Well I'm older 70. Been having lost car, bike, keys dreams for I suppose a couple years. Being a serious about developing lucid dreaming I'm trying to figure out how to get lucid when these dreams happen. The authors of LD books give you some techniques. One is to look at your hands or rub them together. In this way you realize it's a dream. Also I think we don't recognize it as a dream because we are conditioned to think of dreams as only foggy things of the imagination and not at all capable of happening in a world as real and solid as this one. So when yr in one of those very real dreams you don't think of it as a dream but normal everyday reality.

Then fear could come into play. as in I don't want to realize this is a dream because I don't know what might happen to me-so the subconscious blocks the realization. So if we can somehow reinforce the fact that dreams can exist in a real world just not this one that might help us to become more lucid. And like you say nothing bad can actually happen because you're going to wake up anyway.

And if you're quite lucid you can just ignore the dream scenery and people and say things like "hey dream show me something good for me to know" or "hey dream take me to Paris" or hey dream what can I do to heal my bad back?" How about "hey dream give me a great piece of music I can play on my piano" or show me a great picture I can draw that will bring in some good money. Or 'hey dream how can we solve this problem at work?" or "hey dream send love to that person I'm having a hard time with."

The unscene presence behind the dream is connected to universal knowledge. thx for your interest in my post. Keep in touch if you have any other ideas. Robert Waggoner is recommended.