Thread: I Know Why You Wake Up

For waking up deliberately, the breathing technique seems good. Opening your real eyes works too, but it's hard to explain how to feel where they are.

For staying in an LD, the main concept is to remain calm. The more excited you get, the more active your brain becomes, and the more likely it is that you will wake up. While there are different ways to stay calm, anothrguitarist and CloudOne make good points. Slow, deep breathing is used in various meditation and self-hypnosis techniques IRL, so it makes sense that it would have a calming effect in the dream world. While I've never tried to lose lucidity to stay asleep (although that does make sense since non-LDs are more stable in terms of length), inducing FAs achieves the same effect because your (less stable) consciousness is put on hold so that the emotion center of your brain restores its normal chemical balance.

Originally Posted by CloudOne

By the way, the breathing actually works. I've experienced it a few times in the past. It's great for waking yourself up from a nightmare.
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If you become lucid during a nightmare, why woudn't you just change the scene?

Originally Posted by dsr

If you become lucid during a nightmare, why woudn't you just change the scene?
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I used it in bad dreams where I had no control so I couldn't change anything in it. But it's a very good technique, shaking head while breathing quickly makes it even better.