Thread: Will you always enter sleep paralysis when attempting DEILD?

sry for the typos

No, sleep paralysis does not always happen and is not necessary for any type of LD.

I DEILD fairly often and I have never consciously entered sleep paralysis. What time of the night are you trying to do this? If it's early on, I would recommend doing this after about 6-7 hours of sleep. NREM barrier needs to be fairly thin for DEILD.

i really love to experience heavy SP. but in DEILD, i am Lucid in less than 3 seconds....so no SP or i just don't notice it....
isn't SP mostly for astral projection?
i have read in a book that if you enter theta brain wave, dreams appear, but if you wait for more seconds to make your SP much deeper and to feel the vibration, then you are ready to astral project...
but in your case, you might have entered to delta brain wave and as threecat said, you should have encountered non-REM sleep...
these Non-REM sleeps are f... assholes in LD.

Originally Posted by SAFLINT

hey I just started DEILD last week and on first try after 5 seconds after not moving and trying to not to open my eyes I entered sleep paralysis,I waited to enter a dream and I never did. I tried again the next time and nothing happened after a minute so I stopped trying. But I wanna know if I you enter sleep paralysis every time when trying DEILD ?

No, you do not have to "enter" SP during DEILD -- or any other route to LD'ing for that matter.

Indeed, I'm not even sure how you managed to go into SP after you woke and started your DEILD; if SP were to happen at all, it should have been there when you first woke. Given that that was a very strange event, I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't happen again, and I would suggest that you do not look for it.

On an anecdotal note: in the countless of DEILD's I have done, I have never encountered SP, or anything like it, after I woke and began my return to the dream.

Try not to make SP important Saflint, you will not regret the decision.

Originally Posted by ThreeCat

I DEILD fairly often and I have never consciously entered sleep paralysis. What time of the night are you trying to do this? If it's early on, I would recommend doing this after about 6-7 hours of sleep. NREM barrier needs to be fairly thin for DEILD.

. I try DEILD whenever I wake up from a dream I usually always move when I wake up and it very annoying any tips on how to stay still cause I try mantras but they don't work.

Originally Posted by yaya

i really love to experience heavy SP.

Ya me too it felt good

Sigh.

Thanks sageous

Originally Posted by Sageous

Try not to make SP important Saflint, you will not regret the decision.

I must say, I'm a little taken back by this response. I've always thought of sleep paralysis as being a fortunate state to find oneself in, a sort of "sweet spot" for WILDs. Can you elaborate further on what you meant? I've been trying to imagine why using SP to LD might not be a good thing to do -- do you see it as a crutch, or perhaps some sort of "quick fix" that ultimately prevents us from learning how to LD in a superior way?

Originally Posted by TheUncanny

I must say, I'm a little taken back by this response. I've always thought of sleep paralysis as being a fortunate state to find oneself in, a sort of "sweet spot" for WILDs. Can you elaborate further on what you meant? I've been trying to imagine why using SP to LD might not be a good thing to do -- do you see it as a crutch, or perhaps some sort of "quick fix" that ultimately prevents us from learning how to LD in a superior way?

I think Sageous is just recommending the OP remain focused on completing the DEILD, as opposed to focusing on SP. If you personally experience SP a lot and use it to LD, then I personally say fine, do that--but most people do not experience that phenomenon on a regular basis, which means a lot of wasted time (and attempts) waiting for SP.

^^ What he said.

As long as I'm here, this is my general take on SP and other "noise" associated with WILD, from my DVA WILD Class, which might help clarify where I was coming from:

WILD Session 3: Notes About the Noise

In addition, The Uncanny, since seem to have been away for a while, here are a couple of links that might help bring you up to speed on where we're at with SP these days:

Sleep Paralysis Demystified

Sleep Paralysis Explained

I hope that helped!

There appears to be some good info in those threads. I gave them a quick look over but I'll need to read though them more thoroughly at another time. Until then, this part of your post is the most consistent with my own experiences with SP:

Originally Posted by Sageous

SP can also be used as a tool for WILD, particularly in DEILD form, where it is more often noticed, because it gives you an opportunity to metaphorically “step out” of your “paralyzed” sleeping body and into your dream body and the dream itself.

I never really had the patience (or perhaps the skill/discipline) to go from "day awake" directly into having a successful WILD. Instead, I've usually relied on some combination of WBTB, rhythmic napping, and/or DEILDing to get me there. I've had many SPILDs this way (is that an acronym yet? ). In general, they go like this:

1.) I awake after having slept for some amount of time
2.) I lay back in bed (or preferably stay in bed without moving) and wait
3.) After some time, I (seemingly) to go from being awake directly into SP...at which point I start to conjure my LD.

I can't count how many times I've done this -- is there something different "these days" about how this process works? I'm confused...

^^ I had forgotten how generous I was with SP, or rather how necessary it still was to include SP somehow in the process, when I wrote that class...

If you look more into the other sessions of the class, you will notice that I do not recommend doing WILD's straight from "day awake," either; I hope you did not get that impression from what you read there. Anyway:

I think the key word in your description above was "seemingly." Actual sleep paralysis is a condition almost exclusively encountered upon waking, and not when falling asleep. The sensation you feel during your WILD is likely REM atonia, which is the state of simple paralysis that your body enters during REM to prevent you from acting out in your dreams. Unlike SP, REM atonia can be easily exited (you can move your body if you feel like it), and it does not include the anxiety that often accompanies actual SP. Also, REM atonia is what your body does every time you fall asleep, but you just happen to witness it during WILD, while SP is a relatively rare event that most people experience only once or twice in their lives.

I do hope you will look at the threads I provided, because they do a much better job describing SP than I can here, and likely will clearly answer your questions... I would also be very interested in reading your reaction to those threads, given your perspective, if you'd be willing to share.

All that said, though, the process of WILD used in my class is generally the same as the steps you listed above, though we do diverge a bit on your step 3. Even so, we are likely on the same page here; just using different sentences.

Okay, I think I understand now. What you describe as REM atonia sounds like what I have come to understand as "sleep paralysis", though apparently those two things are not the same phenomenon. I'll give those threads a thorough read tomorrow and let you know.

So I'm still a bit confused; is the general consensus here that REM Atonia is the same or different than Sleep Paralysis? NIH defines sleep paralysis as "the inability to perform voluntary muscle movements during sleep" which would seem to apply to both of the aforementioned phenomena (assuming there is a physiological difference between the two). MedicineNet suggests that they are the same thing.

Personally, I don't know enough about the brain/body to have an opinion either way. All I know is that I have induced many LDs from a paralyzed state -- one I have entered into consciously from a state of wakefulness (most commonly with the aid of WBTB or DEILD techniques). What we call that state seems of little consequence, but it sounds like I am experiencing "real" sleep paralysis. It's like being encased in cement. You cannot usually move, at least not initially...but with enough time and effort I have been able to get an appendage wiggling and eventually snap myself out of it. I've even been able to signal my wife to wake me up by trying to scream, though according to her it comes out as a faint moan/whimper. I guess I'm one of the SP unicorns those other threads were talking about!

On a somewhat relevant side note, Christmas was nice to me and I have an iWinks Aurora on pre-order. I suspect its EEG capability might be able to give us some insight into what is really going on with this type of LD (assuming the device ever goes into production, that is).