My first (terrifying) attempt at a WILD lucid dream

When I first discovered lucid dreams, I was impatient to have my first one, and immediately searched the internet for "how to have a lucid dream tonight guaranteed." What I discovered was the WILD lucid dream. The article I read through instructed the dreamer to lay down in a position that was comfortable, but not so comfortable that the person would instantly drop off to sleep. Eagerly I hurried to bed. I chose to sleep on my back with my arms by my sides. I laid in bed for what seemed like a long time. Then a pleasant drowsiness washed over me. Dim kaleidoscopic patterns began playing across my vision, even though my eyes were closed. Simultaneously, my body began overwhelmed with strong vibrations, like I was encased in an extra powerful massaging chair! A loud buzzing filled my ears! I was terrified! The article I had read earlier hadn't mentioned any of this! I was only eleven when this happened; you can imagine how frightened I was! I vaulted out of bed and ran to cuddle with my mother before anything else happened.
The reason I am starting this thread is because I am wondering if, in reality, I was headed in the right direction. Truthfully, I was 80% sure at the time, that I was being possessed, and I have never dared to attempt a WILD dream again. Is this strange experience actually good and normal? If you are experienced with WILD lucid dreams, I would greatly appreciate it if you could share some of your wisdom with me. Thank you very much for reading my post. I hope you didn't find it too droll. Please have a lovely afternoon.
~Caroline Clementina

You were headed in the right direction and were doing everything correctly. Really impressive for a first try!

Your strange experience was perfectly good and normal. Your strange experiences were examples of hypnagogic hallucinations. Many times, you will experience these if you're conscious during the transition between being awake and dreaming. Funny how the guide you read didn't mention these, giving how common they are in WILD attempts. The creator of the guide must have not been that experienced!

If you would have hung in there, these hallucinations would have died down and you would have found yourself in a dream.

This is completely normal and can even be wonderful fun. You basically stayed aware past when you would normally have been unconcious. The idea is to keep the mind aware, AND let the body fall asleep. It is hypnogogia; we refer to it as HI, hypnogogic imagery. It is totally harmless and really can be almost as interesting as lucid dreaming. It does not really mean you were close to a lucid dream, but it does show you were staying aware longer than normal, which is on the right track.

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Originally Posted by CuteClementina

Simultaneously, my body began overwhelmed with strong vibrations, like I was encased in an extra powerful massaging chair! A loud buzzing filled my ears! I was terrified!

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In addition to hypnagogic imagery, unexplained sounds, feelings of unusual motion or vibrations like you describe can also be a normal part of the transition, although you might not experience them every time. When this happens, it's important to stay calm and try not to get carried away with either alarm or excitement, since any strong emotional response (or physical movement) can disrupt your attempt. It stops being scary once you're used to it!

No way, that's just what I felt the second (maybe the third?) time I tried to do an astral projection without falling asleep, when I was around 15!
Even though the tutoral said there would be some vibrations, I still got scared too :/

So actually a I was about to WILD, huh. Cool~

Yeah you were so close. I've only managed one WILD but the only way to describe it is it felt and sounded like a jetplane was taking off on an earthquake and that's all there was my body was awol. But if you ride it out eventually it will subside and you will be in an LD. Enduring that is the price you pay for WILDs :chuckle:

Early on in my LD adventure my WILDs were often quite scary, the good news is that this is all in your head and once you get used to expecting nothing to happen then nothing will happen, nothing at all, these days my WILDs are extremely relaxing experiences, as I'm lying in bed I just get a comfortable buzz feeling and then I'm in a dream.

That's now, but here are some fun experiences I had as a beginner:

- Once I felt like I was tied by a rope to a car and dragged away
- Strong and fast heart thumping that made me think something was seriously wrong (I did notice that your heart does in fact race sometimes, usually through too much concentration / forcing a WILD to happen, but this gets really over-exaggerated during the transition)
- Scary voices / whispers (this is the worst one in my opinion)
- Bed rocking on ocean waves (this one isn't too bad really, bed spinning is something I still get sometimes, but not often)
- Loud BOOM!

Fun times.

Yes! And you are pretty good!

Most of my WILDs (I didn't have many) started after these strange (and very loud) sensations.

I imagine that was so scary not knowing what it was! I had never went through HI until I learned about it and sought it out. I've succeeded at it a good handful of times and my symptoms seem to be utterly consistent. For me it goes:

sudden warm soft feeling
vibrations
increased heart rate (I'm certain I read that this is actually a total hallucination, in lab scenarios under EKG monitoring showed no increased heart rate during WILD attempts...will try to find source)
strong vibrations that roll from head to feet in waves
flashing disconnected imagery, often animated clips of cartoons that don't exist
Feeling of fear or despair (I know consciously that these feelings are not real, so feeling them does not bother me, I've actually come to enjoy exploring the feeling of fear in a totally safe environment)
loud tones, sometimes high but usually deep
A total loss of awareness of my physical body
tone dissolves into snatches of language
A sense of moving forward through images (that have become realistic)
Awareness of dream body
slight sinking sensation as I actively start to move my dream body
Lucid