Continuing my story of how discovering lucid dreaming changed my life forever and what strategies I used to get lucid. Read about step "1. Make a dream journal" in yesterday's part of this series.
This in itself was mindblowing to me. Some people alleged you could tell yourself before falling asleep to "remember your dreams when you wake up" and that it would actually increase your ability to write down your dreams after sleeping. I was quite sceptical at first but it worked for me on my first try. Before falling asleep I would simply lay there and tell myself aloud "I will remember my dreams. I will remember my dreams. I will remember my dreams."
You are effectively programming your subconscious mind in doing this.
And the next morning I had a mindblowing level of recollection about the dream events from the night prior, which really helped me to sort all these into my dream journal. Without these affirmations it would have been much harder to write my dreams down in such a detailed manner so quickly.
It also was curious from my materialistic perspective - if I had the power to change my cognitive abilities to such a dramatic level through repeating a simple mantra I really had underestimated the power of human minds and the unconscious. I remembered that I had woken up many times in my life mere seconds before the alarm clock rang, which was kind of the same idea - priming my mind preemptively with a repeated intention and it would just deliver.
I was beginning to see what Wilfried meant - this lucid dreaming thing had already made significant impact on my view about my own abilities and the mantras our society likes to repeat that might actually cause major damage to our subconscious. This little "I will remember my dreams"-exercise made me see that negative self-talk is not only pointless but in fact harmful. And I hadn't even made it to a lucid state yet! This was getting exciting!
The idea is to get used to a habit that would "register" or feel differently in a dream state than in waking life. Some people like pinching themselves regularly, whereas in a dream state they would not feel the pain of it and thus know they must be dreaming. Other people like to look at their watch twice - and see whether the numbers change drastically from one time to the next. Some like to write down a certain phrase on their arm and read it throughout the day, twice in a row, to see if the letters get jumbled up. For some reason writing seems to fluctuate in the dream state, whereas in waking life what you write down remains exactly as you wrote it down ;)
There are many strategies for checking whether you are awake or dreaming, you just have to find one that works for you and make it such a recurring routine that you would also do it in the dream state by sheer habit and realize the difference in feedback: A great clue to knowing whether you are actually asleep and could go lucid or whether its just a "regular" waking life moment with the feedback you would expect.
Another great hint from the pros was that you want to practice "being cool" when you notice you are actually dreaming and can do anything you want. This seemed totally plausible to me, knowing the feeling of hyper-excitement as a kid in accidentally dropping something or shoving a glass off the table by accident. The anticipation and excitement about some impending awesomeness can be so stimulating for your body that it simply brings you back to this waking reality. And you don't want that, you want to be able to learn calmness when you notice you are lucid, so that your raised heartbeat and increased rate of breathing doesn't bring you back so quickly.
Someone explained it to me like this: When you dream in the REM state you are basically still, as your body is "temporarily paralyzed". The stillness of your body makes it easy for your "mind" to travel and to be rooted in the dream state where you move around as opposed to going back to your asleep still body.
Getting a faster heart rate or starting to sweat lying in bed will thus compell the mind to reconnect to your body and leave the dream state prematurely. If however your body remains still (because you successfully curb your excitement at the realization of "I am dreaming") will allow you to stay in the dream state for longer even and especially when you get lucid and can finally start doing whatever you always wanted without getting carried away ;)
If you ever had an awesome dream that got better and better you might know the feeling: Right at the moment when it all turns perfect - you wake up. "Damn! Couldn't I have stayed in the dream for just a few more minutes?" The answer is: Yes you could have, but you have to curb your excitement to not give the mind reason to root itself back to your physical body so quickly.
Spinning in your dream is also something that worked well for me. You can create the contrast between your physical body and your mind experience by purposefully spinning in your dream. Not only will you not get dizzy (which is a totally odd experience when spinning that could be a great dreaming state test as well) but your spin keeps you rooted in the dream world as your body lies in bed totally still. The contrast of movement is enough for your mind to stay in the dream state and not jump back to your still body, and I have tested this as well and found it to work beautifully, at least for a little while until the excitement simply gets too much.
This is simply a good way to curb your excitement and to not miss out on your lucid dreaming experience once you do finally notice you are dreaming. Some people are so overwhelmed by their first recognition of the dream state that they actually have no idea what they want to do next. And so they wake up before "capitalizing" on the opportunity ;)
It really doesn't matter what it is: Whether you always wanted to have sex with Britney Spears in your high school days, fly to New Zealand like superman or become an ant and check out the egg chamber of the anthill in your garden: Just pick anything. And stick to it. More lucid opportunities will present themselves and a scarcity mindset will only get in your way.
Having picked your desired test case will be very helpful once you do realize you are dreaming, because you can instantly act on your vision instead of overthinking things when time is of the essence. It would be analogous to being at a royal buffet with all your favorite foods in front of you just to be so stunned at "what dish to try first" that you end up being thrown out by the waiter before getting to try ANY OF THEM.
Before you go to the buffet tell yourself: I will try the genuine Italian pasta for a little bit and THEN see what else I want to try if there is still time. You get the idea ;)
For today I want to leave you with the dude I first stumbled upon when I started looking into lucid dreaming for myself. I don't know what happened to his old introduction, looks like he started a new business of his own, awesome.
If you decide to look for teachers online only go with the ones you vibe with well.
While there are many other strategies one could consider, I am quite satisfied to tell you: These were more than enough to get me to my lucid state in mere weeks after first hearing about it.
Pt. 1 - An Unlikely Proposition
Pt. 3 - Implications & Test Flight
Pt. 4 - A Novel Approach for Learning Skills
Pt. 5 - "That's Quite Far Enough"
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