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I don't normally "try" to have lucid dreams but it seems like I'll have them 5 or 6 times per year as a residual effect of having worked at having them in the past.

I also normally don't listen to music while going to sleep, but over the last week I've started to listen to meditation type stuff through my MP3 player (so it doesn't keep my wife awake) while falling to sleep.

So last night before falling to sleep I listened to a meditation cd (Baird Hersey - Waking the Cobra) before drifting off to sleep and had a lucid dream.  I just downloaded this CD yesterday so it was the first time I'd listened to it, so I figure I'll try it again for the next few nights and see what happens - was actually wanting to see if meditation music while falling asleep would increase frequency of AP.

Anyway, the lucid dream - or what I remember of it - was fairly short.  I was showing my 11-year-old daughter the inside of the house where I grew up.  In the dream my Mom still lived there, but after exploring several rooms it occured to us that the house was entirely empty and not lived in - no furniture, etc.  When I was showing my daughter the closet where there is access to the attic it it occurred to me that I was dreaming (the "Aha!" realization - I've noticed that my childhood house shows up occasionally in my dreams and I've made a note to watch for that as an indication that I'm dreaming, and it apparently worked).

So, I turned and mentioned to my daughter - the mood between us seemed lighthearted and funny and I said, "Don't you think it's kind of strange that this house is completely empty?  Do you know why that is?" She didn't and I explained to her that we were dreaming and proved it to her by putting my arm through a wall.  I had her try it too and then I asked what else she wanted to do (this being as far as I knew her first lucid dream and all) - did she want to float up and out of the house?  did she want to fly somewhere, etc?  But she was a little reluctant - and that's the last I remember of the dream.

It's funny that I realized I was dreaming, but wasn't lucid enough to key into the fact that it wasn't *really* my daughter, but rather just a character in my dream.

I'm curious to hear others experiences on how much of your identity you seem to retain while out of body.

Most of my obes begin with me projecting to RTZ, and once I'm out of my body I almost always begin with a few common thoughts.  First I almost always think something to the effect of "Good!  I'm out again!"  and after that I usually remember to try to increase my lucidity, and I usually think something like, "What should I do know?" or "Now, what was it I was going to try to do?"

I'm clearly aware that I'm "me" and that I'm out of body again, and I think back to plans I had made in the physical regarding what to do or where to go.  However, it strikes me as very interesting that beyond that, I seem to take very little of my identity with me.  My name, my job, what I did yesterday or will do tomorrow, what day of the week it is, etc. - these things never cross my mind.  Although I might see my wife there in bed, or pass my kids' rooms, they don't enter my thoughts beyond that.

In short, although I am "me", I am pretty darn detached from anything having to do with my normal, physical existence.   It seems that although I am conscious of my existence and am operating based on my "will" I seem to have left most of my ego / identity behind.

So, who exactly am I, when I'm out-of-body?  

Curious to hear others experiences and thoughts on the subject.

On several occasions I've recollected an AP upon waking that occurred during a dream.  These APs seem the same as others that didn't involve dreaming, but were they a real AP or just a dream?  Here's an example:

Last night, upon waking, I recollected the following:  I was having a dream about being in a church with my wife and some others.  It was time for bed and I was tired and so I went into a bedroom in the church to sleep.  I was a bit annoyed that my wife, instead of coming with me, chose to stay up with the others.  I drifted off to sleep and the next thing I know I woke to vibrations (was I really having vibrations or dreaming I was having them?) and I sat up and out of my body and floated out to where my wife and several others were having a conversation in the church.  I floated into the middle of their group and they saw something and began freaking out a bit.  I tried to explain that it was just me but they apparently couldn't recognize that it was me and couldn't hear me.  I figured I had better go get back in my body and straighten the situation out with them.  I went back to my body and woke up.

That's all I remember and I don't remember whether I woke up in the dream or for real in my bed.  

So, did I actually AP or just dream of it?  And is it possible to wake up (in real life) and then AP back into a situation you were just dreaming about?

Curious if anyone else has these types of experiences?

I'm new to OBEs (3 in last 2 months).  Last night I spent 45 minutes in a mind-awake/body-asleep type of state and experienced a variety of internal sensations and thought for sure that I would OBE, but the vibrations never came, so I let it go.  A few hours later I woke up and decided to try again.

While trying I drifted off to sleep and saw an aluminum extension ladder going from an inner courtyard/entry way up to the second floor of a building.  I was "under" the ladder and I could see three numbers spaced across one of the lower rungs of the ladder. The # on the left was a "5" and I knew that this meant that I could have an OBE by walking up the ladder, but the number on the right was a "2" and because it was lower than the other number this somehow indicated to me that while I *could* OBE the "conditions weren't right". (At the time I knew what the middle number meant, but I can't remember now)  Anyway, I was a bit disappointed but figured that if the conditions weren't right I wouldn't do it.  But then the right hand number morphed into a "6" and I remember thinking, "Okay, - that's good enough for me!".

I went around to the front of the ladder and climbed up. While I climbed I tried to figure out whether I was out of my body and at some point I concluded, "yes, I'm out - it worked".  (In retrospect I think this was a lucid dream and not an OBE since I don't remember seperating from my body). When I reached the top of the ladder I was on a flat surface in total darkness.  I demanded "clarity now!" and "awareness now!" (tip from William Buhlman books) several times until I could see.  I was in what appeared to be a large vacant office space - no partitions.

I saw a woman who looked like an office worker sort of moving towards me, but she was flashing on and off kind of like a strobe light effect - I was a little wary of her since I'm new to this.  I began walking toward the other end of the floor.  At one point a middle-aged woman kind of "got in my face" and I tried asking her who she was and what she represented, but I had a lot of difficulty getting the words out (as if my voice was paralyzed).  When I got to the end of the floor I looked out the windows onto the street below.  There was a secretary type woman at a desk and another woman with a baby came out of a nearby office, apparently casually interested in what I was doing there.

Suddenly I remembered that I had put a playing card in my family room for OBE verification purposes and I got really excited about taking a look at it.  I kind of ran/skipped back to the other end of the floor, passing a middle-aged, balding businessman in a suit on the way.  I came to a bank of elevators and took one down to the ground floor and went out onto the sidewalk.  Never mind that I didn't know where I was or how to get to my family room.  It was kind of wet/drizzly out and in retrospect I think the location was the mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles.  I remember being confident that I was going to find the card and objectively verify the OBE, but was also a little concerned that the experience might not last long enough.  As I started walking down the street I awoke back in my body.

Nothing particular remarkable about the contents of the experience except that I thought the ladder mechanism was an interesting was to obtain lucidity.

Vibes are usually proportional to my level of awareness. If you can get more vibes, always do it before trying to project or do telekinesis or telepathy.