Unintentional Frightening Hypnagogia

It has never been my intention to screw around with Lucid Dreaming or OBE's or Astral Projection. Yet throught my entire life (I am 38 now) I have had semi-regular hynogogic experiences which are both terrifying and unintentional. My mist recent was was ten minutes ago, so I searched online and found this forum. Hopefully I will get some intelligent replies to my situation.

Let me start by saying that I have never had a 'pleasant' hyonogig experience. A few years ago I went searching online to find out what was happening to me, and found out the name for it was most likely hypnogogia. I would be asleep, or I guess almost asleep' and then I would feel paralyzed or more accurately held down by a malicious presence while I was forced out of my body. Each and every experience is accompanied by the feeling of an evil presence. There is no joy here. The worst one i ever experienced was last year when I was falling asleep and felt the familiar paralysis as I rolled out of my body and onto the floor. It was as though I was in 2 places at once (asleep on the bed AND awake on the floor). I tried crawling along the floor into the corner of the room when a hand grabbed my arm and strating pulling me toward it very roughly. Luckily, I jolted back awake. I was scared as hell. It felt very real and I was convinced there was some evil spirit trying to'get' me. Another time I was asleep and then got that paralysis and heard footstpes coming up the stairs while something strong held me down again, and a light in the hallway was on that should not have been. When I awoke, the light was not on and everything was as it should be. I cannot stress enough how REAL the experience is, however.

Just now, I had the experience again. This time, I decided to not fight it and just let it happen and see where it lead. As I heard the familiar ringing/buzzing sound and my body sliding out of my body I said to myself, let it happen. I tried floating up to the top of the room. It worked. I even saw my pillow release it depression from my head and the blankets on top of me move with my ascension. Then I came back down. There was less of the sense of 'evilness' this time but still scary as hell. I tried getting into positions that would help me see the rrom from a different angle so that when I awoke I could remmeber the name of a book, or the placement of a certain bject in the room, so that I could prove I had actually gone out of my body during the experience. I didn't get that far however. Starting tonight I am going to have my girlfriend write a long number (that I will not look at) on a piece of paper and place it in the room somewhere that I cannot see while I am awake, and I will try to float up to it next time I have one of these.

The only consistent theme to all of this is that about 80% of the experience happen during daytime naps, rather than night time sleeps. I get little sleep at night so I try to make up for it in the day. The other mitigating factor is that I am usually quite stressed out when these things happen, although I had them as a small child as well so I can't really explain that.

If anyone can shed some light on what and why this is happening, and what I can do with it (because it seems to be a stepping stone to some other consciousness) I would be grateful. I live in Toronto Canada an would love to meet anyone who has this experience as well. I figure if I'm npot even trying to get to this state, I will probably have an easy time achieving some of the results a lot of people on this website are trying to achieve with LD's and the like. My fina question is this: why are these experiences so often associated with a malevolent presence? And what is the horrible ringing sound I hear just before I leave my body?

Paul

I'm no expert but that seems to be sleep paralysis, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis and, as you said, are experiencing hypnagogic hallucinations from it, there are people more in the matter than me, wait until one answers back, and Welcome to dreamviews

You are certainly suffering from sleep paralysis.

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Originally Posted by Shift

Every night when you fall asleep, you go through a series of sleep cycles. These are divided into the N-REM (non-REM) and REM (rapid eye movement) stages. Though it is possible to dream in both NREM and in REM sleep, during REM sleep your body makes intense efforts to keep you from acting out your dreams and hurting yourself. It does this by completely paralyzing your body, except for your eyes and diaphragm, so that your muscles cannot move and you are completely relaxed. This is called REM atonia (atonia = lack of tone, your muscles are not tensed, but relaxed).

Sometimes, you can have a problem with REM atonia. This can happen when it fails to kick in and you act out your dreams (REM Behavioral Disorder), or when it happens when it is not supposed to- when you are awake. This paralysis of your body, abnormally and outside of REM sleep, is called Sleep Paralysis.

Sleep paralysis can happen randomly, and it often does a few times over a person's life. They may be laying in bed, either having woken up from sleep or just about to fall asleep, and find themselves completely paralyzed. In some people, it happens MUCH more frequently, and this is called Isolated Sleep Paralysis (ISP). In those who suffer from disorders such as narcolepsy it can also occur very frequently, but since it is related to other disorders it is not called Isolated Sleep Paralysis, just Sleep Paralysis.

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A good read on SP

Some of the best advice you will be given is to learn to use your sleep paralysis episodes to lucid dream, turning it into a positive and beneficial part of your life that you look forward to rather than fear.

Another is to try to moderate your fear, as your own fear will cause your hallucinations (all of your symptoms, except for the paralysis, are just hallucinations) to get scarier and scarier.

Try not to sleep laying on your back in the supine position, as it will happen most often in that position. Try to reduce stress, and not get too exhausted, as this will exacerbate your SP.

There are quite a number of members on Dreamviews who commonly and regularly experience ISP, I am sure some of them will be able to give you firsthand advice.

Kudos to you, Video_Junkie for not jumping to conclusions and assuming you are being abducted by aliens or molested by evil spirits. I'm glad your research brought you to DreamViews instead of... say... to this site:
http://naturalplane.blogspot.com/200...ow-people.html

I hope that link doesn't give everyone the wrong idea, and start a shadow people riot :lol: My point is only that this experience is very common, safe, and normal. No reason at all to be afraid. Like you've already said, this is normal hypnagogia / sleep paralysis. Troughout history, this has been seen as everything from demonic posession, to alien abduction, to ghost hauntings, ect. Do an internet search on "Old Hag" or "Succubus" to see what I mean. The experience is filtered through our world view to give life to our mythology.

What you are experiencing is the sometimes rocky transition from wakefulness into a dream state. As real as it seems, you are actually just dreaming you are floating around your room. That is not your real room, only your mind's reconstruction of it. The natural reaction is fear, because this is such an unfamiliar state to be in. I've always assumed the terrifying hallucinations are generated by the fear, not the other way around.

I get this all the time. I get the textbook Sleep Paralysis, with all the associated hallucinations. I sense presences, see shadowy figures, hear loud sounds, feel vibrations and body distortions. This is what led me to lucid dreaming in the first place. I can induce it at will, and it is no longer frightening. The trick is to relax through it, as you did when you floated up out of your bed. If you sense a presence with you, ask it for help, embrace it, or expect kindness from it. Dreams work on expectations, so try and keep your expectations positive and inquisitive. With a little patience, you can turn it into an amazing experience.

Here is one good example from my dream journal:
http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...653#post951653

As you get more comfortable with the odd feeling, it will be less frightening and more FUN! Just imagine, you can experience your wildest dreams with that same vividness and realness you felt in your brief floating. When people recount their lucid dreams, they are not just rambling off some brief imaginary daydream. They are recounting something that felt as real as real life. Sometimes more vivid than real life.

People are always trying to prove Out of Body Experiences are 'real' by attempting experiments like the one you suggested. As cool as it would be, none of the experiments have ever worked. It seems like it would be the easiest thing in the world to prove, but sadly, so far it is impossible. Obviously I'm still holding out a little hope, because it would be one of the greatest discoveries in human history.

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Originally Posted by Video_Junkie

It has never been my intention to screw around with Lucid Dreaming or OBE's or Astral Projection. Yet throught my entire life (I am 38 now) I have had semi-regular hynogogic experiences which are both terrifying and unintentional. My mist recent was was ten minutes ago, so I searched online and found this forum. Hopefully I will get some intelligent replies to my situation.

Let me start by saying that I have never had a 'pleasant' hyonogig experience. A few years ago I went searching online to find out what was happening to me, and found out the name for it was most likely hypnogogia. I would be asleep, or I guess almost asleep' and then I would feel paralyzed or more accurately held down by a malicious presence while I was forced out of my body. Each and every experience is accompanied by the feeling of an evil presence. There is no joy here. The worst one i ever experienced was last year when I was falling asleep and felt the familiar paralysis as I rolled out of my body and onto the floor. It was as though I was in 2 places at once (asleep on the bed AND awake on the floor). I tried crawling along the floor into the corner of the room when a hand grabbed my arm and strating pulling me toward it very roughly. Luckily, I jolted back awake. I was scared as hell. It felt very real and I was convinced there was some evil spirit trying to'get' me. Another time I was asleep and then got that paralysis and heard footstpes coming up the stairs while something strong held me down again, and a light in the hallway was on that should not have been. When I awoke, the light was not on and everything was as it should be. I cannot stress enough how REAL the experience is, however.

Just now, I had the experience again. This time, I decided to not fight it and just let it happen and see where it lead. As I heard the familiar ringing/buzzing sound and my body sliding out of my body I said to myself, let it happen. I tried floating up to the top of the room. It worked. I even saw my pillow release it depression from my head and the blankets on top of me move with my ascension. Then I came back down. There was less of the sense of 'evilness' this time but still scary as hell. I tried getting into positions that would help me see the rrom from a different angle so that when I awoke I could remmeber the name of a book, or the placement of a certain bject in the room, so that I could prove I had actually gone out of my body during the experience. I didn't get that far however. Starting tonight I am going to have my girlfriend write a long number (that I will not look at) on a piece of paper and place it in the room somewhere that I cannot see while I am awake, and I will try to float up to it next time I have one of these.

The only consistent theme to all of this is that about 80% of the experience happen during daytime naps, rather than night time sleeps. I get little sleep at night so I try to make up for it in the day. The other mitigating factor is that I am usually quite stressed out when these things happen, although I had them as a small child as well so I can't really explain that.

If anyone can shed some light on what and why this is happening, and what I can do with it (because it seems to be a stepping stone to some other consciousness) I would be grateful. I live in Toronto Canada an would love to meet anyone who has this experience as well. I figure if I'm npot even trying to get to this state, I will probably have an easy time achieving some of the results a lot of people on this website are trying to achieve with LD's and the like. My fina question is this: why are these experiences so often associated with a malevolent presence? And what is the horrible ringing sound I hear just before I leave my body?

Paul

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Sounds rough, but, its interesting that it happens on its own. I've experienced SP a couple of times, most of them automatic but the last three I experienced(one was yesterday) were due to me trying to get to SP. I haven't had any of these entities, mostly heavy body, numbness, so, I wasn't able to feel the way my body was positioned, sounds such as beeping and yesterday, got some green and purple colors swirling with my eyelids closed. Considering you are getting so far without doing anything means that you can probably get a LD easily compared to others here that have to work for months on end to get one. As for your little experiment with the number, if you are indeed having an OBE, you won't be able to see the number. The reason is from what I've read, the room can change when you OBE and even if you get the same room, the number won't be there/changes, something along those lines. Anyways, keep us updated on that. Would love to see what the results are. BTW, what you are trying to do is called remote viewing if I recall correctly and welcome to dreamviews :)

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Originally Posted by Robot_Butler

Kudos to you, Video_Junkie for not jumping to conclusions and assuming you are being abducted by aliens or molested by evil spirits. I'm glad your research brought you to DreamViews instead of... say... to this site:
http://naturalplane.blogspot.com/200...ow-people.html

I hope that link doesn't give everyone the wrong idea, and start a shadow people riot :lol: My point is only that this experience is very common, safe, and normal. No reason at all to be afraid. Like you've already said, this is normal hypnagogia / sleep paralysis. Troughout history, this has been seen as everything from demonic posession, to alien abduction, to ghost hauntings, ect. Do an internet search on "Old Hag" or "Succubus" to see what I mean. The experience is filtered through our world view to give life to our mythology.

What you are experiencing is the sometimes rocky transition from wakefulness into a dream state. As real as it seems, you are actually just dreaming you are floating around your room. That is not your real room, only your mind's reconstruction of it. The natural reaction is fear, because this is such an unfamiliar state to be in. I've always assumed the terrifying hallucinations are generated by the fear, not the other way around.

I get this all the time. I get the textbook Sleep Paralysis, with all the associated hallucinations. I sense presences, see shadowy figures, hear loud sounds, feel vibrations and body distortions. This is what led me to lucid dreaming in the first place. I can induce it at will, and it is no longer frightening. The trick is to relax through it, as you did when you floated up out of your bed. If you sense a presence with you, ask it for help, embrace it, or expect kindness from it. Dreams work on expectations, so try and keep your expectations positive and inquisitive. With a little patience, you can turn it into an amazing experience.

Here is one good example from my dream journal:
http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...653#post951653

As you get more comfortable with the odd feeling, it will be less frightening and more FUN! Just imagine, you can experience your wildest dreams with that same vividness and realness you felt in your brief floating. When people recount their lucid dreams, they are not just rambling off some brief imaginary daydream. They are recounting something that felt as real as real life. Sometimes more vivid than real life.

People are always trying to prove Out of Body Experiences are 'real' by attempting experiments like the one you suggested. As cool as it would be, none of the experiments have ever worked. It seems like it would be the easiest thing in the world to prove, but sadly, so far it is impossible. Obviously I'm still holding out a little hope, because it would be one of the greatest discoveries in human history.

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I've heard about "Succubus", supposdly they steal your energy if you are in contact with them when you OBE. Also, remember reading people's accounts of OBE and in one case, someone said that they saw someone sitting at the bottom of their bed licking their teeth. Scared the hell out of me and I've decided not to OBE because of those two cases and a couple of other things I've heard which might be true.

daytime naps? classic

sleep paralysis usually happens because of bad sleep habits ;)

also, instead of fighting the paralysis, the alternative is to close your eyes and literally fall into a dream. the hag won't follow you into the dream, and you'll wake up naturally

I dont think there any good answers why almost everyone perceives the hag, the pressure, the evil presence in a sleep paralysis. reality is strange, the answers are even stranger

wow...your so lucky to be able to get it that easily...

I've read about a lot of situations where people even physically 'see' evil beings sitting ontop of them during SP. also i think it's very common to feel hands grabbing you.

It can be a frightening expieriance but personally i think your paranoia about the whole situation is worse. thankfully i've never had a scary experience so I'm not that sure.

I don't think continuing to ignore whats happening to you will help.

I would continue to explore the phenominon--based on your last experiance it wasn't that bad.

Also read some things on how to get rid of evil spirits etc. that would probably help tremendously. good luck.

I've always subscribed to the "Blind Spot" or Charles Bonnet theory for these types of visual hallucinations:

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Originally Posted by Robot_Butler

Thats a great description of Old Hag. People often forget to explain the way the visual aspects of Old Hag work. Its not just random hallucinations, or dreams overlapping reality. I'm sure I won't explain this right, but maybe it will encourage someone who knows more about this to correct me

Basically, you have a blind spot in your vision. It is always there. You can test it by focusing on an object, then bringing your fingers in from the sides of your vision to the center. Don't focus on your fingers, just see them move while keeping focused on one spot. You will see your fingers disappear when they reach a point around the center of your field of vision.

In normal life, your brain fills in this blind spot with what it assumes to be there. This happens automatically, based on the surrounding context, short term memory of what you just saw, since your eyes are always moving. When you are sleeping, your brain does not have any context to use to fill in your blind spot. Your brain still wants to fill in this blind spot, because it is programmed to. So, basically, it fills the blind spot in with dream imagery. This can happen when you are awake in a totally dark room also, and focus on one single spot for too long. Your thoughts start to appear in your blind spot.

The fixed position of your blind spot in relation to your vision explains why hallucinations of this kind are often out of scale with their environment, change in size, have a lack of depth perception, bob around, ect. Its like when you have an afterimage burned into your vision. It follows where your eyes move, and your brain can't make sense of its positon in space.

Its called Charles Bonnet Syndrome. It commonly occurs when your eyes are receiving a lack of information. Your brain fills in the gaps.

Everyone posting in this thread should read this article. You won't be sorry.
http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=604

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that article was interesting, that part about the brain compensating for a shortage of visual stimuli, reminded me of sensory deprivation, though only vision is affected in that syndrome

Someone mentioned before not to sleep on your back as that can lead to the paralysis...I've had to give up sleeping on my stomach, my favorite way to sleep, because of this BS. 75% of my occurrences are when I sleep face down.

Thanks for all the great responses. I see there are some very cool and intelligent people on this forum. I haven't had any more of these experience since my last post (and have not tried) but I think I will try this weekend just for the fun of it. It's raining and crappy out anyway here in Toronto.

I forgot to mention that the use of certain drugs could be contributing to the SP and hypnogogic experiences. I take Xanax and Oxycodone (painkillers) pretty regularly. I still had the experiences before I started the meds but think it happens easier with them. For those curious as to why I take these, the percoet is for a chronic low back injury and the Xanax is for anxiety (I get very stressed out occasionally and have had anxiety attacks in the past). I definitely believe that anyone trying to fool around with LD and SP would have a much easier time if they introduced certain drugs into their system, but that comes at a cost (potential addiction).

I know that with Kaballah and certain other magickal experimentations (Crowley stuff) they use hallucinogens to enter their other states more easily than through meditation but I've always felt that whatever you experience while on hallucinogens could not possible be considered real or valid, because you're high. But I could be wrong. Maybe they do open doors. I did a lot of LSD in my youth and I sure had some crazy experiences. I can't imagine ever doing it again (those days are over) but I do wonder what could have been achieved if I had tried chanelling those highs to accomplish things rather than breaking into swimming pools and diving naked off the high diveboard at midnight, while peaking on acid. :)

I guess Carlos Castenada would argue with me about this but I think that drug induced visions, regardless of how seriously one interprets them, are still just drug induced visions. If you've read A Separate Reality (a fun read when you're on the crapper) you may be tempted to believe that Peyote opens doors to other worlds, and maybe Jim Morrison would agree with you ---- but that's pretty dangerous stuff and look where Mr. Mojo Risin is now, not to mention Castenada. I agree with the person who posted a response to my original post that all of these experiences are basically dreams, and not OBE's as I was thinking they could be. The room I was in while being 'out of my body' was not my real room, but an imagined dream room of similar proportions. But still.....it's pretty amazing what the mind can do. And who knows what is achievable when we focus on playing with it......

Oh man... just wait til you start lucid dreaming ;) You're gonna be blown away at the power of all-natural controllable dream hallucinations :tongue: ;)

I feel excited for you! I can't wait to hear about experiences you have. Mostly because I feel you have about the same mindset as me. I'm curious to see what you do with this power and hopefully when I start working on LDing more than just 'when it happens' I will be able to take your experiences and create some of my own from them, with a little modification most likely. ^^

I have never actually experienced SP but I don't think it would be that terrible of an experience as if you know about it before it happens, your understanding will help guide you to a happier experiece. And just as I feel in the real world the expectations you have create the outcome of events as well as your future, SP also follows these rules. ^^

However, I would like to experience a bad episode of SP simply for the experience.

Sorry I went on rambling about my own plans. Good luck on your exploits into the dream world, that is if you plan on making them, and welcome to Dream Views.

I have those quite frequently. They are always very similar, so its like a recurring nightmare, the feeling is pretty bad. As of late though, I pretty much awake whenever I see myself at the situation. Its easy to spot as a dream because its always the same situation(at least in the begginning).
I have also tried to lead the dream to somethingelse in some cases, or face the fear.
In the end its like someone already said, it happens because of bad sleeping habits. I Often find myself on those kind of dreams if Im sweating cuz there are too many blankets over me. And they usually happen right after I start sleeping, like 20 minutes after I fall asleep. Botton Line if u do get those kind of dreams too frequently you ull notice its a dream right from the start, wich helps you doing what you want in it(in my case I wake up).

So then how do I go forward into a LD from that state? I mean, instead of being confined to the room I'm in and dealing with these so called malignant presences, how do I overcome those and dream travel to wherever I wish to go?

Step one, realize that you aren't actually floating out of your body or anything like that, but that you're just leaving your dream bed behind and dream-traveling into your room. As soon as you understand that this is actually a dream, you'll understand that it's all just hallucinations in your head. This understanding gives you lucidity, and lucidity gives you the understanding required to change the dream.

One of the most popular ways to change things from inside of buildings is to just open a door expecting it to lead where it shouldn't. Since it's a dream door, it can lead ANYWHERE you want it to, fictional or real.
Another is to climb through a mirror. You could actually climb through anything. Try walking through the wall, climbing out the window, looking/climbing through a tv, into a poster or photo album, anything you like.

You could also try working on visualizations as you are falling asleep and entering sleep paralysis. From the get-go, imagine where you want to be, visualize it, and find yourself there when the dream does form.

These finer bits of dream control are pretty well said in the following:

Spoiler for The Nature of Dream Control:

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

I believe there are but two simple rules that govern and dictate the shape every single aspect of dreaming. I believe this holds the key to the true nature of dream control, and that understanding it leads to much more frequent lucid dreams as well.

I'm also beginning to suspect that this rule applies to the waking world as well, and that the dream control skills mastered through understanding of this concept can be used to influence the waking world. I expect this to be demonstratable, not as a physical proof, but as something that can be experienced.

1. Everything in your dreams requires your attention to exist.

2. The more attention you give to one element, the more detail it creates in relation to what you are focused on.

It sounds overly simple, but the implications are infinitely complex. Every single dream unfolds according to those two rules without exception. This isn't anything new, but something you've been doing all along without being aware of it. It may not be clear at first, but like one of those hidden pictures you have to look at cross eyed, it eventually jumps out at you. You just have to learn how to see it.

I have a lot to say on this subject, and hardly know where to begin. I'll be making a series of posts where I try to expand on various aspects and applications, many of which may have small exercises, tasks or questions. I'll of course try to answer any questions in the meantime.

Either this will completely change the way you dream, or I'm completely nuts. I'm anxious to find out which, so feedback and participation will be greatly appreciated.


I want to note that strong emotions have an overwhelming role in shaping dreams, much like a colored lens. Emotions are still something you pay attention to, but their effects are so dramatic I feel they deserve a special mention.

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

1. Everything in your dreams requires your attention to exist.


While this may seem obvious, it's still one of the most basic principles of dreaming. The only things that exist in a dream are things that you are aware of. It's not complete world that you wander around in and explore. As soon as you stop paying attention to something and forget about it, it ceases to exist. If you are in a closed room and can't see the outside, then the outside doesn't exist. When you open to door to go outside, it could lead anywhere, into space or hell or the city of the mole people.

The point is, nothing exists in your dreams until you become aware of it. Much like Schrodinger's Cat. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger's_cat

This can be a useful tool I've used effectively in the past to deal enemies while lucid. If you don't pay something any attention, it will cease to exist. Kind of like when your parents told you as a kid to just ignore whoever is bothering you (I hate it when they're right!).

The skill to be learned here is to learn what things you pay attention to. Ask different people who walked down the same street what they saw, and a bird watcher would tell you about the rare wood pecker he saw, a child would tell you about the playground they passed, your wife would tell you about those shoes on sale, and I would tell you about that girl in the short skirt. ;) What are the things that captivate your attention, and how do these things make you feel? How do they affect your life?

Some things you pay attention to are beneficial, and some are detrimental. If you are prone to only noticing the bad in people, then interacting with people is going to be a pain in the ass. If you focus more on the good in people, then it can be a rewarding experience.

You have to learn to selectively ignore the things that don't do you any good, and focus on those things that accomplish your goals. During a dream, the effects of doing so are quite drastic, but practicing this while awake will have echoed results in your dreams, as well as be beneficial to you on several levels in RL.

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

2. The more attention you give to one element, the more detail it creates in relation to what you are focused on.

The first rule determines the content of your dreams, this one determines how much of that content is going to be in you dreams.

The key to using this rule to your advantage is balance. Too much attention can pull you in like a black hole, creating a universe of detail which can also captivate your attention, further aggravating the situation. On the other hand, if you don't pay elements in your dreams enough attention, they become unstable in accordance with the first rule of dreaming, that things need your attention to exist.

There are many "traps" in dreaming that capture your attention, distracting you with unnecessary detail. A good example is a tooth dream. You notice something wrong with your teeth, take a closer look, and then find more things wrong with them the more you look. This is something you don't want to get trapped in, but this kind of extreme can be used to your advantage. By focusing more on the positive and useful elements you will overwrite the dream scene with new detail. The degree of change depends on what you focus on (first rule) and how much you focus (second rule).

Let's take a closer look at the second half of this rule now. The more attention you give to one element, the more detail it creates in relation to what you are focused on. Initially I thought there would be a great many things vying for your attention which had a culmulative effect on shaping the dream. But in practice there were very few main elements, and the links between them were very straightforward.

The detail that arises from your increased attention or focus is formed by mental associations in your mind in relation to the element of your focus. These mental associations can take many forms, some direct, some abstract, like associated memories tied to a place or object. But this doesn't mean you have to settle for random associations. There are always unlimited ways to zoom your focus, even when there are relatively few elements to choose from.

Say you were to focus on a physical object. You could focus on what it is, what it's used for. You could focus on it's age, history, previous owner. You could focus on it's texture or what it's made of. Or you could use it to reach related memories, perhaps ones with useful elements you could use or expand on. Try each of those perspectives while experiencing strong emotions and you can tweak the flavor of your dream even further. Each of these approaches to the same element will yield different yet reliably predictable results.

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

A Deeper Look at the Effect of Emotions

Again, I feel emotions deserve a special mention. I'm assuming for the moment that emotions are something that require your attention to exist as well. But I'm not too sure about that at all, and the emotional influence may turn out a third rule. Anyone have any thoughts on weather emotions are something that require your attention to exist, or whether they they are independent entities?

Emotions are like a filter or like a color lens. Each emotion shapes your dreams in predictable ways, affecting both your surroundings and the behavior of DCs. Anger will cause harsh colors and sharp angles, and my cause DCs to fight or fear you. The effects of fear are obvious, painfully so in dreams.

Both this Emotional technique and the the Attention technique can be used independently, or in combination with each other. Sometimes it may be better to use one technique over the other. The emotional technique won't change the physical elements as drastically as the Attention technique, but will change the look, feel and mood of the dream, as well as influence DC behavior.

By practicing this you will begin to notice that DCs are puppets and you are the puppet master, only your emotions are the strings. You can influence the way DCs act, and the types of things they say, but not what they say. It's interesting to note that people in RL react the same way in the presence of strong emotions as do DCs. After the confidence and practice gained from using this in dreams, it would stand to reason that this could be used to influence people in RL as well. It seems people do this all the time anyways, but very clumsily for the most part.

You must be capable of being able to summon up any emotion at will, and not let the ones that arise naturally to rule you. The benefits of positive emotions are obvious, but even the so called negative emotions have their uses. Anger can often make thing go your way. Even fear could be used to lure someone close, then you switch to a confident rage. But you would have to actually feel the fear, not feign it. And always make sure you are in control of the emotions, not the other way around.

Strong emotions are best as well. So strong they radiate out from you, or perhaps vibrate would be a more appropriate term. I think this part ties into Aquanina's work with High Vibrational Frequency.

This can be practiced in dreams, or in RL like a reality check. As with the previous parts, these things become more apparent in RL after you become accustomed to seeing the dramatic effect they have in dreams.

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

Schemas and AI

I was going to expand on Archetypes, Schemas, and Artificial Intelligenge to try to give a better understanding of the types of associations that are made when new detail is formed as a result of your attention. But it turn out Archetypes are a type of Schema, along with stereotypes, social roles, and worldviews. Of particular interest inception of the Schema concept.

The following article is from the Wikipedia entry on Schemas.

The original concept of schemata is linked with that of reconstructive memory as proposed and demonstrated in a series of experiments by Bartlett (1932). By presenting participants with information that was unfamiliar to their cultural backgrounds and expectations and then monitoring how they recalled these different items of information (stories, etc.), Bartlett was able to establish that individuals' existing schemata and stereotypes influence not only how they interpret 'schema-foreign' new information but also how they recall the information over time. One of his most famous investigations involved asking participants to read a Native American folk tale, "The War of the Ghosts," and recall it several times up to a year later. All the participants transformed the details of the story in such a way that it reflected their cultural norms and expectations, i.e. in line with their schemata. The factors that influenced their recall were:

* Omission of information that was considered irrelevant to a participant;
* Transformation of some of the detail, or of the order in which events etc were recalled; a shift of focus and emphasis in terms of what was considered the most important aspects of the tale;
* Rationalisation: details and aspects of the tale that would not make sense would be 'padded out' and explained in an attempt to render them comprehensible to the individual in question;
* Cultural shifts: The content and the style of the story were altered in order to appear more coherent and appropriate in terms of the cultural background of the participant.

Bartlett's work was crucially important in demonstrating that long-term memories are neither fixed nor immutable but are constantly being adjusted as our schemata evolve with experience. In a sense it supports the existentialist view that we construct our past and present in a constant process of narrative/discursive adjustment, and that much of what we 'remember' is actually confabulated (adjusted and rationalised) narrative that allows us to think of our past as a continuous and coherent string of events, even though it is probable that large sections of our memory (both episodic and semantic) are irretrievable to our conscious memory at any given time.

Further work on the concept of schemas was conducted by Brewer and Treyens (1981) who demonstrated that the schema-driven expectation of the presence of an object was sometimes sufficient to trigger its erroneous recollection. An experiment was conducted where participants were requested to wait in a room identified as an academic's study and were later asked about the room's contents. A number of the participants recalled having seen books in the study whereas none were present. Brewer and Treyens concluded that the participants' expectations that books are present in academics' studies were enough to prevent their accurate recollection of the scenes.

For starters, lets look at the factors that influenced recall.

* Omission of information.
First rule, without your attention, things can't exist

* Transformation of some of the detail; a shift of focus and emphasis in terms of what was considered the most important aspects of the tale;
Again, a combination of the first and second rule, and your most powerful tool in dream control.

* Rationalisation: details and aspects of the tale that would not make sense would be 'padded out' and explained in an attempt to render them comprehensible to the individual in question;
Second rule, attention creates detail.

* Cultural shifts: The content and the style of the story were altered in order to appear more coherent and appropriate in terms of the cultural background of the participant.
This sounds like the effect emotions have on dreams. Is it possible different cultures have an identifying emotional state?

These factors responsible for flaws inconsistencies in long term memory just happen to be the tools of dream control! The links to memory make me wonder if dreams are really dynamic memories kept alive by our attention.


And now for an Artificial Intelligence approach. A binary yes or no system may be easier to picture than fancy notions like Schemata.

Consider training an artificial neural network to understand language, starting with a concept like tree. You could manually create links to words like grows, leaves, branches. Alternatively, you expose the network repeated instances of trees until it learns on it's own. Links to words like outside would be formed, but not all instances of trees would necessarily be outside, some may be indoors, so another link to indoors is formed. But the majority of trees being outside, the path to "outside" gets used more and gains weight, becomes more substantial. The more connections or paths your word has, then better the understanding your AI will have.

You have to learn to travel those weighted paths or synapses without getting lost within their endless nature.

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Dream Control, the complete tutorial
Dream Control Tutorial

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Originally Posted by Video_Junkie

Let me start by saying that I have never had a 'pleasant' hyonogig experience. A few years ago I went searching online to find out what was happening to me, and found out the name for it was most likely hypnogogia. I would be asleep, or I guess almost asleep' and then I would feel paralyzed or more accurately held down by a malicious presence while I was forced out of my body. Each and every experience is accompanied by the feeling of an evil presence. There is no joy here. The worst one i ever experienced was last year when I was falling asleep and felt the familiar paralysis as I rolled out of my body and onto the floor. It was as though I was in 2 places at once (asleep on the bed AND awake on the floor). I tried crawling along the floor into the corner of the room when a hand grabbed my arm and strating pulling me toward it very roughly. Luckily, I jolted back awake. I was scared as hell. It felt very real and I was convinced there was some evil spirit trying to'get' me. Another time I was asleep and then got that paralysis and heard footstpes coming up the stairs while something strong held me down again, and a light in the hallway was on that should not have been. When I awoke, the light was not on and everything was as it should be. I cannot stress enough how REAL the experience is, however.

Paul

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I have had some of these out of body experiences too but i know that i was dreaming. I experience these kinds (of?) during a nightmare.

I was lieing on the kitchen sofa in the dream. Then my consciousness were pushed out of the dream body and i fell on to the foor. I heard my mother screaming but when i fell on to the foor there were suddenly a silence. I couldn't move and i felt that my other body were still on the sofa. I was terrified and tried very hardly to wake up and i woke. I hate when these happens. I'm really scared of that.

Because of these nightmares i don't like any floating except flying in dreams or so. At SP (if it is what i think) when i feel floating in the dark room i will try very fast to think about something and keeping my body stable in the dark room.

Sorry for grammar errors, i'm trying to improve my english skills. Please correct me so i can learn.

Sorry that i don't have nothing to say how you can overcome of it or sth.

This happened to me twice, the first time i was taking a nap on my desk during study hall. I entered sleep paralysis then a terrifying ringing sound entered my head, I could not move, it was almost as if i felt another presence in my mind, I immediately started praying, and it slowly went away, all of it.

The second experience happened about two years ago, when i was about to wake up. I opened my eyes in the morning and i saw two black detail-less arms from under me, with its hands grabbing my arms down with extreme force, i couldn't move at all, it was unbelievably terrifying, it even started hurting, i closed my eyes and started praying, and slowly the pain went away, until everything was gone, and when i opened my eyes everything was back to normal.

So basically I understand what you mean. The only advice i can give you is to close your eyes, then start praying, because it has seemed to work for me. If this is a hallucination as everyone suggests, it could be a form of fear from your subconsciousness or something, and as common sense says, confront your fears, investigate it.

Shift, thanlks for your explanation of what to do once I leave my dream body. Today I had another involuntary session. This never fails: I awakw earlier than normal, go downstairs andhave a coffee, smoke etc....then an hour later I go back to bed for a 'nap'. I ALWAYS get the out of body LD state when I do this, and today was no exception. But today I took your advice and eliminated my fear and 'went with it'. It started with obligatory ringing in my ears, which then turned to a rather turbulent vibration feeling in my whole body, and then the feeling of something pulling my feet and pulling my astral body out of my real body via my feet. I sank to the floor, as usual. Then I was flaoting around the room. I mean, all over. Every corner, the ceiling and everything. I placed all fear aside and concentrated on being in the Playboy Mansion lol. But I couldn't leave my room. You mentioned mirrors, and doors. I don't have a mirror in my bedroom, and this time I had closed the door when I went to sleep so I knew the door was closed. I also could see with my dream mind that it was closed.I tried everything I could for what seemed like quite a few minuted but just could not prevail. I never left my room. And then, as usual,I was 'placed' back on my bed in what seemed like a different position from that in which I was originally lying (at the foot of my bed near the bedpost). When I opened my eyes I expected to find myself at the foot of the bed like this, but was pleaseantly surprised to see I was back in teh same position I was in when I went to sleep. Also new during this experience was the lack of a malicious presence, and the sensation of drool on my mouth which I cleared in the dream state. Awesome. So....what next? How do I turn this near LD into a real LD? I really tried.....but just floated around my room with no control over wehre I was headed.

Well, I'm hardly experienced with WILDing :tongue: But, it seems like you've conquered that fear and made it into your dream! :boogie: Yay!!

Sounds like the problem you have now is dream control, and I can point out your exact problem, which is a mental one:

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But I couldn't leave my room. You mentioned mirrors, and doors. I don't have a mirror in my bedroom, and this time I had closed the door when I went to sleep so I knew the door was closed. I also could see with my dream mind that it was closed.

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I want you stop everything you're thinking right now and focus on two questions:

1. Just because there's no mirror in your REAL room, why wouldn't there be a mirror in your DREAM room?
2. Just because the door was physically closed in your REAL room, why would there even be a door in the doorway to your DREAM room?

You're focusing too much on limiting yourself by the logic and rules of the real world. You're lucid dreaming, man! There ARE no rules, there is no logic, all there is is what you want there to be, what you think there to be. So stop thinking about your dreams the way you think about real life, or you're going to have to follow the rules of real life during your dreams.

Next time you manage to succeed like this, first pause, and take a look down at your body. Look at your chest, look at your pelvis, look at your knees, and your feet, and the ground you're standing on. Look at your arms and hands. Once you've done this, look up in front of you and look at the dream mirror that exists in your dream room. It DOES exist in your dream room, because you need it to and want it to. So it DOES. Its existence isn't based on what really is sitting in your bedroom at the moment, but on what you think is in your dream room. So you need to overcome this hurdle of "What's already there is what will be here" and instead say "This is a lucid dream. Anything goes. Anything I want I have. There's a mirror behind me. The door is open and my destination is right across the threshold. I can see it out the door."

Try this out. Looking down at your body will help get you into the dream, and keep your dream from being in the third person. Having this paradigm shift about how to exercise dream control will give you a level of confidence that you need to get your dreams to work the way you want them to. I strongly believe that if you have this mindframe and the confidence, you can have ultimate dream control. The power is overcoming your own mind and doubts, and realizing that dreams are limitless. Try to do reality checks when you're in the dream just to keep proving and reminding to yourself that nothing around you is real. And, if worst comes to worse... just walk through the walls or door ;) Good luck!

:poof:

Shift, your help is greatly appreciated. With your advice I have managed to conquer to the fear of these unintentional episodes and turn them into amazing flying dreams. You were right about the mirrors and doors. I can now easily skip out of my body, take a few moments to orient myself (because it feels like I'm floating in outer space upside down at the start), and then fly quickly out of my room and through the outside door into the streets. But is this Lucid Dreaming or something else? The 'dream' is always the same. I am flying around my immediate vicinity. The only thing that changes is where and hor far I'm able to go, and at what speed - before waking up. It feels more like an out of body experience I would think. What do you think? What can I do from here to make this even more enjoyable?

Paul

Wow. What an amazing story; actually seeing someone progress from being a FA/SP sufferer and becoming a lucid dreamer. I don't think I'd ever tire of reading of such transitions.

By the way, you are very lucky and I am envious - I've stopped having FA/SP now I want them!

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Originally Posted by TheWeirdnessSymposium

I don't think I'd ever tire of reading of such transitions.

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Nor would I :)

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Originally Posted by Video_Junkie

Shift, your help is greatly appreciated. With your advice I have managed to conquer to the fear of these unintentional episodes and turn them into amazing flying dreams. You were right about the mirrors and doors. I can now easily skip out of my body, take a few moments to orient myself (because it feels like I'm floating in outer space upside down at the start), and then fly quickly out of my room and through the outside door into the streets. But is this Lucid Dreaming or something else? The 'dream' is always the same. I am flying around my immediate vicinity. The only thing that changes is where and hor far I'm able to go, and at what speed - before waking up. It feels more like an out of body experience I would think. What do you think? What can I do from here to make this even more enjoyable?

Paul

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Firstly, incredibly glad to hear that has helped you out!!! :)
As far as OBEs vs LDs, in my opinion they are one and the same (when it comes to dreams, I believe that they are also possible in waking life, but not with anything like a soul or spirit, just that your perception of the world around you changes to one where you feel as though you are out of your body). OBE is just a matter of perception, the perception that you're out of your body, and this is very easily done in dreams (ex: 3rd person dreams, dreams you are someone else). Again, that is IMO, and not everyone believes it is so. I think reality checking, for most, would settle the dilemma of dream vs ap/obe, as would scoping out the environment around you and then in RL checking to see if things were constant or if they changed. As I've said, for me these things are all just dreams, but that is me being my close-minded self :) Feel free to make your own deductions and establish conclusions and plans fitting for your goals in whatever it is you decide you are flying in.
From my perspective of your issue, I would say these are just dreams that are starting in your room, and that are centered on your room. The more you have these dreams, the more ingrained it will become that the dream starting-place is your bedroom and that the surrounding environment of your bedroom is whatever is around it in RL.
Luckily for you (IMO) this is just a dream, which means that whatever you want can be surrounding your room, or your room can be whereever you want it to be. Next time you make it into the dream, Take a good look around. The walls on the sides don't exist, and instead your room is just a section of an even bigger room- but where is it? What is your dream goal location? Where do you wish to be? Or, with the door, just have it lead elsewhere. Imagine where you want it to go. During the day, sit there and look at your bedroom door (or whichever door you were referring to) and visualize your ideal location instead of the room/yard beyond it.
An alternative would be to realize that doors and flying aren't the only options. Try crawling underneath a dresser, and see what caves are beneath it. Try to climb through posters or photo albums on the wall. Look up and imagine see the different environment that is above you. Find a ladder on the wall and climb it to see where it leads. Absolutely anything that you can think of is a possible dream scenario waiting for you to make it happen :)

Shift, not only did your advice help me to gain a whole new dimension of dream life, but it also took away an incredibly powerful nightmarish event that was taking place in my life on a regular basis. Remember when I started this post I was having these awful experiences where hands were grabbing me and evil presences seemed close by. Now I see how important it is to know, recognize and control this experience that, for me, comes without trying. If not for the unwanted episodes this SP and LD began with, I would probably never have stumbled into the Lucid Dream Control experience. And without your help, I almost certainly would not have understood what was happening and been abot to convert a horrible experience into something so fun and exciting. Whereas I used to get those initial vibrations in my sleep, and I knew I was headed towards another unpleasant encounter with some evil thing, I now embrace it, ease into it, and get excited at the potential awaiting me when that incredible jolt occurs that I leave my body and start the dream adventure. The next step is to make sure my cell phone, alarm clocks, and things are all off so I can prolong the experience. As I said, this morning was the best of the LD's I've had to date, and it ended all too soon with the ringing of my phone. Also noteworthy is that I experienced the SP as I was drifting out of consciousness. I tried to lift my hand and couldn't. And I wasn't scared because I knew what was happening. And let it happen. Knowledge is truly the best weapon. Everyone on this site has been immensely helpful. I think it would be cool to have a real life event with the Dreamview folks. I'm sure we'd all get along famously, and think of the stories we could tell!

For anyone who has been reading this thread and is envious of how easily I get into the LD state, please don't hate....I never asked for it. And hopefully this thread, along with Shift and other people's help will show you the way to achieve your goals. There is another post on this site that is a 5 step instruction (I forget who posted it). It's very good and accurate. The funny thing is, I was doing all those things before I even knew what it was, inadvertently. The lack of sleep, exhaustion, mind racing, caffeine during a break in the sleeping pattern. It is certainly true that the bet time for LD's is during a break in the sleep cycle. Like that 5 step post suggests....set your alarm clock for 4 in the morning. Wake up for an hour or half hour. Drink a coffee. Then go back to sleep. It really helps to be overtired. Ya, being overtired sucks in a lot of ways, but it sure makes LD'ing easier!

I went through a period where I was having pretty regular lucid dreams, 2-3/wk.
I would occasionally stay conscious/lucid, after the REM cycle finished, like I was in some meditative state in my own body. No conscious awareness of anything outside my body. I would then notice a vibration up and down my spine, which would get stronger and stronger. I would on occasion accidentally sit up "out of my body".

One night I had a dream, an angel with a brilliant white face, hugged me and showed me that because of the lucid dreams, I couldn't grab a balloon, that would float me up to heaven, and then I found myself in purgatory, it was a motel, but I somehow knew what it was.

Kind of creeped me out so I checked for an explanation and found that even in the bible, (I was born Jewish, half my family is Catholic on my mom's side) there are references to the apostles being "in the spirit". I fell asleep with the bible withing arms length. I had an "OOBE" that a really evil looking version of my best friend, rolled into the room, through the wall, and my "dream self" took the "dream copy of the bible" and swatted him, and he disappeared. This was more than enough to send me into a frantic paranoia and I started sleeping with a crucifix. Since then I periodically have similar episodes, but now, I generally "sit up" and notice a nasty looking demon running around the room or screaming in my face, while my dream hand, of its own volition, brings the "dream crucifix" to my "dream mouth" and a black vapor is expelled through my mouth, and I can feel it leaving. There's always a force that repels the crucifix at first, but once it makes it to my mouth "it's expurged" Oh yea, and there's sometimes latin/italian prayers I've never heard in the background"

Plus I've been "molested, groped, and one time tazed" in this state

Wasn't religious prior to this, but I got a crucifix and a bible when I fall asleep, and its been improving.


Also in my regular dreams, two figures, a man and a girl, have been making a regular appearance, the male seems malevolent, and the girl seems to be under his control, although this control seems to be waning.

Haven't fought the devil in my dreams lately, but I was doing that for a while.

Any expert opinions, similar stories, and please none of this your brain is concocting the whole thing. That's such a cop out. I'm not scared of this shit at all. It's like this holy crusade I get to wage against evil.