International Association for the Study of Dreams

[nathandavies]

I have always had regular sleep paralysis episodes; sometimes I can have them every night for weeks on end. I hear of how rare they can be and I wonder if anybody else has regular sleep paralysis!

I can usually bring them on at will by laying down and making sure my arms are by my side and my feet are separate. I lay perfectly still and wait. After about 5 to 10 minutes I begin to feel short pulses through my brain with 10 second intervals. After a number of pulses I am suddenly frozen into place and feeling absolutely blissful.

Now that I am frozen I begin to play. I start with moving my arms and legs out of my body. I can feel my limbs plunge down through the bed and then bounce back up into the air which sometimes helps me to lift off the bed. Other experiences include rolling off the bed and standing up; seeing ethereal light visions when I move my (imaginary) hands in front of my face, visual and audio hallucinations, bizarre sexual experiences, strange vibrations, merging with certain objects for example my wifes limbs, and physical contact with other perceived beings (ie hugging, squashing, and choking.)

After I have played around with sleep paralysis for a while I suddenly slip into deep blackness and there a dream world materialises around me. I am fully lucid and can roam freely throughs walls, fly up to the stars etc.

I feel for anybody who finds Sleep Paralysis a problem. I believe it is a truly magical experience.

I have so many other bizaare expereinces, I am starting to keep a diary.
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Nathan Davies

[Leeballz]

At first I was going to move this to the general discussion board, but I see you also are able to establish lucidity using this method. It also sounds like you are able to get an O.B.E. out of it. It's fun when you stumble across tricks that let you experiment with different realms of dreaming and the subconscious. It's also great that you are comfortable in this stage, where others become frightened and have unpleasant experiences. As one would expect, the state of ones mind has a profound effect on their experiences, especially in this stage of sleep. Those who are calm or relish the event, have a pleasant one. Those that are frightened have a frightening experience. Such is life I suppose.

[Robert W]

Nathan,

Thanks for posting!

May I ask a few questions? How old were you when you first recall a sleep paralysis episode? How did you explain them to yourself when they first happened?

Do you have (or did you have) any of these sensations:

Buzzing or humming
Energetic Vibrations or Electric Feelings
Old Hag or Weight on Chest/ Inability to Breathe
Floating above your sleeping body

It seems to me that much of the negative view of sleep paralysis comes from the person's interpretation -- they feel out of control or strange and expect something fearful or malevolent. For people who change that and come to explore sleep paralysis, they often have experiences just like you have described.

Robert W

[nathandavies]

Around the age of 5 I started my journey with Sleep Paralysis and Lucid Dreaming. I know this only because I moved from the city to a country town when I was that age and it was then, in the pristine silence, my mind began to awaken to dreaming (or I became aware of my dreaming).

At first I had no idea what it was or how to explain it to myself. I was occasionally frightened by the experience of sleep paralysis and found techniques to stop it, such as turning my head sideways.

The furthest memories of my lucid dreams are easy for me to recall since they were reoccurring. I would start by becoming paralysed and feeling an intense all over body vibrating buzz that was warm and blissful. I would then have the sensation of sinking deep into darkness where a lucid dream experience would unfold. I would plunge into a large room filled with chairs, I would then fly through the legs of many of these chairs and then everything would suddenly stop with just a single image of a sheep and then the sound of the sheep bleating. Beyond this could have been anything from a further in depth lucid experience to a regular dream adventure. I had this reoccurring dream for many years. It was my gateway into lucid dreaming.

Over the years, the reoccurring dream eventually disappeared. I still had the buzzing sensation and I knew that this meant it was time for a dream and would let it happen.

When I moved out of home and back in to the city, I had some difficulty adjusting. The buzzing no longer meant I would automatically plunge into dreaming. I would stay a while in the paralysed buzzing state. This is where I started exploring Sleep paralysis. I was indeed very frightened at times since I could not move and had worries about people breaking into my house and attacking me. I learnt to overcome this by asking the universe for protection. While paralysed I would simply remember to say “please let me be safe” and I manage to calm myself down. You have to be brave, it’s like walking through a swarm of bees, you have to maintain courage and focus otherwise you will run screaming (wake up).

Now that I am getting older and I have become used to the city, I find sleep paralysis very comfortable. There can be occasional times of terror, but I just re-adjust and try again.

I regularly experience buzzing, humming, vibrations, pressure on my chest, bodies lying on top of me; sometimes kissing and hugging me, hands on my neck, floating above my body, seeing my sleeping body from above.

At first I was curious, then I was frightened, then I managed to turn it around by accepting it as part of life.

Since joining the ASD Dream Board a few days ago, I have already started to experience more intensified lucid dreams. I love the fact that you can increase your lucid dreaming experience just by studying lucid dreaming!
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Nathan Davies

[Robert W]

Nathan,

I find it very interesting to be so young and have these experiences begin (age 5 or so). For myself, the first time must have been in my teenage years (16 or 17). But since I had had a 'vision' experience around age 12, and broke the vision by moving my hand, I knew one way to break the sense of paralysis (concentrating on moving one finger) and so used it successfully when sleep paralysis and these type of sensations occurred.

I agree with you that a person experiencing this has to have a sense of bravery or fearlessness, in order to go along with it. Sometimes the vibrations, sounds, energy, sensations feel so unusual or powerful that you have to have the courage to allow yourself to continue with it.

A few more questions if you don't mind:

Have you ever seen a smoky white light cord connecting you or connecting others while in this experience? Sometimes it appears to be connected to the base of the neck.

What percentage of these events occur in the local environment, do you feel? By local environment, I mean you seem to be within a 100 metres of your bedroom.

Best wishes,

Robert W

[nathandavies]

I have seen a cord once but only after reading about people seeing a cord, so it's hard for me to know whether it was just created by my mind. Once when I had launched up through my roof and began flapping my arms up into the night sky toward the stars, I looked down and saw a bright light trailing me.

About 90% of experiences occur within my room, house, or just outside, and in my back yard. I do occasionally travel further, but the further I go out the more obscure and peculiar the surroundings become. A favourite trick of mine is to reach out with my OBE arms and grab the wall behind me and slide my body half way out of my house and have a good look around.

It's interesting that we all have our ways of breaking the paralysis or experiences. I also have a method to end regular dreams; I wince and scrunch up my face until I hear a dull vibration within my ears (you can do this while awake, just smile and stretch your ear muscles) and that effectively pulls me out of dreams. Sometimes however if I stop wincing too early, I become stuck halfway between dream and awake and remain in a murky paralysed world.
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Nathan Davies

[IndigoDingo]

"It seems to me that much of the negative view of sleep paralysis comes from the person's interpretation -- they feel out of control or strange and expect something fearful or malevolent. For people who change that and come to explore sleep paralysis, they often have experiences just like you have described."

- I must counter this perception, as I believe it is at the heart of misunderstanding these phenomena. It is my observation that we are using many different terms for similar experiences, and not using different terms where they are required.
Sleep paralysis without the associated fear, presence etc is simply sleep paralysis. You are right in observing that not all sleep paralysis need be frightening, and indeed can be pleasant, even a way to achieve lucid dreaming, dissociation from the body etc. However, it is a common misperception that the extreme fear sometimes related to sleep paralysis is caused by the sense of paralysis itself. It is not. The paralysis may heighten a sense of panic, but it is the attendant awareness of pure evil that is the terrifying aspect. For this reason some scientists try to define this different type of experience by joining together two known experiences: sleep paralysis AND hypnogogic hallucinations. While some people may have a sleep paralysis experience and be scared or even panic, this must be quite clearly differentiated from those who experience sleep paralysis with hypnogogic hallucinations. I personally believe the latter should have a descriptive term of its own. Not until we tease out these overlaps of meaning and definition will be able to really understand what is going on, and not simply write off the terrifying aspect of SP and HH as "you just didn't know how to react to it properly."

[Rainbow]

[Leeballz]

IndigoDingo, sorry I missed your post. Welcome to the IASD Discussion Boards.

[Rainbow]

One night I woke up in a state of sleep paralysis with my face fully stuck in my pillow, so I was unable to breathe, and that was frightening for a very real and valid reason. Fortunately I had just re-read Jeremy Taylor's book on dreams, and he had mentioned that during sleep paralysis it's easy to break free of it by moving small muscles, rather than trying to flail arms and legs about. I twitched an eyebrow, and was relieved to get air!

The only other time I remember waking with sleep paralysis, I was dreaming that a cat was attached to the outside of my screen with all four paws, and was yowling and meowing, in a frenzy almost. When I got out of the paralysis, the dream stopped.

Those are the only two times I remember having it. I generally do not have sleep paralysis during lucid dreams, as I know I turn over on purpose when I get uncomfortable. I know I've been on a forum that focuses on lucid dreams, and they all seem to think that they have to be in sleep paralysis to attain lucidity, which just doesn't seem to fit for me at all.
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Rainbow

[Saampunku]

A misconception about sleep paralysis I have seen people use that teach methods on Lucid dreaming, is that sleep paralysis is 'in place so the person doesn't try and act out physically, what they are doing in dreaming'

But sleep paralysis is usually the result of when the body is in a state where it is resting, and the sleep paralysis occurs when they wake suddenly, by a scary dream or sound in their place, physically, and the body is still disconnected to receive thought commands.

Sleep paralysis has no effect on sleepwalking, as is the case.

I used to sleepwalk when I was a child, now I sometimes walk while in a dream vibration, but I can see in the physical, and am conscious.
I call it wake walking.
It is kind of like what a schizophrenic experiences. They are seeing into other dreaming vibrations, while physically awake.

But, and this is pretty well known, when you wake up quickly and experience sleep paralysis, you can relax and use it to get back into a lucid dream, or out of body consciousness.




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Without Deviation from the Norm, Progress is not Possible.
One of my favorite philosophical tenets is that people will agree with you only if they already agree with you. You do not change people's minds.- Frank Zappa

[Snowflake]

I still sleepwalk sometimes, and I am not seeing the physical place. I have a couple of times though.

But I can slip into it while physically awake sometimes, and then I am seeing both, and know what it is.
And sometimes there are double dreams, which is like sleepwalking, or wake walking, in other places.

I like the stillness in sleep paralysis. When I wake into it, I like to stay in it and feel how the softness is.

I have payed close attention, and I can stay in it for a long time. Feeling the body, and it is disconnected that way. It seems to only happen with the physical body.

[Saampunku]

[Snowflake]

I could fall onto your eyelashes