HI isn’t just imagery, any other sensation counts too. That’s definately dropping off to sleep and your dream already starting.
i hear voices in my head just like the ones you’ve described pistgirl. i can usually hear them whenever i’m quiet, but usually when going to bed or waking up. sometimes i will hear them in the middle of the day, and a lot of them inspire the first few lines of poems that i write. i just fill in the rest of the poem when i lose the voice
have you even seen john edward (the psychic who has that show “crossing over w/ john edward”) i’m wondering if these voices are the same thing he hears in his head (spirits of those who have passed) shrug of course he’s a lot better at listening than me
That is just you falling to sleep. It is the same thing is HI, but in audio. I’ve gotten amazing sounds when going to sleep. One time I was napping during the day, laying on a couch and heard footsteps walking across he floor toward me, until they were right next to me and I looked up and no one was there. When I laid back down I had a FA.
I think this often happens during SP. It happens to everyone. It is also a sign that you are getting close with the WILD technique.
I think this is a perfectly normal experience, when you are falling asleep.
I personally experience flashes of pictures more often than this sounds/voices.
Twice. One time I heard footsteps when no one was there (I wasn’t going to sleep, but I had been reading a book from around 10:00pm till about 2:00am, so I was kindda tired…).
And one time, years ago, as I fell off to sleep, I heard a ladies voices say something (can’t remember anymore, but I think it was my name) voer and over, getting louder and louder till she was pretty much screaming in my ear. I opened my eyes, and I was in a ‘hell like landscape’. Freaky 
.
Both of these times was way before I had even heard of LDing.
THAT HAPPENS TO ME ALOT!
I get this too, occasionally. They tend to be saying pretty dumb things, too. And it isn’t usually the voice of anyone I know.
One really amused me this morning as I was trynig MILD again…I kept hearing a woman and a little girl saying “meow…MEOW” “meow…MEOW” I heard it like every 15 minutes, I couldn’t stop laughing and it woke me up every time which really annoyed me cos then I couldnt do my morning MILD!
If the house is quiet and I’m in bed with no thoughts in my mind, then I start to hear loads of voices, mainly my parents, things I’ve heard them say lots of times or my Mum calling me (Sometimes I almost believe she has). After a while the words start to get mixed up and all sorts of random words seem to come from nowhere. But I don’t feel like I’m falling asleep while this happens, just letting my mind wander.
Sometimes they ‘meld’ with my MILD intentions…like instead of saying “The next time I dream, I will know that I’m dreaming” I’ll start saying “the next time I’m freezing, I’ll give the dog a bath” just cos that’s what the voices are saying, or thats the thought thats annoyingly creeping into my mind!
This one time, I woke up and heard this female voice like 1 foot from my head and it sounded as real as anything. Its interesting how capable the brain is at self delusion.
Incidentally, how do you know the voices don’t sound like the ones schitzophrenics hear? Most likely thats where they originate, I imagine they are just more intense and persistent.
I too get this sound thing all the time. Usually its when im falling asleep but once or twice when im pretty awake, I remember one time where i heard this voice and i couldnt make it stop, i thought ‘well its cuz im in bed’ so i got up and still it pestered me. I finally just totally commanded it to go away and havent had such an experience since…though it was a pretty unique experience in itself…i dont want to share it in detail though…
But anyways maybe 2 days ago i was hearing stuff in Hypnogogic State (HS does that work? If not we should have an acronym because like many here have said it is not only imagery but also sounds and any other sense or stimuli. Oh but how to define it??? hehe HS: Hypnogogic State - Sensory reception while on the verge of sleep indicating such and the beginning of a dream. If one is aware such usually seems very real and can even fully wake one up. Can be used and ‘gotten into’ to induce an LD. ) someone revise it for me
But anyways I was hearing the voice of a girl (not sure if i recognized it) kind of like fragments of a sentence or like the ‘memory’ thing (great description pistgurl) its hard to describe but has a very dreamlike quality to them while you hear it, and if you are awoken by such they seem very real afterwards. Well i tried communicating with the voice, asking it ‘what are you saying?’, ‘where are you?’, ‘who are you?’ and other questions, some of them nonsensical but i cant recall any in particular, but nonsensical probably because i was half asleep. It was strange, i think i did succeed but the answers were very vague, and only like ‘partial’ answers, sometimes the answers would be totally something else and i would get confused, ask about that etc. it was very weird but interesting.
But anyways has anyone tried communicating with the voices they hear in HS? Or am i just crazy? 
i’ve tried talking to them, but haven’t had any success 
i guess i should concentrate on listening to them w/o losing them for now
These voices are different from schitzophrenic ‘voices’ because to be a schitzophrenic voice, it has to be considered reality.
A schitzophrenic cannot differentiate between a voice in their head that isn’t real, or a real person telling them what to do.
So, as I know these voices are not real voices, and are just in my head, they are not schitzophrenic voices.(Did this in Psych…really loved that lesson)
I accidentally talked to one once…I mean I was really almost asleep, and a woman asked me if I wanted any milk, and I turned over and said “yeah, ok…” then realised I’d just woken myself up, got really pissed off, and had to start falling asleep all over again.
I didnt actually speak to them out loud but tried to ‘mind communicate’ or whatever through a petty projection in thought. Though i do recall one time where i wasnt really aware of the HI and so i responded i think it was a FA where my mom told me that she had made breakfast and i said ‘ok be there in a min’ out loud, woke up and it was like 3 am hehe.
But I do get that all the time when i become aware of it and im always unsure if it is real or not (i like to think that maybe just maybe it could actually be someone or something trying to communicate with me) though chances are its just HI, and my reasoning for not caring if it is truly external or not is that if it is, cool im communicating with another being, and if not then i am most likely communicating with my subconscious or some abstract aspect of myself, with abstract and hard to understand responses 
hehe so maybe im slightly schizo? nah im jus jokin ** 
** lol
One time I was trying to initiate a WILD, and everytime I got close, this really high pitched tone would develop. It almost sounded like someone whistling. It stopped almost as soon as i became conscious of it, and i thought it was a noise out in the hall or something. But after interrupting my WILD attempts several times, i realized it was all in my head.
Does anyone ever experience HI or HA (Hypnagogic Audio, lol) that actually interferes with their attempts?
Sometimes I hear a phone or a doorbell.
gets up, checks phone
no missed calls…
I don’t hear strange noises very often
One time while doing WILD I heard some noises coming from the distance. At first it was like distant thunderclaps, but it became louder and louder until finally the thunderclaps changed into the agonizing screeching of a bunch of witches. Awww man that was scary 
Sometimes when I try to WILD and I’m not successful I hear some voice or sound…
Funny but when I succeed (I see an image) I never hear any voice or sounds.
I hear voices and often see people moving, before it disappears.