Staying lucid

Hello everyone :smile:

Im a beginner to lucid dreaming and because of this i have only had 2 lucid dreams so far (But im satisfied since i have only been trying for a little more then a week).

My big problem, like many other people i guess, is staying lucid.
In my last lucid dream i realized that i was dreaming but immediately after that everything became black. I didn’t even have a chance to focus on my hands or spinning. After everything got black i think i was in some stage between sleep and awakening but i decided to awake since it seemed like there was nothing i could do.

Is there a ‘easy’ way to change this or do i just have to practice and get used to lucid dreaming?

Hello and welcome to the forum.

It will probably become easier to stay lucid as you have more LDs. However, if you want to stay lucid (and stay in the dream as well), you need to be calm. Don’t get too excited, don’t rush around trying to do things right away either, just stay calm. Other than that, there are several stabilizing techniques you can use to stay in the LD. Rub your hands, spin around your own axis, or just try to get as much sensory input as possible. Touch things, examine objects, try using your sense of hearing etc.

Since you are new to lucid dreaming, I’m guessing you had trouble staying calm. It’s what most novices do wrong.

Not necessarily. If you were still in REM sleep, you should have tried creating a new dreamscape, or teleporting yourself into one. If you were in some inbetween state (or even SP), maybe you should have tried using WILD somehow. Either way, as long as you are not awake, you still have a chance of returning to your LD.

Thx for your advice. I guess i got too excited although it didnt seem that way, but obviously its hard to judge since i was in a dream :smile: I will try to ‘create a dreamscape’ if i experience the same thing again. Happy lding

like odd2k mentions, my best method is to become “tactile” and feel my surroundings. I usually drop to the ground and feel the floor to ground myself if I feel the dream is unstable.

The first thing I do is fly (sensation of movement). That seems to stabilize things well for me. Don’t worry your dreams will get longer with experience.

Also it would not hurt to remind yourself throughout the dream that you are dreaming. It will help you to stay lucid longer. I also recommend using prolonging /stabilizing techniques at various points thoughout the dream. When you first start LD ‘ing you may have a hard time recognizing when the dream is going to fade and by the time you act it may be too late.

Happy Dreaming

I have been having a similar problem - although, strangely, I didn’t have this problem in my very early LDs and it’s just something that’s started happening a few months down the line. I have had a few dreams where I have become lucid and then almost immediately it goes completely black (not a gradual fading of the dream scene but instant loss of it). At this point I can normally feel my eyelids (my real eyelids, AFAIK) closed but I can still feel my dreambody (I guess this is because your real eyes aren’t paralysed during REM sleep so you can get feeling up there while still being asleep?). In the past, I have tried spinning and continued to have some sensation in my dream body but, after a short while, I’ve started to lose that and feel my real body and woken up.

A couple of nights ago I had this experience of losing the visual dream as soon as I became lucid. I could feel my eyelids but could still feel my dream body (in particular my dream legs which I was walking on). I just tried to ignore my eyes and completely focus down on my lower (dream) legs and walking forwards. Then I tried to create a new dream scene. At first it was quite vague/fuzzy/a bit cartoony but suddenly it just ‘clicked’ and became a totally vivid, realistic scene and I was in a new dream. That was the first time I’ve managed to go from losing an LD straight into another one without waking up in between.

I think sometimes the problem can be not engaging with the dream scene enough. This morning, I became lucid and immediately started thinking about what I was going to do in the LD (e.g. I did a couple of somersaults which I couldn’t do IRL) and I think because I wasn’t getting involved in the dream scene that is why it vanished and I woke up. I, therefore, decided that next time I would just explore the dream scene and, when I went back to sleep, I had another LD in which I just kind of wandered around, exploring the house I was in etc and that lasted a lot longer. I guess it is a case of getting a balance between engaging in the dream scene and also doing the stuff you want/trying to change things and us (relative) newbies need to work on finding that balance??

Something I usually do is remain still, and then say very loudly my name, address and all that other kind of stuff. Seems stupid but works for me :neutral:

Rachel, I would recommend not starting out on such a large scale. When I first had LD’s I was trying to do all the big things, you know flying and such, but I just go to damned excited and always lost lucidity, It took me a few LD’s of just getting used to the feeling before I started doing outrageous stuff, but thats just MHO.

I find concentrating on the dream, and pictrue yourself carrying it on helps me… colours swirl back in and I’m alrady acting out what I ahd been picturing.

Also, you could try droppign abck in once you’ve woken up. if that fails, take a RC to check its not a FA (just in case).