The best way I’d describe it is that it’s like trying to catch smoke with your bare hands. The moment I try to reach out and grab it to get a better look, it goes away.

That’s an excellent way to describe it.

One of the main starting points for lucid dreaming is remembering your dreams

And that right there is why I never got into lucid dreaming, luckily on a normal wake I don’t remember much of my dreams… when I started writing them down and remembering them I realised how often I’m having horrible dreams. Like, I’ve died in my dreams multiple times, though I always come back as something else (like the time a demon chopped me up and boiled me, and I came back as crisps, or the time I fell off a cliff then came back as a big red bird).

Thanks for these tips, will give me a good excuse to read to my niece next time I visit :)