Best Ways to Lucid dream

Keeping a dream diary or dream journal is one of the best ways to initiate lucid dreaming. When you write down your dreams on a page, you are forced to remember everything that happens in your dream. Dream journaling helps in recognizing dream signs and enhances your awareness of the dreams. For best results, write down your dream as soon as you wake up as it is easier to forget what happened in the dream after a few hours.

A Wake-Initiated Lucid Dream (WILD) happens when you directly enter a dream from waking life. In this, your mind stays conscious while your body goes to sleep. You will need to lay down and relax until you experience a hallucination that occurs when you are going to sleep. This technique is difficult to learn and execute and takes a lot of practice.

Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dream (MILD) is one of the first techniques for lucid dreaming that has used scientific research. In MILD you make the intention to remember what you are dreaming. Follow these steps for the MILD technique:

Think of a recent dream as you fall asleep.

Identify a “dream sign” or something that is strange in your dream. For example, your ability to fly.

Think about returning to the dream and acknowledge that the dream sign only happens when you are dreaming.

Tell yourself, “The next time I dream, I want to remember that I am dreaming.” Recite this phrase in your head.

Reality checking or reality testing is a form of mental training that increases metacognition by training your mind to notice your own awareness. High metacognition when you are awake leads to higher metacognition when you are dreaming. To do reality testing follow these steps several times a day:

Ask yourself, “Am I dreaming?”

Check your environment to ensure whether you are dreaming or not.

Notice your own consciousness and how you are engaging with your surroundings.

Small details in the dreams are not real and usually absent or twisted such as what the clock shows or what the book or a poster reads. To lucid dream, you need to know that you are in a dream and if you cannot read the words or check the time in the dream, you can tell that it is a dream.

So the question is how to make yourself look at the small details when dreaming. Well, many things we do in a dream come from our imagination, habits, and daily routine. If you read a book or look at the clock 10 times a day you will probably do it in your dream too. Once you notice something that does not happen in the real world, you will know that you are in a dream and you will be able to take control of what is happening in the dream or lucid dream. 

The Wake Back to Bed (WBTB) method involves entering REM sleep when you are still conscious. Follow these steps for the WBTB technique:

Set an alarm for five hours after your bedtime.

Go to sleep at your usual time

When the alarm rings, stay up for 30 minutes and enjoy a quiet activity like reading.

The activity can be anything but it should require your full alertness.

Fall back to sleep.

You are more likely to lucid dream when you fall back to sleep.