Unreal WILD(pun) experience! Can you help?

[FinalEx3cution]

Hello everyone! New to DV; this is my first post. Anyway, I've always been interested in lucid dreaming, last night, I experienced something crazy. I have spectacular dream recall, every morning, I wake up and can recall at least 2 of my dreams in vivid detail. With this "ability" I felt lucid dreaming could be easy to pickup. Get comfortable, ya got a lot of reading a head of yah! So, last night, I laid down in bed. I was going to try lucid dreaming with a custom approach, using Mantras. I was falling asleep with this phrase, repeating in my mind, "I will wake up in my dream", repeating this over and over. Eight minutes into me lying still, I feel these weird rushes throughout my body, and I started to lose sense of where my body was (positioning). I knew this was sleep paralysis, so I tried to wiggle my arms and move around a bit to shake it off, as I just wanted to sleep and wake up, not go consciously into the dream world. No matter how much I moved, the sleep paralysis took over my body. My heart was racing so fast, I swear the beating of it was shaking my bed. I started feeling pressure of a million fingers pushing down on all edges off me. Then, it felt like I got pushed back into my bed, and all the sudden I was imaging me being pushed into my bed, but I was seeing it from a very very blurry third person perspective. Maybe an OBE? My heart in my body, I could still feel and my breathing was very very very fast, faster than it's ever been in my life. I was sweating like crazy and everything. This paralysis feeling got so intense, it felt like an extreme psychedelic trip. I started to feel intense vibrations. At this point, my heart was beating so fast, I legitimately feared that I was going to have a heart attack, so I struggled with all my might to come back, I finally did. When I came back to my body, I was sweating, breathing heavy, weak and panicky, and my mouth felt very very weird. Anyway, the reason I fear sleep paralysis so much is because I have a very very strong imagination and a very "powerful" mind. In other words, my dreams are always so vivid and my imagination can do crazy stuff. I really don't want to see all these crazy entities in my room. I know they can't hurt me, and I realize being more scared or expecting them to come makes my subconscious create them, but I can't help it. So my question is, during sleep paralysis, can I keep my eyes closed? Or am I forced to see in my room? I'm fine with having audio hallucinations, it's the visuals that I'm scared about. Secondly, what do I do when I'm in paralysis? How long do I have to wait it out. I have ABSOLUTELY NO problem whatsoever for enter paralysis, I can easily do that at will, it's just when it happens I get so scared and I can't enter a dream, I don't see fragments of a scene or anything. What do I do?

[Oreo]

Typically while you're attempting WILD you're supposed to keep your eyes closed, not open. Closing your eyes might prevent you from experiencing most of the visual hallucinations or make it a lot less creepy. Aside from getting scared by your sleep paralysis, everything you did was right I think. By the time the sensations end you should already be in a dream and do a reality check. I can't really give you much advice on getting rid of your fears. You've already stated the obvious reasons why you shouldn't be afraid. One way I deal with it is to turn fear into anger and challenge myself to get through the sleep paralysis. Hope that makes sense to you.

[FinalEx3cution]

What if I have my iPod right next to me and I have headphones and and I listen to music as I lay on my stomach? Could that drown out the audio hallucinations if I close my eyes? That way I have no hallucinations to scare me out of paralysis and just wait for a connection to the dreamworld? Also, how long should the paralysis last? *Sorry, I'm new to LDing*

[Oreo]

if the songs you play are relaxing and comforting to you it should help. I'm not so sure if closing your eyes and playing music will completely stop the hallucinations though. They're within your head so you would experience them anyways. I believe closing your eyes and playing music will at least distract you from the hallucinations and make them more bearable.

[FinalEx3cution]

Okay, I'm about to go to sleep so I'll try it in a few minutes. I really hate the whole process of conscious paralysis because of the hallucinations, but no matter how vivid my regular dreams are, I never seem to go lucid or realize it's a dream. I only did once in my life, it was when I was watching my body being thrown around by some invisible force in my room. I knew it was a nightmare so I woke myself up. Also, how do you get past your hallucinations, how long do they usually last, and what method do you use?

[Oreo]

I'm sure if you can get your problems with conscious sleep paralysis sorted out you'll be able to lucid dream real easy. Just keep trying and stay confident. Good luck.