I have yet to experience a LD, but recently, the last few seconds of my dream, I have realized that I am in a dream, and I’ve been able to try and figure out where I am, only to wake up a few seconds later. Is this just natural for someone in the first stages of waking up, or is this a sign of getting closer to lucidity?
You probably got excited. This can knock you out of lucidity or wake you up. Just try to be calm. Do some focusing exercises like spinning or staring at your hand or something. This web site has other suggestions, I think. Once I got excited and I thought, “Wait. Don’t go.” And I thought “focus” and everything became sharp and clear again. I know it’s a really exciting thing, but keep your cool as best you can so you can hang onto it.
if you realized it was a dream while you were still inside the dream then you’ve just experienced lucidity (however brief it was)
so you’re not getting close to lucidity, you’ve achieved it… now you gotta work on holding on to it.
p.s. i live in raleigh too, i go to state 
I feel like both can happen:
Either you wake up and therefore realize that it was a dream, or you realize it was a dream and therefore wake up.
I don´t have anything to back this up, it´s just from my own experience.
tapir
Nearly all my nightmares end like that. I shake myself awake almost like a reflex. If only I stopped and thought about it first.
Yeah, it was definitely that I woke up BECAUSE I realized I was dreaming.
Heh, so techically I’ve been lucid! Sweet. So you’re exactly right, I just gotta keep it longer now.
btw, I go to cardinal gibbons high school (i’m a junior), which is pretty close to state, you probably know where it is (right behind the rbc center).
i was out that way tonight going to the state game, small world