Hypnogogia gateway.

Hello.
I have been looking into using hypnogogia as a WILD entrance technique. Most of the time though, when people speak of it, it stops at hypno and the impressions you can gain from this state. Rarely do i see it evolve into dream transition. However this is where i am wanting to take it.
I am sure some of you have heard of the technique used by Benjamin Franklin and Salvador Dali where they sit in a chair and doze off, with a spoon in their hand only to drop it and wake themselves up. Well i want to do this with holding my arm in the air, as this is a similar way of doing this. The only problem is i cannot seem to fall asleep on my back. I can manage some pseudo- back position if im tired enough but otherwise no way.

Another issue being the idea that if my arm is being held upwards, will i ever truly be able to enter a dream? This would imply a muscle group being tightened so i am not sure how i could. Although people can fall asleep in worse circumstances…

I suppose the question would be, how would i know when to relax my arm? Would REM atonia simply overcome it at some point anyways? Would letting my arm relax actually alert my body to my awakeness?

Thank you for your time.

I don’t have any experience with the arm technique, but another one involving hypnagogia has been quite successful.

As soon as the images appear, I start “daydreaming” about a similar scene. For example, if I get random news headlines, I imagine sitting at my table reading a newspaper. If I get a landscape, I imagine walking along a road. With some luck, the hallucinations merge with the visualisation to create a WILD.

I try the same thing to get a lucid dream, but i thought that was the SSILD technique?
Is there a difference? if yes what is the difference?
The SSILD technique works for me sometimes, but mayby this one works better? :content:

Hello everyone, I write from Italy and I excuse me because I use an automatic translator to write to you. I get hypnagogic images every day, especially doors that appear in the dark, but I do not know how to get inside. I tried to observe passively, but they vanish … Please, I need the concrete advice of those who have lived the same experience. Thank you.

I achieved this once, it was amazing. Had woken up in the middle of the night and when drifting back off, I saw a scene of trees in front of me. I didn’t really know what to do, but I thought I would try and “enter” the scene and somehow I did. The trees became clearer and clearer until it was super HD. I could reach out and touch the leaves in front of me, and they felt so real. By this time I was in a normal lucid dream and began walking around and found a house not too far off. Lost lucidness not soon after, but this marked the first time I’ve ever entered dream from hypnogogia imagery.

I’d more call it a WILD/VILD hybrid. It is a mix of random and consciously created images.

If that was my dream, I’d imagine myself opening the door. The subconscious would usually make up a scene behind it. The trick is to stay sleepy enough to not lose the images, and a “daydreaming” state does this well for me.

I believe I was having a hypnagogic experience recently and thought to myself this is a dream and did a RC but it didnt work i tried the finger through hand and it felt like my fingers were hitting my hand and not going through them so I figured this isnt a dream but maybe just hallucination prior to dreaming… do RC work during hypnagogia? Also, is it usualy to feel very low of energy in the hypnangogic state if that makes sense? for example, in all of the ones I have had I feel like if i go to move my arms and whatnot its difficult like I cant do it lack of energy or groggy.

Hi and welcome, ryanster89!

It sounds to me like you were WILDing and at the beginning of the dream. It can feel very annoying when the focus hasn’t fully shifted from our real body to the dream. To me, it can feel a lot like trying to not fall asleep!

Maybe you could try different RCs if the finger through hand one doesn’t work for you. :cool: