I guess I'm just asking for advice here

[SarcasticIndeed]

Hello, all, I haven't been here in a long time. And now I'm back, with new motivation to LD, I guess. This tread will be just a list of problems I occur during various techniques to induce a lucid dream whenever I try them. If you have the time and knowledge, please give advice, since some of these things have been bugging me a lot. So, uh, here it goes. The first and major problem I have during dreams is how foggy and unclear they are. The only things I get during dreams is some visual images, but that's it. My dreams are like watching a movie of images that I can barely discern. And during those dreams, I think the most random thoughts, which make the image change constantly. I rarely have a dream where I actually am a person where I walk, and even then, the dreams are so unclear I mostly understand what's happening in it through a "mental image". I sort of just have knowledge of the dream. Is there any way to make them more clear? I have similar problems with visualization: I literally cannot visualize something and hold the image. All images I try to make disappear before I can even "see" them. This makes for not very incredible dreams, as I never had something that was even half-near realistic. Lack of visualization skill just makes some ways to induce dreams impossible on harder. Another problem I have is mainly concerning WILD. I'm all nice and comfy in my bed, with no interruptions from outside and a sleep mask to protect me from any sharp light. And just when I start to feel SP kicking in (my heart starts beating like crazy out of no reason, which I suppose is HH), my eyes start opening randomly. It's not something I do consciously, it's like a reflex. My eyes want to open, however slightly. I obviously cannot let it go like this, so I try to close them forcefully, and (of course), ruin the whole thing. Is there any way to just suppress my eyes from opening? I tried lots of things. And that would be it... for now. If you know a solution to any of the problems, I'd be forever grateful. Please give some tips for how to improve visualization or general clarity of dreams. Thanks

[Sivason]

For a great challenge to help learn to control your eyes, try this. It is hard as h*ll, but after awhile you will get it. Close just one eye, and keep it closed, but relaxed. Every instinct will try to force you to open it. Now, look around and attempt to do various things with only the one eye open. The closed eye will feel very twitchy, much like what you describe, trying to open. Reach up and gently smooth out the upper lid of the closed eye with a slow down ward stroke when it feels twitchy. It is a special type of muscular relaxation of the eye lid, that must be learned. As soon as you figure out the subtle control needed to keep one eye closed, while the lid remains relaxed, you will have no problem controling your eye lids in WILD. It will seem too hard at first, but when you figure it out, you can go about your day with only one eye open. Strange I realize, but unless some else has another suggestion, that is what I would do. You already wear a sleep mask, which is good. As for visualization, get some guided meditations and use those. In a guided meditation, you sit and listen, while a narator describes things for you to picture. I think you should find ones where you picture things that involve you being in the scene, to help you start to dream with you having/being in a dream body.

[SarcasticIndeed]

For a great challenge to help learn to control your eyes, try this. It is hard as h*ll, but after awhile you will get it. Close just one eye, and keep it closed, but relaxed. Every instinct will try to force you to open it. Now, look around and attempt to do various things with only the one eye open. The closed eye will feel very twitchy, much like what you describe, trying to open. Reach up and gently smooth out the upper lid of the closed eye with a slow down ward stroke when it feels twitchy. It is a special type of muscular relaxation of the eye lid, that must be learned. As soon as you figure out the subtle control needed to keep one eye closed, while the lid remains relaxed, you will have no problem controling your eye lids in WILD. It will seem too hard at first, but when you figure it out, you can go about your day with only one eye open. Strange I realize, but unless some else has another suggestion, that is what I would do. You already wear a sleep mask, which is good. Thanks, I'll try this! As for visualization, get some guided meditations and use those. In a guided meditation, you sit and listen, while a narator describes things for you to picture. I think you should find ones where you picture things that involve you being in the scene, to help you start to dream with you having/being in a dream body. Hmm, interesting... Where can I get those? Should I just look on youtube?

[Sivason]

I bet they have them on youtube or I just typed guided meditation free mp3 into Google and it had over 100,000 hits, so some of those sights are probably legit.

[SarcasticIndeed]

I bet they have them on youtube or I just typed guided meditation free mp3 into Google and it had over 100,000 hits, so some of those sights are probably legit. Alright, I'll try them. Thanks

[ThisWitheredMan]

There's a tension reduction exercise for eyes that, for me, solves the problem of twitchiness when I'm trying to keep my eyes closed either to fall asleep or meditate effectively. Basically all you're trying to do is stretch/tire your eyes. Open them both as wide as you can and hold that, then start flicking them left to right, left to right, up, down, up, down, top left, bottom right, top left, bottom right, top right, bottom left, in circles and so on over and over, straining fully (though not TOO fully, haha...) and blinking a few times in between. Basically anywhere you have tension like that, stretching that sensate muscle group seems to do the trick.