Thread: What are the Symptoms of burn out?

The common attributes of burnout for me are minimal, lazy RCs, and half-hearted use of techniques. Usually, this only happens when I go ham for a week. Taking a complete break for a day or two often fixed that burnout.

You are describing the biggest challenge to all practicing lucid dreamers. How to continuously maintain the kind of motivation necessary in order to maintain regular frequent lucidity. It's something we all deal with. Interest fluctuates depending on so many factors and life events that are thrown at us. It's very hard to always stay focused on the goal. That's why we all go through phases of frequent lucidity and really bad dry spells. I don't think there is any one right answer. It's one of those things we all go through and have to figure out how to get through. Each individual is different, and the things that motivate us are different. And if and how badly we want to get back to it. It definitely helps when you have already been through the off phase, repeatedly, and are familiar with your own process and know what you need to do to get it back. It's just a matter of finding the motivation. Persistence and patience always pays off in the end. For me there is nothing better than a good dream to help motivate, even if non lucid. Waking up from a wonderful, intensely vivid dream is always a good feeling. The better my dreams, the greater my motivation becomes. You can get a snowball effect going where success brings greater motivation, and greater motivation brings even greater success. And you suddenly find yourself in a state of blissful frequent lucidity and living on a high. Until some stupid distraction in life comes up, your dreaming starts to fall apart. You lose motivation. Whatever period of time goes by and you start wanting your dreams back and you begin the entire process all over again. And you have to get yourself into the right mindset to find enough motivation and persistence to get it all back and bring back that snowballing effect of lucidity.

What is it you love about dreaming and achieving lucidity? Only you can decide if you want it badly enough to attain it. And the things that motivate you. You say you have only been at it for three months, in the scheme of things that is actually a very short time. Patience... persistence...

Caradon, well said. Looking at my old dream journals definitely helps, even the ones here on dreamviews.

Another note about riding that high is that sometimes I think I've got it all figured out and I start slacking on my practices and then my results go down until I get tired of the poor results and, as you say, go back to what I know works for me personally.

As Jacob said, taking a break of a day or two can also help.

Try not to get to caught up on trying to get it to work every time. Try something different then come back to you are ready. Do a DILD for a while.

Originally Posted by Ant101

Good morning all,

I was wondering what the symptoms of “burn out” look like, I’ve been practicing for 3 months had one LD but I’m wondering if I’ve hit the “wall” I’m was very motivated about a week ago, I stepped up my practice , waking in the middle of the night writing dreams down and making notes of times, during the day trying to be very aware and engaging in 1 time PMRC, ( an exercise from Ewol because my memory is poor) , as well as the normal RCs linked to my dream signs, gathering all kinds of LD info.

I still do my RC and PMRC practices but when I go to bed now, I don’t get to finish MILD before I’m falling a sleep, I wake up in the night and just roll over and go back to sleep? So is this me just becoming tired because of the extra effort or is this the beginning of burn out?

Hey, where are you getting your prospective memory RC guide material? I need help with this too. My working memory is a challenge area. Could use help.

Stephen Leberges book exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. - pick 5 things to look out for everyday, the very next time you see it do a reality check. Eg - next time I hear laughter, next time I use the toilet in the afternoon, next time I hear my name, next time I unlock a door.

If you later realise you had an earlier chance to notice your PMRC and you didn’t realise, it counts as a fail, you read your list in the morning only, at the end of day before bed go through the list to see which ones you recognised.

Originally Posted by Ant101

Stephen Leberges book exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. - pick 5 things to look out for everyday, the very next time you see it do a reality check. Eg - next time I hear laughter, next time I use the toilet in the afternoon, next time I hear my name, next time I unlock a door.

If you later realise you had an earlier chance to notice your PMRC and you didn’t realise, it counts as a fail, you read your list in the morning only, at the end of day before bed go through the list to see which ones you recognised.

Oh yeah, I'm doing that. I made these cool things, one for each day of the week. I make them my desktop background. Like this: Saturday.jpg

Thanks, just looking out for new material.

Try to RC at least ten times a day. When taking this daily journey, become familiar with your chosen focal points. Get to know them well. Be vigilant in your observations. Good luck, Ant101!
~Lang.

For me symptoms of burn out is when the routine and practices start to feel like a chore. I usually notice a big dip in dream clarity and recall as well which sends me into a downward negative spiral. I recently had one of these and it was the closest I came to giving in at least for a while. What I did instead was tell myself I’d take the weekend off. I had stuff planned on the Saturday so I took a break and didn’t practice any daytime or nighttime practice and just went to sleep as normal. What happened that night was I had a near DEILD experience Completely spontaneously and recalled a cool vivid dream in the morning as well. It was as if taking a back seat actually helped me!? The following night I had a lucid dream and my enthusiasm was boosted once more. So I highly recommend a short break even if it’s just 24 hours. It helped me.

Other ways to keep motivated and enthusiastic: Read inspiring articles or Dream view discussions every evening before bed. Think of some cool dreams to have and imagine them playing out during visualisation. Read over old exciting DJ entries. Read other people’s DJ entries. Finally, try experiment and get excited about trying new techniques and try come up with your own ideas and experiments to try. Sometimes been told how to do something all the time isn’t very interesting especially when it’s not working so try some new, creative ideas of your own. 😊

Originally Posted by Tiktaalik

For me symptoms of burn out is when the routine and practices start to feel like a chore. I usually notice a big dip in dream clarity and recall as well which sends me into a downward negative spiral. I recently had one of these and it was the closest I came to giving in at least for a while. What I did instead was tell myself I’d take the weekend off. I had stuff planned on the Saturday so I took a break and didn’t practice any daytime or nighttime practice and just went to sleep as normal. What happened that night was I had a near DEILD experience Completely spontaneously and recalled a cool vivid dream in the morning as well. It was as if taking a back seat actually helped me!? The following night I had a lucid dream and my enthusiasm was boosted once more. So I highly recommend a short break even if it’s just 24 hours. It helped me.

You know, this is just what I need to hear right now. Awesome idea. Focusing on LDing so much lately has caused me to have insomnia, I can't seem to sink into full sleep after attempting WBTB. And then when I finally catch a nap later, I don't remember any dreams. I think a short break would do me good.

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

You know, this is just what I need to hear right now. Awesome idea. Focusing on LDing so much lately has caused me to have insomnia, I can't seem to sink into full sleep after attempting WBTB. And then when I finally catch a nap later, I don't remember any dreams. I think a short break would do me good.

Yeah I worried it would feel like neglecting the practice and I would suffer as a result but it really was the opposite. Worth a shot. I think you’d have to have a long break for it to effect you negatively.

I also found a more laid back approach really did me some good. I used to do so much that I became desperate for that sweet lucid dream that I think it really hindered my progress. I hear a lot that you should want it badly and believe you’re going to have one but sometimes I think the opposite is true and just been like “meh, if it happens it happens” can be a good approach.

Insomnia episodes are the worst! I still haven’t mastered how to get over them but the closest thing I’ve found to work for me is trying to keep my eyes open. They become really heavy and tired very quickly if I do that.

[QUOTE=Tiktaalik;2238046]For me symptoms of burn out is when the routine and practices start to feel like a chore. I usually notice a big dip in dream clarity and recall as well which sends me into a downward negative spiral. I recently had one of these and it was the closest I came to giving in at least for a while. What I did instead was tell myself I’d take the weekend off. I had stuff planned on the Saturday so I took a break and didn’t practice any daytime or nighttime practice and just went to sleep as normal. What happened that night was I had a near DEILD experience Completely spontaneously and recalled a cool vivid dream in the morning as well. It was as if taking a back seat actually helped me!? The following night I had a lucid dream and my enthusiasm was boosted once more. So I highly recommend a short break even if it’s just 24 hours. It helped me.

It’s good to hear that a short break hearted you too it’s strange isn’t it.
I took a break a few weeks ago, I’m so glad I did because I finally began to see some signs of progress. I gradually did less and less Practice over a period of 3days then on the 4th and 5th I did nothing. Initially I was worried I would lose my hard work hence gradually Letting go.

I agree about wanting it to much, I was reading how you really have to want it and have it at the forefront of your mind but for me I think I can over do it so now I kind of use the approach of every other day I rev the engine ( apply a little more effort than the following day ) and the days in between I just let it tick over just work on self awareness and memory. This seems to be doing the job just nicely.