Can someone describe what exactly happens while trying to WILD?

[Openmind0306]

I've been trying to WILD a lot of times, but without success. There's been much times when i stopped feeling my body, laying down with my eyes closed, watching hypnagogic hallucinations, however, everytime i just fall asleep. Sometimes i've been wondering if i'm asleep now, even though i'm concious... however i still knew that i was not asleep and when trying to open my eyes, hoping that i'll magically see i'm not in my bedroom or something... i still am in it. Since i've never had a successful WILD, i don't know how i'm supposed to transition in the dream... or what's supposed to happen. I've tried also the CANWILD technique, but most of the times I don't even hear the alarm, or i hear it, but then immediately fall asleep again.. Please, anyone who has ever done it... explain it... or at leat try. Thank you!!!

[Zoth]

It's incredible hard to explain the technique for two most reasons: - First, you're half asleep. When you actually do it, you later recall the dream and tend to forget exactly what you felt in the moments before :p - It's such a deep experience (feeling your body, not feeling your body, hallucinating, etc etc) that is very hard to generally describe as something linear. The first thing that you'll star to notice is your body going heavier and numb. You sense shifts on awareness like someone is turning off some switch in your head. Your brain starts to wander around like you would be zapping in tv. Images and sounds that make no sense come to your mind but you're just ignoring them. It's like your in some sort of stupor, like when wake up from anesthesia. You are still awake, but you're groggy and with slow thinking. At this point, the experience varies greatly. Sometimes you feel a violent transition into REM, like your whole body seems to be contracting (when it actually isn't) and you sense yourself (not your body, but yourself) lifting and showing up in either your room, or in another scenario. Sometimes it's a very quick and smooth transition: you're lying there, and then sense yourself disconnecting from your body and more present on the images that are showing up than at the real world. And you just appear there. Hope this helped. It's really hard to explain because I never had 2 WILDS that resembled one to another. Oh, and don't move! You'll know when the dream is starting is just something that you feel without a doubt. Many people have false awakenings though because they just think that shift in consciousness was merely an event previous to the REM, when it was actually a smooth transition

[Avalanche]

Very good description from zoth00 there. I have had about 2 or 3 short WILDs before and they all happened through this. You feel numb and heavy, then you "hear" voices in your head, like you would when you are thinking, but they are unprompted and random. If you relax enough during the day you can do this, but that's beside the point. If you feel like you need to move or you want to just shift over into another position then this is good, you shouldn't. Don't move and try not to focus too hard on what is happening. This is the hard part, and being sleepy helps avoid this. Most of the time with me I get to that part and it just holds my attention, so I can't slip out into a dream, which is annoying. You want to get to that stage, then fall asleep there. If it goes well, you will be awake enough to be lucid there and then.

[gab]

I just started having WILDs a little while ago, and as Zoth00 said, they were all different. I used to have biggest problem exactly with entering a dream. I never feel any SP, by the way. Basically, after I lay motionless for a while ( I do scratch and swallow on occasion, but try to fight it as long as you can and do it only if it distracts you), I start seeing swirling black and grey "fog" on the back of my closed eyelids. Soon I start seeing skulls, faces forming from this fog. After that, some color may be added to the mix, most offen yellow-green. Then I start seeing different objects in bright colors - like white and golden, sometimes I recognize them, sometimes I don't, but they are well defined, crisp. After this, I start seeing movies of different things. It can be in a shape of a 35mm camera film that moves fast and I watch the movie, or there are just pictures on this film. Soon after I see just one big picture of a scene playing out below me. This is where I used to have a problem not knowing how to get into the dream, because I knew what I see is already a dream. Last couple of times when it worked, I concentrated on the scene and said very deliberatly in my mind " there...... I ......am". First time, I watched a dream scene under me of some fields. I tried to imagine myself on the ground. In that instant, my field of view moved closer to the ground. I saw something flying through the air and when it landed, it was me. My point of view changed again as I was comming closer to that person untill we merged and I was on the ground in lucid dream. What I just described is how I enter LD when I don't feel the vibrations. When I feel the vibrations, that means that your dream/astral body is ready to separate, or it's already separating. You may also feel that you are already projected and floating above your body. At this point you may get 'astral vision' and see the world through closed eyelids. Depending on where your astral body is, you may see your room from the bed or from another place in your room, like 6inches under your ceiling. Then I say something like "up" (when not having floating feeling yet), 'or to the window, door, kitchen...' (when you feel projected). At this point you are in a copy of your room thats in the astral plane that's closest to the physical world we live in. If you not in your room, you may be on another astral plane already. And if you keep falling asleep after seing HH, try saing something like "I'm dreaming", or something to occupy your mind. At this point you are just minutes or seconds away from LD. And don't get too excited, or it will all end.

[Avalanche]

Quite a few times I have felt my eyelids being shut but I was able to sort of see things, most often my bedroom ceiling. This is usually after a fair bit of laying still. I will have passed the stage where you hear and imagine weird things (like daydreaming) and then I feel like I can see my ceiling, but I know my eyelids are shut. I don't actually see my ceiling, I just "know" I'm looking at it, or my memory of it is very clear. How far away from a dream is this? What stage would this be at?

[gab]

Quite a few times I have felt my eyelids being shut but I was able to sort of see things, most often my bedroom ceiling. This is usually after a fair bit of laying still. I will have passed the stage where you hear and imagine weird things (like daydreaming) and then I feel like I can see my ceiling, but I know my eyelids are shut. I don't actually see my ceiling, I just "know" I'm looking at it, or my memory of it is very clear. How far away from a dream is this? What stage would this be at? Sorry, I don't know what stage you at when you think you see the ceiling. But seeing the ceiling from up close, eventhough you know your eyes are closed, and maybe even you are not on your back, is classic clue, that you have projected - your dream/astral body had separeted from your physical body and is hovering nearby. When you see the ceiling, say 'to the door, window,' or anywhere that's at least 10-15 feet away from your bed. (Practice this during daytime. Stand away from your bed and say "to the...." and imagine yourself at that place. You don't have to visualize or anything, just get the idea in your mind.)

[Avalanche]

I'll try that next time it happens. But it was mostly like a vivid daydream. I still knew I was laying in bed and if I focused my eyes the image would go. It was hardly an image to start with, more like an imprint of it.

[Robot_Butler]

It is a good sign that you are falling asleep during you attempts. I think it is very helpful to give yourself a chance to just observe and witness the way you fall asleep. Understanding this process is half the battle. It is different for everyone. The basic idea behind WILD is to stay self-aware as you fall asleep. In execution, this means maintaining a balance between sleep and wakefulness as you are falling asleep. You need to let yourself drift close to the edge of sleep, without totally falling off the cliff into oblivion. It takes practice to know when you should be pushing yourself to be more relaxed, when you should be encouraging your mind to wander, and when you should be focusing your awareness to keep from going unconscious. Keep practicing. Every attempt will give you a better understanding of your process, and bring you closer to your goal.

[Avalanche]

Another tip is that being focused and aware doesn't mean you need to keep snapping an elastic band on your wrist. You need to watch your daydreams (and then hopefully dreams) without interfering and without shutting off. That's different to trying to keep an internal voice in your head to prevent you from drifting off. If you find yourself having to keep jerking yourself awake to avoid falling into a regular dream then you are doing it wrong. You need to watch absent mindedly in a way, and through watching you witness the dream form and you identify when it's a dream.