dreamers who encounter SP unprepared. It is just a natural bodily function that you happen to notice because you possess waking awareness at a time when nature never intended you to be awake. So if you ever encounter SP (I rarely do) just relax, acknowledge it, and move on!

Most of the time SP isn’t really even SP: People who are talking about their experiences in SP are really talking about their experiences in NREM sleep, which can include the vibrations, sensory deprivation, and other assorted bells and whistles associated with SP these days. This is sort of a shame, because consciously navigating NREM sleep is an adventure unto itself (and, BTW, the place the Tibetan sleep yogis like to visit), and to belittle it by calling it SP is to miss out on an otherwise good thing.

Vibrations et al are, well, just noise. Period. Any psychic/cosmic/astrophysical explanations or deep meaning you might attach to them might sound good in the dream journal or on websites, but in the end those Vibrations et al are simply your witnessing of bodily events to which you are not naturally privy. I’m not sure that I can honestly attach value to Vibrations et al in the context of WILD, because they truthfully are nothing more than a distraction, especially if you’re the sort who chooses to attach meaning to them. At best they are another mile-marker, and I think that if you see them as such then you will find yourself more able to allow them to come and go as they will without interfering with your effort to hold onto your awareness.

So that is the extent to which I think the “noise” need be discussed. That’s it; there’s nothing more to it.

WILD Session 4: Mental Prep Part 2 -- Forming Your Dreams

This week's session is the other half of the original mental prep session with emphasis now on getting ready to be in the dream. In the first mental prep session, we talked about activities to do during the day like the RRC, but today we are going to look at getting our minds ready for the dream itself, and more importantly ensuring that there is a dream at all waiting for us when we get to it. Keep in mind though, that you still need to keep doing those RRC’s -- anything discussed here, or for the rest of the course, is counting on the self-awareness you’re building with that effort!

Now to mental prep:

A funny thing often happens to dreamers when they succeed at a WILD. You may have experienced the phenomenon yourself: You lie down and wait properly, you make it through the “noise,” you’re in good possession of your self-awareness, and may even have managed to leave your memory switched on. Everything went perfectly. But then there you are, sure you are dreaming, but still lying in your bed, or wandering the rooms of your house, with nothing to do, to see, or pretty much to show for all your efforts. Yeah, you’re still lucid, but the dreamworld is pretty damn dull.

What happened?
Simply put, you did your WILD, are lucid, but there is no dream to enter! The required mental materials for a dream -- unconscious input like day residue and dream schemas, etc. -- have not been spooled up, because your normal sleep schedule is not being followed. That would be sort of dull, I think. Not to be left completely behind, your unconscious quickly scrambles with the most recent or ready images it can grab, usually your bedroom, or perhaps standards like your childhood home, school, workplace, or something else very familiar. This phenomenon can happen very easily, especially in classic WBTB WILD, because your dreaming mind was not prepared for a dream. Though you must be in REM because you’re dreaming, if you are in late cycles your dreaming mind might not be fully prepared to offer up another dream just yet.

This all may sound ridiculous, and I would bet that there are plenty of knowledgeable folks who might thoughtfully disagree, but I think it is a true condition: when you’re doing it in an unnatural fashion like WILD, it is possible to enter a dream state without a dream schema on tap. Your unconscious mind, in effect, wasn’t prepared for your visit! Even if I’m wrong about this, today’s session will still help you increase the quality of your LD, so it might still be worth considering.

Here is what to do about it in three easy steps:

1. Set your intention: It may seem counter-intuitive to set intention for a WILD. Since you are never separated from your waking awareness from wake to dream, intention-setting doesn’t seem necessary. But it is. Though setting intention is a handy tool during DILD and MILD for leaving a breadcrumb trail of reminders to consciousness (and your plans for that particular dream), it can serve an equally important purpose in WILD by giving your dreaming mind a rudder during the listless few minutes of a WILD dream state.

You can set your intention via the mantra you may have chanted during the front half of your WILD, and I’ve had some success with this myself. For instance, you can use a mantra that includes an image of the place you want to be when you arrive in your dream, like, “I will be on a beach.” I’m not a big fan of this, though, because I think it might interfere with both the actual purpose of your mantra, and the more global meaning you might be able to attach to a mantra that you use in every WILD, like chanting “I am dreaming.” We’ll talk more specifically about mantras in their own session later. So, if you’re in the habit of changing out mantras every time, or you do not normally use mantras at all, then perhaps building your intention into a mantra is okay. Otherwise, I recommend setting your intention the old fashioned way: by resolving to recognize your dream, by visualizing yourself dreaming, and by imagining yourself playing out your dream,. You can do all this during waking life both well before and right up to the moment of your WILD. All this is nicely laid out in LaBerge’s EWOLD, and I recommend reviewing it.

2. Harbor Expectation: Much of the fabric of your dreams is woven with expectation, so it is a very good idea to pocket a thread of expectation with you on your WILD trip. Expectation differs from intention in that it tends to be more specific, and more directly responsive to existing stimuli. For instance, you may have had the intention all week of being lucid, and maybe seeking your goals in a dream, and all that happened -- but you’re still stuck in your "bedroom." Now, if you also have a clear expectation of what will happen next after you discover your dream bedroom -- perhaps you know that a special door will appear that opens not on a hallway but onto, say, Saturn’s rings -- then you stand a much better chance of leaving your room and entering a new dream. You need not have some specific expectation in mind, either. Sometimes just an openness to change in the dream is enough to tap the vast warehouse of unconscious expectation we all possess. That openness might counter the unwelcome but already fulfilled expectation of your bedroom’s “reality,” and get you out of it without having to think up anything in particular.

Bottom line with expectation -- don’t just accept the scene you’re in when the WILD dream starts; be ready and willing to encounter changes.

3. Nurture schemas: First, in case you don’t already know, what is a schema? I’m not sure I can describe this briefly, but I’ll try:

A schema is your mind’s basic building block for its perception of reality. For instance, let’s say you see a round object. There are a lot of round objects in the world, so how does your mind know how to identify it? It does so by forming a mental model of the object, searching the images of round things you’ve got stored in your memory for an object that fits the context of this round item for a likely match. It turns out this object is floating above you in the sky, and seems to be lit up, but not blindingly bright, and seems to be stationary…by now you’ve probably already found a mental model match that says, “moon.” In its search your mind could have come up with balloon, or basketball, or Frisbee, or UFO, or any number of other models, and likely did so without your consciously knowing, but your mind settled on the best choice -- moon -- and that is what you perceived. That is a schema.

In a very real sense, all of your perceived reality is simply an assemblage of schemas -- you define everything you perceive or think by attaching schemas to them, and these schemas are simple mental models, building blocks, of your known reality (i.e., the moon image is a mental model for a round object that fit the surrounding context). They’re sort of like mini-metaphors, or bits of explanations, for what you are seeing. Without schemas, nothing would make much sense. Imagine what an infant, who has not yet assembled its library of schemas, thinks when it sees that round object in the sky; not a moon!

How can we use schemas to form dreams in WILD's? Here are a few ways:

First is during the dive itself, when your “vision” is hit with Hypnagogic Imagery. You can take the simple, usually formless and meaningless images (or sounds, or even vibrations) that comprise HI and attach schemas to them.

For instance, let’s say little triangles of yellow light are flashing about in front of you. Instead of seeing just the light, imagine that the triangles are actual objects seeking definition. In a moment, your mind should begin searching its database of “triangular objects” to try to match up a real image to the flashing triangles. Very quickly, probably within seconds of deciding that the triangles look like “something,” you will notice them resembling “something real,” perhaps a mountain, or a mountain range, if there are lots of triangles. Then expectation kicks in and before you know it you’re sipping hot cocoa on the deck of a Swiss Chalet (also a triangle, BTW)! A caveat about using HI, though: when you allow your unconscious to do a lot of work for you -- as in defining the reality of those triangles -- you run the risk of permitting it to take over completely, and thus sacrifice lucidity. So remember to remember when converting HI to dream schemas, always being careful to hold fast to the facts that you are you, and that you are actually awake.

Another way to use schema is as a sort of reality glue for the expectations you’re supposed to be harboring from step #2: After you are in the dream, and perhaps see that unusual door in your room, open the door. The scene it opens on might be blank, or chaotic. This is because, though you expected Saturn’s rings, your mind may not have had a chance yet to form the rings themselves. So look around at the blankness or chaos until you see something that looks even a bit like Saturn, or one of its rings. And -- here’s the expectation bit -- you will see something very quickly. It may only be a wisp of curvy smoke or a strange ball with a stripe, but something will appear. When it does, simply let your mind search until it finds the mental model that matches not the (still blank or chaotic) environment but your expectations. Sure enough, in just a few seconds, Saturn will be looming before you! This method sounds simple, but in practice it can be “difficult” because it depends on solid expectation, confident awareness, and a genuine openness to change that sometimes is hard to gather in a dream. But when it works it does so quickly, and with often staggering results. Oh, and this method has very little to do with WILD -- you can flip on the expectation/schema switch whenever you get the urge in any LD -- it’s a great way to switch scenes!

My favorite way to use schemas in WILD is by forming them myself, from scratch. After HI has passed (or diminished), there is a brief period of “nothing” that occurs either because you’re still in NREM or your dreaming mind hasn’t put together a world for you yet. At this point you can do something like that “door” trick above, only without the door and, oddly, without much expectation. Instead, first form or choose to notice a very simple object in front of you -- any kind of blob, line or dot will do -- and focus on that object. Notice that the object is malleable -- it seems ready to change its shape at your command -- and then just play with it and see what emerges. After a couple of shape-shifts, the object might start to resemble something. That’s your mind automatically attaching a schema to it; work with that by focusing a little harder and let the object materialize. Let’s say the blob is elongating slightly and turning red -- you decide it looks like a fire hydrant. Then it is a fire hydrant!

Now comes the fun part: take a second and imagine where exactly a fire hydrant belongs and whoosh, you are suddenly standing on a city street, your dreaming mind having (gratefully, I think) attached a world of schemas to accompany the reality of the hydrant. This method is my favorite mostly because it satisfies my artistic interests, but also because it can offer up real surprises without much risk of lost lucidity.

With these three dream-forming steps in play, you will likely not find yourself wandering your empty bedroom during your WILD, at least not for long. You should be able to jump right into the kind of LD that all this work learning to WILD ought to afford you. Also, the act of doing these three things will very likely set within you a mindset of understanding that, should you still emerge into the dream state in your room, you will not be stuck in it -- you will know that you can leave it whenever you want, that you simply need to give your dreaming mind a chance to catch up.

WILD Session 5: Mantras and Why They Matter

The Oxford English Dictionary, an old-fashioned paper tome, defines mantra as “A sacred text or passage, especially one from the Vedas used as a prayer or incantation.” Also: “A holy name, for inward meditation.” Mantra itself is descended from ancient Sanskrit for “Instrument of thought.”

But none of that matters much here.

For us, a mantra is something much simpler. Further down the OED’s listing is an addition it made some 50 years ago, which reads: “Forms of speech which carry a material effect upon the mind, emotions or body, or even on things…” That’s much closer to our purposes here; also it omits the religious nod, a direction toward which this class does not need to steer.

How then might I define a mantra, as relating to WILD? A mantra for our purposes is a simple word or phrase of your choosing that you repeat to yourself throughout the front half of your WILD dive (the “Lie down, hold still, and wait” part). The presence of the mantra will help to keep your focus and to stay on the narrow path of waking awareness as your body falls asleep. For WILD, a mantra can act as a verbal reminder of what you are doing (and why, if you chose well) while everything around you tries to persuade you that you are not doing it.

The mantra you choose to use should be easy to remember, simple to repeat either out loud and to yourself, and, above all, your mantra must be meaningful to you. This is important, because if you simply grab a couple of words off the shelf because they seem appropriate or, worse, because someone else told you to use them, then your mantra will likely not work well for you, even if you manage to remember to repeat it. This is because the mantra you use must pierce several layers of your psyche in order to be useful as an anchor for waking consciousness, and all anchors must have weight. That weight is nothing more than the meaning attached to your mantra. For instance, “I am dreaming” is a very popular off-the-shelf mantra among LD’ers, its “weight” diminished, I think, by the obvious message it speaks. Though popular, adapting such a phrase because many others said they did so will never make it a good mantra if the words mean nothing important to you. No meaning equals no weight, which amounts to a very weak anchor…not to mention that a phrase like “I am dreaming” can easily be adapted by your dreaming mind (especially during this vulnerable time, per Session 4), incorporated into a non-lucid, leading to a false lucid and loss of your WILD. So make sure that mantra means something!

How should you choose a meaningful mantra? First, don’t pick it from books, or websites, or even from the sage advice of a guru*. Next, think of a simple phrase that you are sure will help you achieve your goals, be they in WILD, dreaming, or life. If you think quietly for a little while, you’ll likely come up with a phrase that matters in short order. And if you cannot, don’t despair: keep the desire for formation of a mantra on your mind long enough, and one should come to you eventually. I personally have drawn upon several mantras over the years, from phrases like “Here and now,” – also one of my staples – on the simple side to very complex positioning phrases specific to whatever goals I might be pursuing (for instance, I once spent a few months repeating, “I am at the point where the land and the water meet,” in order to attach to my mind a particular magical metaphor – that’s fairly complex, and I don’t recommend doing something like this initially, because you not only have to repeat a long mantra, but also attach a unspoken subtext to it that must be remembered throughout the dive – and it all must mean something to you! ). In between those extremes have been mantras like “remember,” a simple phrase linked to whatever particular goal I had in mind during the mantra; gibberish phrases like “Ja Nah Heefra” that came to me during one “deep” LD that I hoped might be meaningful again (that particular one never was); and of course I repeated “I’m dreaming” once, only to have Aerosmith’s “Dream On” as background music throughout an otherwise uneventful non-lucid dream. But none of that matters, because you really must choose your own mantra – I just wanted to give you a feel for the range of choices you have. So be creative, be thoughtful, and be careful to pick a mantra that means something very real to you. That’s all.

After you’ve chosen your mantra, putting it to work is very simple: Throughout your WILD dive, repeat your mantra constantly, perhaps matching it with every “in” or “out” breath, and let it serve as that anchor. That’s all; there are no more instructions on its use -- it’s that simple! You can repeat your mantra either vocally or silently to yourself, though if you can manage to say it out loud and still fall asleep, it will probably work better for you, as the sound of the spoken mantra adds a special dynamic to the cadence of your WILD. At least I hear it does; I myself could never go to sleep while saying something out loud!

So, why do mantras matter? I think you may have already surmised that, but let me paraphrase: Meaningful mantras, by virtue of their mix of relevant verbal, symbolic, and metaphysical qualities, are a unique tool for WILD (and meditation, and prayer, and other similar “deep focus” activities). As such, mantras, through mere repetition, can help keep your mind clear and your goals intact. They’re pretty handy, I think, and, though they’ve been used for millennia, mantras seem to be regularly overlooked in the “Lie down, hold still, and wait” tutorials. And yes, mantras also have deep meaning for religious practitioners, including – but not limited to – Buddhists, Hindus, and even Catholics. If you seek focus in your efforts of mind or spirit, including WILD’s, then you’ll need to learn to gather mantras eventually – might as well start now!

Oh, and for what it’s worth, when you hear the guy on the news talking about some politician’s “mantra” of, say, “no taxes,” he’s not talking about true mantras, but a modern-day misuse of the term.

[EDIT: It only took five years, but I stumbled last week upon an excellent example of what I'm talking about here. This is what I just posted on the What Happened? thread:

Last week I was doing my usual Wednesday WILD attempt, which in general haven’t been going too well these last few months, thanks to problems with memory, focus, and way too much drinking on Tuesday nights. I was having the usual issues when suddenly I had a combination inspirational/huh-duh moment: I changed my mantra from a tired mix of “Here&Now“ and “Remember” to one simple syllable:

“Dive.”

This worked on several levels.

• “Dive is what I’ve come to call the WILD process in my DV posts.
• It worked metaphorically, which helped me keep my mind focused with imagery of diving into the ocean of my dreams.
• “Dive” is an exciting word, one to which I can emotionally attach myself as I repeat it; i.e., as the dive went deeper, my repetitions sounded a bit lie those of a submarine captain, which was both exhilarating and kept me focused).
• The word “Dive” is ridiculously easy to repeat!

The WILD worked perfectly, especially because I had an odd bit of HI that amounted to a screen-filling purplish eyeball with a red iris that filled my vision for most of the transition (not scary at all, BTW), keeping my “visual” focus pretty sharp. My dream finally began in a very bad copy of my bedroom, from which I left quickly and went about my LD.
Later on, after a wake-up, I used the mantra again, and it worked exactly the same, and just as well.

… And to think it only took me 40 years to think of this! ]

WILD Session 6: Doing the Dive

At long last it is time to put everything together. Yes, when you get to it, you’ll see that this week’s homework assignment is to attempt to enter the dreaming without ever losing waking consciousness… I hope that still sounds familiar at this point! Before we get there, though, let’s do a quick review of the tools we should now have available to help clear a path to WILD:

Mental Prep: We have built up our self-awareness –- by far the most powerful tool for lucid dreaming in the chest –- with a steady practice of Reverse-Reality Checks. At this point wondering about the significance of our presence in, and interaction with, our surroundings is second nature –- or at least reasonably constant by habit. Plus we’ve learned to stir intention, expectation, and schema into a soup rich with potential dreams once we are “in.” So mentally we may be ready for the big-picture event that is a WILD. Also, not so incidentally, we have generated much innate expectation just by participating in this class and, come time, intent should be much easier to set for the very same reason!

Timing: We have learned about when to attempt WILD -- for instance never at bedtime, but definitely as late in your sleep cycle as your schedule and nature will allow. We have learned the basics of Wake-Back-To-Bed, and understand why it is an important part of WILD. We’ve found our optimal personal time for WBTB. We also know now that WILD is a thing that needs to be attempted only when there is flexibility at both ends of the sleep spectrum (i.e., never attempt WILD an hour before you must be up for work or school). So now we’ve got the timing thing down.

Ignore the Noise: We have come to understand that the physical sensations that accompany the natural course of falling asleep -- “Sleep Paralysis,” Hypnagogic Imagery, vibrations et al -- are nothing more than “noise” that nature has included in the course of physically falling asleep that you normally would not notice. We know now that that noise should be regarded as mileposts marking physical progress, and nothing more. Above all, we have finally come to understand that SP is not to be feared or venerated by any measure, just noticed…at least I hope we finally understand that (SP is a stubborn subject).

Mantra: We have looked into ourselves and found a word or phrase that we feel might best guide us through the WILD process. We know that, for WILD, a mantra is not a magical or religious incantation, and should not be “supplied” to us by an “authority” like a guru or website. It is just a simple word or phrase that means something to us personally. We know that repetition of our mantra during WILD will keep us focused and, through its personal significance, help us to navigate the often twisty and bumpy path that is WILD.

So that’s it then. We've got it all in our heads and under our metaphysical belts: mental prep, timing, mantra, general attitude for success … Wait. What is missing here? There must be something else … Oh yeah, the whole “lie down, hold still, and wait (LDHSW)” portion of our journey!

I gave this bit a lot of thought (I swear!), and finally decided that I would leave specific front-end process of relaxing and beginning to fall asleep up to you. Seriously. You are each in charge of picking the LDHSW that best suits your interests, abilities, and nature. No, I’m not copping out; at least I’m pretty sure I’m not! Rather, I am acknowledging that somewhere in the eighteen bazillion tutorials and advisory threads out there waits the process that best suits your interests, physical status, and ability. I’d wager that you all have sampled or reviewed much of this stuff; hell, you likely know more about LDHSW techniques than I do! In truth, if you possess the tools of this course, any of the LDHSW methods will work just fine. In other words, the LDHSW portion of the WILD journey is by far the least important, yet, oddly, the most extensively covered. If you possess a strong sense of self-awareness, you know when you’re going to WILD, and you’ve got a mantra to repeat during the attempt, any or all of the popular methods for WILD will work for you, simply because the LDHSW portion of WILD just doesn’t matter that much. So pick whatever you want to do for this bit -- if you have the rest of the tools in your belt, then it’ll be a snap! Of course, if it is not, bring it up on the Q&A thread, and we will consider some popular LDHSW methods…

So now we’ve got everything. We’re ready. What’s next? Well, doing it ought to be next, right? But there might be a chance that you are still not feeling too terribly confident, or have a feeling, based on past experience, that you are in for an hour or so of just lying there with nothing happening at all. This would not be unusual, but do what you can to temper that insecurity with the knowledge and awareness you’ve accumulated these last few weeks.

This is important, because if you expect failure to happen then it will -- in truth I cannot teach or even advise you clear of that roadblock. Confidence is in your hands: you must go into WILD with a positive mindset, or else nothing will work for you, regardless of the quality of your individual tools. And, of course, you need to maintain this confidence even if you spend a few WILD sessions just lying there until you fall asleep or get up, thoroughly frustrated, because WILD doesn’t always work (I personally still fail at it more often than I’d like to admit). But I always lie down knowing that this WILD will be successful, regardless of what happened yesterday.

So I guess that what is next, what is left, as it were, is the final ingredient for successful WILD: a positive attitude. Before you finally attempt your dive, try to be sure, to thoroughly convince yourself, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you are ready, willing, and fully able to WILD. Like most things in life, if you truly believe that you are up to the task of completing a WILD, you will do so…and if you are confident, working the dream initiated by a successful WILD will be that much easier.

So to summarize the summary, here are the steps to take for WILD:

1. Determine the best time for your WILD, “schedule” that time, and spend a day or so looking forward to it.
2. On the night before your dive, relax, don’t drink or do drugs, and simply, quietly, irrevocably set your mind, intent, and expectations on the mission of staying awake -- holding onto your self-awareness -- while you go to sleep….this bit is important; don’t take it for granted!
3. After several hours’ sleep (you should already have determined how many), wake up; hopefully you did so naturally, but a minimally intrusive alarm or helpful spouse or family member is acceptable if unavoidable. Remain awake for less than an hour, careful to fill your mind only with dreamy thoughts -- no TV, phones, or internet! Go back to bed.
4. Do your chosen version of LDHSW, with the inclusion of your mantra -- carefully, yet without effort, repeat your mantra with every breath. Let it support you, guide you or at least give your wandering mind something to cling to while you wait for, and then endure, the passage to sleep and dream. Carefully maintain your waking awareness, your sense of self, and remember, at all times, who you are and what you are doing.
5. Mind the noise! Don’t let SP matter, skip the vibrations et al, and keep HI from turning your natural progression to sleep into some ersatz mystical experience. Note it all, and use some of it (HI in particular) to form your dream if you must (see step #6), but don’t be taken by the “noise,” it does not deserve you!
6. Form the dream. With awareness in place and the difficult bits of falling asleep behind you, allow yourself to enter the dreaming, and let the fun begin. Be sure to have a dream on tap, because your dreaming mind might not be ready for you, and might just haphazardly deposit you into your room! Form that dream from your own invented schemas, or use HI to “work” images into a particular dreamscape … you know the drill!
7. Dream; and do so with the same waking awareness that you had before you lay down.

So that’s it; there is no more. It is time. If you were able to pay heed to the rest of the course, you are fully ready to attempt -- and complete -- your WILD.

WILD Session 7: The Other WILD

So we’ve learned about, studied, and prepared for classic WILD, and we’ve discovered one major aspect to all of this that haunts us, and makes us wonder: This is a crapload of preparation and work that promises only a distant chance of a lucid dream; isn’t there some other way to do WILD that bypasses WBTB, the noise, and all that unnatural focus?

Why yes, yes there is. It is possible to enter a dream without losing waking awareness without orchestrating and enduring all that stuff associated with classic WILD. It is currently known as Dream Exit Initiated Lucid Dream, or DEILD, though like WILD it existed long before the term was invented. If your self-awareness, memory, and intent are strong but your patience (and, if you’re like me, your sleeping skills) are low, this might be just the technique for you!

What is DEILD? In a nutshell, DEILD is simply the act of briefly emerging from a dream – preferably a LD, but you can DEILD from NLD's as well – gathering your self-awareness, and then stepping back into sleep and dreamland, this time with your awareness and intentions intact. Since it occurs, almost exclusively, during the very late cycles of REM, and does not ask you to find a way to go back to sleep, DEILD does not require a mantra, sidesteps most of the “noise,” and shouldn’t need any advanced “lie down, hold still, and wait (LDHSW)” techniques.

So what does it need? Well, of course it needs the fundamentals -- self-awareness and memory -- plus expectation and well-set intentions (from as long ago as the night before is just fine). But every LD needs that; what DEILD also needs is a real desire on the dreamer’s part to capitalize on the dreaming/waking cycle and use the force and moment of a dream to initiate another, this-time-lucid dream.

Huh? It is way simpler than it sounds, and pretty easy to do, once you get the hang of it. All you need to do is recognize that you are waking from a dream, and then, preferably without ever fully waking up, allowing yourself to drop back into that dream, this time (or still, if you were lucid earlier) with waking awareness in hand.

For instance, let’s say you are enjoying a LD about a ride on a school bus that’s dropping kids off on the moon. You feel yourself beginning to wake up – you know the signals: the dream loses consistency, you start to hear your breath and feel the light pressure of your blankets, and you know that waking life is approaching fast. But with DEILD, instead of waking up naturally, you choose instead to return to sleep and the dream. You step off the bus and stroll the moon, awareness intact … no need, thanks to your dreaming mind’s lingering presence, to form a new dream, because it has one to offer (be prepared, though, for the moon or bus to be much different than the previous dream, though, as your dreaming mind re-spools). Of course, you are lucid, so you can leave the dream or form a new one at will, all without juggling noise or repeating mantras!

The process is simple, though it does need some practice and, of course, mental prep:

1. Recognize that you are waking up from a dream. If you are emerging from a LD or ”recovering” from a false awakening (FA), this will be an easy step, for obvious reasons. However, if you are in a NLD, then things are a tad more problematic, but not insurmountable: what you need to do then is to have previously prepared yourself, via earlier mental prep, to be ready for the signs of waking up. One of the main purposes of this class was to instill into you a natural sense for that preparation so, if you’ve been doing your homework, you very likely will recognize if not actually expect that you are exiting a dream when the time comes. Also, you might have the awareness necessary to dive back in without all these silly instructions!
2. Keep your eyes closed and, yes, hold still. As the dream wraps up and sleep wanes, your body is going to start tripping automatic switches to bring you quickly and painlessly back to waking-life consciousness. You can’t let that happen. The first, and most effective “anti-switch-tripping” device is to keep your eyes closed to hold back morning’s light (even if you’re sporting a sleep mask). Next, to hold off the physiological progression from sleep to waking, keep yourself as still as possible – don’t roll over! You should be getting an assist of sorts from your body, as REM Atonia is usually still lingering during the first moments of dream exit, so you can let the “SP” work for you (finally, you say?). LaBerge suggests simply “rising” out of your frozen sleep body and walking right into the new dream; if you can do that without suffering delusions of OBE, then go for it -- it’s a good plan. Otherwise, read on.
3. Remember. Run your recently exited dream through your mind, and decide if you want to return to it. If you do, then simply visualize the dream -- it should still be readily available -- and picture yourself among its scenery and events. If you don’t care to return to your previous dream, then pause for a moment – without opening your eyes! – and imagine where you want to be (this phase can even be planned -- when you set your intentions the night before, you might include the scenario for the DEILD dream).
4. Reenter the dream, self-awareness intact. No need to explain that bit, I think!

That is it. Not much different than Lie Down-Hold Still-and Wait, is it? And yet, it is, because you are already lying down, REM Atonia (aka SP) is likely still holding you somewhat still, and though there may be a brief wait for sleep to restart and your dreaming mind to get back into motion, it is not long, because in real physical terms you haven’t completely woken up yet.

Then why, you ask, isn’t everyone just doing DEILD’s and LD’ing with ease? Well, mostly because DEILD is still a very difficult process, thanks to the required mental prep noted in step #1 above: it takes a good chunk of self-awareness to identify your “dream exit” state, and building the capacity for that self-awareness takes time and serious care. DILD, by comparison, is a much easier process, because all you really need do is deeply anticipate a LD, file away lots of dream signs, and make RC’s a habit. DILD, though, is much more hit-and-miss than is DEILD -- at least theoretically.

So that, in a nutshell, is DEILD. I suppose I should have given it more attention, but in the end it is difficult to say more about it without restating all we’ve already discussed about WILD. The things that matter in WILD are the same things that matter in DEILD.

Good luck, and Best of Dreams to you all,
-- Sageous