Crossing the border to lucid dreaming.

Hi lucid dreamers,

As a little anti-realist (world = mind) lucid dreaming is a very interesting phenomenon to me. And especially the part in which a dream turns lucid in relation to the control You gain over Your dream. Sadly, i myself have only had 2 such occurrences during my life. And it is hard to find the time and attention to teach me to become a frequent lucid dreamer (though i am most likely going to at some point).

I'd like You to describe to me the situation, the feelings, and the realisations/thoughts that go through You when the change occurs, as detailed as You possibly can.
At first i thought that merely the realisation that You are dreaming (i.e. thinking up the world) was enough to influence it. But apparently being aware that You are dreaming does not guarantee control. This is interesting to me as it is not immediately logical.
Also, the control appears to be limited. In what ways is Your control limited? Is it limited because You wake up if You cross a certain set of rules? Are the rules different per dream? Or is it simply impossible for You to do it?

Hi Mocari...I've been an avid 'Dreamnaut' for over 30 years. I had realized at a young age that I could actually influence and direct my dreams. The books on the subject (LD) were few to none.
For me the key has been developing a consistent dream environment. One that is familiar and easily recognizable. Usually it is a house, a city street, driving, swimming, flying a jet, walking the Serengeti etc, that take me beyond the 'Wow I must be dreaming" stage.
On occasion, I can be fooled by those dream 'landmarks' and not realize that I'm dreaming and it runs its course. But that is less than 10% of the time.

Okay so now I know that I am dreaming, the very next thing that I will do is my LD reinforcements, these serve to stabilize my awareness and realism, I will usually touch something, the ground, take a few steps, or perform the 'spin' maneuver. I can somehow also estimate how much LD time that I will have, I guess that I have the ability to monitor my sleeping body somehow.
Now here is where it gets interesting, I find myself in a real solid place, not opaque, fuzzy, random, but a completely awake experience. I am myself, I'm there, I'm a person, but I can simply levitate instead of walking, or breath underwater after I've jumped in, or summon a flying horse (always brown) to take me places. Sometmes, my LD world is too real.
Consequently, I find myself thinking about situations that exist in my waking world, house payments, my job, my faimily, myself, whatever is part of my normal routine living.

As far as control for me goes, I have my limits. But I am always working at improving those LD tasks. Flying used to be difficult, it took several years of good LD practice to master it. I'm better at LD combat, hand to hand, weapons and martial arts.
I understand my LD limits or rules, so those are the places that I always strive to improve. Some are scary, some a simple, some are fantastic.

Read my journal when you have time.

Moonscape

I've only been lucid dreaming for about half a year but I have LD's every 4 days which is apparently pretty good. When you realise you're dreaming you immediatly get a kind of "rush" of exitement which you need to learn to get over or you will wake yourself up. After that when fully lucid without danger of the dream ending due to exitement you just feel "different" in a good way, the feeling is like a mix of a rush of accomplishment and exitement and the slight fear that the dream could end at any moment. When you become lucid you will need to stabalize the dream. You MUST do things like spinning or rubbing your hands together to prolong the dream

Ok thank You for replying Moonscape and Zezarict and i will most likely check out that journal of Yours.

You lucid dreamers use almost exclusively Your knowledge of the real waking world to realise that You are dreaming, right? Maybe if i want to apply lucid dreaming to the waking world i better pay more attention to creating a clear image of reality first. Does it also happen that You realise You are dreaming, in a way that does not involve comparing the dream to the waking world? Probably not, but if You can think of anything let me know.

Your ability to somehow sense how long the LD lasts makes me wonder something else. Is it possible for You, or someone else on here, to think of the waking world while dreaming? (not one thing from the waking world, but the waking world as a thing)

Zezarict that excitement comes straight after You become 'aware' right? Do You (sometimes) slowly become aware or always suddenly? The excitement could be a nice sign whether i get things to work or not.

BTW i appreciate any replies i get. And i don't expect anyone to put in as much effort. I'm very interested and this is the best LD forum i know of. If it is a better idea to go with my questions elsewhere then i'd appreciate that knowledge too.

Yes Mocari...I am so in touch with myself that I am able to conciously think about matters in my awake world. Things such as having to get up in a while to go to work, did I put gas in the car, what am I doing for lunch. All the while I am in my LD doing whatever I wish.

Another practice that I use, is to periodically ask myself if I am dreaming. I do this while I am performing routine tasks such as driving, walking, eating, anything that is part of your normal everyday life can become a road sign that you are LD. I will also occasionally tell myself out loud that I am dreaming, with no one around of course.

One last tip, most of the time I realize that I am dreaming simply because I can remember that I am actually asleep!

Dream on!

I've only been into this stuff for almost two years, but I've had my fair share of LDs - it's an odd feeling, becoming lucid.. It's like, you have always been there happily enjoying yourself when suddenly your eyes are open to this strangely familiar world (yeah, becoming lucid is a sudden thing) it's almost like when you are stuck on a puzzle forever and you finally find the answer - right in front of your face!

I kinda have trouble keeping still to stabilise the dream - the techniques mentioned above are use to calm yourself down so you can see clearly... the only thing is when you know how much time you have left you begin to feel like you are being rushed (i still can't push that feeling aside right now, im still working on it ;D)

control is kinda hard to explain... i guess it goes away because an LD can become pretty real, to a point where it's almost like you're doing it in real life. you feel like there is a specific way to (for example) create a lightning bolt - but in dreams, there is no right answer, right?

reality checks are a good way to improve your chances of having an LD - it's in the forums somewhere, I just don't know how to link it using my ps3... (computer is broken D:) you do it while you are awake, I suck at reality checks :P

anyway, have an LD... you can see for yourself ;D