The Other Perspective

I have had recurring sleep paralysis for over 30 years now. It is a curious and complex experience even by modern scientific standards. In today’s culture secular thought is widely accepted while any other reasoning outside verifiable physical science is disregarded and/or discouraged.

I’d like to give a few reasons why I believe the experience may be something more than just a brain glitch. I do not claim to know others’ experiences as I know my own, but if sleep paralysis is something you experience on a regular basis this information should interest you.

Science theorizes sleep paralysis occurs during REM sleep since most people report hallucinations. I suppose this applies if your sleep paralysis episodes occur 60 – 90 minutes after falling asleep, but personally more than 75% of my episodes happen as my body falls asleep without any rapid eye movement or any drift from conscious thought.

My first experience with sleep paralysis was when I was 12 years old. I was sleeping over at a friends house. There was a conversation about dreaming of being dead while asleep and not being able to move. My friend explained to me that if you sleep on your back with your arms crossed on your chest the way dead people are placed in coffins you will experience it. Even though I didn’t go to bed in that position, that night I had my first episode of sleep paralysis. Then my second episode was when I was 15 years old. I was with a different group of friends who were having a sleep over close to home. We talked late into the night for hours about spooky stuff. We mostly talked about sleep paralysis (we called it half-sleep back then). This was 1995 when many people didn’t have internet access at home. They mentioned the tall dark figure, the old hag, being held down, being strangled, and suffocating. They also suggested that talking about sleep paralysis before bed would induce it. And sure enough, when I went home to sleep that night I had my second episode. Could talking about sleep paralysis encourage it?

It can be self-induced through thought or meditation. It is used as a gateway to experiences like astral projection and lucid dreaming.

Physical reality can snap you out of sleep paralysis in an instant. For instance, a doorbell, the ring of a phone, or a nudge from someone can instantly break the paralysis, yet oddly enough, the overwhelming sense of fear, frightening visuals, increased heartrate, and desperate struggle to move won’t break the paralysis and often times will intensify it.

Even after thousands of episodes of sleep paralysis, the overwhelming sense of fear still visits from time to time. These days there is little to no fear, but sometimes it’s just as frightening as ever before. It just becomes easier to muster courage.

I highly recommend trying this exercise if capable. When one uses sleep paralysis to achieve astral projection or lucid dreaming there is a separation phase. It’s where one separates their dream body from the physical body. If you are able to pull your dream body from your physical body, separating ONLY your arms should be an easy task. Now, if you wave your separated dream arm in front of a light source like a TV or nightlight you will see, with your physical eyes, trails of your invisible arm. Also, if you hold your separated palms to your unseparated face you can feel an energy radiating from your separated palms.

Sleep paralysis has definitely shaped my life and the person I’ve become. For many years it made me miserable. I felt forsaken and tormented. To experience it every night, going to bed became a nightmare. I felt like I had gone insane and maybe I have. It’s not a path I chose, but that path of misery has transformed into a quest to strengthen the spirit. Sometimes a change of perspective is optional, and sometimes it is demanded.