Whenever I try to WILD manually, I fail. I just never fall asleep etc.
But sometimes, and this is kind of a tip, whenever I snooze repeatedly (you wake up of your alarm, put it on snooze, fall asleep within 1 min, wake up after 8 min over and over), I sometimes get into a state of pre-pre-WILD (before you actually start to see/hear things). I know I will be able to WILD succesfully, and I really want to. (The tip being that snoozing repeatedly is a great way to eventually WILD).
But whenever I get the opportunity, which I personally see as a blessing afterhand, I always chicken out as I get this glitchy feeling inside my head.
Around a year ago, I experienced a pretty serious pre-WILD moment. I was paralyzed and had my eyes opened. I heard very scary, glitchy music play inside my head (sort of like a glitchy piano melody). Not only did I hear a nightmare soundtrack play inside my head, I also saw a distinct totally black and shadowy creature in front of me in my room. It was “dancing” in rhythm of the music. Whenever a note of the music was “played”, the shadowy creature “ran” towards me (although standing still). So with every note, it was doing a jerky running motion. This scared me up to the point of being afraid of something I knew was surreal and “natural”.
During this pre-WILD moment (which never turned into a LD as I actually moved/“woke” up out of pure fear), I felt a very glitchy and scratchy feeling within my body.
That is the same feeling as I now get whenever I am in a pre-pre-WILD moment. I know it’s a natural process which won’t kill me, but I still can’t relax and just let it come. I always “jerk” out of the moment by twitching my body to “wake” myself up.
Do you have any tips on how to combat this momentary fear of what I really want to experience? Thank you.
That feeling you’re talking about is something called the Old Hag (among other things). Essentially what is happening is you’re beginning to fall asleep. Your body is locked in SP and you are beginning to go into a dream phase. When this happens and you are still conscious, your mind tries to come up with reasons for you not being able to move.
A lot of times it appears as a malevolent being looking over you or holding you down (a demon or witch is common). This is also usually accompanied by sounds and other lovely experiences. Now, since it is all in your mind, you can control this. I know a lot of people who have switched the image to something like a cute girl looking over them and other things. Just remember it’s based on your expectation.
I had the same hesitations and fears about WILD when I read about it. Although, as you have said, people say that it is natural and harmless, it’s a bit difficult to believe when you have read about (and/or experienced) the HI/HH horror stories!
This is what prevented me from trying the WILD techniques, I was terrified of what I might see/hear/feel if I was actually able to succeed with them.
Recently though, I read about a technique called “Chaining” here on ld4all and I was fascinated with people being able to link dreams together and go into them lucid. (Here is a link to the thread https://community.ld4all.com/t/chaining-deild-guide-and-faq/31172)
A few nights ago (completely by accident), I had just become lucid when the dream started to fade and I started to slowly wake up. However I managed to stay somewhere in between the dream state and the waking state, trying to keep myself still - this led to a sort of WILD experience, but I was completely calm and amazed at how strange it was to feel the tingling/humming vibrations and to see a dream scene appearing before my eyes (without all the scary stuff!).
To cut a long story short, I accidentally woke myself up by having to swallow but this taste of what a WILD could be like left me inspired and motivated.
My advice to you would be to try ‘chaining’ (I think they are also referred to as Dream Exit Induced Lucid Dreams) and forget about the label of WILD; that might also be a part of your fear. Once you are able to associate the vibrations and other ‘pre WILD’ phenomenon with a positive experience you won’t be hesitant anymore and will be much more successful
I’ve seen this thing during SP…when I saw it, that same inky black shadowy figure, my eyes were wide open and it was flopping around beside my bed in paroxysmal seizure-like activity that was utterly terrifying. I mean, the fear was absolutely exquisite at the time…and it seemed like the more afraid I became, the more frenetic the shadow’s movement became, like it was jacked in directly to my fear. And then, all of a sudden, something in me snapped and I reached out, quick as a snake, with my dreaming-body hand and grabbed it by the wrist. When I did that, the whole shadow stopped and kind of slumped slowly to the ground. Its wrist (felt like a soft “force” more than anything substantial) slowly dissolved into shadowy smoke, which dissipated, along with the rest of it, into the air.
The key is to let the SP allow you to transition to your dreaming form, in spite of the acute fear. Then you can act out with courage to face that fear. If you try to escape by physically moving or waking up, sometimes it just makes things worse, adding to the feeling of being trapped and helpless because of the SP. Also key is to know that there’s nothing that the apparition can do other than cause fear, even tho it seems like a pedigree pro at this I’ve seen that shadow many times since the above incidence and I always just laugh at it or, last time, flew right through it in dreaming form.
When you treat it like its nothing (which it is!) then nothing it becomes.
Glyph, you’re 100% right. In fact you make it seem even comical… funny idea popped up in my head: Maybe we can actually get to know those shadowy apparitions and bond with them. You know, hang out in the dream afterwards.
Always, I already get these scared feelings when I even only read about some post about for example a Dark shadow figure.
The more I try to WILD, or read about WILD, the less I dare to do it
I’ve already succeeded in doing it a few times, but the dreams I get afterwards are the worst of all (That is, in my case). Since I really suck at dream control, there’s nothing I can do about them yet. (Even when they are indeed LD’s)
WILD always give me this negative feeling when trying it. And I always think of the most scariest figures I’ve seen from horror movies or games etc. during SP, which makes me force myself to snap out of the WILD attempt. How come my mind is always so uncontrollable?
Would it be best for me to just try WBTB for now?
I know this post may come out of nowhere, but I just felt like typing it
Exactly. In the same way that if you treat it like something scary (which it isn’t!) then something scary it becomes
It does indeed feed off fear. The more you fear, the scarrier it becomes. I’ve never feared seeing anything scary in SP. So I never have. I’ve seen bizarre things, though. And they would be scary if I let myself fear it. But I look and laugh, or in worst case scenario, think “wow, that is weird and ugly and unconfortable”, but I don’t let myself fear it. It’s like a movie, it’s an image, or a sound, and it’s not real.
Slightly off topic, but I should point out that swallowing won’t necessarily wake you up or ruin your experience. As long as you do it without giving much thought you should be fine. Just don’t dedicate too much thought to it.
I only bring this up because it’s a major source of grief for a lot of dreamers and there are a ton of guides warning against it. Just play it naturally and you’ll be fine.
I’ve seen bizarre things, though. And they would be scary if I let myself fear it. But I look and laugh, or in worst case scenario, think “wow, that is weird and ugly and unconfortable”, but I don’t let myself fear it. It’s like a movie, it’s an image, or a sound, and it’s not real.
Once you cross the fear threshold, anythings possible