# Lucid Dreaming > DV Academy > Current Courses > DILD >  >  MrPriority's Workbook

## MrPriority

Hello there! 
My name is MrPriority. People usually call me Prio (or Thom, my real name) but you can call me anything you want. As long as it's not Bob.

I decided to start a workbook here because I want to really focus on DILD's for a while. It has always been the practice I can keep up and get succes in so far. I plan to do some WILD later on, though I want to get some experience in meditation and DILD's first. So I believe I will be here for a while. I also have a Workbook in the intro class, though as I said before, for now, I really want to focus on DILDs.

*My Experience:*
As stated in my profile I have had a total of 17 LDs so far. Almost all were DILD's or MILD's, with one accidental WILD I think. These were all in a time span of about 2 months. This was my first experience in LDing at the time. I started out reading a lot and tying out a lot of stuff, resulting in a LD after only a week. After those 2 months I would get about 2 LD's a week. The main focus of my practise back then was MILD, together with WBTB. Though the 2 things that I feel were the most impactfull by far are 1. Having a very complete and detailed DJ and 2 sleeping a lot!. I used to sleep around 10 hours a day back then. I found that after my first WBTB I would usually wake up after every dream (about every 30min or so). The longer I could keep sleeping and WBTBing the higher my chances of a LD became, though also the shorter the dreams became. 

*My current situation:*
Things have changed a little since then, with me starting school (software engeneering). It took me a while, but I now can complete my study without to much effort, so I once again have a good amount of free time on my hands. I hope to find some good techniques that I can keep up for a longer time, while fitting into my irregular school schedule. I pretty much have to start from scratch for now, since it has been a while. But I am very motivated to get my "second first LD" :;-): 
*
My practice atm:*
I am starting to write in my DJ again as of today. I also want to start up my meditation again. And I have been trying out some SSILD & MILD combinations. Though I don't always have time to WBTB. I have also started doing regular RC's, though I don't tend to put too much emphasis on that. I have never gotten lucid from one, but they do help make me more lucid after my first realization. So as long as I remember to do it in my LD's it's enough for me. 

*Goals:*
I want to get back to regular LD'ing. For now I aim for twice a week, while in a normal school week. A little less when it's busy, a little more in vacation times. Once I have acomplished that, I want to keep that up for at least a couple months.

Well that was all I had to say for now. I hope to keep some regular updates here. I used to post about once every 1-3 days in the intro section, which I liked. So I will try to do that here too. Perhaps a little more at first  ::D: 

If you have any questions, do let me know!

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## FryingMan

Hello MrPriority, and welcome to the DILD class!   fogelbise and I will be happy to answer any questions you may have and to offer advice on LD practice options.

You're already a fairly experienced lucid dreamer, so you've passed the first major hurdle: you *know* you can have lucid dreams.    So now, it's just a matter of re-establishing a practice, and putting back on that "hat" that reads "I'm a lucid dreamer!"

Starting up the DJ is a great idea, almost mandatory I'd say.    I think it's fine to plan for LDs when you have the extra time to do so.   Keeping to a regular schedule would be great for expectation (for example, "tonight is Tuesday so I WILL be lucid tonight!").    If I may add a recommendation, it would be that you should always try to reach for dream recall whenever you find yourself awake.    During the night, or in the morning when you're getting up, always take a few minutes and lie quietly without moving, probing your memories for dreams.   By doing this every single time you wake up, your recall will build in strength over time, and will be ready for you on those nights where you decide you want to lucid dream.

meditation is also wonderful, and is something I'm working on doing more and more.  I try to follow a path of "continuous vigilance" and/or mindfulness all throughout the day.   If you can incorporate a mindfulness mindset in your daily life, your "background" level of self-awareness will increase and will be waiting for you on those nights where you do set intention to lucid dream.   In addition, living mindfully (even not with the goal of lucid dreaming) is its own reward, so it's a great way to approach life.

And while "get up for a while" WBTB may not work for you with your schedule, you may want to try "micro-WBTB" where you wake up, recall, reset your intention, and head right back in to sleep.  This can greatly increase your chances for lucidity.

Again, welcome, and let us know if you have any further questions.    Using the workbook to track progress is a great way to keep yourself accountable to your goals.  Good luck!

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## MrPriority

Thanks for the warm welcome! 

Honestly I hardly feel experienced, haha. Most of my LD's were 5min long (or less) and I haven't had one in a couple months. That said though, indeed I know I can LD and I know at least to some small extend what works for me, so yeah I definately got that going for me  :smiley:  Still I feel I have much to learn!

The main thing I am after and why I signed up here is the same thing that I originally planned on doing towards the end of my big holiday. I want to have some regular LD's, but I find it hard to decide how to exactly go at this. In the past my way was just brute-forcing it. Sleep 10-11 hours every day, do WBTB every night, spend a ridiculous amount of time on the forums/ planning out LD's. I just kinda obsessed over it. Now I don't have nearly that amount of time, nor persistance. Since I have a lot of other things to worry about during the day. 

So even though my experience really helps me, I still feel like I need to find something almost completely new. I need to create a habit. Which I find a lot harder than giving everything for a short while, somehow.

I do like the idea of the micro-WBTB. I used to do those a lot too. And they indeed don't take up a big amount of my sleep. I will definately try that again :smiley: 

If you were to create a new habit, say meditation for instance, how would you go at it? I have read some things about a habit only needing about 30 days to become "normal" to you. So people use a big sheet where they can check off every day they did their part for 30 days. I might try that approach. If you have any suggestions/experiences, they are greatly appreciated :smiley: 

Lastly, I have just gotten some extra schoolwork on my hands and a Dutch holiday around the corner which I need to prepare for. So I have decided to make my "serious" comeback after the weekend. With the holidays vacation comming up, I will probably have some more time to brute force a little. Just to get back into the game:p Though that's far off in the future. For now I shall contemplate my methods :Cheeky:

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## FryingMan

It is a very good to establish a regular day-work regimen as you've voiced a desire to do.   Meditation is one thing that is great, but finding those 10-20 minutes to set aside sometimes can be hard in a hectic schedule (and noisy environment).

One thing you could do is focus on mindfulness, something I'm working on now.  It doesn't take much time away from your day, but it does change the way you spend your time.    To begin with, simply learn to notice when you've become "zoned out."   Being zoned out is how most people live these days: on auto-pilot, reacting without thinking.   Instead, always bring your attention back to yourself: your thoughts, your experience, how you are reacting.   Don't beat yourself up "AH DANG zoned out again!", it's normal for the mind to wander, but just keep noticing it and bringing your mind back quietly to paying attention.    This is a long-term exercise -- something to do for one's whole life.   But I've noticed that in a few months I just don't "feel right" when I'm zoned out or do something on auto-pilot, and constantly bring myself back to paying attention many many times per day.     Meditation is basically focused mindfulness practice where you purposefully remove yourself from the ebb and flow of everyday life to do nothing but observe your breath and your thoughts.   You can do mindfulness without the meditation part but I suspect that meditation provides a boost.   

Another very helpful way to get lucid is to have some firmly established goals: realistic, but stretching your current abilities a little bit.  Keep these written down and refer to them fairly frequently.   Participating in the Lucid Dares thread and the tasks of the month/year activities here on DV are great ways to stay motivated for your dream goals.  LaBerge emphasizes that having concrete, frequently-adjusted "stretch" but realistic goals is invaluable in achieving those goals.

To be lucid on a regular basis takes a dedication to day work (build awareness, strengthen memory) and to night work (WBTB, MILD, WILD, recall).   And always always recall and journal (at least key words) your dreams.

Let us know what approach you ultimately decide on!  It's OK to adjust as you gain experience and find what works for you and what doesn't.   But do plan on continuing: ultimately, success  comes with patience and perseverance.

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## MrPriority

Ok then, the last week was horrible dream wise. As expected I had a lot of things to do and worry about. Though now I am looking at 2 relax weeks followed by 2 weeks of vacation. Time to really get back into the saddle!

And what better way to start of my second attempt than with a lucid ::D:  I had one last night (for the first time in like 3 months). It was very short, I got little to nothing done, though I am very happy with it. It's a great start and great motivation. Since it was very short I will break it down here real fast and give a little analysis of what I think about it. 

So I was lying in my old room from like 10 years ago, though I didn't notice it wasn't my own bed. I saw my dad pointing a shotgun at the closet in the hall, and I thought: that's odd. I realised very fast it was a dream without doing any good sort of RC. So I asked dad to shoot me, knowing that he wouldn't do it. Then I walked up to him and put my finger on the gun as it fired. Nothing happened. I laughed and realised I could be doing something much more fun. I ran down and before I opened a door I imagined Paris Hilton to be behind it. (I have no clue why I thought of her, I don't even think she's that pretty but let's ignore that for a bit :tongue2: ) So I found her, or atleast my own version of how I think she looks. I took her to a quiet place and then I woke up. 

Now to me it seems that I should be doing more proper RC's during the day, so that I also do it in the next LD. I had this idea last time, where I would do a RRESI. *R*elax, *R*eality check, *E*njoy, *S*tabilize and *I*ntention. If I had gone through those steps one by one, I would've probably realized that at one point I wasn't in my house anymore. Also I was really worried that I was sleepwalking and that someone would find me doing dirty stuff in my sleep, so I wanted to go to the toilet first, hoping that my sleep walking body would also go there. If I had taken some time to think about it, I probably wouldn't worry about that. Lastly I didn't have a proper goal. I wanted to find Paris and then a quiet place. Once I got both, I woke up. If I had a proper longer term goal, I would've probably had a longer dream. 

These are the things I will start to work on. I remembered 2 dreams pretty vividly last night, so that's not too bad. Though I want to work on that too. I used to get at least 4 a night. This one is going to be the harders one, since I don't really like the DJing. But hey, gotta do what you gotta do  :tongue2:  I guess I'll try and make it fun somehow. 

Well that is all for now. I you are confused by my RRESI check out my post in the into class. It's 4th from the bottom and it explains the idea in more depth.

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## fogelbise

Awesome! Congratulations on getting back to lucidity!! I also use memory tools like your RRESI to help me remember to do all of my day practices and also using that memory tool during the dream is a great way to go about it. The two most effective ways that I have found to remember what to do in my next lucid is practicing it during the day (what if this were a lucid right now!?) and also going through at least the thought process (if not actually practicing) just before sleeping and during any awakenings or WBTB's. 

Hmmm...a fun way to DJ. Perhaps voice recorder, voice to text on a smart phone, drawing your dreams or just realizing how fun it can be to relive your dreams when reading back over them later.

Welcome back to lucidity and a belated welcome to the DILD workbooks!  :smiley:

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## MrPriority

Thanks! 

Last night I had 3 quite vivid dreams which I wrote down, and a couple lesser ones that I ignored. I really do love it when I can actually remember plots of dreams and some details. Even the nightmares can be truly intriguing. So I think that could be a good motivation to keep writing them down. Though simultaneously I find it so annoiying when I can't remember something. I get really frustrated when trying to remember those dreams. Maybe I should just only write down the good ones. 

I have been thinking about voice to text for a while, but I always thought it wouldn't be good enough to write down what I say. I'll have to try that out sometime.  

I did have about 10 hours of sleep last night though, since I have a lot of free time at the moment  :tongue2:  That also helps a lot. 

I figured I'd might aswell post something here, even though I don't really have that much new to say. Helps me get my thoughts straight I guess.  :smiley:  Well that's all for today.

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## FryingMan

Great, vivid dreams are a great sign, and a lot of fun!    I know that feeling of having dream right there "on the tip of your tongue" but you can't quite pin it down.  I had one like that last night in fact.  But I had a nice/bizarre/interesting short vivid dream with good recall so that made up for it, and a short lucid later on.

As long as you always reach for recall, that's the important thing, so that your subconscious is always used to being asked for dream memories every time you wake up.

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## fogelbise

The voice to text seems fairly good on android devices and I imagine also on iPhone too. I do have to speak clearly and deliberately and it works best when I hold the phone microphone away from my mouth where I can also see what is being automatically typed. I do have to make some corrections but if I click on a word it gives me other guesses as to what I may have said instead of the original interpretation. 

For those faint dreams that are frustrating you might just quickly log something like "something about a train?." If nothing more pops up then move on carefree to the next dream. You may want to start with the interesting and/or vivid ones because sometimes that reminds you of other dreams or fragments.

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## MrPriority

Thanks for the advice so far guys! Really appreciate it! I've thought it over a bit, and it's feels pretty weird to record my dreams out loud with my brother only a small wall away from me :tongue2:  But I intend to move out within the next year, so I will definately try the speech to text later on.

I'm still having trouble putting those faint dreams into words or text. I just find them frustrating and annoying, and I just turn around and go back to sleep. I know I missed at least 2 of those last night. Though now I kinda wish I had wrote at least something down. Since now I can't remeber anything at all about them. I'll have to keep trying to find some way to make it less of a nuisance.

With all that bad(ish) news out of the way, it's time for all the good news. First, I recorded 5 dreams last night. I woke up after every one of them. And since I know I had atleast 2 more, where I woke up but didn't write anything down, I woke up 7 times last night. And all that was in an 8 hour night. So it seems my recall is now pretty much as it was a couple months ago, when I was having a lot of lucids. Also, I again recorded some very vivid and long ones. I almost wrote 2 full page(a4). And that was only because I wanted to go back to sleep. I still had plenty left to write about. 

To top that all off, I had this weird experience. It felt like a lucid, but I'm not quite sure. At the end of a very long and vivid dream, I found myself staring at the ceiling. When I realised I could zoom in with my right eye. Also the right side of my body felt numb. I figured I was either WILDing or DEILDING or something. I knew I was close to a dream. So I tried to sort of "roll" my left side into the numbness. And after fiddling a bit I was now totally numb and able to control both my eyes indipentantly. I could zoom or even copy and multiply what I saw. So I started to focus on the light bulb. The whole room began to shake, and after really concetrating hard on the lamp, it started rolling over the ceiling. I was somehow now pushing the lightbulb wherever I wanted. Using some kind of telekinesis.  Rolling it as if gravity was pulling it up against the ceiling. After a while I slowy lost the image and went back in my body, only to realise that the ceiling wasn't even my ceiling. 

I'm not sure what it was. And I never did a RC, since I never had a body to do it. I know I can do those without a body, but I never practised that. So what do you guys think? Does it sound like anything you've experienced? And should I count it as a lucid? (gotta keep score for the motivation of course :tongue2: )

This weekend I won't be sleeping in my own bed. I hope that will help a little. Because I really want to get the basic TOTM. I feel like I can do it, and I think I am in a good place right now. 

Well that's all I have for now!

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## FryingMan

Sounds like great progress!   And I'd certainly count that as a lucid with low awareness, basically a lucid just means you know you're dreaming.   It definitely was a dream.   Great work, and keep it up!

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## fogelbise

I agree, that sounds like an LD to me. I feel that congratulations are in order! Very nice progress indeed!

I sometimes get similar experiences...usually when trying to WILD or DEILD.

Count it!  :smiley:

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## MrPriority

Thanks for the kind words  :smiley:  

Only a little update this time. Unfortunately not that great. I got myself quite a week before me, and had a packed weekend. 

I didn't get any dreams on friday, since I had a couple of beers. I think I just didn't have the right intentions when I went to bed. I can normally get some good dreams even with alcohol, though I think it's because I'm still not really into the habit of remembering dreams atm. And since I wasn't sleeping at home saturday I ended up not writing anything down. Which, I know, I probably should've. So I forgot my dreams. Then last night I again got no dreams. Though I did get some quality sleep.

I had some worries, most of which are resolved, luckily. So I'm just gonna focus on getting some good sleep this week and try and squeeze a lucid in! Starting saturday I'll have lots of time to get crazy with WBTB and what not. For now I'll just try and make the best of this busy week. :smiley:

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## FryingMan

No worries, there are ups and downs, and sometimes we just need a good night of sleep!

I do recommend still reaching for the dream memories every time you wake up, and ask yourself  "What was I just dreaming about?" so that even if nothing comes after a few minutes, your SC knows and expects you to be asking this question.   It's of course better to then write them down (since this helps to cement the dream in your memories), even if you have nothing, but sometimes one's schedule doesn't allow for it.  Just try to jump right back in as soon as you can.

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## MrPriority

Ok, so I'm finally past the week. I got totally stressed and honestly a little depressed, but I somehow pulled myself through! Now it's finally 2 week vacation!  ::D: 

I think the stress was holding me back. Last night, even though I had quite some beers, I had a pretty long LD. At one point I even noticed the dream fading away. I have been noticing that feeling more and more lately. It almost feels as if my vision zooms out, blurrs a little and then turns darker and darker untill I realize I'm staring at my eyelids and I'm right awake. This time though, I stopped for a bit and relaxed. Kept doing RC's, until the dream came back, and then I simply continued the dream for quite a while.  :smiley:  

In the end it got erotic though, so I pretty much lost lucidity there and the dream as well. (this is starting to become a standard, hehe)

Anyways, I'd say it's a great start of the vacation! And I anticipate many more lucids in this perios as well! And I can post a little more in here too :smiley: 

EDIT: It's LD number 20 as well!  ::D:

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## fogelbise

Congrats on holding on to that LD! That seems to be one key to extending LD's...KNOWING that the fade does not mean that the dream has to be over! Very nice!  :smiley: 

It is easier to find time for WBTB when on vacation but it can also be easier to slack on the day practices...so definitely focus on keeping them up!  :smiley:

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## FryingMan

Wonderful, MrPriority, you made it through the badness.   Stress and poor sleep (I'm going through a phase of a bit of both right now, sigh) are both major LD inhibitors.   So keep those thoughts happy and light, and do what you need to in order to sleep well.  Those taken together with proper day and night work result in lucidity!

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## MrPriority

It's been a little while since my last post. So first of all: Happy New Year! 

With that said, I kind of underestimated how much time goes into the holidays. In the end I didn't get an epic holiday of lucids, but I got some valuable time spend with friends and family.  :smiley:  I only got 3 lucids these 2 weeks, though I did not do anywhere near the effort that I can do. I guess it's a good thing and a bad thing. Mostly good though, since I am starting to get lucids easier and easier with every one of em. 

I do feel I can reliably get a lucid a week at least. Even in busier times, so I will aim for that for now. Also, I did not make the december TOTM. I kinda forgot about it, haha. With all that general information out of the way I do have some things I am worried about. 

I got this awesome and long lucid this night. I did a bunch of stuff. At one point I wanted to push away my mom, but instead of just pushing I stretched out the entire ground a couple meters. I literally added a few meters between me and here. I also flew around and saw an epic fire. Though as fun as I thought it was, it was nowhere near the kind of reality I've had in other LD's. It was really just like a dream. I even forgot some parts of it. Only the last part was really fresh in my mind when I woke up. And even that last part was still only "like a normal dream". Now, I've noticed this a lot over the last couple of LD's. It's actually been quite a while since I had a really realistic one. 

RESI was actually one way I wanted to add realism to my dreams, though I find it hard to keep up that practice. I never seem to remember to do it in dreams. Do you guys know of any other good way to make dreams more realistic?

Well, that is about all for today. Overall I am pretty happy of my progress so far. I'm pretty satisfied at this point, though I do still need to improve a lot in the future.

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## fogelbise

Happy New Year to you as well!  :smiley: 

The ground stretching sounded really cool and the epic fire. Congratulations on the LD!

Your RESI or something similar should help if you remember to do it and maintain it throughout the dream. I think one key is to realize your true state...I'm exploring this world while my body is sleeping in bed or something along those lines...while not focusing on your sleeping body. Slowing down and reminding yourself that this is your dream should also help.

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## FryingMan

Congrats on the lucid!

I think one important mindset to cultivate is to really enjoy your dreams, all of them.   In probably my best LD of 2014, I did all the TOTM tasks, and was so *happy* in the LD, having a great time,  I think that's one of the reasons that it lasted so long.   I was laughing and joking with the DCs, it was really fun.

Another important mindset is attention/involvement: my theory is that we (using only myself as a sample point of course) dream vividly in great detail pretty much all of the time while we're actively experiencing dreams, lucid or not, and what is missing to make the dreams more "vivid" or "waking-like" is *attention*.   Most of us habitually ignore most of what we encounter during the waking day.   It should be no surprise then that, when in a dream, it's challenging to come away with detailed memories of the environment or the plot/interactions.   We can't just suddenly become entirely different from our waking habits, especially when under the influence of the dullness/fog of the dream state.

I'm fond of saying: "lucid while wake, lucid while dreaming," meaning  that we should cultivate a lucid mindset, "lucid living" if you will, if we want to also "be" lucid in dreams.   Analogously, if we want to have a hope of remembering our LDs well, of having a "waking-like" experience in them, we must live the same way all during the waking day. 

Let me give an example:  Let's say you just walked from your desk in your office/bedroom to the kitchen to get a glass of milk, and return to the computer (you're of course journaling your dreams from the previous night  :smiley: .   Did you notice how you turned the corner from the bedroom into the hallway, did you notice the shifting perspectives of objects positioned relative to each other as you move down the hallway?     This isn't to recommend some "ADA" style approach, but rather to encourage you to "celebrate the present moment," to be aware and participating in each waking moment.    I believe that if such is your approach to waking life, such will be your approach to dreaming, and you'll both *see* and *remember* much more.

I will be frequently half-way down the hallway, lost in zombie mode, before I realize, "Hey, wait a minute, exactly how did I get here?"  That brief space of time in between getting up from the computer and heading down the hallway was a blank.   I try to minimize these "blank" moments as much as possible these days.    

When I go out on a walk or just stand and talk with people, I try always to pay attention (be "mindful") while doing so.  For those walks/talks where I am mindful, I find at the end of the day I have a very very clear memory of what I did, where I went, and whom I spoke with.   Those are the key things to great recall and dream experience: Who?  What?  Where?

I noticed that my dreaming took a pretty serious turn to the much more vivid with consistently more detailed recall when I started really approaching waking life with mindfulness and participation/celebration of all the little "here and now" moments throughout the waking day.

Another thing is that I see some DILD class participants disappointed that their LDs or dreams don't seem "just like waking".  For one thing, I think that dreams *are* different, and that I'm unsure if wanting them to be *exactly* like waking is a reasonable goal.   

What I notice in my dreams, especially the LDs where I remember to really pay attention, is that yes they are really different from the waking state.   Objects appear/disappear suddenly, objects/DCs transform, sometimes constantly.   It's not a world based on sensory input of static objects: it's a world of the mind and memory.

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## MrPriority

Thanks for the lengthy response! I really like your idea of having fun in a dream. That is most definately very important! A little while ago I was talking with Threecat about the TOTM(december) and he said he would try and just walk untill he found snow. I think that is kinda in the same boat as having fun. Instead of trying to fight the dream to get what you want, you just go along with it. Have fun, and let the dream guide you to where you wanted to go. Also what pops into my mind is something I think I read from Sensei somewhere here on the forum: "Be an actor of you own dreams". I can imagine it will be harder to attain lucidity while doing that, though. Since you get more involved as well. But yeah, it's an attitude I have since also tried to adopt. I hope this is similar to what you mean?

Also, thinking back. When I was having those very vivid dreams I was really high on lucid living as well. So it totally makes sense to me. But I let it slide mostly because it took me so much effort to keep it up. I am at the moment getting more and more into mindfulness and meditation. Though I find it hard to find a balance in these things. I often either overdo it, or just lose awareness for a couple of hours while in zombie mode, when practicing it during the day. I do think mindfulness is more than just a tool for LDing. I think it's a great tool for a better life. Even though I'm only starting with the very basics:p





> Another thing is that I see some DILD class participants disappointed that their LDs or dreams don't seem "just like waking". For one thing, I think that dreams *are* different, and that I'm unsure if wanting them to be *exactly* like waking is a reasonable goal.
> 
> What I notice in my dreams, especially the LDs where I remember to really pay attention, is that yes they are really different from the waking state. Objects appear/disappear suddenly, objects/DCs transform, sometimes constantly. It's not a world based on sensory input of static objects: it's a world of the mind and memory.



This I can agree with. But it's not entirely where my problem lies, I think. I've had some really good LD's that, although definately different than waking life, still felt "real". The problem is that lately, I feel as if it's not me that is having the adventure. I feel like I am watching myself have fun. I realize it's a dream, I make some small desicions in it, but mostly it's still just me in a dream. Perhaps this is a little vague, I'm sorry. 

Also, what I have noticed, which could be a large factor. I often don't have certain senses in these dreams. For instance, I have no sense of really having a body. Or I never speak. Or I don't smell. Usually there's more than one thing missing. 

Though I think it's mostly just the feeling of not really being present or aware. Now that I think about it a little more, I've had really vivid dreams where I only had vision. And even that was blurry. Still it felt like it was me doing that, while nowadays it feels like it's a story about me that I am experiencing, instead of really expeciencing the dream itself. Like an interactive story game. You can conrol what happens, but in the end you are only experiencing the story, instead of being the character itself. Kinda.. Something like that... I think  :tongue2: 

Slowing down is also a good idea. I do find myself rushing through the dream. In this last LD I looked at my father and suddenly realized it was a dream. And I literally started running, haha. Perhaps I should make a mantra for this, since I've been wanting to slow down for a while now, but I don't seem to remember that when dreaming. I think it's when I set myself a goal, that I start rushing through the dream. Though when I don't set myself a goal, I tend to wake up very early in the dream. Perhaps I need some kind of slow, vague goal. Or maybe I need to set my self 2 goals. 1 normal goal and a second goal to not immediately go for the first goal. Or something like that. 

You guys have given me some good food for thought! Thanks  ::D:

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## FryingMan

Rushing is common in the beginning, although by 22 LDs you may want to make it more of a solid goal to slow down.

As Sensei wrote a while ago, new LDers usually have LDs like this: "I'm lucid!  Run!   This is awesome!   Run!   Find a girl/guy!   Run!   Run!"  so don't feel too bad about that, I was the same way, and I still sometimes feel like I'm propelled forwards against my "will" at times.

A "just  got lucid" ritual can greatly help many things.   I practice reciting a count to 5 while rubbing my hands and looking around, followed by a dream-body pat down of my chest, stomach, and legs that brings my dream body fully into the dream.
I also say "goals: TOTM, dares, <personal goals>" so that I always, when I think of it (sometimes I don't) have a goal well-remembered (if you can't remember your goals when awake how do you think you can possibly remember them in a dream?!), so you don't just end up standing there doing "duh….." in the LD.

Learning to slow down and pay attention in waking life also really helps,  I think.  Actually it's more than just helpful, I think it's critical in bringing a sense of "I'm here" into the dream.   My non-lucids are very often "I'm here" dreams more and more the longer I work on daytime mindfulness.

And I think there's a lot to just going with what the dream has to show you, but I don't see anything wrong with giving nudges to the plot, my awesome "did all the TOTMs" LD in September had a mixture of observation, direction, and reaction that was thoroughly enjoyable.  

It's good to have a mix of goals: general (things you want to do in any/every dream, like narrate the dream, engage deeply, just-got-lucid ritual), specific (something you want to try for the first time), and dream-location focused (see what's behind that tree there).   Having goals gives the dream direction and purpose and really helps to extend length IMO.

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## FryingMan

Hello DILD class member,
  I'm making a one-time announcement to individual recently active workbooks to let you know about the new DILD class announcement thread.  Please subscribe to the announcement thread to see notifications of activities and other threads of particular interest/importance to DILD class members!

The first announcement is about the upcoming Sensei dreaming competition (starting on Thursday [in 2 days!], look for the official rules and scoring post on Wednesday).

http://www.dreamviews.com/dild/15591...uncements.html

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## MrPriority

Another update ! It has been a while.

I find myself without much motivation lately. Though I still want to keep LDing and I can never really leave DV. So I think I will try and go back to the basics for a bit. I had a nice LD last night where I (finally) actually felt like it was me in the dream. It sorta reminded me why I wanted to LD in the first place. Unfortunately I didn't stabilize and soon after went full caveman mode and woke up before anything actually happening (as per usual). I also didn't record the dream, and since I had another dream right after it I lost some details. I kinda regret not writing it down now.

So for now I think I will be going back to my intro-workbook. Since I don't really have many questions about DILDs in particular and I really mostly want to use it as something to just write down my thoughts. I hope you guys don't mind! If I can find back my form and my motivation then I might return here with a new batch of questions hoping for some guidance in the future! 

Thanks for the help so far!

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## FryingMan

Best of luck!  Just remember, in a year or two or 5 from now, do you want to be in place where your abilities reflect having spent all that time honing your skills?   That's what keeps me going, I don't want to waste any time not doing my best to improve.   Dreaming is so awesome, I only want to keep getting better and better at it.   Caveman cutting an LD short is a drag (been there, oh, I don't know, around 100 times?! haha), but that can generally be countered with reviewing goals ahead of time.   I actually avoided girls in a few LDs by choice (just a few though!).   It's useful to have concrete goals that you review frequently so that they're easily available in memory.

Good luck and of course come back any time!

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## fogelbise

Sure, we are here if you need us!  :smiley:  Hope to see you around the forums!

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