Usually if i sense my stability/lucidity shaking, i drop everything and just focus on a small piece of my dreamscape. That is all that occupies my thoughts. I want to see it in detail (because its fading) and almost immediately it ‘focuses’ into detail. Think ‘zoom focus’ on a digital camera - its just like that! (at least for me) Once this has happened, im usually good to go. The general feel of the dream strengthens accordingly.
Looking at my hands seems to help me too (though it did not in the beginning for some reason), in the same detail fashion (though on an interesting note, my hands are still a little ‘blurry’ and are ALWAYS bright, which is probably why they seem a little blurry cuz im being slightly blinded by them.) Hehe yeah, i never really thought about what my hands looked like (always focusing just on if it helps my stability or not), they are bright!..weird
I havent really tried spinning or rubbing my hands enough to see if its personally effective. I think the one time (?) that i tried spinning, i woke (not being used to the dreamscape ‘clear’ that happened to me). The time i tried rubbing my hands, that worked in the sense that it helped solidify my ‘physical’ orientation in the dream.
Tough to decide on the ‘best’ one… I normally do a few things.
I’d settle on verbal commands perhaps.
They have an amazing visual effect on my LDs… a forcefield of green crackling energy grows outwards from me and stabilises the world around me.
I use a variety of techniques I made up myself. In one, I just imagine that as the dream gets blurrier and begins to fade that I’m just looking in a dirty mirror or window and turn around or wipe it off. It works pretty well, as long as I was extremely lucid to begin with. Another is under the same circumstances, I’ll just reach out and flip a ‘lightswitch’ and all of the lights in the dreams turn on at once and everything regains clarity. This one’s easier when I’m not as lucid. Other than that, I just try to ‘juggle’ topics. I make sure that I never focus on one thing specifically (like holding some thing you’re juggling) for too long, so that I don’t ‘drop’ the rest. I just make sure that I keep looking around and noticing new things in the environment to prevent the dream from loosing clarity. Really, when you think about it, the major reason people loose lucidity is because they’re convinced that they can’t stop it, so once you realize you can it becomes much easier.
I use only spinning if my LD starts to fade away. Although in few recent LDs i have not troubled myself much about the idea how much i can do in LD before it fades away, and just enjoyed my adventure in the dream. So both times i didn’t need to spin myself during the whole long dream. When the dream ended it ended within a moment, so i didn’t had time to stabilize it anymore.
But basically i use spinning pretty much in average LD.
I used to spin and rub my hands, and it often worked. But I think this was because I’d read that it would work. It doesn’t work very well now, and I find the best way is to do an RC, what I do is stick my hand into an object in front of me and the dream stabalizes.
i did something interesting a few nights ago, which made my LD last for a long time.
I kept going from high lucidity to low on purpose. i became lucid then did a few things then didn’t do much i just let my dream carry on like a ND but keeping conscious, i then went back into high lucidity and back out and so on. It was interesting because while it was low lucidity i just watched my dream unfold as i wasn’t controlling my actions then when I wanted kept getting full control.
As half of the LD was watching the dream unfold it told a story like ND
I speak with dream people about lucidity or something interesting. I may be cutting myself short of more fun activities but it is very useful in that it allows your mind to get used to the very awkward state of mind that is lucidity. It pays off very well in the long run
The longest dream I ever had was due to falling asleep in my ND. Effectively, I had a full length ND, followed by an LD, followed by the ND as I returned to it. I’ve tried spinning, but in my case I always end up in almost complete blackness, normally with only one or two objects visible. Is it perhaps that I’m not quite sure where I’m ‘spinning’ too? I guess its better to aim for a very familiar setting, as opposed to something your mind doesn’t know - for some reason I prefer going into space ships, in those situations - not something my mind can easily picture me in, I guess!
I’ve used spinning and focusing and although spinning has been way more effective for me, I usally only remember to focus for some reason. It does the job though to be fair, it’s just spinning is generally more effective. The downside of spinning though is it usually breaks up the continuity of the dream by sending me to a new location or ‘restarting’ the scenario. Focusing allows me to carry things on but is less effective.
I use all of them, really. If I’m looking at something, I’ll try to stay aware. If I’m walking somewhere, I’ll spin around while rubbing my hands. They only give me a few extra seconds, but they feel like they would work well if I would stop getting so excited and waking myself up.
Focusing my awareness works best for me. Though my trouble isn’t with becoming or staying lucid–it’s waking up! False awakenings and deja vu follow me everywhere–but I’m not complaining–I love lding every night.
I never loose it, but they thing to do is focus on the fact that it is in reality, just a dream. Basically, when you go to sleep register in your head that you are going to sleep not forcing yourself into sleep, if you dont it gives you a clearer though to mind. I find that finding a comfortable position helps alot with the sleeping, or even placing part of your body in the cold of your room makes me concentrate on it, once that feelings gone and im not in bed I know im not in a dream and can do and feel as I please.
