Hi :) Lucid dream or OBE?

[PandaFoEva]

Okay. SO, I'm new here and I'm not really sure how this site works, but I just thought I'd try and get an answer I've been looking for for a while. Even though I'm only 14, I've had sleep paralysis a lot. I know sleep paralysis is pretty common, but I have it probably more often than usual. During school when I'm stressed, I had it several times every night. It's summer now so I'm not as stressed, but recently I have been more stressed than usual. I knew I'd have sleep paralysis, but what I've been experiencing is not what normally happens :/. I typed everything out on a note pad thingy on my laptop the morning after my second strange experience, so i thought I'd just put it in here so I don't have to type it again. Everything in parenthesis is what I've just added. Please excuse my bad language/grammar/spelling/sense of humor and sarcasm. And this will pretty much be a long LONG ramble of mine, so I'm warning you, you might get bored this is what i wrote: OKAI. so, basically I'm just gonna explain my sleep paralysis/possible OBE experience so i can have it all down and wont forget any details. I'm kind of afraid the details will get fuzzy if i wait any longer (as would happen to a normal dream). sooo ya this is what happened: I was extremely sleep deprived (i only had maybe 5 hours of sleep the night before which i know isn't that bad, but it still isn't healthy.) and i wanted to get to sleep as soon as possible. Its the summer so of course my body isn't adjusted to going to sleep earlier than maybe 2 am (hehe i know that's not a good thing). I have had maaaaany experiences with sleep paralysis and maybe even OBE or lucid dreaming, I'm not sure. So since I've had experience, i knew that sleeping on my back could make my chance of having sleep paralysis greater, which was definitely NOT what i wanted (i HATE having sleep paralysis because i cant help but feel terrified while having it and it makes it difficult to be calm enough to fall back asleep after waking from it.). I laid on my side, even though this is very uncomfortable to me. However, somehow i must have rolled on my back while i was dozing off. I was so deep in thought that i hadn't really noticed i did that. I felt my body relax and begin to numb at my feet and hands and work its way up. This is when i begin to panic because I'm aware that its happening, and quite frankly I'm not sure if its really normal. but i cant do anything really because i can't feel or move my body. I'm not sure when the heaviness on my chest really starts but I'm aware that i feel it and its difficult to breathe (really i feel a heaviness on my whole body but it feels heaviest on my chest). During all this i feel as if something is in the room, but i cant see it. (for some odd reason, i can see my room even tho im 90% sure my eyes are CLOSED). the fear of this thing i cant see elevates as more of my body numbs. I want to move or shout so bad but i can't. I'm not sure if the thing is getting closer but I'm definitely getting more and more scared as time passes by. all of a sudden my body jolts awake and shakes uncontrollably. I catch my breathe and try to calm down. (What i just explained is what normally happens during my SP. this is NOT the weird experience i talked about earlier) Okay so obviously I've had this before so I'm not confused, yet I'm still scared as always. Eventually i calm down enough to fall into sleep paralysis AGAIN, but this time its a little different. I feel calmer as my body numbs and i don't feel a presence in the room. I felt as if i was going to start dreaming normally. But i realize that I'm having sleep paralysis as soon as i feel the heaviness. But this time i do not panic because i don't feel a presence in the room. I feel aware of my surroundings and i actually feel like I'm awake. i slowly sit up, get off my bed, and hover to my door (yes i do mean hover, it didn't feel like i was actually walking) and for a second i feel like maybe i am asleep and I'm sleep walking, but i quickly realize i wouldn't be aware of my surroundings if i were sleep walking. so i basically just hover out of my room (i left my door open) and make my way down the hall way and into the living room. as i do this i realize my surroundings are kinda blurred and a bit distorted. the lighting was a weird too. aaanyways, i was in my living room and i looked down at my couch to see my mum sleeping there. (she sleeps in the living room because my dad snores, which I'm sure you are TOTALLY interested in.) i try to wake her up by calling her name and shaking her (i cant remember if i could actually shake her, i just remember attempting to), but she never woke up. I remember staring at her for a while (yes i realize that's kind of creepy) and trying to find out if I'm actually awake. then the next thing i know I'm back in my body and just laying there thinking "what the hell was that??" So I'm thinking this could have been an OBE or an extremely lucid dream. I don't know. all i know is it was relieving to have an experience that didn't completely terrify me. I actually recently had another abnormal experience where i pretty much got out of my bed and stared at my wall and thought for a little bit, "how the hell do i get back in my body??" and that's when i started freaking out because i didn't have a clue how to get back in my body (i don't know bout you, but to me, that's freaking scary!) but freaking out just made it end the same way most of my sleep paralysis ends, with me waking up shaking and in complete fear. I kinda want it to happen again just so i can turn around and look at my body. Ive heard OBE stories were they can see their bodies, and I'm thinking maybe if i cant see my body i can rule out the OBE possibility and assume its a lucid dream. but at the same time i don't want it to happen because i face the chance of having to go through a scary sleep paralysis or maybe even not getting back in my body, which i'm completely and entirely scared of happening. I know i should be able to control my fear when i have SP since i have it often and isn't unknown to me, but i just cant help it. Ive read websites that talk about how sleep paralysis can be caused by a demon trying to detach your soul from your body. I am definitely a skeptic to this idea because it sounds ridiculous to me, but part of me IS terrified that they COULD be right. Especially since i sense a presence in my room most of the time But ya. that's basically all i have to say about my "experience". It was pretty much a long ramble. I feel like i just wrote a novel and i should be taking a minute to thank all my supporters haha... so anyways i feel better because i got it all down and i know i wont forget the small details I've been trying to trap inside my brain. i feel like i should be saying "THE END" but it really isn't the end because i can guarantee you it'll happen again so I'm just gonna say BYE and ill write more if i have another experience. as if any one really wants to read this...haha... Yep. A long and almost meaningless ramble, but it explains the information that you need to answer my question. Does this sound like and out of body experience or a very lucid dream to you? i have a bad habit of talking to much so this must have been HORRIBLE to read, but if you made it this far, thanks for reading and please, if you can, answer my question. ~Maddy

[Burke]

Keep in mind that a lucid dream is a dream in which you are consciously aware that you are dreaming, what you're confusing it with is a vivid dream which is a very realistic dream and everything just seems extremely clear. From your description it sounds to me that this was not an OBE but just a very vivid dream, emotionally. I say emotionally because different things in dreams can be at varying levels of vividness. For example you could be completely out of it, almost like you're on a drug, but everything would look completely real and your senses would act just as if you were awake, sometimes more so. However during this experience your emotions were very high due in part to your fear or SP and it's possible causes. I want to assure you that there is nothing supernatural about SP, no demons are coming to get you and your soul isn't being ripped away from your body. It's simply your brain causing all voluntary muscles to become relaxed so you don't act out your dream and hurt yourself. SP is entirely natural and a good thing, you don't want to jump off a building in your sleep . The part of your account that tells me this was likely not an OBE was "...my surroundings are kinda blurred and a bit distorted. the lighting was a weird too..." Dreams are notorious with lighting. It is very unpredictable and can either act completely normal or out right ignore the laws of physics. The fact that everything is blurred and distorted also makes me believe this was not an OBE. During OBEs you are very aware of yourself both your outer self which is floating around (or w/e your OBE entails) as well as your surroundings. Things often seem very clear as if you were a walking around normally but nobody can see or hear you, like a ghost. You also said that afterwards this happened the next thing you knew was you laying in your bed. This was you waking up (or experiencing a FA, but that's another thing) and your ignorance of what had just happened was your reaction to the intense emotion you went through while this was going on. People often wake up from nightmares sweating, breathing heavily, and with an elevated heartbeat, completely freaked out. While you may not have had any of the first three symptoms that doesn't automatically make this an OBE or any other "beyond dreaming" experience. As a tip for coping with SP I would say you wound up in the right place. SP is an ideal place to be when trying to achieve a lucid dream since it is one of the final steps towards being asleep and dreaming but you still may be conscious. Practice lucid dreaming, experience it for yourself and find out what lies beyond SP, it's completely worth it and unlike any other experience on earth. After you get some experience with lucid dreaming you will end up looking forward to SP and be thankful that you are quite a natural at it. If you have any further question regarding your experience or lucid dreaming feel free to ask via post, thread, or pm to any members of the community, especially the dream guide team whose names appear in green with 3 stars below them. They're hand picked by staff to help people out with their problems and aid in any way possible. Oh, and welcome to the forums! EDIT: I ended up writing a novel myself xD

[PandaFoEva]

Hi what you all said makes a lot of sense, thanks for replying! i am less freaked out bout all of this now, and after reading what you guys said, i think your right again, thanks for your help and the welcome~ oh and burke, your novel was very helpful ;D haha

[melanieb]

Welcome to the forum! I read both of your long posts. Not bad. I agree with what Burke posted above. I honestly don't have much to add. We do have a section of the forum for OBE and Astral Projections. Beyond Dreaming You can read in there and see if any of the experiences seem familiar. In our WIKI we have tutorials on lucid dreaming, control, OBEs and more. It could be good reading. Let me know if you have a specific interest. If you have any more questions feel free to post them, or you can click on my profile picture and send me a private message. Welcome to the forum! Keep up the detailed writing!

[Sivason]

One small thing I wish to point out is that we really need two classes of SP. That is, two distinctly different things are both using the name SP. 1st) The topic of WILD. It is a method of having a lucid dream. It requires the body to fall asleep, while a bit of waking awareness sneaks along for the ride. You get to observe the phases of sleep. One of the first noticable things is the healthy normal type of SP. It is intended to keep you from acting out your dreams. It only has a subduing effect on actual concious movement. You have to focus aand intend on moving, and suddenly the state breaks. The idea of visions and general hallucinations in SP is misleading. SP is the protective movement supression. The images and so on are resulting from you being asleep(mostly) or in a meditative state. Often they are low grade dream like noise and clutter or actual non-REM dreams. 2nd) What happens to a select few. They do not have to seek to induce awareness of SP. They may lack that power to terminate it at will. Upon opening your eyes you should normally be able to move if you really want to in only seconds. That is not what happens in this case. Some one is half asleep and still dreamy, but when they want to get up or turn over, some thing goes wrong. The SP has them locked in a weird combo state between awake mind and sleeping body. I have no big point. Most every thing you read here about SP will be hobbist who are inducing it for fun, or others telling them to stop wasting their time focusing on SP. Example: "I can never be sure I am in SP?",,,"Why do you care, your trying to complete a WILD, not reach SP" and so on. We will all enjoy teaching you this great hobby, but for real medically caused SP disorder, you will not find too many who understand. My mom did the SP thing, or she would loose SP and actually start acting out here dreams. It was very scary to see that!