Lucid Dreams

I've had flying dreams, many times, and the swimming-underwater-and-realizing-I-could-breathe-down-there dreams, but I have tried for years to induce lucid dreams, and I never have been able to do it.
 
I started lucid dreaming in my early twenties. It started because I wanted to remember more of my dreams. A friend advised me to say to myself as i was falling asleep, "tonight when I dream, I will remember to wake and record the dream"- like a little meditation. I kept a notebook beside the bed. After a week it started to happen and I would write down the dream and try to understand the meaning in the morning. Sometimes it was just gibberish, but in time I got better at remembering and writing something understandable.

I don't keep the journal anymore and find it very easy to influence the course of my dreams. Sometimes I decide to just end them, other times I will take an active part and react to events.

My favorite flying dream is to be an owl and fly at night around the farm I lived on as a child.
 
There are several books written on the subject of lucid dreaming, so you can look it up. The other way is to set it in your mind before you go to sleep to 'remember' and 'be aware'. It isn't an automatic given that it will happen. It means you will need to continue with it.
 
Bump. I'm honestly shocked this isn't a skill more interested in being learned among a site full of horny men.

I've wanted to do this for the longest time, but also forgot about it the longest time.

Some night in the late 2000s, one night winging it, just knowing the definition of what it meant I willed myself into having one as I was falling asleep. That night I started dreaming and was aware I was dreaming, briefly, before I got excited and woke up. All I managed to make happen was starting in this blank dreamspace kind of, it looked like it does when your eyes are shut. But, it was beginning of the real thing, that I'm sure of.

Fast-forward like 16 years or something.

I've started actually following a few advised steps like dream journaling (well, Notes app) since a few nights back to train recall (that's going well so far - too well - last night/morning I woke up from dreaming semi vividly a few times). I've started counting my fingers at random intervals time I remember, trying to imagine I'm in a dream, checking if they look normal.

I was too tired last night even though I tried, but the night before, I got dream consciousness and a moment or two of control (kind of just to rewind a bit) but nothing meaningful. Eventually I chose to wake up 'cause I knew like nah, it's not happening properly this time. But this was before last night and today starting to do reality check at points throughout the day which apparently helps.

I feel like I'm already kinda close with this, like I'm maybe a natural. I'm having a break tonight to hopefully catch up on sleep, but hopefully if I keep the topic on my mind in general, keep journaling and doing reality checks, I can actually do this properly (like not just be dream-conscious but start controlling some things) sometime soon or eventually :relieved:.
 
Random things I actually would like to do in these dreams that I've heard of people doing (besides sex stuff which goes without saying - although TBH, I actually think getting too good at 'dream sex' could be quite bad for you, akin to porn addiction or neglecting the want for real connection and so I'd even practice moderation there) if I got good enough at controlling things.

- Tell myself to spawn my physically ideal man, just to see what that looks like. Or my ideal of many things of which there are countless varieties and options.
- Tennis practice. It's my sport lol. One probably couldn't practice everything, but I have no doubt I could probably practice the basic swings assuming the ball would be coming back with a decent level of monotony like real life.
- Make my subconscious take a form of a person (or even animal or something, lol) and ask questions about myself.
- See deceased people from my past, and also real people (living or dead) I don't know personally but fascinate me.
- Shift into animals (including flying things, but TBH I'm more interesting in like taking the form of a bird or something and flying rather than just flying as myself).
- Dangerous stuff (sky dive, motorsports etc.)