I’m looking into the watch RC and was wondering if the watch has to be digital for it to work? If I got a watch with hands, would they still change in the dream? Thanks!
I think it has to be digital (somebody correct me if I’m wrong) because it’s reading alphanumerics that is difficult in dreams.
Yeah, that’s what I was thinking… My counting fingers RC is certainly not working anymore. I’ve lost a lot of LDs because of it. So I’ll go out and buy a digital watch or find one somewhere around the house… I’m sure we have a few.
The watch doesn’t have to be digital. Any kind of watch will do! I have a watch with hands and it always works as a RC! So you don’t have to buy a digital watch for it! Trust me! I’ve always had a watch with hands and it has never failed me yet! It will show different time whenever you look at it in your dreams, so it’s just as good as a digital one.
That’s interesting! But if I tell that to everyone I’m talking to, then I’m pretty sure everyone will think I’m nuts! 
I thought of that too and I’ll try that tonight. I already recorded a wav file that says “Minako, you’re dreaming” and I downloaded a simple program from Ld4all site that will play this wav file for me all the night in intervals. I wonder if it will work. I remembered that cause today when I was sleeping I had my pc on and the sound for new email played when I got one. I heard that sound, but I was still sleeping so I went to read an email in my dreams and so dreamed that I got a romantic greeting card from someone I like. (Unfortunately when I read the email after I woke up it was just a stupid joke from a friend, no card 
) Anyway I’ll try it tonight and we’ll see if it works.
Minako, you have no idea how happy you just made me with the watch reply 
I’ve been wanting to get a pretty un-digital watch for a while now, and the thought of having to get a digital one was annoying me… 
But since watches with hands also show different times, I’m good! 
Glad to hear that, daysong! 
Anyway, I tried that thing with a wav file playing in intervals all night and… well it didn’t work as it should. I set the program to start around 4am and then repeat every 30min. Somehow I just woke up a bit before 4am and I was lying awake in my bed. Then suddenly I heard a voice saying ‘Minakooo, Minako!’ OMG, even if it was my voice, it really really scared me!!! I then remembered that I set this wav file when I heard ‘you’re dreaming’… but I wasn’t dreaming, I was awake and my heart was beating really fast! So I just got up, turned off my pc, hugged my teddy-bear and went back to sleep! (I managed to get lucid later anyway 
)
And that
Has just discouraged me from recording my voice.
Let’s record some pretty lady’s voice instead, so I won’t be scared.
Anyone wanna volunteer?? 
My stupid digital watch ran out of batteries yesterday and made me do an RC. Then I had to go get it fixed for 10 bucks
Ok, I’m gonna make a high pitched version of my voice and record it. The extra alertness high pitches provide and the less fear of chip-and-dale voices should work nicely.
LOL 
That’s an idea too! I think I’ll try with an animal voice next time. Like it was written in instructions. The guy who wrote it set the sound of a rooster and when he was dreaming and was in a desert for example and heard the rooster, he remember that he was dreaming. But then you have to remember that a rooster means that you’re dreaming… who knows, it might work. But I wouldn’t choose a rooster, don’t like them very much 
… a cat maybe? Hmm… I’ll see. But definitely no more voices calling my name in the middle of the night!
I don’t think you’re right on this. It works for you, so that’s good, and people can try it.
However:
The advantage of the digital watch is that you have to read it, while with the analogue watch you don’t have to read. The thing is that while dreaming reading digits is harder than viewing a picture of hands. Do you use a digital watch which uses Japanese symbols (pictorial) by any change, because I think that might be the same as a picture of hands (for the mind - it’s the same type of information)
I think I’m right. Try it, you’ll see. A watch is just the kind of thing that always shows different times in a dream, just like a light never works when you try to turn it on. Digital or not. If it works for me, why shouldn’t it work for others too? Btw: I have a watch with hands but there are all 12 numbers written on it in a circle. Anyway, daysong will try it and we’ll see.
Well, what Minako said does make sense to me at least. Yes, a digital watch does have characters, but think about it… Dreams are quite unstable if you aren’t lucid. Your mind has many things to control while in a dream… If you look at a watch with hands, look away, and then look back, I think there would be a good chance that it would change. I’ll post my experiences with it though after I try it out.
does not have to be digital, like minako say.
I have few lds where I look at clock downstair that have hand rather than number, I look at clock, say 6:30, look away, 12:00 midnight. So Must be work with hand clocks too yes yes? ^.^
Alright, I finally went out and bought a non-digital watch a few days ago. I’ve been doing RCs by looking at the time, looking away and telling myself it would be 12:00 midnight (while imagining what it will look like) and then checking back.
I had no results for a couple days, but this morning I was just about to go look for a dragon that my gym teacher spotted, when I just decided “Hey, do a reality check.” So I dug under my sweater and checked my watch. It wasn’t even the one that I had purchased! It was much bigger, and had a white face opposed to my light purple one 
Well, then I became lucid.
So even though that didn’t have to do with actually checking the time, it still worked… 
I finally received my Laberge book (Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming) - perhaps that’s why I had another LD last night (besides Ed’s excellent bwgen preset).
In any case, this is what I wanted to point out:
On p.64 it says about the digital watch RC - “this test works only with digital and not with old-style analog watches, which can sometimes tell dream time quite believably. Once when I decided to do a state-test I looked at my watch and found it had been converted to a fairly realistic analog watch. But I didn’t remember trading in my digital watch for the Mickey Mouse watch that was on my wrist, so I figured I must be dreaming.”
So the test with analog watches can work (because the watch itself can fail to give correct/real/believable time), but it can fail (if the watch gives believable time results). Perhaps what we can expect to happen during the LD can affect this, or perhaps it’s just different for different people. Perhaps there is some other factor which influences e.g whether you are artistic or not, who knows…
In my last LD, I could read some words on the wall but some words were unreadable and I thought they were reversed somehow. I think it’s connected.
I found my old watch I got in 5th grade, it’s the greatest digital watch evar!
Radioshack’s talking Watch!
It says the time loudly every hour and can tell the time at will Plus it’s digital and has words on it. Also, the fact that the thing that holds it to my arm is partially brokens helps me remember to check for Rcs since I have to fix it ever 15-30 minutes.
I used it for about 3 days before I left it somewhere but I found it again today.
Anyway, I’ve had about 2 dreams that dealt heavily with LDs and my inner self. I don’t remember much from them, but I do remember waking up 3 times during one night, I think I might have relized I was dreaming but the shock might have woke me up. The entire dream was about LDs but I had those before and still didn’t become lucid.
Well, I figure after I start wearing it more, I will start having some more LDs. It pisses my teachers off though
Watch: IT’S 11:00 AM!!!
Mr.Koos: GIVE it to me now!!!
My sister’s b/f just bought me a good digital watch (I used to have an embarassing mickey-mouse watch) and I’m starting to do RC’s.
Is it better to set my watch to chime every hour or is it better to do random RC’s without relying on the chime?
my guess is that it would be better to have it set to beep. Just so that your mind knows that it will beep eventualy, so the thaught of it will be lurking in your head. So sometimes your mind will remind you to RC before it beeps… Our biological clock in our minds, whatever its called…
Then it will force a habit on yourself. Perhaps relying on the beep for the first bit would be good. But try withought it some time later and see how your results are…
Ive found exploiting quirks in your “luck” gave me great results… For instance im pretty much a dufus and do a lot of stuff wrong, and nice things never really happen to me… So when im buying a new guitar/F gear i really want i am probably dreaming, or if ive thrown a moldy can of tuna in the bin (without it bouncing of the rim and splattering everywhere) i am probably dreaming lol