The most succesful technique that works for you (final version)

[LucidDreamGod]

LucidDreamGod:What method do you use to induce lucid dreams? I know you can chain the lucid dreams using DIELD, but what technique do you use to actually use to induce the first lucid dream of the night? DEILD, I don't need to have a ld to start chaining I can wake up from a normal dream and do deild.

[DCK7]

Ethan: I'm not sure if that technique would work or not, but I would like to know the science behind your technique.

[TheUncanny]

There are many ways to invoke lucid dreams, most requiring that the individual “override” their body’s natural processes through lengthy meditations and such. However, the most efficient way to have a lucid dream is to work with your body as opposed to against it. You can do this by exploiting the way your body is already designed to work, which is why it’s important to have the necessary background information on sleep (stages of sleep as well as basic information about sleep paralysis). The key to success is in knowing that, should a sleep cycle be interrupted, the brain will naturally be inclined to resume where it left off, within a given amount of time that is. Normally, the average sleep cycle lasts anywhere between 90 and 120 minutes, start to finish. Considering this, if you have ever hit the snooze button on your alarm several times in a row, and somehow managed to fall sound asleep within those 4 minute intervals of silence (especially if experiencing dreams during these intervals), you have already experimented with this phenomenon. The idea is that, if done in a timely manner, this same phenomenon can be used as a sort of shortcut to a lucid dream. Its invaluable because it bypasses the need to maintain one’s lucidity throughout the first four phases of sleep, and long enough to be coherent when one’s body enters REM sleep. This can make the difference between it taking 90 minutes or more to achieve a lucid dream, and it only requiring 10 minutes or less. The general goal, therefore, is to make it a point to interrupt a sleep cycle by waking up at an abnormal hour, with the intention of going back to bed and experiencing a lucid dream. There are a few ways to do this, some preferable to others depending on your sleeping arrangements (spouses, roommates, family, etc.). If you need not worry about disturbing others, do the following technique step by step. To begin, go to bed roughly at the same time you would normally go to bed. Make sure to set an alarm clock to awaken yourself somewhere in the area of 3 hours after the time you go to bed. When the alarm goes off, you will most likely be tired, groggy, and otherwise “out of it”… but it’s important to gather your senses at this time. Get a drink, go to the bathroom, or anything else that will sober you up a bit, but stay away from watching TV or going on the internet as it floods the mind with distracting thoughts. Use this time to remind yourself of what you are doing, and to reset you alarm to go off X minutes (45 for me) from then. Go back to bed, but make sure to lie on your back (the supine position) as it is the most common position to have a lucid dream. Attempt to stay awake as long as you can this way, with your eyes closed and your body relaxed, still and comfortable, almost as if pretending to sleep. The goal is to wait for the onset of sleep paralysis. Ideally this happens the first time but it often doesn’t, even with seasoned oneironauts. This is where a technique called “Rhythmic Napping” comes into play, which is basically what happens when you try to catch extra “Z’s” by hitting the snooze button over and over again. A byproduct of doing this is that it trains the mind to fall asleep quickly, to alter its sleep cycles as to adapt to the frequent interruptions caused by the alarm. generally, this causes them to be "faster". To do this, set the alarm to go off in X minutes (15 for me), and once again, attempt to faux-sleep in the supine position until the onset of sleep paralysis. Repeat these X minute naps as necessary until finding yourself lucid when sleep paralysis begins to set in. If you are in a sleeping arrangement that doesn’t allow for such a disturbance, you can use the vibrate function of a cell phone or pager instead of an alarm clock. The X vaules can be changed and should be experimented with to find what works best for you as an individual. Other than that, from sleep paralysis I just slowly sit up, my dreamself that is, and wait for the dreamscape to solidify a bit before walking around and such. There is a thread here on dream views that has a link to the original website where this technique was developed. I believe its under the name of "Rhytm napping", or something similar. The website should have something to do with "saltcube" if i recall correctly.

[MindDaguerreotype]

I voted WILD even if I have more DILDs in total, because they feel less "random". I'm lucky to be able to WILD in less than a minute, but only with the right conditions (enough hours of sleep before) which means only on week-ends. Very close to the DEILD method in fact.