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(7:39 AM): On my sleeping bag, trying to fall asleep. I hear a "meow" and see my little kitten on the bed, looking at me. I start petting her, but then ask, "How did you get out of your room?" as she is not allowed in the bedroom. I nose pinch and can breathe. I immediately remember the toilet task. I phase through the bedroom door and enter the bathroom.

There is a bunch of stuff spread out on the toilet seat, so I sweep all of this away and lift the lid. It's clean inside I realize I am wearing jeans so I strip these off (though I have some issues getting them off). Finally I am free, and go after my underwear, but I am having difficulties getting my legs disentangled. I finally realize it doesn't even matter so I jump into the toilet with my underwear still hanging from my leg, and squat all the way down. I then press the flush button.

The bowl fills with water, but nothing is really happening. I try to spin my body around, to get some momentum, and I do spin now--sort of like a lazy turd. The spinning has also teleported me and the toilet to an outdoors location, on a small, wooden screened-in porch. I try to imagine one of those powerful toilets that just suck shit down with ease. No dice. The cookie task occurs to me, but I keep focusing on getting sucked down. I wake up.

Not sure what my deal is lately! Recall has been low, and dream awareness has been low as well. Woke up around 5:00 AM, didn't remember any dreams. Also couldn't find my sleep mask. Walked all over the house, looking in the office, living room, and even kitchen and dining room. Wtf. I test my state, as I am really hoping I'm dreaming. Nope, just me and no sleep mask. I go back to bed, perform MILD (using seven affirmations instead of my normal 21), wrap a shirt around my head, and fall asleep.

I am in a living room with my grandfather and uncle. A baby is here, and the baby is insulting my grandfather. He keeps laughing (not at all in character for him). The baby then apologizes. Something suddenly seems off to me.

"That's weird that the baby apologized," I say to my grandfather and uncle. They just stare at me.

"Isn't that weird?" I ask. Can't remember what happened after that, but almost certain I state tested.

I am in my mother's house with my sister and one of her friends from childhood. We are all kids again. For some reason, I think that I am dreaming. Instead of nose pinching, like I normally do, I decide to phase my hand through the wall as a test. It fails (the wall remains solid) but my hand becomes transparent. I now decide to nose pinch. I can breathe, but think that maybe there is a second nose, or a part of my nose that hasn't been pinched yet. I double pinch my nose with my other hand. I'm dreaming!

I go up to my sister's friend and invite her to go flying. She agrees (I think) and we set off. I try to phase through the glass door but can't. I just open it and head out onto the back patio. I try to fly but cannot. I decide to walk up into the sky, using invisible stairs. I am heading up, step by step, when I suddenly fall back to the ground. I continue to try to fly (even reverting to swimming motions) but keep failing (in part because I am afraid I will fall into the pool). The dream finally (mercifully) ends.

I haven't been very lucid in my lucids lately. I think part of this has to do with returning to work--I'm often wrapped up in material thoughts as opposed to dream thoughts. Looking forward to finding that happy medium: the one where I'm not thinking about work at all, and thinking entirely about dreaming!

That being said "gentle MILD," as I have been calling it, seems to be doing alright as an induction method. I wonder though if it is also partially responsible for my drop in dream awareness?

I don't remember too many details of this one because I was asleep for a while between having it and writing it down. In fact, I almost forgot it entirely.

I'm in a room interacting with a DC when I become lucid. I remember my goal of attempting the second basic TOTM and robbing a bank with only a banana. The first step, is getting out of the room. There's a window, which I open and lean out of. The room is many stories above the ground.

I decide to jump out. I do a couple of RCs to make extra extra sure I'm dreaming, then slither out and fall. I expect it won't hurt and, though I do feel a definite crunching sensation when I hit the ground, there's no pain. I get up but big black spots start appearing in my vision. I attempt to stabilize but become convinced that my IRL body is moving with my dream body. I decide to hold on for a DEILD. That's the last I remember.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

This dream was from yesterday morning, August 8th.

I'm in a small apartment with the drummer from Rage Against the Machine. He's cooking omelets. I'm thinking about what the band's politics likely mean about his beliefs when I become lucid.

I had a theory the previous night that talking to DCs would draw me into the dream and increase stability, and anyway I wanted to attempt the basic task of the month. So I turn to the drummer to ask him to tell me a word in a foreign language, and its meaning. Before I can ask, it becomes clear that he's morphing into my dad.

I don't worry about this too much. "Can you tell me a word in a foreign language?" I ask.

"Maybe," he says.

"Maybe?"

"Spelled m-i-g-h-t."

I either interpret this as a success or decide to give up. I must decide to try flying, because I hop and realize I float a bit on the way down. I start hopping higher and higher. My dad looks impressed. Finally I get airborne and am flying around the small apartment. I make a tight loop. It's pretty fun.

I decide to go looking for other DCs and try to fly through the wall. My eyes are closed before I reach it and I feel this "bonk" feeling, like I slammed right into it. This drops me into something like the void. I try to use Xanous's gladis trick but I'm having trouble controlling my body.

What comes next is either a real or a false awakening. Everything looks black, but I see a small triangle of light that looks like the aperture at the bottom of my sleep mask. I try to lift it with my hand, but I don't think it changes. This probably means I'm still dreaming, but at any rate I decide to settle in for a DEILD.

The next I remember, I'm having a false awakening where I'm journalling the dream I described above. However, I get all the details wrong (i.e. it's not the drummer from Rage Against the Machine, but rather the guitarist) and I have to keep crossing them out. The dream evolves in typical non-lucid fashion from there.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

I'm sitting in class and interrupt the teacher two times in a row. I resolve not to do it again but find the urge almost overwhelming. I also notice some jaw pain, which is one of my dream signs, and decide to do the finger-push RC. My hands end up in a configuration with weird geometry and I realize I'm dreaming.

I leave the classroom, which has become a room in my childhood home. My goal: finally take a bite of that Krispy Kreme burger. Things appear a little flickery, and I attempt a light stabilization by feeling my forearms and paying attention to the scenery as I walk. This seems to work, and I realize that the flickering is just a result of the fluorescent lighting.

I briefly attempt to look for the burger in the fridge before remembering I don't want it to be cold. Next I try the pantry. Before opening it, I close my eyes and picture the bag the burger will come in. But then I get nervous that I'll wake up if I keep my eyes closed for too long and stop. I open the pantry and the bag is there. But by this point I think I'm rushing, and things are not very vivid.

I look inside the bag, but instead of the fat donuts and juicy patty I'm hoping for there's a really sloppy burger with a disheveled, stale bun, a greyish patty, and two tiny strips of limp bacon. I'm a little disappointed and resolve to re-try the summon, with more concentration.

I re-stabilize and go into the living room, expecting to find a better burger on the piano bench. It's not there. I take a couple of seconds to visualize the kind of burger I want and tell myself it will be under the bench, but again I get nervous about closing my eyes and rush the summon. The burger is not under the bench.

I decide time is running low, and I should just take a bite out of the burger I already have. I do. If it had a taste at all, I don't remember. Likely I wasn't focusing on it at all.

My goal achieved, more or less, I don't know what to do next. I notice a small package on top of the piano. After doing a quick RC just to verify I'm not going around opening other peoples' mail, I open it up. There's a chocolate inside! I take a bite, and this time I think it does taste like chocolate.

Now I don't know what to do, and decide to try to summon my girlfriend. But before I can, I feel myself start to wake up. I prepare to do a FILD/DEILD but my IWL girlfriend is moving around and I wake up for real.


Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Ritual: Went to bed around 12:50am. Woke naturally at 3:32. Seemed a bit soon to WBTB but my motivation was good and I recalled traces of imagery so decided to go for it. Drank guayusa tea and read Brooks & Vogelsong. Before going to bed did hybrid of SSILD/counting/affirmation while sitting in chair. Technique: counted incrementally while breathing slowly and deeply, thinking the number on each in-breath, and on outbreath rotated between senses (thinking "look," "listen," or "feel") and then adding an affirmation, letting it fall randomly between "always lucid" or "always aware." Counted to fifty in this way, though I was impressed how easily it was to lose track of the number (this is good, it means the mind is losing its focus on waking life) even while sitting upright in a chair. Returned to bed at 4:52am and continued counting up to 70 while lying on my back, then ceased the practice and turned on my left side to sleep. I soon realized that I'd overdone the WBTB a bit and was excessively wakeful, but consoled myself that I should be able to return to sleep eventually given how few hours I had gotten so far, and my chances for WILDing should be improved by this touch of insomnia.

I had made sure to fix a very clear task in mind: I had read about the "fairy tale" challenges on DV and they seemed potentially interesting, but I realized I should make a clear plan. If I did successfully WILD I would find myself in my house, so how would I go about pursuing the task? My idea was this: grab a loaf of bread from the kitchen, exit the front door, turn right and walk up the hill, where in a previous WILD I had passed through a tunnel and found myself in a deep, dark forest. I could leave a trail of bread crumbs and see what happened from there.

WILD #1: It took a long time to go back to sleep. Eventually I felt sensations I interpreted as the onset of SP: tingling and distortion of the physical body, then a sense of weight on my chest so localized and specific that I wondered if the cat had actually jumped on me, but the weight quickly increased beyond that of any cat. I was encouraged because it seemed like this transition was happening very cleanly and consciously, and turned my attention to beginning to "move" the non-physical "body." I was careful not to wiggle my fingers or adjust my limbs lest I break SP, so I concentrated on unnatural movements like full-body rotation. I could begin to feel my body swinging in a horizontal rotation but didn't yet have enough traction to "get up" out of bed. Suddenly I felt a vertical "lift" as though my body had floated up several feet, and the next moment I was standing on my feet next to the bed. "And I'm up!" I thought to myself, pleased.

I noticed right away how dark it was, and despite the clarity of the transition, I did not feel well-integrated into the dream body. I deduced that this was probably a consequence of weak REM-state, given how little sleep I had gotten before the WBTB. I thought I'd better do some stabilization, so I touched some surfaces around me and then rubbed my hands together. This felt lifelike enough, so I became too easily complacent and didn't do anything further to integrate... a mistake, as it turned out. But I was pre-occupied with performing my task and didn't want to get distracted to the point where I never left the antechamber, as so often happens, so I rushed to get started.

I moved swiftly toward the kitchen and picked up the bag of bread from the counter as I passed through. It felt quite full, and I recalled that I had bought a new bag just the other day in waking life. Although the environment was still very muddy and vague, I could easily find my way through the house out of habit, so I headed straight for the front door. As I was crossing the threshold, I noticed that the bag of bread suddenly felt very light, as though there were only a few slices left. I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I should return to the kitchen, but didn't want to be distracted from my task, so I figured, "That's alright, I can always manifest more."

I walked out into the night, the outdoor environment no more distinct than the indoors had been, but I knew where I was going. I turned right and began to walk uphill, reaching into the bag to start dropping breadcrumbs. To encourage the right environment to appear, I started muttering under my breath: "Entering the world of Hansel & Gretel. Entering the world of Hansel & Gretel." But I only got off two recitations before I abruptly awoke. I realized my error at once: the dreamspace outside the antechamber is always less stable, and in my impatience to get started on the task, I hadn't integrated properly before exiting.

I lay for a long time in the position I woke in. Often I can seamlessly re-enter a WILD if I half-wake and don't move. But this was no half-waking: my mind was fully awoken and I soon realized that holding my position would be of no use, sleep had well and truly gone. I used the bathroom so it wouldn't pre-occupy me later and returned to bed, lying on my other side now to make a fresh start. By now the sun was rising so I got out my sleep mask from the drawer. I hate wearing it, but I could tell the light would be disruptive today. I considered checking the time but was trying not to stimulate wakefulness any further, so deliberately decided not to. It was evidently around sunrise, anyway, which occurred at 6:01am today according to Google. That was well over an hour after I had finished my WBTB and the dream can only have lasted a few minutes, so it must have taken me a very long time to fall asleep beforehand.

WILD #2: I lay on my right side and tried to keep a positive attitude: of course I can do it again! I re-WILD all the time! Not usually from such drastic awakening, admittedly, but I didn't let myself focus on the negatives. I wondered if I should rise and write a report, but reflected that there was little to report apart from the exact wording of the phrases I had thought or spoken, and these I had already scrawled in my notepad. The rest, what little there was, would be easy to remember. So I let go of those worries and focused attention on my breathing, remembering not to "try" to fall asleep but just let it happen. Eventually, it did.

Whereas the previous transition had been so vivid, this time I was surprised to find myself simply standing at the foot of the bed. I hadn't noticed the separation. But at least I remembered where I had gone wrong in the last attempt, and reminded myself: don't rush it. Get traction. Find something to do in the antechamber to better immerse yourself.

I noticed that this time the bedroom was full of books, stacked in messy piles and filling bags all over the floor. I figured that these would provide a good opportunity to more fully engage my senses in the dreamspace. So I selected a few and carried them with me as I moved out of the room. The kitchen floor was also covered with books, so many piles and stacks that was actually hard to pick a path through them. I was picking up volumes more or less at random until I noticed what was clearly an artist's sketchbook, a spiral-bound 9"x12" Strathmore, on top of one pile. "Oh, I should look at that!" I thought, and grabbed it. Finally I made my way to the living room, where I found a small oriental rug on the floor (about 2'x3', black pattern on a white background) and sat down on it to begin to peruse my books.

I chose the sketchbook first, because I was the most curious what I might find inside this one, and dream pictures tend to be easier to perceive and remember afterwards than dream text. The first picture I saw upon opening it was a portrait of what looked like a tribal chieftain, showing the upper half of his body and filling the whole page. He looked about middle-aged, with angular but weather-beaten features. The most distinctive element of the portrait, dominating most of the visual space, was the enormous headdress he was wearing. It wasn't made of feathers or any obvious RL material but seemed composed of abstract patterns with a Mayan styling to them. I took note of the colors. The headdress was all in shades of red, mostly an earthy brick shade. There were constrasting shades of muted green in the distinctive wide straps criss-crossing his body in various places. It didn't occur to me at the time, but the obvious deduction is that these straps were there to secure the enormous headdress.

After looking carefully at the first drawing, I turned the page. The next image I saw was more cartoon-like. The page was divided into four rectangular panels, each one the width of the page, and stacked vertically. There was a caption, though I don't remember if it was above or below the panels: "Doyle Oss Toss." How clever, I thought... until I realized that it didn't rhyme as well as I had thought at first, because I was aware from the start that "Oss" meant "Owl" but soon realized that the RL word had been distorted unrecognizably to fit the rhyme. My dream texts often demonstrate this tendency to favor rhyme and alliteration over comprehensible meaning.

The four panels showed the Doyle Owl being punted by a large shaggy grey wolf. The Owl was on the left, the wolf on the right, and the setting suggested the outdoors but was very plain, with little in the background to distract the eye. The sky behind them was dark. The first panel showed the Owl already in mid-air, with the wolf's head lowered, evidently having just head-butted it. The second panel showed the Owl about halfway down, in the act of falling, the wolf's head still lowered. The third panel showed the Owl having come to rest again on the ground, the wolf's position unchanged. The last panel showed the Owl lying on the ground where it had fallen, and now the wolf had lowered its haunches into a crouch and lifted its head toward the sky, howling in what I interpreted as triumph.

I think I might have spied one more drawing but I don't remember it, because around this time I woke up. In a false awakening. Which I didn't recognize. Responsibly, I immediately began to record the dream on my notepad, first sketching out the four-panel cartoon I have just described. After completing that, I started blocking out the tribal chieftain, and made some notes about the colors. I think I wrote about the green straps first, and when I started trying to describe the particular shades of red in the headdress, the dream began to evolve, and I thought I remembered dreaming that I was a sultan who had a vizier who wore a turban constructed of red cloth in various textures and shades, including a dark red kerchief. It's possible that this image relates to a drawing from the original sketchbook that I've forgotten, because as I was jotting down notes about color of his headgear a new visual appeared, where I could see the vizier from above and behind, with a clear vantage on the dark red kerchief, and I was surprised because I knew that I had not previously seen him from that perspective.

Before the FA could evolve any more, I woke up for real and recognized that I had just been writing my dream report in another dream, and I'd better get up and do it properly. In this case I didn't mind the delay because writing it down in the FA had helped cement the details in memory (this is not always the case). So I started jotting down my notes on the notepad next to my bed... only to realize soon after I'd started that even though I was more or less awake now, I still wasn't actually doing it, I was still just experiencing a kind of half-dreamed enactment of writing, and I should stop tricking myself and physically get out of bed so I could be sure I was doing it properly. So I got up and hastily sketched out the four-panel again—noticing with amusement how much crappier it looked in RL than in the more elegantly sketched version from my initial FA. I noted the time of rising as 6:56am, and recorded the rest of the dream on my laptop.

I find myself semi-conscious and decide to attempt a FILD. Almost immediately I hear the crackling noise from my last SP experience. The crackling intensifies as I move my fingers faster, and I decide to attempt an OBE. This fails and I decide to try to visualize a new dream instead. However, this too fails and I find myself awake. In my childhood bedroom. My friend T is trapped in a glass box on the floor and is screaming and beating on the side.

I realize the FILD worked after all, but I'm still scared. I leap out of the bed, screaming "I'm having a lucid dream!" I trip over something and find myself in the void.

I decide to try a trick I picked up from CanisLucidus's dream journals and imagine swinging a sword around in one arm. I begin to hear shouts and clashing steel and wonder if I'm going to end up in the Coliseum. I'm not sure if I'm ready for something like that, and soon I end up right back in the hallway outside my childhood bedroom.

I realize I'd better stabilize and start looking at my hands. I feel stability slipping away, and since my last three stabilization attempts lead to early awakenings, I decide to just skip it and go for my lucid goal: eating a Krispy Kreme burger and drinking an IPA.

I fly (perhaps literally) down the stairs, briefly marveling at their similarity to the real ones. I decide the burger won't be in the fridge, since I don't want to microwave it. Rather, I think to myself, "that's right, my parents said they'd leave it for me on the piano bench." I go into the living room, and sure enough, there's a greasy white bag with "Krispy Kreme" written on it. I pick it up and it feels pleasantly warm.

I consider taking a bite right there, but I want that beer to wash it down. I go into the kitchen, expecting it to be in the fridge. But there's no beer there. I try to make my expectation more specific: "OK, there's a Flying Dog IPA right in the ice tray in the freezer..." I open the freezer door, and the beer is right where I thought it would be. I take it out and wake up.

Not trying to stabilize seemed to help prolong the dream here, although I got the impression that the dream wasn't particularly vivid. I wonder if I'm doing my stabilizations wrong: perhaps focusing too intently? Anybody have any ideas about what to do differently?

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

A couple more stabilization fails, but my first SP!




I'm on my way to meet my friend A when I pause across the street from a tall house with beautiful chamber music coming from an open window. Suddenly the scene darkens and shadows begin to roll down the vines of ivy along the wall. I start getting scared until I realize it's only dark because I'm wearing my sunglasses.

I take them off but then it gets dark again, and I discover I'm squeezing my eyes shut and can't open them. I recognize that as a dreamsign, and start to do the finger push RC. But even before I start, I feel this floaty sensation and I realize I'm dreaming.

I think this may send me into the void or SP, but the next thing I remember is being in a brightly lit room with my girlfriend. We're talking about something, when again I feel that happy, floaty sensation and realize I'm dreaming.

I decide to phase through the window and go exploring. I tell my girlfriend, "I love you, but I'm having a lucid dream and I really want to go out there." She seems happy for me.

Then things start to get a little blurry and I remember I have to stabilize. I decide to try NyxCC's advice and take a bite of a chair. But part of me doesn't believe it's going to work, and I close my eyes as I bend down. When my jaws close, there's nothing between them.

Then I'm briefly in the void, and I try to spin. I end up lying in my bed, hearing incredibly loud electric crackling noises. I recall having heard these before, perhaps earlier in the night, and conclude I'm experiencing SP. I attempt an OBE exit by trying to will my dream body to move. The crackling intensifies greatly and I feel like I almost escape my body, but it doesn't quite work and the crackling fades.

I decide to relax for a little bit before I wake myself up. The crackling begins to transform into creepy music and I start thinking of SP horror stories and becoming a little frightened. But I remember that SP is completely harmless and will only get nasty if I let myself get scared, so I calm down.

Then, my IWL girlfriend moves in bed and I wake up for real.



Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Ritual: wtb 3:15am, last wbtb 9:15am, woke 10:38am, SSILD: WILD

Last sleep, last chance. It was already 9:15am, but since I'd gone to bed so late, and all my previous attempts that night had been without real motivation and had resulted in falling asleep before completing a single cycle, figured I could try once more. SSILD: tempted to mix it with other techniques, but if I was going test this properly, ought to do it straight up. My timing was messy and uneven, but remembered that was okay. Did maybe three cycles on my back, uneven length, afraid of waking myself up too much, given that it was already mid-morning, so turned on my side and prepared to let myself sleep. A few times I ran through the cycles very lightly and quickly, just to get back in touch with my senses. At some point in this process the cat jumped on the bed. I was getting closer to sleep but figured I could work with this if he settled down and didn't just start yelling. Fortunately he decided to sleep on me, and I was able to work that sensation into my rotation. I wasn't cycling regularly, just randomly once in a while when I felt I might be losing touch.

I must have been already dreaming without knowing it, because I thought I was only thinking, and it never occurred to me that the presence of sustained visuals suggested otherwise. I was replying to posts on some online forum made my a friend—nothing to do with DV, no one even connected with dreaming, just an old friend I haven't talked to in a while (AS). He was posting something about falling asleep a certain way and used an acronym like "TILD," and I wanted to reply snarkily with something like, "Does TILD stand for 'talking to yourself in bed'?" At the time, I was convinced this phrase perfectly fit the acronym, so I was apparently already touched by dream logic. So I was trying to type out my reply, and I simply could not type "TILD" properly. I tried over and over, and my fingers kept slipping and hitting everything else on the keyboard. Technical difficulties like this are one of my dream signs, but since I was convinced I was still awake, it didn't occur to me to RC. On the contrary, I thought I was having this trouble typing because I was getting too sleepy! This was precisely the opposite of a false awakening: instead of losing dream awareness by believing I had woken up, on the contrary, I failed to realize I was dreaming because I thought I hadn't fallen asleep yet! (If there's no acronym for this yet, I propose FFA for "false falling asleep," as it pairs well with the more familiar term FA.)

Around then the music started. I could hear a Pixies song. At the time I was sure that it was a song I knew, and it was playing perfectly down to the last note, even though I hadn't heard it in years. (I can't remember now what song it was, if it was indeed a real one.) I knew the music wasn't coming from outside me, and figured it must just be hypnagogic activity. The whole time until now I had been aware of lying in my bed, which was part of the reason I thought that I hadn't quite fallen asleep yet. After the Pixies song played in its entirety and then concluded, a new song started. This one intrigued me even more, because I was sure it was a song I had never heard before. It was lively enough to make a good follow-up to the Pixies, but the singer had an accent that sounded African. It reminded me of the song "Rise" by Seun Kuti, one that I downloaded free from Amazon and put on my running mix—but I'm not familiar with his other work. This song, like one before it, was crystal clear... like so often before I regretted that I am not more musical in waking life, because I felt sure if I were musically literate I could wake up and recreate it. But I didn't feel like rousing myself and trying to hum the melody into my iPhone when I hadn't even gotten to sleep yet.

WILD: At some point around here the transition finalized, and I realized, hang on, I think I am asleep now! I'm in my dream body! I could probably just 'get up' without disrupting anything... so I got out of bed, and even though everything felt extremely lifelike, there was a lightness to my body that I was sure meant I was dreaming. I was impressed how bright and clear everything was, and how mobile I felt, unlike a lot of WILDs where it's dark at first and I'm crawling over the carpet trying to get traction. But perhaps integration wasn't perfect yet, because hardly had I gotten out of bed when I was disturbed by a loud rhythmic noise that threatened to disrupt the dream state and wake me. At first I thought it must be the mailman knocking on the door, because I'm expecting a package. But as it continued without abating, I realized it must actually be construction on the house up the hill. How foolish it was, I chided myself, to do my dream practice so late in the morning! The world wakes up and starts making loud noises; at least during the night it is quieter. (RL: It turns out there's nothing at the door and no construction going on outside, so despite these very reasonable hypotheses about bleedthrough stimuli, the sound appears to have been largely or entirely internal.)

The sound was extremely disruptive and I felt alarmingly close to being woken by it. But I had just gotten into a perfectly good dream and had no wish to lose it so soon (like that time recently when I was woken from an otherwise fantastic WILD by my own snoring—come to think of it, this is another possible culprit for the sound!) How can I deal with this and remain in the dream? The answer occurred instinctively: dance! So I started dancing to the noise. It was a bit like dancing to the sound of hammers, and my dance was correspondingly jerky and spasmodic, but it did the trick! After a while I felt that the dreamstate was no longer threatened, so I paused and looked at myself in the bedroom mirror. Once again, as in the last SSILD, I was impressed how much like my waking self I looked: the hair was different, shorter, but the same face, same eyes. I smiled at myself and could see the smile in the reflection. Interestingly, even though it was a full-length mirror, I have no conception of what I might have been wearing. I wasn't curious about it at the time I was looking, so I have no impression of it now. If I had to guess, I would suppose it was a loose white summer dress of the sort I've been wearing around the house lately (I don't wear these to bed though).

Even though I had come to terms with the noise, it was still loud and annoying, so I decided to leave the bedroom and move deeper into the house, hopefully away from it. It might have diminished slightly by the time I got to the kitchen, but only a little, so I keep walking through to the living room. I notice my fluffiest down comforter is heaped up on the couch for some reason. I pull it off, and as the folds of cloth open I see the dark silhouette of a butterfly within them. I am momentarily confused: is butterfly a dream figment, or is it real? That is, just as I thought the sound might have a source in waking life, it didn't seem improbable at that moment that a butterfly might have accidentally made it into the house. Dream logic prevented me from realizing that, even were that so, how would I realize it when I was asleep in my bed? The butterfly flutters up and flies into the kitchen, so I follow it. Around this time I am too distracted to notice the noise anymore, being completely engrossed in the butterfly. When I enter the kitchen, I notice that in place of the little black one I followed, about the size of an ordinary monarch, there are now two very large butterflies, their wingspans about 16 to 18 inches across. One is slightly larger than the other, a very pale greenish yellow. The other one has the same base color, but its wings have black borders.

I am reminded of the task I had been intending to work on next, "creo animál." However, it seems that the dream has jumped the gun and already created the animal for me, so I roll with it and decide to experiment with "rego animál" instead—apparently forgetting I've already done this one numerous times. I know I should try "intellego animál," as I've never tried anything with that technique, but I'm not sure how to go about it, so I decide to put it off until later. I hold out my hand and command "Rego animál," focusing on the larger, lighter-colored butterfly and intending for it to land on my hand. The butterflies flit around and ignore me. I try again. Doesn't work. What's the problem? They are "animals," aren't they? I mean, in the broad sense of the term, I'm pretty sure insects count. Do I need the "auram" sphere for this, as they are creatures of the air? But I've worked with wind before—I've found it quite straightforward to conjure all the elements directly—yet somehow this is harder. I'm forgetting all the times I have commanded animals very easily in other dreams, and am probably just making it harder for myself by all the Ars Magica rigamarole, but truth be told I like rigamarole... it's more stylish and satisfying than just making things happen in a perfunctory way. I conclude that the main problem is that I'm just not putting enough focus into my intent, and so the third time I sing the command. For some reason, I always get the best results in dreams when I sing to shape them, and sure enough, now the butterfly comes over and lands on my proffered hand.

What next? I walk the few steps back into the living room, and command the butterfly to fly up again and go land on the small table by the window on the other side of the couch. Again, it takes me a couple tries, but the butterfly finally obeys. As it lands there, it turns into a young light-haired woman. I am distracted from this transformation by a young blonde man who is now at my side. He is not the second butterfly, the one with black-bordered wings: around this time she transforms into a dark-haired woman who is standing near the closet. With all this transformation going on, I am inspired to try "Muto animál," so I direct this command to the young man, intending for him to turn into a butterfly. He stands there looking a bit obstinate or confused, so I sing the command in what I intend to be a very persuasive manner, and he finally complies—sort of. He lies down on his right side in a fetal position. He is not lying on the floor, but on some platform a few feet high that doesn't exist in RL (there would just be a wall there). He produces a bundle of red yarn that he stretches along the length of his spine. I watch, waiting for the transformation, but nothing happens. I command him again, and he respond that he is doing his best, but that it will take a very long time—maybe up to a year!—because the timing isn't right.

It's possible that the guy is just dicking me around, but he seems sincere, and he does offer that he could transform more easily into a goat. (OMG! I hadn't even realized until I wrote this that my first SSILD also involved a goat... odd coincidence, as I don't remember dreaming of goats under any other circumstances.) I say that this would be fine, so he gets back up, discards the red yarn, and transforms at once into a brown goat of ordinary size. He warns me that when he is a goat, he speaks in a strange high voice—which seems contradictory at first, because he has already turned into a goat and is still speaking in the same voice as before. However, after delivering the warning, his voice does change. From his description of a "high voice," I was expecting him to start speaking in falsetto, but instead he sounds more cartoonish, like his voice has been sped up. With his new voice he introduces himself to me, telling me his name is "Hemm." I find myself wondering how this is spelled. I imagine it with two 'mm's, but having only heard it spoken, I can't be sure. Should I ask? Well it can't hurt, and might help me remember the name better. "Is that spelled H-E-M or H-E-M-M?" I inquire. He replies that there's no way to know: he was just a blacksmith's son and never saw it written down.

I realize that I should get the names of everyone in the room, because then I'll be able to write a more detailed report when I wake up. So I turn and ask the girl sitting on the small table, formerly the pale butterfly. She tells me her name is "Anna." She is now holding a painting, a vertical rectangle about 24x36 inches, and turns it around to show me the back. "And his name was 'Jakachibe', he was a Japanese thief." I gather that the guy she mentions is represented on the front of the painting, but I barely had time to glimpse the image before she turned it around, and now she is just showing me the back of the canvas, where something like 'Jakachibe' is written in large sloppy pencil letters on a wooden crossbar. I say "something like" because the transliteration of the name is even worse than what I've rendered here—there was another 'h' in it somewhere, maybe even a 'q', something more like "Jaqhachibe," but I can't remember precisely—and I have to bite my tongue to refrain from telling her that "Jaqhachibe" doesn't sound like a proper Japanese name and even if it were, it certainly wouldn't be spelled that way in English. I just smile and nod, then turn to the dark-haired woman who has continued to stand by quietly. She tells me her name is "Caroline." After I hear each name, I am repeating it aloud, to better impress it on my memory.

After talking to each of the women in turn, I notice that the young man who had transformed into a goat has returned to his former human appearance. He is of average height, with wavy blonde hair, short but not too short, a bit tousled, and he has a pleasant, open face. He volunteers that his name—in this form—is "Viryec." Or at least, he says something that sounds like that phonetically, but is probably spelled very differently—"Virjece" occurs to me as the most likely possibility—so I start inquiring more about it. He tells me that his name means something like "sincere effort." This rings a bell—both in sound and meaning, it reminds me a lot of the Pali word viriya, which has been on my mind lately, so I ask him if that term has any relationship to his name. Although he and his name both strike me as coming from northern European stock, perhaps there is some ancient Indo-European etymological relationship with the Pali... but before he can reply, I wake up. I don't know why my dreams so often seem to end just before what promises to be some interesting revelation, but here we are again. Still, I'm not that disappointed because I have so much to write down!

Woke after five hours vaguely remembering a dream about being on a space ship. Some kids were catching a ride by hanging on to our landing gear as we went between stations, and I wondered how they didn't freeze and suffocate in the airless void.

I wasn't planning on doing any real practice since I didn't sleep much last night after my excellent LD got me out of bed early and writing furiously, but since I'd woken up from REM I thought I'd run through some SSILD cycles just for fun... and this provoked a sleeplessness that eventually got me out of bed an hour and a half later without having fallen back asleep at all. So no dreams, but I did manage to record fragments of the hypnagogic phrases that manifested at certain points:

"...the beautiful eye, and the faithful smiling hand..."

"...the stress of a healthy city farm too..."

"...semantic, and by the way kill the emperors..."

Mostly these were just words running through my head without any corresponding imagery, but at one point I had a hypnogogic image like I was looking at a forum post (unsurprising given that I waded through almost the whole SSILD thread yesterday, a tedious enterprise at 36 pages). So this one I "read" visually rather than thought directly. My recall of first few words flickered out almost immediately, but the sentence concluded "...and the king's building in apotheosis."

Yesterday I came across the SSILD thread on the induction forum, and decided to try it out. Success!

Ritual: Slept about three hours, woke up with awareness of having dreamed though no recall of specifics, but figured since I had been in REM I might as well give the SSILD technique a try. Doing the sense-cycling delayed sleep onset more than I expected, even more than with my usual WILD technique of incremental counting, even though I kept reminding myself that I wasn't attempting to WILD. Interestingly, when I was starting to get closer to sleep I was experiencing much more vivid flashes of hypnogogic imagery than usual, which I attribute to having primed my attentiveness to it with the technique.

On the verge of falling asleep finally, when I sense that I'm in an empty room with plain white walls, and that it's substantial enough to enter as a dream space. "I can work with that," I say to myself, and close the door. The handle has a pleasing feeling of solidity and the door closes with lifelike sensations, so I know this is actually working.

WILD: What to do now? Well, I need traction, so I decide to just use my body a bit until I feel more substantial. Last night my husband showed me a video of a guy doing amazing acrobatic tricks on a pole, and that must have subconsciously inspired me, because without really thinking about it I start emulating him. It's fun because I could never do anything like this in RL (who could? It's real gravity defying stuff) and even in a dream it takes a bit of concentration, so it is a useful way to integrate myself better into this space. As I do it I remember to occasionally rub my hands in front of my face for more traction, and for some reason it occurs to me that it would be a good idea to feel my head, which I've never tried before, but the lifelike sensation of the shape of my head and texture of my hair is very helpful, they make this dream body I'm in feel more like "me." The vividness and clarity at this point is quite high, and I'm wondering what I look like. I see a mirror on the wall (the walls were featureless initially so the mirror seems to have manifested in response to my intention, though not before my eyes... it was just there once I decided to look for it) so all I have to do is position myself properly in order to see my reflection. I'm pleased with how much like me it actually looks, although my hair is different: loose, shoulder-length and with a layered, almost spiky cut. But the face looks just like mine, especially the eyes. It was remarkably like looking into a real mirror, which is not my usual experience of reflections in LDs.

Given how lifelike my body feels and my reflection looks, I decide to play with it a bit. A couple times in my LDs I've experimented with trying to create an extra set of arms, like you see on some representations of Hindu deities, and I want to try that again. I'm now standing on a sort of balance beam, looking at a second mirror that has manifested on the next wall (a little more conveniently positioned than the first) and I start waving my arms and trying to create a second pair. With a little concentration I have a partial success: I think I can see and feel a second pair, but they are moving in tandem with the first. To be more successful, they would have to move independently, all four arms moving simultaneously in separate directions. I try to get the second set to move independently from the first, but I can't figure out how to do it! I realize that I simply have no mental imprint of what this would be like. Perhaps with a little more creativity or effort I could get this going, but I sense that at this moment the strain might be close to disrupting the dream, so I give up the attempt, amused by how tricky this is, and re-stabilize.

What next? I remember my current task: "Creo vim." (I've been working through spell combinations from Ars Magica.) I anticipated this would be a fun one because I had no idea how it would manifest, and deliberately tried to avoid anticipating anything in particular, hoping the dream would surprise me. So I hold out my left hand and concentrate on the spell. Nothing happens at first. How should I do this? I wonder if I should be using my right hand (my dominant hand in waking life), but figure that since I instinctively started with my left, I should stick with it. "Creo vim," I murmur, since I've found that saying the name of the spell aloud can be an effective focus. A tiny bubble manifests in the air above my open palm. It looks like a soap bubble, and as I have this thought, it bursts like one. But I'm emboldened by the fact that something is happening, so I keep concentrating, and another bubble appears. It grows larger and slowly sinks until it is a half sphere sitting on my palm. From there it keeps growing, getting larger and lumpier and turning grey in color, but still completely weightless and seemingly inflated with air. When this mass is about a foot and a half in diameter, it lifts from my hand and sinks gently to the floor, and transforms into a small white goat.

The surroundings have changed around me while I was focused on the spell. I am no longer standing on a balance beam in a white room, now I am outdoors at night, standing on the ground, looking at this goat that has inexplicably appeared. My husband is lying next to me, asleep. Standing in front of me is a horse harnessed to a cart. I ponder the goat, wondering what it might signify. On the one hand, it is an extremely cute little goat, with long white fur and two straight horns that are only a few inches long. On the other hand, it subtly disturbs me for some reason I can't identify. I remembered a trial take of a commercial that I saw many years ago. The commercial was intended to advertise a financial services company, and was showing clips purporting to be the customers. The most memorable one was a dignified elderly gentleman who for some reason was accompanied by an equally dignified white goat. It was so random and surreal, elegantly and subtly satanic, that the image always stuck with me—though I learned later that the scene was cut from the final version out of concerns that people might be disturbed or distracted by the goat. So what to make of this little goat in front of me now? The goat itself was just standing quietly and not revealing anything, until before my eyes it abruptly transformed into a few pieces of ripe and runny brie cheese on a plain white plate. This was even more mystifying.

I wanted to ask someone's opinion about the goat and its transformation, but I looked around and couldn't see anyone else in this landscape. There was just me and my husband, but he was fast asleep and I didn't want to disturb him. Finally it occurred to me to ask the horse, as the only other creature around. I figured the question of the goat's moral status could be answered by how the horse responded to the cheese, so I picked up a piece from the plate and offered it to the horse to sniff. "What do you think?" I asked. The horse readily accepted the cheese and ate it with apparent relish. This seemed to speak well for the goat! "Want more?" I asked, offering the horse a second piece, which it consumed as eagerly as the first. I decided to try a bit myself, and found the taste and texture very much as I would have expected from a runny brie.

There was a cemetary nearby, surrounded by a low wall. I could see the tops of gravestones over the upper edge of the wall, and I instinctively knew that one of them was connected with the goat, so I should investigate it to find out more. The entrance to the cemetary was just across the lane on which the horse and cart were standing, so I walked around them and went inside. From my original glimpse across the wall I had made a mental note that the relevant gravestone was the fourth one in, so I counted the stones I passed until I reached the fourth. It was an old style of slab carved from reddish stone, only about two inches in width, about three feet tall, and with a simple curved top, unadorned except for the text that was carved on it. I knelt down and looked at the inscription. I was pleased to discover that I could read it easily, and one phrase that immediately caught my attention was "Ghast of Vail Light." I took this to be the title of the mysterious goat. It sounded a bit spooky after all, but I loved this phrase! I immediately determined to remember it. "Ghast of Vail Light," I repeated to myself several times, and even said aloud to myself, "Remember that." I wanted to get it just right. Was it spelled "Vail" and not "Vale"? I looked again at the inscription. The letters were remarkably stable, and the spelling was distinct: "Vail."

I hadn't done any tactile stabilization in a while, so I decided to run my hands over the face of the gravestone. It had the cool touch of real stone, smooth overall but a bit gritty in texture, like sandstone, and I could feel the indentations where the letters were carved in. I was still muttering to myself "Ghast of Vail Light." I didn't know how much longer the dream would go on, and wanted to make sure I wouldn't forget. But I concentrated so hard on the idea of remembering this phrase when I woke up, that it woke me up! I wasn't disappointed, though, because I had plenty to write about already.

I have a long, meandering dream which ends with me being shot. As everything fades to black, I think with some frustration, "I hope my next dream is better." I become lucid.

I'm in a supermarket. I shout out "I'm lucid!" and start running down the aisle. I slap a 12-year-old kid in the back of the head for no reason, then slow down. I know if I get too excited, I'll lose lucidity. I look behind me and maybe apologize, but the kid doesn't bother me.

I try the "hand examination" method of dream stabilization and look at my hands. They're a mess. Three fingers on one hand, the other has fingers blinking in and out of existence. I keep focusing, trying to will them to become normal, but it doesn't happen. Soon, the dream fades to black. (Unsure if this was part of the same dream or an exit, or if it matters).

I find myself in the void and attempt to spin out of it. I spin slowly at first but nothing happens, so I decide to spin faster. I find myself in the kitchen of my childhood home, where the original long dream started. In the dream, I label this as a false awakening and think, "this makes sense because I tried to WILD from here."

I look at my hands again to stabilize. They're still a wreck but may look a little better. However, they're not returning to normal and I fear the dream will end soon.

Out of the corner of my eye I see a fish statue I recognize from my house, except here it's painted bright red. I decide to throw it through the family room window. I first do a nose-pinch RC to ensure I'm dreaming, and I am. I head towards the fish and wake up.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

From Wednesday, 7/9/14.

I'm in the air force and our CO takes us to another base. The CO there is insane. He orders ours to leave and forces us onto some kind of thrill-ride-like trainer, where he says we'll "do backspins until we pass out."

While on the ride, I'm reading notes on some folded paper. I finish just before the ride ends and note that it's actually pretty fun. I regret not being more aware for it. As we walk off, I'm headed towards the attendant and wonder if she'll let me ride again. "Of course she will," I think. "I'm dreaming."

I run up to her and announce "I'm having a lucid dream."

"I know," she says, sounding gleeful to be in on the secret.

I start rubbing my hands to stabilize, saying, "I'm rubbing my hands to stabilize the dream."

Then I decide to go exploring. I walk down a hallway with a black and white checked tile floor when my vision starts blurring, like my contacts are falling out. I stop and try to rub my hands again, but the blurring continues. I consider spinning, but decide against it, and soon the dream ends.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

6/27/14* hold my hand / little blind girl with little pink ribbon with writing on adorable / driving onto soccer field me in passenger seat so many kids so close to car but he's driving slowly. Typical markings on field plus extra for coach's game plan on field itself! (world cup residue perhaps) / Someone named David falls off a 2nd story or higher front porch balcony but lives to say something from down below. I crawl over railing into front door and plan to go back down and out through a back door and stairs I assume there should be. Working my way through the house feeling lost I think what if I could fly out like in dreams...why of course, this is a dream. Phase out through back of house and goes gray. I fly in an undulating dolphin-like motion and can see my hands (normally I am looking down with my hands out front while flying). After a bit I start looking down for anything and start to see a flat dark green surface with little nicks in it with no apparent pattern. Eventually I am on the ground and my son is there. Feeling frisky, bold and very lucid I
announce to my son that I am going to give it to "your mother!" (wouldn't dare say this if there was any doubt I was dreaming). Wife appears and I throw off her clothes with tk and get to business. Ready to add another female to the mix I think of who to summon, Girl Friday? Scarlett? But the dream fades. 167

7/4/14 Didn't record these LDs right away so going from memory hours later. Late dream malaise affects last 2 LDs. DILD#1 I am getting instructions from 30-something woman with large breasts in a seating position. I am standing over her and I get the idea to brush my arm against her breasts. As I do, I realize that I am dreaming and immediately think of the basic naked task and strip down once again with my pants bunched up around the ankles I fling them off with telekinesis. She has removed her shirt and I reach behind her back and undo her bra and her sumptuous breasts flow out. I gawk and enjoy the scene and don't remember anything else before before waking. 168


DILD#2 end of REM assumed. Wife, Son and I have free tickets to a nice dinner and we are being seated with another group who left 2 seats on one side of the table and one on the other. Wife and son go down left side of table with plenty of room but the one seat on my side is blocked in by the rest of the group at the table and by the neighboring table being so close. I wait patiently and they eventually get up and I get to my seat apparently thirst and look down at an untouched small thin medium-tall glass of water with a small amount of melted ice water and a clear straw. I am obviously focused on it and slurp on the straw thirstily. The water is barely splashing in my throat as if the straw is broken and the sensation keys me in that I am dreaming again! But even shorter than the previous. I wake up feeling quite thirsty. 169


#3 In dream DEILD (really a DILD) I am attempting to WILD and I am getting decent vibration feedback with my clinched eyes method but lose consciousness before dream begins. I am playing a song on my phone that has a really nice beat and electronic percussion sounds and something reminds me that I was just trying to WILD but I don't feel fully immersed in the dream and feel like I am still trying to WILD so I try a movement based entry and start dancing my way into the dream and end up on a big concert stage and for some reason I think it is Prince playing. I just keep dancing on the stage and rip off my clothes and will my junk to hang large and low. I think I feel movement in bed and I am probably close to waking up anyway, but that either way I do. 170


7/5 DILD#1 Son sick goes into huge public bathroom but doesn't choose stall. Seems drunk also. I get him to move but all toilets have no stall. 2 ladies come through with their small boys and I get mad at them, chide them. I go back to room and lady getting ready to go to bed and husband already asleep. Leave but come back and she is changing and is in her bra but bottomless, she just took off her pants. Seems shy at first but then not so much. I start to close the door but keep opening it back a little to look at her sexiness. I continue around a long hall that circles the whole floor passing different couples beds and looking to see what I can. One lady is topless in bed as I pass. All Asian like last night. Some start to wake and one mentions getting coffee. I comment that they are getting up so early but i need an excuse...I was not able to get back to sleep. I continue to around the halfway point of circling the floor and it goes dark with thick curtains and I
realize I'm dreaming. I float up a little and back down and planning to go back the way I came but not working so I visualize a church where I thought it would be more challenging to get naked and I see it from the outside like an old largish white country church with one traditional steeple in the middle front and then I'm suddenly inside on the stage-like pulpit. And I remove all my clothes. People start mumbling that I'm one of those demon loving lucid dreamers...I laugh it off and start to imagine an elevator and starting to think about the other tasks but can start to hear sounds from IWL. Try to DEILD but must be end of REM. Get up and record. 171


DILD#2 I was sure I would remember the details and was very lazy and planned to commit it to memory but dozed back off quickly. All I can remember at this point is that the DILD moment had something to do with an interaction with a woman while looking for a towel when coming out of the shower. And I remember thinking 2nd DILD of the night. 172

Some short DILDs lately. Possible ways to rectify: 1. adjust WBTB time, mostly doing them too long lately and it seems to affect how I am doing my SSILD cycles and perhaps length of REM? 2. Get back up to par with my daytime practices. 3. Start off my LDs properly more grounded in my dream environment! will try Click-Freeze-study environment (click=time stopping pocket watch but more for me to stop and take a moment). Too much of myself in the dream (reference: Mzzkc's Stabilization Fundamentals).

Did self hypnosis lucid dreaming script night of 7/3 and recall one a night or two before that.

(This may be a more boring entry, but maybe it gives some newbies an idea of some of the things you can run into)

6/12/14* wake up after about 5.5 hours of sleep needing to go to the bathroom and afterwards I do my SSILD cycles and I start to get HI's but fall asleep. Later I am having a dream where I am on the field after one of my games and the game after ours looks like a forfeit, perhaps not enough players. It seems like I'm very tired and I believe what happened is that I lay down on the field and went into an in-dream WILDing-like session where I immediately start getting strong HI's and vibrations which I start to play with including a woman on the field whose clothes I pull off with telekinesis and some motion based dream entry. I find myself in my bed (possible false awakening) but I can feel that I'm still fully in the dream world. I decide I should take off all my clothes and get into some mischievous activity. It feels like I am struggling with taking off my clothes and I start to worry a little bit about using my real waking life hands and possibly waking up or exposing myself
while sleeping. But I do get it together and take off my clothes and I'm hanging around the bed when I hear my wife coming up the stairs again and it reminds me of the false awakening last time and I remind myself "okay FA FA FA" (in other words don't get fooled by the false awakening-like scenario). My wife comes into the room and she's holding my laptop and it's on my email account and I get sidetracked from my lucidity for a moment concerned of what she might have read...perhaps some of my updates from dreamviews related to some of the crazy dream adventures I have which she may not like...But then I hear a song playing very clearly (later when I actually woke up I could hear music coming from my son's room but it wasn't where I could hear lyrics or anything whereas in the dream I was definitely hearing lyrics and a song that I seemed to recognize, all much more clearly than what I heard when I woke up). Anyway, I closed my laptop and looked out my window for the source of the sound and I could see some of my teammates outside getting ready for a game and my first thought was why am I not there, why are they playing without me but then I realize the scenario is highly unlikely, especially a game right outside my house...oh yeah this is still a dream this was a false awakening like scenario. I specifically remember "J" & "K" being out there and a little scene played where someone was asking J if he had ever been an ex-WAIF (unsure what this means) and a scene of J sitting at his current job with a desk full of papers. I think that I'm forgetting some details throughout this lengthy dream because I specifically remember thinking that this lucid dream is going fairly long. I find myself back in bed and I wonder if this is another false awakening but then I can feel my wife being amorous and I start to wake up for real. My lucidity level was obviously low throughout or I wouldn't have had such a hard time retaining it or remembering so much of it. Because of this I put the dream through Sageous' FLD test of proving lucidity to yourself and came up with the verdict that I was definitely lucid in spots. I tried to go back to sleep and got some HI's or dreamlets of Cameron Diaz leaning over showing off her cleavage (saw her in a movie last night). 160