Thread: WILD & SPASMS - Truth?

Originally Posted by Howetzer

This has been talked about in many many topics and has created a scare in many people.
A lot of us have learned to relax & let it happen.

But the question is....
What is the physical reaction that is actually going on.
Is it physical or is are mental state perceiving it to be physical. When you think about this, I don't know of too many members who have been seen vibrating or shaking, etc.. So it leads me to believe it is a type of hypnopompic hallucination of sorts.
Either way, at times there is a turbulent transition. Why?
You have to wonder why.

Does any one know the physiological or physical nature to the reason this happens?
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In response to the spasms part go to this thread and check out the last post. http://www.dreamviews.com/forum/index.php?...mp;#entry327740

Someone posted this in one of the other topics about spasm during WILD:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnic_jerk

Apparently there is no definite answer to the reason for the spasms.

HEY!
Thanks a lot DyerMaker & Raylin
That makes a lot of sense.

Yeah I posted the link in the other post BUT. I think it may be both related to the hypnagogic state as well as physical. Case in point: I have had hypnagogic jerks that startled me awake to the point I got out of bed, im roughly 80% sure they were physical movements(The more I think about it, the more I consider I could be wrong though). But while I have been WILDing(or trying) I have had urges to move, so strong that it eventually felt like my foot or arm moved... but it didn't. In these latter cases im 90% sure I DID NOT move. Are those two phenomena related? I don't know. Lot's of interesting things happen in this whole process.

In my opinion, a spasm is caused by an overload in a neural pathway. When one or more neural pathways are overwhelmed with energy that natuarlly circulates through the body, it causes a spasm. I know this from experience, I've actually had my abs contract and displace me almost an inch. I wasn't going to sleep, but I was laying down and relatively still. Most people, sadly, are not aware of this energy and that's why they think it's "random".

That does not explain how we get too much energy when sleeping, and after thinking about it for twenty minutes, here's the working explanation I formulated. I think everything that exists is energy in one form or another. Energy has a wavelength, thus it vibrates. When we walk around and move through out the day, the vibrations move too. Think of it as swimming in a pool, it creates waves and turbulence. Once you get out and leave the pool undisturbed, the pool will go back to it's calm conditions. This would be when we lay down at night.

I also believe that all energy that exists is just one giant unified pool, what the theists would call God. If we lay still long enough, the pool of energy around us calms down. Then, we are free to restore our vibrational rate back to it's higher natural frequencies. I believe the healthier parts of us vibrate faster. Since temperature measures the rate of vibration of molecules, you can test this out with something warm. See if moving it down cools it off. If you light a candle, and walk around with it, and you will see the flame is obviously disturbed from it's natural resting state. Theoretically, if the candle moves too fast, it will get relatively "too cold" and extinguish. I think that's why we naturally flail our hands when we burn it.

Edit(s):
Here's a recap of a tested experiment, that you can recreate, to verify/disprove we are in a pool of energy. Forgive me for being non-descript. Using electric power, a motor caused an object to rotate in a circle until it was at a uniform speed. The scientists stopped the motor, then the rotating object. They immediately started the motor again, and found it only took 1/10 as much energy to get it back to the same rotational speed. Then they turned off power to the motor and stopped the spinning object, waiting 60 seconds for the "pool of energy" to calm down, and redid the experiment a third time to find the same results as the first time.

Originally Posted by Distant

In my opinion, a spasm is caused by an overload in a neural pathway. When one or more neural pathways are overwhelmed with energy that natuarlly circulates through the body, it causes a spasm. I know this from experience, I've actually had my abs contract and displace me almost an inch. I wasn't going to sleep, but I was laying down and relatively still. Most people, sadly, are not aware of this energy and that's why they think it's "random".

That does not explain how we get too much energy when sleeping, and after thinking about it for twenty minutes, here's the working explanation I formulated. I think everything that exists is energy in one form or another. Energy has a wavelength, thus it vibrates. When we walk around and move through out the day, the vibrations move too. Think of it as swimming in a pool, it creates waves and turbulence. Once you get out and leave the pool undisturbed, the pool will go back to it's calm conditions. This would be when we lay down at night.

I also believe that all energy that exists is just one giant unified pool, what the theists would call God. If we lay still long enough, the pool of energy around us calms down. Then, we are free to restore our vibrational rate back to it's higher natural frequencies. I believe the healthier parts of us vibrate faster. Since temperature measures the rate of vibration of molecules, you can test this out with something warm. See if moving it down cools it off. If you light a candle, and walk around with it, and you will see the flame is obviously disturbed from it's natural resting state. Theoretically, if the candle moves too fast, it will get relatively "too cold" and extinguish. I think that's why we naturally flail our hands when we burn it.

Edit(s):
Here's a recap of a tested experiment, that you can recreate, to verify/disprove we are in a pool of energy. Forgive me for being non-descript. Using electric power, a motor caused an object to rotate in a circle until it was at a uniform speed. The scientists stopped the motor, then the rotating object. They immediately started the motor again, and found it only took 1/10 as much energy to get it back to the same rotational speed. Then they turned off power to the motor and stopped the spinning object, waiting 60 seconds for the "pool of energy" to calm down, and redid the experiment a third time to find the same results as the first time.
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I think you lost my faith when you suggested that something other than electricity flows through neural pathways.

Raylin,
what I meant by energy is "whatever it is that flows through neural pathways". Electricity is one form of energy, just like heat or potential. If that restores your faith, please keep reading.

My best guess on this is that your mind refuses to give up control over your body and that keeps connecting and disconnecting you from your senses.

I'm sure all of you have been sitting in a chair dozing off. Say a fan is blowing, making some background noise. All is quiet and suddenly, you jerk back to wakefullness, hear all around you and then get a jolt.

I suspect this is happening as well, often when you are transitioning in WILD.

The length of this seems to be related to how quickly you can relax and let go of the physical world.

Sometimes for me it takes some number of seconds, other times, I slip into the dream state with a minimum or no sensations.

I haven't done a proper WILD but i know what you mean.
I woke up once and thought i should at least try a WILD so i was at the point when i was completely relaxed and suddenly my leg when flying in the air...it was really funny.
Plus every now and then when im a bit relaxed my arm or leg suddenly give off a slight jolt which really irrates me.
Plus if i'm in bed and get up i can't go to sleep until a half hour or so, so if i get a spasm then i can't get to bed for awhile.


Why this happens has to be with the messages going through the nerves. There could be many reasons why this happens when we're in a relax state. I think it could be your mind just sending off a discharge of energy and because your in such a relax state maybe it has to give it off then. It could be that your mind is trying to wake you up from a situation what could turn out to be bad or it could be fault in such a relaxed stage. There could be many reasons and we're never going to get to one conclusion..its best for the scientists to do it.

I still favor the reasons listed in the wikipedia article rather than overloaded neural pathway


1.That the feelings associated with relaxation before sleep are misinterpreted by the brain as falling or toppling over, and by reflex the body jerks out the limbs to stay upright.

2.That in the same way a body will often twitch as a person dies (as a reflex to attempt to keep the body functioning) it is thought the body might misinterpret falling asleep as a situation in which the body needs to be stimulated.