Where to go from here, hypnagogic state?

**ImNewHere** · 07-14-2014 02:05 AM

I often attempt lucid dreaming and have had some success but not as much as I would like. I practice waking up and falling back asleep. Sometimes this leads to sleep paralysis and possibly a hypnagogic state but im not entirely familiar with that. What happens is I am laying in my bed, (sometimes I feel numb and sometimes I don't) I feel vibrations and start to hear things like voices. I have seen things in this state as well that are often quite scary. My heart starts to pump faster as well. I feel myself falling deeper and deeper (if you will) and I can't move. I feel like I am so close to activating a lucid dream but I never achieve it, I usually wake up shortly after. Is this the hypnagogic state or just sleep paralysis? Any tips on how to take more control?

**LolaTheLoner** · 07-14-2014 02:37 AM

This sounds like sleep paralysis to me, which still falls under a hypnagogic state.

To clarify, most people do not experience sleep paralysis when they are trying to WILD, but go through REM atonia as normal. Sleep paralysis is less common and causes one to be caught in between sleep and waking.

When I'm trying to transition from SP to a dream, I often visualize myself rolling out of the bed and into the floor. Normally this results in rolling straight of of SP and into the dream. I used to think that if I just lay in SP long enough, a dream would eventually come on its on. This did not prove to be true. Instead, I would just be stuck there in sleep paralysis for ages with nothing to do. So some sort of visualization is the key to taking control here.