I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but I totally have an old-man crush on Alec Guinness. Before he died, that is.

I had a lucid dream when I was very young, before I knew what it was. I mean, I was aware that I was dreaming and I let it go so far before I decided in my dream to rub my eyes and wake up. I was trying to stop a giant from eating me.

I think the remembering your dreams part is one of the most important if you are trying to purposely lucid dream. The times I have lucid dreams generally occur when I'm in a dream and I realize, "hey, I've had this dream before..".

As for a dream journal, you have to keep it by your bed and write in it when you wake up from your dreams in the middle of the night. You forget most of your dreams by morning and you will nearly have forgotten all dreams once you've been awake for about 20 minutes.

I just now realized that I hate dream journals. They don't work for me. I do not have the ability to wake up and write things down. Perhaps I am just too clumsy. And it seems to take all joy and magic out of my dreams. Like I can never do the dream justice, so it's frustrating. Maybe I would do better if I just tried to write down keywords.

Yeah, I was never able to write down my dreams.. mostly because I'm too tired/lazy/cranky when I wake up in the middle of the night.

As for taking the magic out of your dreams, wouldn't taking control of them take the magic out?

Hmm, good point. I am much more interested in awareness than control. And, as I found out this morning when I could not get out of my dream, awareness does not imply control. Also when I drove the car off the cliff, I did not intend for it crash. But some part of my mind obviously did not agree.

My goal is to have awareness and control of my actions, but not total conscious control of dreams. The eagerness to control dreams was actually something that really bugged me about that book.

Oh, and to be clear, I have become lucid during dreams many times. But this was probably the most lucid I've been, the only time I've had successive lucid dreams, and the only time I've dreamed about something approaching what I wanted to dream about. I think that part of my success was that I went back to bed after I got up and was in hypnogogic state as I fell back asleep. I actually went into the first dream somewhat lucid.

In case anyone is interested here are the methods that have been helpful (or seem helpful but I haven't actually tried them) for me in discerning that I am dreaming.

1. The thing that usually alerts me that I'm dreaming is a glaring logical inconsistancy. I think the way to achieve this is to examine any dreams you remember (this is the point of the dream journal, although I eschew it) and see if you can find any internal logic to them. If you've trained your mind this way it can happen during the course a dream.

2. Transportation is usually left out of my dreams. Travel is usually instantaneous. So if I stop and ask myself how I got where I am, I might realize that I'm dreaming.

3. Trying to speak can clue you into the fact that you are dreaming. I believe this is different for everyone, but in my dreams, I do hear people speaking and I sometimes hear myself speaking. But if I speak my lips aren't usually moving and I'm not actually producing sound.

4. Notice the light source. Is there one? Can you turn off the lights if you are in a room? (This is from Waking Life.)

5. When you are awake, notice how you know that you are awake. Are you sure you're actually awake right now? Now? Right... now? I know I'm awake when I have continuity of awareness. (This goes back to no.2 and is from Lucid Dreams in 30 Days and I think the only point of value in the book.)

6. Examining my self during a dream often clues me in. What shoes am I wearing? Do I own a pair shoes like that? What's in my pockets? Where did I get this purse? This is kind of a baby steps approach to gaining awareness. Again, the way to train yourself to do this is to examine dreams you remember for details. I think this is part of why I don't like dream journals. It would take me all day to write that crap out. I prefer to simply lay in bed and remember as much as I can at the moment. Then I will sometimes remember more later, which is like finding the plum in the pudding.

I still don't know how to reliably wake myself up from dreams. Opening my eyes does not always work. I have had the experience of opening my eyes without waking up and while it was interesting (to say the least), it did not end my dream. But usually what happens (this happened today) is that I think "Open your eyes!" and nothing happens.

last night i dreamed that the zoo found a duck billed dark humanoid thing.

I had another lucid dream right after I fell asleep (I think. Time is tricky when you are sleeping.) last night. Awesome.