What exactly causes us to "lose" awareness?

**Graupel** · 05-23-2010 01:22 AM

I figure if I can understand why we lose conscious self-awareness each night as we go to "sleep", then figuring out a way to get around it might be the first start to having a WILD.

I have heard of people remaining conscious during theta, delta (K complex), and deep delta, so I know it is possible.. so the first question that this brings to mind is what exactly causes us to lose awareness each night?

Is this an acutal mechanism in our brains that shuts off biochemically that can't be countered (if this were true then how do people remain conscious in all stages of the sleep cycles)?

Is this a protective mechanism that our brains are programmed to do from birth so that we don't get scared by the weird stuff that happens when passing through the sleep cycles?

I have been trying to observe what happens when I go to sleep and it seems that the more I let my mind wander, the easier I fall asleep. I am unsure though as to what point I actually lose conscious awareness or how it happens.

Some people like Vessen Hopkins have described this as a "tug" on your awarenss to pass out as you are falling asleep, but I have yet to experience it like this.

**Philosopher8659** · 05-23-2010 01:41 AM

There are many ways of losing awareness. Anger, love, heat, etc., The function of the human mind is not to produce awareness, but to produce will. The best I have done with lucid dreaming is staying lucid through six consecutive dreams. Between dreams, each time, all I was aware of is seeing my face in the darkness. What sustains long efforts of awareness is desire, which is a particular emotion, and knowing what one can do to accomplish it. One might suspect that there are two causes for not being able to maintain awareness. Lack of desire, or lack of knowledge on how to fulfil that desire. Both are called apathy. To maintain awareness, one must have both.

**Kuhnada29** · 05-24-2010 07:23 PM

Years of non-awareness in waking life is why we lose consciousness during sleep. We're not aware in waking life, so why would we be in dreams. Most of us walk around lost in thought-patterns, and so we're not aware. That's why meditation is so beneficial.