Hi, first time starting a discussion here so, I'm a bit nervous. I don't know if the topic has been brought up in the forums before, so I apologize if it has, but, I've been reflecting on my past lucid dreams and noticed that my brain sometimes stalls when I want something to happen. I'll provide some examples first.
Example 1 - my second ever lucid dream. It started with 3 false awakenings (waking up in the dream, realizing it was a dream, getting too excited, repeat) before I was able to actually do anything. Me, being (and still am) a noobie to lucid dreaming, starts flying (on my second attempt) and I remember dream goals that I have set in mind. I create a portal (also on my second try, this whole dream required what I have nicknamed the "flip it" approach where I have to just stop caring about everything) and, in my mind, think of where I want to go. I fly into the portal and it's probably the most "you tried" results ever as, instead of being 3d in a realistic world, it's in a 2d video game and I wasn't even the character I wanted to be. I was someone close to the character I wanted (in terms of personality) and I was technically in a setting that I could have been in (if it wasn't a 2d video game).
Example 2 - probably my longest lucid dream. I have had a few in between this dream and the example above, so, I would think I would be a little bit more experienced. To cut things short (though something at the beginning was super interesting in terms of what happened), I had gone to a concert for my favorite band. It was in a small-ish building in a town near me. I went in and found out it was an album launch concert. Cool! I wait around while they set up and the timer for when it'll start keeps getting pushed back. I start getting a bit anxious and talk to my friend beside me, but, it keeps getting pushed back. I wake up with the concert not even starting.
In the first example, I consider it stalling since I basically threw my brain into another direction than it had be intended to do (false awakening, probably was going to be a dream about being in my house if I hadn't noticed it was a dream). In the second example, my brain kept stalling as it probably couldn't come up with a new song in an instant, pushing the timer farther and farther back. I find these two dreams frustrating as I was so close to actually doing/experiencing something I wanted to in a dream than just following the dream plot only half aware. Is this a common occurrence for anyone else and is there a way to kind of "cure" this? Does it start to fade once more experience is gained or is it something that we have to learn to manage? I apologize if this isn't coherent enough or has been explained/answered before, but, I thought it was an interesting topic just for discussion in general!
I don't have a ton of experience myself, but I often seem to need two tries to get something done! Like my first attempt to turn a cupboard door into a portal – I opened the door and only saw the cupboard with the usual stuff behind it, but on my second attempt, it actually worked. And I'm also prone to false awakenings. Wow, that was a lot of dream control in your second lucid!
I think this thread will be useful to several people, so thank you for creating it!
As always, please don't take my input as anything other than personal theories, as I still have limited experience with this type of dream control. With that disclaimer out of the way, the very first thing I thought about while reading your post was that this may be a result of a combination of (slightly) negative expectation and not yet having had a lot of experience (and, consequently, training) with dream control? Also, would you say you were quite lucid in these dreams? If not, perhaps stopping to ground yourself before attempting a scene shift might be a good idea?
If you haven't watched it yet, you may find the following video useful, as Love here touches on this aspect of dream control:
I'll also link to another one of his VR videos that I feel may be relevant here:
Learn Lucid Dreaming in Virtual Reality (360 VR) - DREAM SCENE SHIFT / SHIFTING REALITY