By: Archemedies
To: Hypatia
Re: Wierd @#$% Experience
hyp> I kept dreaming there was something, some kind of entity coming
hyp> after me and making me paralyzed. In the dream I started saying,
hyp> "In the name of the Goddess leave me alone!" and once again I
hyp> was paralyzed and my mouth wouldn't move properly to form the
hyp> words, it was like speaking with a lipful of Novacaine.
What you're describing is a hypnopompic hallucination, a phenomena which
bothers about 18 to 22 percent of the populace according to which report you
review. Hypnagogic hallucinations outnumber the hypnopompic yet are not as
memory-intensive nor as paraletic.
Susan Blackmore did some good research on this; it's known among laypeople as
"the Old Hag syndrome." It's so named because many people wake up and
experience an old hag either sitting on the person's feet or upon their chest.
Suffocation and paralysis is a common and classic ear mark of the phenomena.
Blackmore et al. does a good job explaining the mechanical aspects of the
phenomena as well as provide some demographics. She and her colleagues find
that the dream sequence aspect is often forgotten yet the after-waking
hallucination can't easilly be forgotten. The phenomena usually occures in
teens yet can approach adults as well.
The causes are many yet center around the sleep poisons the body secreets into
the muscle tissues to inhibit the conductance of a chemicle which allows
muscles to be controlled. (If you wish the names of the chemicles which allow
conductivity and the chemicle which destroys that chemicle, I can look it up
easilly enough in Blackmores' works.)
Synaptic conductivity during sleep is somewhat different than during the
wakeful state. (Individuals who have difficulty discerning fact from fiction,
by the way, at times evidence no difference is conductivity in the synaptic
nerve endings in their brain.) This leads toward the development of noise in
the cortex of the human brain which in turn causes visual and audatory
hallucinations.
Most people report a sound -- a rushing in their ears quite unlike wind or
water yet a close analog. In your report you didn't mention hearing anything.
Most people also report trying to break free of the paralasys, being unable to,
and beseeching a third party to interceed for them.
Blackmore and friends found that predisposistions dictate the avenue of
conflict resolution of hypnopompic and hypnagogic hallucinatory events. In
deity beliefs, the third party called upon is a major deity in their beliefs
(just as you did.) In individuals who hold flying saucer lore dearest to them,
they may employ an experience resolution for "missing hours" (when they believe
they're awake yet they're not to the time they break free of sleep paralasys)
to alien abductions.
Preconceptions held by the individual experiencing the hallucination are what
color the resolution of the conflict. You asked for Goddess to help and she
does.
Carl Sagan has told people in two of his conferences (to my knowledge) that he
has heard his parents (dead these 14 years) call his name. "Carl." His
parents called him by his first name.
Sagan correctly points out that his brain (indeed, all human brains) are
preconditioned by parental feelings and conceptions held by society. He
recognizes that the loss of his parents still grieve him and he finds himself
contemplating them when alone -- expected calls of "Carl" are during those
times when he's been introspective, as I recall. This type of hallucination
differs from a sleep-poison induced hallucination yet is more akin to "whight
line fever," a close cousin.
I used to collect instances of hypnopompic and hypnogogic hallucinations. I
had acquired about 30 of them after about three weeks. When you have described
is quite common and doesn't stray from the realm of experiences which are
entertained by a great many people.
---
* Origin: Bigotry is _not_ a "family value." (93:9700/9)
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