I was just wondering what everyone's thoughts on dream paralysis are?


Bob

Whats dream paralysis? Being paralized in a dream? Which never happend to me. But to me I since i dont know what it is, I would guess being stuck in the same dream or concept of the dream but different setting would be it. Which has happend to me many times.
hehe i know it aint right asking a question with a question, sorry.
But what is this dream paralysis you speak of?

Thnx bye

Do you mean not being able to move in your dreams? IF so, I've never had dream paralysis. I've had dream molassesness tho where I move really really slowly. I guess it's about the same. Maybe the mind wanders off to another dimension therefore you don't move in your sleep and this in turn prevents you from moving in your dreams. :confused:

I've always had a thing where I slow down on slopes no matter how steep it is or isn't.

One moment I'm running from armed penguins (Yes, you heard me) the next, I can't get up onto the pavement:confused:

The Penguins gain on me and I have to jump onto te pavement, its weird

anyone seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas?

remember the scene in the bar where that dude gets into a bad trip and sees dinosaurs, some of which are flying straight through him?

well, i dream like that. the feeling of something flying straight through your body and you can't run away, you're paralyzed. it's so weird! i usually wake up screaming.

:eek:

hehehe

If dream paralysis is actually been paralized in a dream, then nope, it has not yet happend to me, I'm glad it hasnt though cuz before I always had scary dreams, of me running from something. I use to see someone chasing me but I can never remember the whole face, its like theres a cloack over there head. But once I saw the mouth , he was grinning at me with sharp pointy teeth.. cant get it out of my mind. But those dreams are past, I think I figured out why I was having them cuz now there gone. I only have dreams of freedom , like being a bird. And I keep hearing someone talking to me like a guide, teaching me seriously. When I wake up I can hear it sometimes very faintly though and its someone trying to help me, I believe. I don't want to talk about what i hear cuz its hard to explain but its got to do something with spirituality.

have either of you had the feeling that your falling, and you end up jumping? that always happens to me...

When I have Dream Par., Im always concious Im asleep in a Dream, I can even open my eyes a little and see the room.

However, its like sitting in a theater watching a movie, but until it is over you cant wakeup or get out of it.

Sometime's if your determined enough, or aware, you can force yourself to get up or roll off on the floor.

I dont have them often, but when I do I hate it......

These types have a significant meaning.

Just exactly what there meaning is depends on the context of the dream, and what is happening in your daily life.

In my opinion.....


BJL

I have had it many times. It occurs just before "officially" going to sleep. I read a long time ago that this is a natural function of the brain, so as to prevent acting out dreams. ie: if I run in my dream, I'm not kicking my girlfriend in the back while my body attempts to run in bed.... scary feeling, I hate it. Usually coincides with a feeling of dread, like someone is looking over me. That dread keeps me from giving in to the paralysis and thus I fight like hell to wake up. This usually will happen several times before I'm so tired, I just fall asleep.

I have experienced this often, sometimes while going to or waking from sleep and other times when I swear I am awake completely. I have been told by doctors that when you sleep your body will paralyze your muscles so that they can recover properly but that this only happens during deep sleep and that it could be possible do awake consciously before the body. I spent quite a long time trying to find a common denomiator for this event and was frustrated for many years not being able to find one. Later I found that stress caused from worrying or other anxiety can bring it on especially if I have a lack of sleep. I relate them to what some call a panic attack even though it is different.
In reply to your specific question, I have had some dreams where I experience this phenomona while dreaming under the pretence that I am awake only to discover that it is only a dream when I do awake and find myself somewhere other than where I was in my dream state.
It is normal to be upset from these events because of the lack of control and the fear that can be associated with the experience.
I made several self experiments with them to try and determine the quickest way out. I have found that relaxation or allowing it will only make it worse while fighting it and trying to move will speed your recovery. What helps me the most is to focus on a single part of my body and use all my strength to move that part. It can be slow at first but as you begin to move you can recover quite rapidly.
I have a question for you. When it is over, aside from emotional feeling, how do you feel?

I experienced it alot before my teens. It was quite annoying and
was sometimes accompanies by audio and/or visual hallicinations.
My extremities (fingers/toes) were usually somewhat unaffected
by the paralysis and wiggling them broke me out of it.

I was already thinking that it had to do with some supernatural thing, because I have exactly the same sensations, but I feel someone grabbing or pushing me, and then I have to insult or kick this presence off me...It's very scary and this forum kind of relieves me of some more superstitious conclusions...I also agree that the best way to get the paralisys out is to focus on one body part, specially the elbows or feet. If anyone got more info or more experience please post them.

Of course. First and foremost there is no evidence that the supernatural exists. Sleep paralysis is typically accompanied by hypnogogic hallucaintion. It can affect any combination of the senses and superimposes itself upon external perception.

I have tried it - I was fully awake and could think normally, but I couldn´t move anything in my body except my eyelids , could not even talk - luckily I had heard about it , so I did not panic totally - and I managed to fall asleep again ...

I hope I NEVER get it again ....

In my country (Denmark) it is called sleep paralysis - not dream paralysis ...

I suffer from a variety of parasomnias including sleep paralysis and hypnogogic auditory hallucinations (only the other week I had extremely loud unbearable screaming in my head). They are definitely related to stress. I have had much improved sleep patterns since giving up drinking caffeine-laden Coke in the evenings.have either of you had the feeling that your falling, and you end up jumping? that always happens to me...
This is called a myoclonic jerk. Everybody gets them. There's a theory that it comes from when our monkey ancestors slept in trees and needed to have an instant reaction to falling out of it.

Usually coincides with a feeling of dread, like someone is looking over me. That dread keeps me from giving in to the paralysis and thus I fight like hell to wake up. This usually will happen several times before I'm so tired, I just fall asleep.

I had to pick this part out as I think it sums it up quite nicely. For some reason there's a feeling of someone looking over you or in the room, and an urge to fight it.
I only get this when I sleep on my back, and it happens in my dreams and then when I wake up(i've pretty much practiced forcing myself to awaken) it continues for about 2 seconds as I force myself out of it by desperately trying to move my neck. I've also had a case where I dreamt I was paralysed, inside of a dream, of a dream(quite complicated). Essentially I had to awaken myself 4 times in a row to get out of it and awake properly.
Does anyone have a link to a scientific study on this? I always felt it was something to do with my necks position when I sleep as I don't always get it and only when I sleep on my back.

when i had a sleep paralysis once, i had the feeling that my mom was trying to wake me up but i couldn't move and she sounded like she was worried that something was wrong with me. when i woke up "a few seconds" later (or whatever, that's how it felt) she was in another room and said that she touched me before but saw that i was asleep.

i know i was just dreaming when i heard that she was talking to me and seemed worried. i wasn't "hallucinating", but dreaming (if there is any difference).

i think sleep paralysis is like lucid dreaming, but you're even more lucid/aware.

it's pretty creepy, but if i get a sleep paralysis again i'll just laugh to the fact that i can't move. because who fucking cares?

when i had a sleep paralysis once, i had the feeling that my mom was trying to wake me up but i couldn't move and she sounded like she was worried that something was wrong with me. when i woke up "a few seconds" later (or whatever, that's how it felt) she was in another room and said that she touched me before but saw that i was asleep.

i know i was just dreaming when i heard that she was talking to me and seemed worried. i wasn't "hallucinating", but dreaming (if there is any difference).

i think sleep paralysis is like lucid dreaming, but you're even more lucid/aware.

it's pretty creepy, but if i get a sleep paralysis again i'll just laugh to the fact that i can't move. because who fucking cares?

It's happened to me only one time, your awake, but you can't move. I remember being scared because there was a dark shadow standing next to my bed. I have read a little bit about this and most people who experience this sort of sleep paralysis think that someone or something is trying to talk to them or communicate with them. I read that they're called Mara visitations. Some people think their paranormal, others don't. The point is it's weird...

This is called a myoclonic jerk. Everybody gets them. There's a theory that it comes from when our monkey ancestors slept in trees and needed to have an instant reaction to falling out of it.

Weird. I didn't know that.

I just woke up from one of these incidents. I'm sitting here at just before 5 in the morning, terrified even though I know that nothing is wrong.

For me, they happen anytime I sleep without the light on. I'm not really afraid of the dark, except for when I'm asleep. For some reason, if somebody turns the lights off on me while I'm asleep I get these absolutely horrible nightmares. Usually something like waking up in my house, in the dark and reaching for the light and not being able to get to it because I'm paralyzed and then I fight it and fight it and when I can finally move everything is screwed up and shadows are moving everywhere, but I can never reach the light, dimensions are all out of wack and I go on and on for what seems like forever... before I realize I'm still asleep and go through it all again and again and again. Eventually, I really will roll of the bed and be able to wake up and then I'm sitting up like I am now terrified to go back to sleep. I'm really afraid that I'm going to have a heart attack one of these days from this. My pulse gets insane and I can't catch my breath. It's really weird, because I'm not normally afraid of anything.

But, over the years, this has gotten to where it is a guaranteed event if the lights are out and I fall asleep or if the lights go out once I'm asleep. As long as their is light, I'm okay. I don't understand this at all. I'm not afraid on my way to sleep; it's just when I'm waking up, but I really think that the light going off somehow sets off something in my subconcious that causes me to wake up and go through this.

Anyway, I apologize if I'm rambling here; I desperately need some sleep and instead I'm googling for information on this.

Best wishes to all.

Any thoughts on how this relates to the potential of TLE?

This is some fucked up shit by the way... totally freaked me out.

I've had this sort of thing before, but not whilst actually being AWAKE and aware of my surroundings.

I went to bed pretty late, and had a lot of really paranoid nightmares about being late for work amongst some other disturbing dreams. Although I don't remember the nightmares that well, I knew they were dreams and was trying to wake myself up and trying to move... but couldn't. Then at some point I 'woke up' and could see my room, and I knew I was awake because I could feel my eyes blinking, but worryingly I could also hear foot steps in my room and I just wanted to be able to move so I could see who was there but I just COULDN'T move. When I was finally able to move I literally had to pinch myself just to make sure I wasn't dreaming (there was nobody in the room).

I can totally understand where 'legitimate' claims of alien abduction come from now: Sleep paralysis.

Or you were still in the grips of your nightmare.

I can totally understand where 'legitimate' claims of alien abduction come from now: Sleep paralysis.

Definitely. What alien abductees often claim are experiences mirroring victims of sleep paralysis. Almost all sleep paralysis victims claim seeing something or someone in the room and feeling helpless to do anything and generally scared out of their wits. Combine that with a dream of pop-culture sci-fi grey aliens and bam you have your alien abduction.

Scared out of my wits described the first time extremly anoyed described the second time. Sorry to tell you but if you had it before you probelry going to get it again I have it ones every 5-10 years.

It's funny that you gain control over your back muscles yust a bit fasther then the rest so it feels like your head is hanging loose. Ah well one of those things. Don't worry, the chanses that your paralysed and a alien kidnaps you both at the same time are pretty low.

The first time I had it, which was still sort of in a dream (because i was looking at a completely different room to the one I was in), I could see a shadow moving accross the room as if a person...

Funny how it is always something in the room when you can't move. There has to always be some paranoid freaky element to the paralysis...

If you're tired enough, natural human hallucinations such as hypnogogia can occur during normal 'waking' hours (no paralysis involved).

You often get a sleep paralysis if you're tired and you're trying to sleep but some sounds keep you awake... your mind then distorts these sounds...

Sleep paralysis is when you're not sleeping but not awake either...

After having an astral projection you're usually paralysed for a moment...

The gray aliens are not real aliens, they're just astral beings which reflect our thoughts... but it's not like in ordinary dreams because other people's thoughts can also affect the astral realm... and we see these... UFO's...

those "aliens" are the same "fairies" people used to see before....
but because we're in a technological age today they (the astral beings) reflect those thoughts...

but worryingly I could also hear foot steps in my room and I just wanted to be able to move so I could see who was there but I just COULDN'T move. When I was finally able to move I literally had to pinch myself just to make sure I wasn't dreaming (there was nobody in the room).

I wonder why that is?

While staying at my parents house in the country i had the most unusual experience.

I was with an ex gf and we both drifted off to sleep, only my sleep was chaotic. Basically what you describe, the unusual part was the first thing my gf said to me when she awoke was "all night long it felt as though someone (actually more than one was the feeling) was walking past me, heard it felt it"

I felt the exact same thing. We woke up covered by a blanket yet neither of us recall ever waking to get a blanket. I allways know when i wake up to do something and neither of us have any history of sleep walking.

Ghost's?

Definitely. What alien abductees often claim are experiences mirroring victims of sleep paralysis. Almost all sleep paralysis victims claim seeing something or someone in the room and feeling helpless to do anything and generally scared out of their wits. Combine that with a dream of pop-culture sci-fi grey aliens and bam you have your alien abduction.
If all abductions 'occured' while asleep then maybe yes.

What "abductions" do you have evidence of that haven't occurred while the "abductee" was asleep?

wow this sleep paralysis sounds interesting. can they happen in just anyone??

What "abductions" do you have evidence of that haven't occurred while the "abductee" was asleep?

Theres plenty man, car journeys in which passengers experience abduction being pretty common. As well as cases of people being abducted while walking about/performing daily tasks etc.
Abductions certainly arnt confined to people asleep in bed.

Yes, there are many people who claim to have been abducted. That much is common knowledge. What I was asking is what evidence exists that supports that conclusion? What there is evidence for is Hypnopompic and hypnogogic imagery and paralysis. There's also evidence of people misinterpreting phenomena they don't understand, misunderstanding events that have prosaic explanations, exaggerating anecdotal reports of events, and outright inventing and fabricating (a.k.a. lying) anecdotes for attention, status, etc. There's even evidence of a link between sadomasochistic tendencies and the belief of being abducted by aliens.

But no evidence of actual aliens that I'm aware of. Are you aware of some that you're not sharing with us?

Actually what i meant was that there are just 'claims' of abductions which occur while awake.
Theyre as valid as non-valid as you want them to be ultimately, but thats a seperate issue as i see it.
In my opinion believing absolutely that all abductions are the result of fraud or too many beers is just as much of an article of faith as believing that all abductions are objective experiences. Way too much dogma in both directions, which tends to make it very hard to work out what is actually going on.

Actually what i meant was that there are just 'claims' of abductions which occur while awake.
Theyre as valid as non-valid as you want them to be ultimately, but thats a seperate issue as i see it.
In my opinion believing absolutely that all abductions are the result of fraud or too many beers is just as much of an article of faith as believing that all abductions are objective experiences. Way too much dogma in both directions, which tends to make it very hard to work out what is actually going on.

This was very well put.
Supposed rationalists are way to comfortable saying what 'things really are' without back up. I can understand why people without experiences of their own or without having come in contact with people who have are skeptical, but to make the leap and simply say: you believe in this because of this, does generally have very little scientific basis. Another unproved theory. They think it is alright to be irrational in this way because they are arguing that something IS NOT TRUE.

having met a large number of people who have had these experiences, many of whom are professionals, even scientists, I take them very seriously. I do not think any of them are confusing dream imagery and sleep paralysis with their experiences.

The most disturbing account I heard was the morning after by 2 members of a family. Their stories were upsetting, not something they felt happy discussing and were not exactly the same, but with a great deal of overlap.

None of this is proof to people here of course, but a little humility, please. You simply do not know why these people are having these experiences. To assume that you do is to hallucinate about other people's experiences. That is odder than what you think they are doing. (by 'you, I mean skeptics here in general)

I only take issue with the space-aliens explanation. Such nonsense is the hypothesis of ignorance not of logical and critical thought. That's not to say that space-aliens are impossible, but I will stand by the notion that they are extremely improbable. Having said that, there is a reportedly excellent book by Susan Clancy titled, How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped by Aliens (Harvard University Press, 2005). A short review/synopsis can be found at this link (http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/CLAABD.html?show=reviews).

I've not yet had the opportunity to read the book in its entirety, but it sits on a shelf somewhere waiting on me.

having met a large number of people who have had these experiences, many of whom are professionals, even scientists, I take them very seriously. I do not think any of them are confusing dream imagery and sleep paralysis with their experiences.

The most disturbing account I heard was the morning after by 2 members of a family. Their stories were upsetting, not something they felt happy discussing and were not exactly the same, but with a great deal of overlap.
)

Same here, ive seen whole families from grandmother to mother to child relate abduction experiences theyve had together when out on the road.
all Breaking down in tears over it, with psychologists diagnosing clear post traumatic stress disorder.
I mean what are you going to tell them to make it instantly prosaic 'yeah you were all actually engaged in an inter-related mass hallucination'.
It just starts to get silly after a while.
Id be very suprised if there wasnt some objective validity/reality to these kinds of claims. But that doesnt make all abduction experiences true by default. I think you just have to be sensible about it and use abit common sense when it comes to these things really.
I actually used to think all abduction experience were outright nonsense, but i realised that that explaination really falls short alot of the time - ergo im not really comfortable invoking the subjective experience argument willy nilly when ever i feel like it anymore.

Ok, I don't know if this is what everybody else is talking about...but every now and then, I get totally freaked out by this.....it always happens before I've fallen asleep at night...never after I've slept a while, and woken up. It seems as if it happens when I'm close to falling asleep - though this isn't always the case. It starts with a noise....kind of like a humming or buzzing that begins quietly and gets louder. I am unable to move....blink, twitch, etc. Also, a feeling of terror quite often accompanies these sensations. I feel like if I don't shake myself out of it, I will be sucked out of my body or something like that. When I was little, I thought Satan was trying to kidnap me...of course, that's just plain silly....but, I've never heard anybody else mention anything like this happening to them. When I asked my doctor, he told me (get this!) that I should read up on alien abduction symptoms! Then he laughed....and said it sounded like I was having a bad dream, and not to worry. I don't think he really understood that this happens quite frequently.

buzzing, thumping, pulsing, etc. are common for hypnogogic / pompic hallucinations. I think the sound of blood flow might influence those hallucinations.

I remember the first time it happened to me. I was very little. Over the course of my life, I would get it often. I in the past year, I would probably get it almost everytime I sleep. Lately along with some pretty bad nightmares.

Nightmares almost every night.


When humans go to sleep, chemicals in their body cause them to be paralized so they do not act out their dreams. When there is a defficiency, people act out their dreams moving and walking around while they are sleeping. Sometimes leading to injury.

On the otherhand, there are also cases in which people gain consciousness while paralized. This is sleep paralysis. Sometimes hallucinations occur as will. Seeing things, hearing things, etc. All the while, not being able to move. All thi hallucination is no different from the hallucinatory effects of dreaming. Dreams are nothing more than hallucinations while you sleep.

Sometimes without even having a real nightmare to go along with it, I still get the feelings of terror. I logicly know there is nothing there to be afraid of, and yet I get feelings of terror. This would probably be similar to laughing gas where people laugh from inhaling the gas. It's like sitting there thinking about any random normal thought that is not in anyway scary. Yet just feeling terror. Also including sensing a harmful presense.

Ok, I don't know if this is what everybody else is talking about...but every now and then, I get totally freaked out by this.....it always happens before I've fallen asleep at night...never after I've slept a while, and woken up. It seems as if it happens when I'm close to falling asleep - though this isn't always the case. It starts with a noise....kind of like a humming or buzzing that begins quietly and gets louder. I am unable to move....blink, twitch, etc. Also, a feeling of terror quite often accompanies these sensations. I feel like if I don't shake myself out of it, I will be sucked out of my body or something like that. When I was little, I thought Satan was trying to kidnap me...of course, that's just plain silly....but, I've never heard anybody else mention anything like this happening to them. When I asked my doctor, he told me (get this!) that I should read up on alien abduction symptoms! Then he laughed....and said it sounded like I was having a bad dream, and not to worry. I don't think he really understood that this happens quite frequently.
What a jackass of a doctor. I have the exact exact same symptoms. There has to be some sort of explanation. My previous post was the best I could do. I need a cure though. There is sort of a strange repetative sound.

Sleep paralysis is more common than you think. This is due to the fact that it happens every time you sleep. Your mind goes into REM and forces all motion to stop below the neck. Its a safety mechanism so that you don't do something stupid to yourself when you're sleeping, like say, get up and jump off a flight of stairs because you are having a dream about chasing a rabbit.

I can recal having about five experiences of both what I consider to be sleep and dream paralysis, two of which where in my dreams and three in a conscious state (as I was aware of the surroundings of my room just with the possible addition of hypnagogic hallucinations). They seem to be rapidly increasing. The first two I can't quite remember when I had them, the third happened all of a few months ago, the fourth was about two weeks ago and the last one was about three days ago. Because of this I decided it may be appropriate to look into the possible causes for the experience:

*Sleeping in a supine position (facing upwards)
*Irregular sleeping schedules; naps, sleeping in, sleep deprivation
*Increased stress
*Sudden environmental/lifestyle changes
*A lucid dream that immediately precedes the episode. Also conscious induction of sleep paralysis is a common technique to enter a state of lucid dreams, also known as WILD[1] .
*Artificial sleeping aids, ADD medications and/or antihistamines

But I believe these are specific to being in a conscious state, in dreams I am uncertain. Although I have been told that in dreams to be paralysed is a reflection of how you may feel about a particular topic in your life. As for me personally, I've probably done/still induce all but the last one from the list above.

Suddenly I wonder if I have further induced the possibility of getting this by conciously trying to force myself awake once I realise I'm having a nightmare, and do not mistake me for having a hallucination in a conscious state. I'm literally reffering to something with the likeness of: Just about to be eaten by a zombie, in the back of some alley way and not being in my room thinking I can sense some sort of entity holding me down. Which actually lol that makes six I can remember.