Questions about Taoist dream practice

I own the audio course and have questions. Michael stated that the dream practice can be used by anyone from any path. My questions are:

1) Are the healing sounds absolutely necessary in order for the dream practice to work?

2) How does one stay in the conscious dream state? I keep waking up within 10 – 30 seconds of realizing that I’m in a dream. This has always been the case with the me and I’ve had like 30 lucid dreams in my life. There have only been a few that lasted more than five minutes. It’s depressing that I wake up so quick. Can someone tell me why this is and how I can “fix” this so that I can actually stay in my lucid dreams?

Thanks.