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Hypnagogia: A Bridge to Other Realities
Biology 202
2000 First Web Report
On Serendip
Yun-Wen Shaw
" To dream and altogether not
to dream. This synthesis is the
operation of genius, by which both
activities are mutually reinforced."
The phenomenon of the hypnagogic hallucinations which occur in this
period are characterized by a slideshow of highly condensed,
discontinuous, and bizarre imagery of faces, figures, animals, print
and writing. Also accompanying this is often hearing one’s name being
whispered, hearing music, and undergoing temporary physical paralysis (4, 7).
These visual, auditory, and physical stimuli, have been known to
cultivate intuition, bring flashes of inspiration, and offer creative
insight to those who experience them (1).
During this fleeting psycho-physical state, people report randomly
occurring visual and auditory experiences which are relatively more
disconnected and short-lived when compared to dreams characteristic of
REM sleep. Hypnagogia is in fact very common, occurring in 72 to 77
percent of the population, many are unaware of the phenomena (1).
A possible physical explanation for Hypnagogia is rooted in the discovery of magnetite crystals in cells of the brain and meninges. It has been found that there are five million magnetite crystals per gram in the human brain, and twenty times that number in the meninges (2). These ‘biomagnetite crystals’ are oriented in the brain in a manner that maximizes their magnetic moment, thus allowing the crystals to act as a system, and marking the ability of the brain to sense energy fields (4). These crystals could very possibly be the cause and explanation behind psychic abilities, as well as the feelings of intuition during states of hypnagogia.
Let us further explore how this phenomenon may be possible. Studies that show the proximity of the crystal-containing brain cells to the pituitary and pineal glands, have led researchers to propose that these glands may use information from the earth’s magnetic field to regulate the release of hormones in the brain, thus directly controlling conscious awareness levels (2).
However, there is still no way to ’read’ the signals that might be carried by the brains magnetic emissions. Despite this being so, the evidence indicating the existence of these signals and their possible constitution of a means of communication between various parts of the brain, is very compelling. This is the system that many speculate to be that which selects the neural areas to be recruited, so that the appropriate state of consciousness can elicit the suitable phenomenological, behavioral, and affective responses (4).
Studies have been done to show that various low intensity magnetic signals delivered to the temporal lobes indeed have a positive effect of producing various hallucinatory effects in the subject . Such effects include vestibular feelings in which one’s normal sense of balance is replaced by illusions of levitation and vertigo. Also experienced are transient ‘visions,’ whose context include motifs that appear in near-death experiences and alien abduction scenarios. Another neuromagentically elicited experience is bursts of emotion, most commonly fear and joy. Interestingly, all of these experiences very closely approximate those in the hypnagogic state.
Further experimentation performed on monkeys has determined the temporal lobes to be the part of the brain which mediates various states of consciousness. EEG readouts from the temporal lobes are markedly different when a person is asleep and undergoing a hallucinogenic seizure, or on LSD. In this case, seizural disorders confined to the temporal lobes (complex partial seizures) were characterized as impairments of consciousness. In the study, monkeys were given LSD after having various parts of their brains removed. The monkeys continued to ‘trip’ no matter what parts of the brains were missing. Only in the case where both temporal lobes were removed did the substance seem to have no affect the monkeys at all. The conclusion inarguably shows that the temporal lobes, in addition to all their other functions (in aspects of memory, language, music, etc.), also function to mediate states of consciousness (4).
The interpretation of hypnagogic images in some studies have seemed to provide striking examples not only of the existence of various states of consciousness, but also of clairvoyance and telepathy (7). In his book Hypnagogia, Andreas Mavromatis declares that "…hypnagogia gives rise to the insight that there are many realities and that what we call wakefulness merely constitutes one of them…hypnagogia suggests the evolutional possibility of a further expansion of consciousness, and poses a serious question concerning the nature of reality" (7). People have applied many different strategies to channel into the "powers of the hypnogic’ by means of meditation, hypnosis, spiritualism, hallucinogenic drug use, and others. Many hypnogists report states of instantaneous intuition, exhilaration with an inspired poem, mystical insights, and exquisite peaceful joy. Occultists believe they can tap into clairvoyant experiences in the hypnagogic. Others feel that they can engage in self-hypnosis so that they can achieve things they thought impossible or too difficult, by hypnagogic visualization (5).
Hypnagogic stages of sleep, with all its hallucinatory imagery, tends to act as compelling explanations for many claims of alien or supernatural encounters. It is easy to imagine how an individual who has had a hypnagogic experience with sleep paralysis, who is not familiar with the neurological explanation, to likely interpret their strange experience in terms of their cultural beliefs or in other bizarre supernatural terms (2). Hypnagogia presets new dimensions of a true New Age exploration, waiting for us all to travel together into this New World. And if any are skeptical, we can gain confidence in our hypnagogic pursuits from the realization that we are following in the footsteps of some of the most creative, intuitive and influential human minds in history. After all, Aristotle and Einstein can’t be wrong.
WWW Sources
1) Altered States2) Mind Whispers - Psychics and Scientists ; Patrick Marsolek
3) Hypnagogia ; Robert Novella
4) The Production of Consciousness out of States of Consciousness
5) Psychic Syzygy: Hypnagogic Antilogic
6) Paradigms of Consciousness During Sleep; Donald J. DeGracia, Ph.D.
7) Hypnagogia: Bridge to Other Realities
i noticed your link to my article "Mind whispers..." on your page on Hypnagogia:
/bb/neuro/neuro00/web3/Shaw.html
needs to be updated.
The correct link is now:
http://www.innerworkingsresources.com/articles/mindwhispers.html
Warm regards ... Patrick Marsolek, 13 June 2006
I was reading ur article on Hypnagogia. I've have had serious Sleep paralysis before falling asleep for the last 10 years. I am 27. I just wanted to share that it's incredably terifiying. When this started I guess I had hypnagogic hallucinations for the first 3. And it's not fun. I think that people who don't have think of it as romantic. (p.s. I'm not insulting you guys) But sometime it feels like i'm going to die. Maybee because i was always scared I did not understad it. I have done 3 sleep tests. And nothing wrong was found. I went to see a neurologist at mount sinai hospital in toronto. They did a cat scan and my brain was 100%. But that i might have a cross between epilepsy and narcolepsy and that they could do nothing to help me. I told the doctor to go f-himself, and left. Who can I talk to about this? I would love to share my experiences and maybee understand them beter? Any help would be greatly appreciated ... Anthony Lorusso, 30 December 2007
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Comments
19 years of age. VERY interested in the subconscious mind.
Let me first thank the writer of this article, for I found it to be extremely informative and helpful. I didn't like the ending comment, "Aristotle and Einstein can’t be wrong." because it was quite shallow, but other than that, I loved reading it.
-------
My biological father is a legally diagnosed skizophrenic, and my mother is a bipolar manic-depressant. So of course, I am going to live a life-time of vivid and intense subconscious experiences, however I don't fear them, and I look forward to the learning and creative insight.
Anyway, for the past week or so, I have been reading[online] about the subconscious mind, the bridging between sleep and alertness, dreams and their meanings, and basically all things involving our creativity being tapped into through hypnosis and other forms of complete rest.
I have had many lucid dreams, and for the most part, I've had just about every experience listed on this page, including the lights, the voices, the music[ONE OF MY FAVORITES], the flying, floating, and many more.
But I also had another one, and I was wondering if any one had any clue as to it's meaning...
Ok, so, when I was about 12 or 13, I woke up. Fully awake, and aware, able to move and all, and I began to hear things. It was voices. I know voices are a result of skizophrenia, but I don't hear them often, and so I am certain I'm not skizophrenic, at least not yet. But from what I've read, skizophrenic symptoms include one or two voices. And they usually hold conversations, or continuously relay a message of some sort. And this experience was nothing like that. In this particular case, there were many voices. Far too many to count. They weren't speaking sentences, however, they were whispering numbers. All of them, different numbers at the same time. And I tried to connect them, to see if maybe it was phone-numbers or math problems my subconscious was repeating, but I could not find any relevance to them. Well, as this whispering kept on, it got louder and louder. Almost as if each voice was giving an answer to a math problem, and they each thouth they had a correct answer, though each had a different number to say. And it seemed like, at first they were making suggestions, then eventually, they started to get more and more assertive with eachother. After a while, the voices were each shouting there numbers, and it started to become difficult to understand them. Soon enough, it was like a loud static blur, or a din like arguing. Then it ended breifly with a "swishhh" sound, much like a wave.
My step-father tried to explain it to me, by telling me it might have something to do with an above average iq, and maybe it was my mind practicing algebra for school, but I don't know.
Any explanation would be appreciated.
I'm just mainly concerned because I was fully awake, and able to move, so it wasn't a case of hypnagogia.
But... thanks for reading.
hearing voices ...
Wow..I'm not alone
I've found this site by chance...but this happens to me all of the time. I'm glad to see that I'm not by myself. I thought either I'm going insane, I'm being possessed or...well I don't know..I have dreams about people I don't know personally and then they come true...mainly celebrites...I have dreams about family and friends and they come true...not neccessarily the very next day. I have dreams where I'm literally having conversations with people who are no longer here and in the dreams I'm always talking to them on the phone...and I can remember every word they say to me...and then there are nights that scare the living daylights out of me...where I feel as if I can't move as if someone is lying on my chest..one time in particular I feel asleep on my couch downstairs..I remember struggling thinking wow I feel asleep...let me get up and go to bed....and I couldn't move...and I panicked and frantically kept trying to move..I looked and saw three dark shadows on my stairs watching me and as I finally forced (yanked) myself up I tried to run up my stairs...but when I moved my feet weren't touching the floor...it's as if I was floating...I busted in my room scared my husband half to death and jumped on the bed sobbing...I was prety freaked out...other times it's been me hearing someone say my name...then I hear the doorbell ring once...and I remember laying thinking who the heck is coming over my house this late at night...and I lay there..waiting to hear if the doorbell will ring again..to get up and answer...and my covers will slowly slide off a little as if someone is trying to force me to wake up and get out of bed. I've got too many instances...If I wrote them all it would be a novel.
The part where you woke up
The part where you woke up and couldn't move then three entities on the stairs looking at you---- then finally after struggling you could move but find yourself floating all indicate you were having an out of body experience. You are probably a very psychic person. Read Robert Monroe's book "Journeys out of the Body". He started out having problems like yours and eventually wrote two books about his experiences.
Thank you for your insight
Thank you for your insight and response I will definitely read Robert Monroe's book "Journeys out of the Body ...It's been a while since I've been on here and this post has really grown! I do continue to have experiences some not as scary as not being able to move...I've had instances where I've taken a nap and I can hear children laughing and playing in my room. I think it's my kids and without opening my eyes I say can you guys please stop Mommy's trying to take a nap...Then I feel them jumping up and down on my bed (eyes still closed) I yell out my kids names to tell the to stop and I open my eyes to see my oldest daughter opening the door to ask "Did you call us mommy?". My eyes are open now and I'm looking around the room still groggy I ask "Why were you guys jumping on my bed like that when I'm trying to sleep". She looks at me like I've lost my mind and replies We were downstairs watching tv and heard you calling us so I came upstairs to see what you wanted. As stated before I could go on and on and on. I'm really anxious to read the book...maybe I can get a better understanding.
lights that ive never seen before
hi anyone get this...im asleep at night and ill suddenly wake up and ill see bright static illuminous lights in my room. sometimes they will jus be like lightening and other times they will be like a shape. a few weeks ago i had a illuminous green grid in my room the whole length of my room. last night i had what looked like red electric shooting accross my room. sometimes these shapes and patterns metamorph into something else straight in front of me. it only lasts about ten seconds then it just fades away. its like a completly different world with some of the shapes ect immpossible to describe.......
Hypnagogic Hallucinations
Indeed LSD is one of the causes Of Hypnagogic Hallucinations. Hallucinogenics such as LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide, or acid), psilocybin (4-phosphoryloxy-N, N-dimethyltryptamine, or mushrooms), ecstasy (3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, or MDMA), and mescaline (3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine, or peyote) trigger hallucinations.
First Hypnagogia Experience - strange
I have just had my first Hypnagogia experience last night. I was having a nightmare about being caught by someone who wanted to kill me or perhaps my family members and I was fighting for my life. I awoke suddenly and saw a large heavy metal engine coated in off-white paint about 1 foot wide and 2 feet tall floating about 2 feet above my chest. I thought this cannot be happening. I felt as if i turn away it might vanish so I stare it and it recedes slowly, retracting like movie camera lenses pulling away smoothly and carefully.
I turned on the light but it was gone. Although I knew it couldn't exist I know that my eyes saw something.
I am frustrated that I didn't try to touch it to see if I could feel it's form.
I want to know what it means. Is it just a mind glitch?
Hi, I don't know if I'm
Hi,
I don't know if I'm saying stuff you already know as I havn't visited this site before. My whole life I've had a lot of night time halucinations and some day time ones. There's theories on what hypnogogic halucinations are and you can google that. It's obvious that heaps of people have them. One of the main ones that i had is of this big camera being close up to my face when I open my eyes and then it madly retracts, telescopically up into the wall or ceiling and disappears. You're the first entry I've found on the web who also sees the camera. I often wondered whether there was some underlying subconscious link to feeling like I'm under the microscope of my mother's (and to some degree, others) judgement and control. I haven't really broken free in terms of being real, honest, confident in who I am etc although I've come a hell of a long way. I should add that i have long suffered from mood disorders and had a very brief episode of paranoid schizophrenia. At some point I made the decision that next time I have the camera episode (by the way my partners can attest to me being "awake" during halucinations - the most talked about incident being when I said to my husband "don't tell me you can't fucking see that!") I would reach out to it and bash it to pieces. I actually have never had the camera one since then. I see it as part of my progress. As for the schools of thought of how it is all linked to extraterestrial or demonic activity I don't know and since I probably never will know I just try to concentrate on what I can do in my life to try and create better mental health. I hope I haven't freaked you out. Much love to you and good luck.
Hypnogogia - seeing faces
I have had this for years, and normally welcomed it as a prelude to sleep, I am now beginning to consider this at a deeper level.
As I drift towards sleep faces form in the darkness then morph into new faces, sometimes taking just one part of the previous face like a nose or a brow and blending in to create a new face.
During a period of real stress last year instead of benign faces I began to see hideous agressive faces misshapened and damaged, one moving to the next just as before, I would shake myself awake and try to rush through this phase into sleep. It felt like some sort of demonic assault, to begin with I was curious but it became too distressing to dwell on.
Otherwise I have the same weird visions as already detailed here by other people. Mostly enjoyable but always so random. The thing I find hard is focussing, the moment I try to watch it seems that my conscious mind flushes out the unconcious.
swimming
I close my eyes and the faces appear out of the darkness vivid and scary. These faces are deep within, so terrifying I could not create or represent them in a conscious manner. They are like something you may conjure up in an abstract painting. They move vividly in the darkness like shadow people out of the corner of your eye. If I really have the guts to keep my eyes closed to see where it takes me the faces may subside and a storyline may begin to unfold like a vision of a house or a road---and being aware, I ask myself is this a clue of some kind, but it never goes any further—but back to the menacing faces.
I am 17 years old and for
I am 17 years old and for the past 3 weeks or so i believe i've been suffering from a combination of hypnogogia and lucid dreaming, and it's terrifying. It's always the same: i am lying in bed, just like im lying there with my eyes open, though i'm asleep, and sometimes someone is sitting on my, or shaking me, or it feels like i'm possessed, and i can't see who it is. Sometimes i'm flying in the air, like dangling, limp, trying to move. And I'll try to move myself to wake up because i know i'm asleep, but i feel frozen or weighed down. my dad says it's lack of sleep and it might be, but it's terrifying and i don't look forward to closing my eyes. some vicious cycle, huh?
NIght terrors, hypnogogia, sleep paralysis and lucid dreaming
Hey man,
I know the exact feeling, although I have only had one sleep paralysis experience/ night
terror (which sounds similar to what you experienced but I thought I was awake.):
I was lying in bed thinking
"man, Im NEVER gonna get to sleep!"
LOL but I actually had JUST fallen asleep.
I noticed a man come into the room and in my typical weird dream-thinking
I though "uh-oh, dont want him to know Im not asleep yet...bet fake it."
So I started fake snoring as the guy went around my bed and towards the bedroom
door (to leave I thought - even though the door he entered the room doesnt actually
exist).
As soon as he went out of my vision it turned into a night terror.
He leant on the bed (with his arms) right next to my head and I SWEAR it felt like
an elephant had just stood on the bed (if felt like it was sinking FAST and DEEP).
I was paniking, I was thinking
"WTF IS HAPPENING!?! IS THIS POLTERGEIST?!"
THen when I realised I couldnt move it reminded me about the concept of sleep
paralysis since i am experianced in lucid dreaming (fun ones) I knew it was a dream
and I just used my classic "dream-escape" technique....I slowly phased back into
a conscious state and I was perplexed at what had just happened.
Hypnogogia is not a thing that we should fear!
Why?
Because for years now I have experianced the pleasure (well, most times its good!)
of MUSIC hypnagogia....its absolutely amazing. You hear FANTASTIC music that you've
never heard before and since Im a musician I truely appreciate it.
Only problem is that I have to lie passively to the music - If I move or even THINK the
music disappears...I only have very little control over the music by subtlely kind of
"nudging" the music mentally with a lick (guitar buzz word, not a actual LICK).
By the time morning comes I dont remember the Music at all (in the same way you dont
remember your dreams) but all I remember is "wow that is great music".
The music is SO good that If I could RECORD it I would make the beatles, rolling stones,
G'n'R, Bob Dylan, Niel Diamond etc etc look like 1st GRADE music school.
Seriously.
What this means is that the creativity of the human mind is INCREDIBLE.
When God said that He made us in His image; its true; our creativity is a signature of
God.
Hypnagogia Music!
Oh my god! Often I go to bed and during this 'hypnagogia' I start to hear music that is so CLEAR! It is better than anything else I have ever heard, even live music. During the day when I think of music all I can do is think about the song and the lyrics and what it sounds like, with this I can HEAR IT IN MY HEAD!
hypnagogic music
Yeah isn't it amazing!?
I've tried to get up and kind of "beat box" the music so that i will have something to remember in the morning but now days, when I hear it I often just think "stuff it! Im just gonna listen to the whole thing!"
I think a major key to harnessing this state of mind is via the WILD technique of lucid dreaming...or even playing the music in your dreams (done that, its of the same quality.
you should check out 'lucidipedia' on youtube - Tim does a great video series on lucid dreaming from beginners to advanced!
Hypnagogic Music
I have found that mine, lime some more common, though still rare, is out of my right ear and sadly not very loud. I have to focus to hear mine, although I rarely get to make out lyrics or true vocals, I do find that more times that not I hear a combination of classical, jazz and spanish music. I have no idea but I am glad I am not the only one.
Learning to breath underwater
Hi,
I know you posted this comment about 3 months ago and of course your situation may have changed (which would be intersting to hear about). If the situation has not changed greatly might I suggest that you think of what is happening to you as being like thrown into a pool without being taught how to swim. Water can be very scary in that situation, though if you know how to swim then it is not scary. So given this analogy, what is the equivalent of swimming in the hypogogic state. It is first learning to "float", to do this first learn to maintain your focus upon your breating (do this several time a day for a few minutes) while ensuring that your breathing is slow and continuous (holding your breath is a sign of anxiety) and not too deep (you are trying to learn to underbreath). Second learn to relax, by feeling one-by-one each major area of your body and while "letting it go" (try to go through the whole body in less than 5 minutes else you will get distracted or go to sleep). Notice in both of these activites above you are practicing learning to focus your attention where you want it to go. By doing this you can either then choose to "go into" the hypnogogic (a potentail great adventure) or choose not to go there by keeping you attention focused on a neutral stimulus and maybe fall to trouble free sleep while doing so.
If you do find that you are still "overcome" by the hypnogogic then seek a guide.
Bill