The technique of lucid dreams
It is difficult to know how effective certain techniques can be given the unreliable self-reporting nature of data. Studies have shown that there are specific techniques that participants think can work research has shown that you can induce lucid dreams by priming the mind to observe unusual details in your dream to tell yourself that it is not real. More research is being done to know if any of these techniques can trigger a lucid dream.
Lucid dreams occur mostly during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep [3]. In some people, it occurs spontaneously (without the help of any external stimuli). The degree to which a person can alter their dreams vary. Some people wake up when they realize that they have been dreaming while others are able to alter the story within the dream.
These techniques include:
Reality testing
The process of testing reality focuses on persistently testing the reality of the person’s environment throughout their waking day. Some processes include staring at your reflection in the mirror, pushing hard against strong objects, and trying to inhale through a closed nose. The concept behind this is, if you do them enough when you are awake you will do them in your dreams too and when you observe that these tests end differently in your dream state, you become aware that you are dreaming.
Reality testing involves stopping at different times of the day to see whether you are dreaming; people are told to do things that are difficult to do in dreams.