I read in several articles that before your first REM period you enter a stage of deep sleep. How is it possible to keep your awareness from the transition from awake to asleep when there is a long period of deep sleep between in between?

I've spent the last few months doing lots of meditation to improve my awareness and mental discipline, and so far I never got lucid with WILD. I had about 7 DILDs but those were totally random and accidental (RCs have never worked for me).