What is sleep paralysis and it's causes?

This is an article that was posted in our local newspaper.

intresting, but they only say how to prevent it, not how to “induce” it! :smile:
cause i dont think i ever have experienced it, and i want to! so how do i do it!? hehe

Well, do the opposite. Work a lot, stay stressed, drink caffeine and alcohol before bed, and sleep on your back. :grin:

Joking of course! :wink:

I’ve never experienced SP until recently. I had a very short and small experience where I couldn’t move my hand. When I woke up, I noticed my hand was not where I perceived it was. It was funny. :smile:

but thats what i already do!! :grin:

Hi
Yesterday I talked to my brother about LDing, and also about SP.He is very interested in biology, and so he started to wonder how sleep paralysis actually works.
I also told him about a method LaBerge used to prove LDing.Not the one with the eye movements, but another one in which currents to the arm muscles were measured.This way, the dreamer send signals to the outside, making his dreamheand to a fist and relaxing it.

If I got LaBerge´s method right, that´d mean that the impulses aren´t stopped in the brain, but at your muscles.
My brothers idea was that your body produces acetylcholine inhibitors.Acetylcholine seems to be the hormone that makes your muscles move.

So, anybody knows how SP actually works?

Traumgänger

My sleep paralysis started after i got an internet broadband connection and a computer and a coffeine addiction. So far it seems they are right.

But i would say the best way of inducing it for me is to stay sleeping for as long as i can in the “morning” (early afternoon) - and do it on my back. It’s not something i would recommend though. You’re better off without it.

ive had sleep paralysis when i was just laying in bed watching tv when all the sudden i had a very extreme tingling sensation and then my body froze and i couldnt move or talk but i guess ive got strong will or something cause i fought it (it seriously felt like i was being possesed or something) at first i tried to scream for help but all i did was just barely mutter hel a few times until the third time i said help …so i prayed without putting my hands together and it just stopped.dont ya just love the power of prayer. but anyways its scared me half to death i told my parents and they thought it was a panic attack and for awhile so did i…but now i see that it was sleep paralysis…scary

It is not just bad, you can easily enter a dream while being conscious, with some practice :smile: I was one of those who was scared death from SP too, but i have now learnt to somewhat master it and often even use it to induce LDs :smile:

My only experience of sleep paralysis wasn’t frightening at all. Of course I knew what it was and that may have helped. I was taking a nap in the midafternoon laying on my back, which is rare for me as I have trouble sleeping on my back. I was working alot on a robotics project and wasn’t getting a whole lot of sleep, just little cat naps like the one I was taking. The SP occured right after dropping out of an LD. It lasted for about 3 - 5 seconds and then the doorbell rang and I was able to move again.

i had this experience when i was listening to the new lucid test preset in BWGEN (brain wave generator) it can be found at bwgen.com btw just PM me and i can send you the regerastion crack where you can use every option on the program insted of limitations, ie… not being able to import presets, anyway i was listening to the lucid test and i fell asleep withen 15 mins while i was still at the computer altho i was dreaming i was still on my computer i noticed that i was sleeping when my fingers started going further and further through the keyboard and i relise i’m dreaming! i get excited and almost break the dream but i immediatly remember to spin so i spun around in the chair IT WORKED! so i tred putting my hand thru the moniter/cpu and watched as relity was melting away into a dream around my hand i felt a really icy sensation along with some tingeling while my hand and arm was submerged wich spooked me and i wake up or atleast i thought i woke up i was still dreaming then i stood up and fell through the floor then i really wake up and was like WHOA! did that just happen? afterwards i had a strange OOBE that felt like i was being ripped through a invisibal tunnel by body felt a huge accelerated motin as i was slideing down a long tube then it was like a sudden stop with a realy shrill sharp sound i cant realy described but it hurt my ears after that i started floating upward slightly outside my body watching myself i snapped back to reality but i couldnt move and i couldnt breath or feel a heartbeat it really freeked me out i had sleep poalisis many times before but not like this in my deam world i was lifting my hand wic seemd to weigh about 500 lbs over my face and dropping it to try and slap myself to wake up i did this about3 times and i finly really wake up but i’m still alive so i’m happy, it had to do with sleep poralisis so i thought i would post altho this isnt the first time i have has sleep porlalises i have heard it refered to as a wich rideing you back but now i know its sleep poralisis which is a big releafe you are totaly right about the fear part i was fleeking out thinking i was dieing now prehaps since i knoe what it is i can play around in that state knowing if i cant move i’m still dreaming :smile:

It’s interesting how it induced a WILD for you while you listened to it, sitting down.
Were you wearing heaphones or did you just listen using speakers?

Some scientific pages about Sleep Paralysis and Associated Hypnagogic and Hypnopompic Experiences,
like Old Hag, Incubus, etc.
and, less interesting, it seems :Sleep Paralysis and Lucid Dreaming

When you are sleeping the body is paralyzed to prevent sleep walking, but when you experince SP its because the brain thinks you are still sleeping, so it keeps the body paralyzed.
This is of course only my own thoughts on this, but it seems to be a pretty good theory. :slight_smile:

I have been so scared from sleep paraylisis.
I have been lucid and wanted to wake up but not been able to… i use to think at those stages that i was dead…

the other week i was having constant sleep paraylisis when i was falling asleep… that was after a week of not much sleep… not much food… consumption of (drugs) and alcohol… that was scary my head was vibrating and i thought i was going to die…

But all in all i really like the feeling :content:

I found another article that was recently reposted at:
coasttocoastam.com - “A Look at Sleep Paralysis”

It also links to these sources:
stanford.edu/~dement/paralysis.html
arts.uwaterloo.ca/~acheyne/S_P.html

I see this SP is caused by overstressed wake time, so it is not good to have it. I have my LD as a part of normal dream state when I recognize it is a dream. SP is unvoluntary waking in the middle or REM phase, so it could be harmfull for the stability of mental state. Don’t you think?

They said : “Though the experience is frightening, it is not particularly dangerous or indicative of any pathology.”

Who said?

About the second point, I’m wrong : according to DSM-IV, sleep paralysis is a symptom sometimes related to Narcolepsy. SP can be a secondary symptom of a bipolar disorder too. But for most of the people, it’s isolated (and that’s why it’s called “isolated sleep paralysis”).

This sentence sounds pleonastic, don’t you find ? :grin:

if ur naturally gifted with sleep paralysis then thats the best … Sleep paralysis is the best , the secret is to relax and u wont see any hallucinations , Sleep paralysis usually comes after u know u are dreaming while having a nightmare (always happens to me) like atleast once a week …And then u can choose to get out of ur body freaky stuff…