more effective reality check

i’ve been doing the reality check where i count my fingers to see if i have five. and two days ago i did this RC all day every thirty minutes and i did it yesterday also. i’ve done the RC in my dreams but i just dismiss it like “that cant be” (when i count six fingers on the same hand) because everything is just so real i accept i have a thought that goes like this in the dream "i see that i counted my fingers wrong but all of this is too real this is definitely waking life " its just not clicking yet that im in a dream. Whats another really good RC i can do i’ve always tried putting my finger through my hand. What other RC’s can i do that are really effective besides the reading text and reading watches?

pinch your nose and breath its a really cool feeling and a good rc
also if you ever, EVER have any doubt about a rc do follow up rcs like putting a hand through a wall looking in a mirror (always reflects wrong) or try to make something appear! (usually doesnt work in rl)

I tried the finger through your hand thingy RC in one of my LD’s (the last one actually). It didn’t work for me very well… it was something like pink light in my hands and they combined each other - this lasted only a second. Still, it didn’t work.

Dreamscape_Awakener, in dreaming life you usually also have 5 fingers, just like IRL, because you expect it to be that way and it is that way :wink:.

Pinching to see if it hurts and covering your nose and try to breathe are the best :smile:

Instead of counting your fingers, you could take a closer look at them. In my dreams I usually have 5 fingers, but they are bended and twisted in a way that would certainly hurt a lot in walking life.
The nose pinch works very well either, but I just can’t to remember to do it when I’m in a ND (so for me it only works when I suspect I’m dreaming)

For a more effective reality check, you have to first of all become aware as possible. Really get in touch with your 5 senses, your REALITY.

My favorite reality check is to take a little jump. In reality, I come down with a heavy thump. In dreams, I can come down slowly, float, fly, or just be aware of the unusually soft landing. I would say it is the most effective reality check. You can try it right now, by jumping up and down while being very observant with how the gravity feels. In dreams, gravity is not reliable.

I faced a similar problem in dreams. After a year or so of lucid dreaming, my dream self eventually always had the correct, REAL number of fingers. Sometimes I had to go and count my toes. After this all failed, I decided to pursue more RCs.

Plugging my nose and trying to breathe through it is pretty darn effective for me. :wink:

It happens because you just do your RCs without thinking.
You need to really question reality!

Even when you are absolutely sure you are awake, you should do it like you expect it to be a dream.

So, always question reality and expect the RC to work (indicating that it’s a LD)

If you do it like that, any RC should work.
Also, effectiveness is subjective.
What’s effective for someone, might be ineffective for someone else.
I hope this helps :smile:

Definitely follow up with another RC if one doesn’t work the other one probably will.
Some RCs stop bing effective, but I agree with Six, the jumping one works. I always use falling as a 2nd RC in my dreams, for some reason just doing an RC when dreaming, even if it doesn’t work somehow makes me question “reality” then I just do the falling trick. I have thought quite often in the dream, “Boy if this is reality this is gonna hurt!” LOL

Counting fingers work perfectly for me. Before that i used finger through hand but never succeeded and when i first counted my fingers in my dream i had my first LD.

Tonight i had to repeat it 3 times to convince myself that i didn’t count wrong :razz: I don’t think the RC is your problem, you just have dismissed it as “I’ve counted wrong” or something. I had to count them 3 times tonight as i said, the first 2 times i thought i counted wrong.

I had an interesting dream just this morning. after a false awakening, I stood up next to my bed and tried to fly but i just stayed there. My mom asked me what i was doing and i said, “seeing if I’m dreaming. I know it’s not a dream right now. If i was dreaming i would be able to fly though.” Its crazy how REAL dreams are it just amazes me I ACTUALLY thought i was in waking life and not dreaming. I cant wait to get LUCID in my dream. Especially after you realize i missed all these dream signs and its all so real.

This, this, this. A million times this.

You always need to TRULY question your environment and senses even when awake.

The nose-plugging RC is the way to go, if you ask me. It’ll never tell you you’re dreaming when you’re not, and it’ll almost never tell you you’re not dreaming when you actually are. Sometimes I’ll try in a dream and it won’t work at first, but if I try it a few times and believe I’ll be able to breathe, it never fails. The sensation is so unmistakable that it’s relatively easy to train yourself to go, “Okay, well, I guess I MUST be dreaming!” It’s also quick, discrete, and not dependent on other objects.

Changing text is good too, though. Like the nose-plugging RC, it’ll never give you a false positive, and false negatives are pretty rare. Text doesn’t like to stay the same in a dream. I’ll usually do the nose-plugging first and then find something to read, just to make sure. What makes these RCs so great is the fact that they’re based more on the very nature of dreaming, rather than on abilities that may or may not manifest in any given dream. Obviously, if I can fly, it’s a dream, but if I CAN’T fly, it could just be a dream in which I’m having trouble flying. Not as reliable, IMO.

I wouldn’t use the ‘trying to fly’ as RC, because many people can’t fly the first time they are lucid. It’s more effective to try pulling your legs up and seeing if you can float instead (or just try to breath though your noise while pinching it).

Edit: Datameister beat me to it :grin:

I could say exactly the same about counting fingers. But believing you’re not having 5 fingers instead of believing you can breath of course :smile: