First WILD failed, wasted time...

[Arra]

I tried to induce a WILD for the first time in my life, just now. I'm sure this forum gets a lot posts like this, and I imagine it might be annoying, so if you don't want to hear about a failed WILD experience from a WILD newb, don't read this. I read most of the WILD tutorial on this website, but have done little more research than that. I just want to know if I was doing anything essentially wrong, or if anyone has suggestions. I'm sorry in advance if I'm being an idiot and should be looking through other posts to find answers to my specific problems. I just don't feel like doing that right now. I'll understand if I'm yelled at anyway. I'm a bit irritated right now because of what just happened. Sorry for the terrible typing. I'm not really going over my words after writing them for the first time, because I don't have time for that right now. My goal wasn't even to have WILD, exactly. That would have been a bonus, but I really just wanted to try to get my body into SP, and maybe see some hypnagogic imagery. I used to do this unintentionally years ago, so I've experienced it before, but barely remember. I woke up, went to class, came home. I had gotten about 6.5 hours of sleep, and had been up for a bit over 2 hours. I know the ideal time is 6 hours of sleep and being up for 0.5-1 hour, but I thought I'd try anyway. I also drank a cup of coffee, but was still very tired, and I know from experience I can fall asleep in this situation. Long story short, I just wasted an hour and a half getting nowhere. Long story long, it was incredibly difficult not to move. First, I lay on my side, and didn't move for about 45 minutes. I was getting overwhelming urges to swallow, though, and when I tried to ignore it, more saliva would build up in my mouth, not very much but enough to really bother me. It's sort of like a tourettes feeling, like the need to scratch an itch. Speaking of that, I was getting randomly itchy too. I've heard this is normal, your body's way of testing if you're asleep, so I tried to ignore them. It was easy to ignore the itches, and they went away quickly, but swallowing I could not ignore. I finally decided that I'd just let myself swallow when I needed to, hoping that wouldn't interfere with my body going into SP. A few times I found myself deeply in a thought, as though I was falling asleep. I never felt paralyzed, but when I decided to switch to lying on by back and start the no-moving thing over again, I stopped being able to feel my hands, which were on my stomach. It was as though they weren't there. My thoughts began to get a bit more detailed, and some images and random memories would come to my mind, as happens while falling asleep, but it wasn't very strong. The only thing that I experienced which was the type of thing I was expecting to was, near the end, I began to see flashes of light through my closed eyelids. An area on one side of my vision would flash rapidly, and then it would switch to another side. That lasted for a couple minutes then stopped. A few times, I felt as though something odd was happening, my mind was going into a different state, but it never actually did. I just continuously felt as though it was about to. The swallowing was a constant problem. My alarm clock went off, so I had to move to turn it off. I was too frustrated by this point to start over again, and was aware I'd just wasted an hour and a half of my day, so I gave up. I'm reluctant to ever try the WILD technique again after this experience.

[ultranova]

You ought not to push it too hard. It would be a miracle if WILD succeed on you first attempt and I think that you stayed up too long so that decreased your chances of successful WILD.

[LikesToTrip]

Don't be so negative! I don't know of anybody successfully getting to SP on their first try. It sounds like you were able to get some HI on the first try which I would consider a success. Next time don't stay up as long, and don't drink a cup of coffee. And don't expect quick results, it takes many months to be able to induce SP consistently. As for the saliva build up making you want to swallow, I find laying on my side or on my stomach helps prevent that. When I lay on my back it pools at the back of my mouth and I find it impossible to ignore. And you definitely didn't waste your time, each time you attempt to WILD you get closer and closer to actually having one. And try to be a little bit more optimistic over all, mindset has a lot to do with success. If you decide that you really want to WILD and are willing to put in weeks or months of effort you WILL eventually have a WILD, it is something that takes time and MANY attempts. Good luck, and happy dreaming!