Feeling apprehensive about lucid dreaming

I have never lucid dreamed before. I have been interested in it for years and have made multiple attempts to keep dream journals, but have always faltered after a few weeks or so. For the last few months I have been writing in my dream journal maybe 3 - 4 times a week, which is better than nothing for me. I have a problem with willpower.

Anyway, I have been reading Stephen LaBerge’s book, and it has resinspired to really give it all I’ve got this time. I have been listening to a lucid dreaming podcast and reading over my old dream journals to try and acquaint myself with that part of my brain again.

The issue is, I get to a point where I can feel I’m on the edge… before I even fall asleep. It’s like I know it’s going to happen, I can just feel it. (I’d be interested to know if anyone else gets this feeling). As I lie there in my bed, instead of feeling the excitement and curiosity I usually do about lucid dreaming, I get… apprehensive. Anxious.

It’s something to do with the decoupling from reality and the infinitude of possible scenarios my mind can create (what if it’s a bad one?) that gets me nervous. That’s one part.

The other part is I’m afraid of sleep paralysis. I’ve only had it once in my life and it was terrifying. It sort of happened again last night though, I think I did wake up to sleep paralysis a few times, although they were short and there was no hallucinations. I slepped nervous and restlessly.

It seems like when I’m on the verge of slipping into lucidity, I wake myself up into paralysis. I don’t want that to happen. It really terrifies me.

And there’s one more thing… I feel like in (waking) life I am very… reserved. I feel like I have ignored the dark parts of my psyche, mainly from my childhood, and I have done a good job at it. I never truly, truly express myself. I’m in a pretty dark place in my life, in some ways. When I am falling asleep, half conscious, and nervous about sleep paralysis, I get terrible visions. Nightmare visions. Like a creepy monster laughing (haha it sounds innocent but it’s one of those things, you gotta be there, ya know?). I think it’s my shadow, or neglected feelings coming up… If I just don’t think about dreams and browse reddit on my phone until I pass out, this doesn’t happen. But I don’t want to live like that.

If I could just add something else. If I could try and find a metaphor for the feeling I get when I’m about to plunge into lucidity (but as of yet have not) it would be like this:

floating in space at the mouth of an enormous black hole. I feel like once I go through it I am going to feel so alive, and understand so much. It’s like I can feel the electricity flowing through me. It’s like I’ve been so wrong about so many things and through that door is everything I’ve been ignorant of, in denial about, afraid of. It’s like through that door, there’s no more fucking around. In life things are what they are. Whatever there is, there is. I feel like that’s all about to be proved to me. Absolutely terrifying with a hint of excitement. But really… i’m scared. I’m scared to go to sleep tonight.

Thanks for reading if you got this far.

Very interesting post Saturday7
I feel empathy for how you feel there, because I’ve been there myself, so let me share my experience, I hope it can make you feel more positive about all this.

Learning LD has been easy, light and pleasant for me. From the beginning my LDs have been positive, rewarding, wonderful experiences.
In retrospect, most likely because that’s how I expected them to be. The fact is, your SC feelings are king there, and you get exactly what you expect.

So here it comes my first suggestion: first of all, think to LD as your private VR, a pleasant playground, where only wonderful and positive things can happen to you, and that is what you will get.
Leave aside stuff like merging with the darker part of your personality or overcoming nightmares or finding your true self.
I am not inventing anything new here, as this is also LaBerge suggestion

As for how you feel about it:

Very well expressed !
I have been feeling the same when I read Robert Monroe accounts of his OBE.
I was on the edge of accepting that as a possibility or rejecting it, on the brink of wanting to attempt it, but feeling scared to death to do so.
More accounts I read (Robertson, …), more my curiosuty grew, but anxiety growing with it.

Then the brave part of myself won, and I started several serious attempts at having my first OBE - you can read them in my DJ, I think my contrasting emotion at that time is clear there…

And, after few successful attempts, I know I have chosen well.
Later on, after several OBEs, I can tell you they have become another way to live wonderful adventures, although I consider them happening in a subjective, and not objective environment

So my second advice is: change your feeling to being in front of the entrance of a colorful, playful theme park, 10,000 times the size of any you have been at before, just need to pay some entry ticket. Go to the cash desk, pay it and have fun !