Half-Dreaming

I've been trying to do WILD recently, without much success. I can get to the point where I've lost all sense of my body, besides my breathing and pulse. After that point, however, I slip into these half-dreams. I'm fully lucid, but they're not very interesting. I see things in my mind's eye (not abstract things, but real objects), and they're definitely clearer than just imagining something, but I can still see the blackness that comes with having my eyes closed if I focus on it. I can imagine myself in my half-dream, and control myself, but not the same way I would control my body; if I try to make a movement, I'll wake up. At one point I tried this, got out of bed, reality-checked, and I got some minor eyes open visual hallucinations in low light...I wasn't so much seeing things that weren't there as I was misinterpreting what I saw as real objects, then imagining the details, if that makes any sense.

Anyone know what I'm talking about/have any advice?

I have had some kinds of half dreams, in the period when I'm between being asleep and awake, but I can wake myself up, sometimes I twitch like a bastard because I fell off a cliff in my dream or tripped on something.

I know exactly what you're talking about. It happens to me occasionally, but it doesn't last long. I usually end up banging into something in the half-dream, or falling off of something, and coming fully awake with a jump. The transition makes it feel like I jumped about 2 feet off my bed.

This usually seems to occur when I remain fairly conscious, but let my mind wander. I usually just drift right into that state from some similar thought. If you want to avoid it, try either focusing on one thing when you're falling asleep, or just relaxing. You might also be able to get into a normal dream state from this if you concentrate hard enough, but the brainwave patters might be in the wrong stage. Give it a try, it just might be a good LD technique.

Ha ha ha. That reminds me of when I'm drifing off to sleep, but then i jerk myself awake becuase in my semi-concious state, I feel like I'm about to fall or something... and it's my natural reaction to try to counter act that fall.... hence, the big jerk. And then I lay there feeling so silly for not falling and feeling like I could have.

Sounds like Hypnagogic Imagery...

http://www.pureinsight.org/pi/articles/200...10/21/1172.html

not quite dreaming, really.... since it's NREM sleep.

I would say that you're missing the last step. When I reach that stage I then have to use a trick to really attach myself to the image - so I'm in it not just looking at it. There is a knack to it and its very hard to explain.

eg. I visualise myself reading a book, trying to make the words clearer and clearer. When I can read them, I look up from the book - lucid.

you might just try to step into the image, flow into it or stand up if you visualise yourself as still in bed.

I wish I was better at explaining :(

It seems to me that you're sooo close to having a nice morning lucid dream experience.

in reply to what Soilent Green said: well yes true, this is probably hypnagogic imagery and not quite dreaming really. BUT, it is the perfect entry into lucid dreams in the morning. Sure, they may not always be as good as spontaineous lucid dreams in rem, but they can be and you can sure have a lot of them. Once you are good at this you can have ld's over and over again in the morning, seemingly out of cycle with all rem phases and all that nonsense.

I wouldn't normally write so much, but you are so close and what you said rings a lot of bells. Keep at it and let us know if you get there.

hehehe.. It becomes more interesting if you can control the half-dreaming status. I would not call it hypnogognic imagery, as it is a little deeper then that. The unique thing is.. you can dream while being fully conscious and aware of what is around you. I know this because i've gone into it while sleepwalking, and I can walk around and dream at the same time. Happens in class sometimes.. i just close my eyes and in a few minutes it happens.. yet I am still listening to whatever is being said in class. Teachers hate it, but after they've gotten to know me, they know I kinda half-sleep everywhere, whenever I have nothing to do.

Jeez, that used to happen to me a few times a week, but once I posted about it on another forum, it stopped happenig. (Or so i thought). It happened yesterday, and even though I knew better, my reflexes jerked my leg anyways.

In anycase, I think I'll just try to imagine reading, maybe even making up a story along the way, then finally look up to a lucid dream.

Hypnagogic Imagery like this is so peculiar, since most pleople say it starts with patterns in their eyes. Oh, well.