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I've been playing around with WILD lately, in an admittedly casual matter. This was at 01:00 this morning, as I just got in bed. The method was: Breathe through nose (difficult since (a) I breathe through my mouth usually when sleeping and (b) my sinuses are worse for wear), counting each breath, and accompanying each exhale with the mnemonic 'dream'.
Below is a 'timetable', relative to breath number, of my experiences with it.
0-50 Nothing, approaching calm
60 A change of contrast in the black-green-purple haze that is my minds eye. The beginning of both loss of sensitivity in my left arm and involuntary movements in the entire right side of my body (I have right-sided hemiplegia, so this assymetry did not surprise me)
80 Involuntary movements in right hand becoming much more pronounced; full fledged gripping motions start to occur. Sense of an impending event.
100 The bed starts wobbling slightly. The left arm is not there anymore; the hand is though.
120-140 At last, something of note. A great pressure is exerted on me from above; I feel pushed some way into the bed. As if I am buried under some rubble. I feel afraid, but this a common sympton, and I try to seperate myself from it.
150 My body just 'hangs' there. The pressure lifts. My counting is becoming more confused; faster. My minds eye, which is usually just 'static' of dull lime green and dusk pink/purple dots, starts forming flowing shapes. That diminish down into the centre of my vision. The depth of my view is suddently more that 0, but still quite shallow.
150-200 Intermittent periods of eye movement, 'shuddering' vision, nausea, fear, apprehension and changes in gravity and direction.
210 What can I say? Whoa!!! I know about REM. I know everyone does it in their sleep. But this was proper REM and I was conscious. It felt like an earthquake in my eyes sockets. The next sensaation was sudden and not at all slight: it felt like I was rushing towards some centre point in my 'vision' extremely fast. Both speed and distance seemed infinite. I am really apprehensive now, and I (stupidly!) fear what may follow.
250+ The rushing feeling has subsided some time ago, and all is calm. This was not meant to happen, I tell myself. I have failed, I tell myself. I breathe a few more times, then give up. I might be in a dream. Let's see. My clock looks funny. Ah, it's at an angle, that's why. I try more RCs that return 'positive'. Damn!
Tenacious as I rarely am, I try all over again.
0-120 Nothing.
120-150 The body starts moving slowly upwards both in the Y and Z axes, as if I'm on an elevator.
1?? I lose count and start at 160 again.
180 The minds eye starts creating tunnels of various geometric properties, all of the green and purple shades that are staple for me (and for everyone else, I presume?).
220? This where it starts getting really interesting. I've heard of hypnogogic images. Not sure if these are thee same, but I will describe them below.
After a boring 200 or so breaths, suddenly (and I mean suddenly!) a field of bright green grass appears. Above it is a deep blue sky. But this pales into disinterest as the centrepiece, a potato shaped dark orange sun rises above the horizon. On it: my face. My eyes are bright lights of voilet, piercing my vision. The face changes, sometimes my own; sometimes other generic faces, sometimes skulls and other vaguely humanoid variants. It is a recurring dynamic image.
My vision begins to flicker.
Skulls of stone appear, and a vast, lavish 17th century hall. Images of dandy fellows dressed in 17th century garb, but with no heads. They are sitting desks, quill at hand, but are perfectly still.
More of the potato boy, and counless other images, some forgettable, appear in my mind. And then the most vibrant of them all -
An image of the inside of a ruined temple, in perfect sepia, except for the rich tones of a huge but short length of dark purple ribbon floating above the groun. The image stays there for a while. Back to potato boy and the headless men, but then suddenly back to the ribbon, and lo! the ribbon bursts into many smaller ribbons that float there too. A sudden rush is felt as the ribbon splits, and it really took me by suprise.
270 In RL, a large gust of wind causes the house to creak, making me (in the vulnerable state I was) jump and utterly ruining my WILD.
350+ I give up. It's 5 o' clock already! Damn.
I didn't have a good night's sleep overall.
So, very interesting! I will definately try it again.
What do you all think of it? Apologies for length (girth, etc. :wink: )
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you almost made it from the sounds of it, if ya didn't move ya might have been put into a dream.
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Very cool. I think I will start doing a few 'counting logs' just to get an idea. I usually do "1 I'm dreaming, 2 I'm dreaming, etc". I sometimes find myself reciting something totally different, and losing count. It's kind of funny to see you get scrambled up counting by the initial stages of sleep.
