Consciousness

• seCtIon FIVe: BoRDeRLAnDs
  As with other kinds of hallucination (Chapter  14), the form constants are com-
  mon, and many people describe flying or falling through tunnels, tubes, or cones,
  or through black spaces lit by stars. They see whirling circles or suns, luminous
  points or streaks, and vibrating coloured threads. More rarely people see animals,
  people, mythical creatures, or complex landscapes, or they hear chattering and
  muttering voices. Sometimes people who have been doing something for many
  hours in the day see perseverative images of those things as they fall asleep, such
  as weeds if they have been gardening, or endless shoals of fish if they have been
  snorkelling. Others hear their own name being called distinctly as they fall asleep,
  and this can be so realistic that they get up to see who is there. A few people learn
  to control their hypnagogic images, but they say it is more like ‘wishing’ than ‘will-
  ing’ because you don’t always get what you wanted (Mavromatis, 1987). Mostly
  the experiences are vivid and uncontrollable, and are not mistaken for reality as
  the strictest definition of hallucination requires.
  These hallucinations can be combined with one of the oddest phenomena on
  the borders of sleep: sleep paralysis (SP), illustrated in the example at the end of
  Chapter 14.

9 December. I had a dream from which I awoke with a throbbing heart. I

saw as if I were in Moscow in my house, in the big sitting room, and Joseph

Alexéevich came in from the drawing room. It was as if I knew at once that

the process of regeneration had already taken place in him, and I rushed

to meet him. It was as if I embraced him and kissed his hands, and he said,

‘Have you noticed that my face is different?’ I looked at him, still holding him

in my arms, and it was as if I saw that his face was young, but that he had

no hair on his head and his features were very divfferent, and as if I said,

‘I should have known you had I met you by chance’, and

thought to myself, ‘Am I telling the truth?’ And suddenly

I saw him lying like a dead corpse; then he gradually

recovered and went with me into my study carrying a

large book, decorated with Alexandrian senna. It was

as if I said, ‘I drew that’, and he answered by bowing his

head. I opened the book, and on all the pages there were

excellent drawings. It was as if I knew that these drawings

represented the love adventures of the soul with her

beloved. [...] As if looking at those drawings I felt that I was

doing wrong, but could not tear myself away from them.

(Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace [Война́ и мир], Book VI,

Ch 10, our translation, 1869))

STRANGE DREAMS

When Sue realised that the ski lift, mountains, and rising sun were

all a dream, she knew she could fly, and soared up into the cold

morning air over the mountain peaks. Flying dreams are reported

ACtIVItY 15.1

Discussing hypnagogia

The exercise in Practice 15.1 lends itself well to
group work. Ask everyone to practise ‘staying awake
while falling asleep’ for several days, to keep a pencil
and paper by the bed, and to write down anything
they experience. It may be impossible to record the
experiences immediately when they happen because
the most interesting ones happen right on the edge
of sleep, but they can be written down, or drawn, in
the morning. Ask participants to bring any notes and
drawings to the discussion.

Were there common themes? Are the form constants
discernible in the descriptions? Is there any pattern to
who did and did not have hallucinations? Did anyone
experience sleep paralysis or body distortions? Was the
experience pleasurable?