Hey all, I stumbled upon the site after a google search on lucidity and the articles piqued my interest and I decided to join.
Having read about sleep paralysis and some peoples’ frightening ordeals with a host of nefarious nocturnal invaders, I was wondering, if we’re having these hallucinations because the amygdala is still stimulated and essentially using the outside world as a “dream canvas”, couldn’t we just imagine something else and change the frightening hallucination to a more pleasant one? For instance, if somebody was experiencing the “old hag” sleep paralysis phenomenon, couldn’t they simply imagine that there was something else pressing down on their chest? Perhaps people could resolve these sporadic hallucinations by just trading the scary hag for an attractive person or a benign object like a schoolbag or something.
It’s not just the amygdala, I think, it really is different parts of the whole brain that are causing hallucinations, paralysis, and fear.
I’ve read that some people learned to make it more pleasant by initiating an “out-of-body experience” and making it a paralysis-free lucid dream. Because of that, I have experienced both but not consciously experienced them together which is frustrating (so, even though I’ve had OBE’s and LD’s, I still haven’t managed to use them to get out of hallucinatory SP.)
The suggestion that it’s possible, might be all that some people need. But, I’m thinking if the conscious, glitched SP hallucinations come from deep-seated issues, they might be slightly more stubborn than would allow them to be imagined away.
I had a reoccurring dream a few years ago (starting December 29th, 2007 and ending February 11th, 2008) where I would false awaken in my room and feel too heavy to move, and then a shadow creature would appear on my chest and I could feel my ribs crushing and grinding together. The fear and intense weird vibrating sensations in my body overwhelmed to the point of not being able to think the creature away.
The last time I had that dream, the creature disappeared randomly. I looked up at my doorway door and there was a lady standing facing away from me. She started turning around and I expected her to be some sort of monster or something, but surprisingly when she turned around she looked normal. She said something to me that I couldn’t understand and then I woke up. Never had that dream since.
Lately though whenever I encounter some sort of DC that wants to hurt me I just remember they can only hurt me if I believe they can. Pain will only happen if I expect it to. I remember a few months ago when I was having a lucid dream a monster came to attack me, but when it got to me I basically became non physical and it passed right through me and I felt nothing.
Yes. That’s the point. It’s you that controls what it will happen in SP.
I will again quote lyrics from the song Unkle - Rabbit In Your Headlights:
If you’re frightened of dyin’ and you’re holding on…
You’ll see devils tearing your life away.
But…if you’ve made your peace,
Then the devils are really angels
Freeing you from the earth…from the earth…from the earth…
It’s just how you make it, no other way… If people hear and read only negative experiences then that’s what they will mostly experience. Although I never approach negatively toward SP and I had 2 negative experiences that I can recall…
