9 Ways to Wake Up From Sleep Paralysis
April 29, 2010 by Ryan Hurd
Filed under sleep paralysis
Sleep paralysis is the terrifying feeling of being held down after just waking up or going to sleep. You can’t move or scream, and sometimes this paralysis is accompanied with the certainty that someone –or something — is in the room. Quite simply, sleep paralysis is one of the most horrifying experiences in life, because we know we’re awake but can’t believe what appears to be happening to us.
The truth is, sleep paralysis is a biological event and it can be often prevented by attending to lifestyle choices, but making new habits can take time. So how do you wake up from sleep paralysis tonight? There’s not a lot of information available. Below I compiled 9 ways to get out now, adapted from my ebook Sleep Paralysis: A Dreamer’s Guide.
Note: Because this is such a personal thing, some of these tactics will work for you, and others won’t. Choose the ones that make the most sense to you intuitively. Think of these strategies as tools in a toolbox to bring out when the conditions are right.
1. Don’t Fight
If you feel like you are being held down and you can’t move, do not fight back. This actually will intensify the experience. Not only is fighting back likely to increase the feelings of being held down (so much that it may seem like you are being crushed), but fighting back will also increase the fear, thus triggering the emotional centers of the brain and strengthening this lucid nightmare. Controlling fear is the most important skill during these moments.
2. Surrender and Go with the Flow
Instead, try to relax when you notice SP starting to happen. Prepare an affirmation like “This is SP and I am okay.” If you feel pressure on your chest, see if you can “go with” the pressure rather than against it. It’s like winning a fight by having no resistance. For example, for me, I often feel like I’m being pushed into the mattress when I have SP. I let myself go, and mentally “pull” in the direction I am being pushed. What happens is I then “pop” into a full-on dream, or I can wake up directly.
3. Wiggle your Toe
Another excellent tactic that works for many people is to try to move an extremity, such as a finger or a toe. Most of the feelings of paralysis are in the belly, chest, and throat. So focus all you attention on the toe and try to move it back and forth. In many cases, this will break the paralysis.
4. Clench your Fist
This is a variation of the toe wiggle method. Clench and unclench your fist.
5. Focus on your Breath
An easy way to stop these nightmares is to do some controlled breathing. Controlled breathing does several things at once. For starters, it lessens the feelings of chest pain that sometimes accompany SP. Breathing is autonomic like the heart’s beating or digestion, so it’s not paralyzed like the big muscles in our arms, chest and legs. But breath can be controlled with attention or be affected by severe fear, which may be why SP sufferers “forget” to breathe when under attack. If you can control your breath, you can control your fear. Simply draw your breath in at a normal rate, and exhale fully, using all of your lung capacity. Notice that you can breathe fully without obstruction. This technique will keep you calm as the SP runs its course and then you will wake up without any trouble. A few moments of focused breathing with a strong intention to wake up is effective.
6. Lean into Love to Find Courage
Now is also the time to lean into unconditional love. For many, the surest path is in religious or spiritual beliefs. Regardless, focus on a figure that you admire and love. Think of someone who calms you down—someone who you associate with peace, love and safety. This could be Jesus, the Dali Lama, or someone you know personally. In my first SP nightmare when I was fourteen years old, I thought about the love and respect I had for a girl in my class. Embarrassing but true! It worked: the feelings of oppression and evil dissipated immediately. In this case, true love really does conquer all.
7. Getting Help from your Sleep Partner
If someone shares your bed, you can tell them about your SP attacks and what to look for when you are having a nightmare. For example, my wife used to shake me awake whenever I began to breath heavily and irregularly in my sleep. As it turns out, she was waking me up each and every time from an intense SP nightmare. Now when this happens, I tell her not to wake me up, because I actually use SP to go into a lucid dream.
You could also have your partner respond to a verbal request. This only works some of the time, because some people cannot speak in paralysis. But some can. Choose a short word that is easy to say. “Help” is a good choice. When you’re in paralysis, focus your attention on your throat and say “Help.” Don’t try to say it as loud as you can; what may happen is that your imagination will take over and you will only say the word in your dream. Instead, say it forcefully but without screaming.
8. Coughing for Help
A variation of using your voice is to try to cough into wakefulness. Like breathing, coughing can be autonomic or consciously regulated. By coughing on purpose, you can jar yourself awake.
9. Write out the Plan
The suggestions above all have helped hundreds of people get out of SP and get some sleep. Not every tactic will work with you. But having too many tactics in your mind can actually be counterproductive. So it is important to make a plan, almost like the fire escape plan you may have for evacuating your family home in case of emergency. Write it out; this will cement the plan in your mind and make it easier to remember when the paralysis comes on strong.
10. The Ultimate Method I know — I said 9 ways, but this is the single best way to wake up from sleep paralysis and it’s really in a class of it’s own. When you realize you are in SP, scrunch up your face. In other words, make a face like you just smelled something bad. Snarl and squint. Do this two or three times in a row and the paralysis will break IMMEDIATELY. I’m not sure why it is so effective, but unlike the pinky wiggle, this method is foolproof.
After you wake up, get out of bed immediately and turn on a light. Wash your face with cold water. If you just stay in bed, the chance of sliding right back into sleep paralysis is pretty high.
For more information about preventing sleep paralysis from occurring in the first place, as well as how to get over the fear of SP, check out my ebook. This $10 ebook also covers the science, psychology, and history of SP, as well as methods for using SP to have lucid dreams and other extraordinary experiences.
CC Image credit: Ornoth @ Flicker.
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CS Moore (1 comments.) on Fri, 30th Apr 2010 8:33 pm
Man, I wish I knew about a lot of these when my SP attacks grew more frequent a year or two ago. Thankfully, I learned the pinky trick somewhere and it really does help out.
Though I tend to resist a lot in my SP…I say things like, “Get off” or “go away” while trying to fight and move. One of those things I guess I can’t quite control yet…
Ryan Hurd (177 comments.) on Sun, 2nd May 2010 10:20 pm
I hear you. I actually had an SP encounter the other night, and I still feel fear in the beginning. sometimes, all you want to do is wake up as quickly as possible! I did the finger trick and it worked.
Adrian on Sun, 13th Jun 2010 12:35 am
hey! what a good site for the people like us!
i have SP, and, for a long time, I did not know what it was that happened to me… or how to wake myself.
so, one night, i begin to breathe in a particular way: closing the mouth, like a balloon.
the feeling of my mouth filled of air awake me.
its a personal variation of the clues 3, 4, and maybe of 5.
in the past, i thought in Buda, in God, and even in Jesus.
But the image in my mind of my ex girlfriend, her hugs and smile, was my favourite.
But i can’t use that image anymore
Althought, i still use the “special breath” sometimes.
pd: my english isn’t good enough, sorry.
pd2: Saludos desde Argentina! y felicitaciones por la página…
Darren on Tue, 29th Jun 2010 3:01 pm
I recommend the wriggling a finger or toe. My SP seems to either change into a normal dream or I just wake up if I can pull this off. I’ve found fighting it just makes it worse.
It can be managed once you know it’s SP and it’s about to happen. However I had a bad attack recently but I shouldn’t have eaten cheese before I went to bed.
Good Luck everyone who encounters this. Your not alone.
Ryan Hurd (177 comments.) on Wed, 14th Jul 2010 8:26 pm
thanks Adrian and Darren. The breathing trick sounds interesting. I’ve found that by breathing fully, I can overcome my fear of SP and see what happens next.
Jeffrey on Thu, 15th Jul 2010 3:13 pm
When I first started having lucid dreams when I was very young I discovered that I could easily wake myself up when ever I wanted to by rolling my eyes upwards until it would cause real pain. I guess while lucid dreaming you have to an extent some control over your eye movement while the rest of your body is paralyzed.
Has always worked for me so give it a shot.
Karen on Sat, 31st Jul 2010 7:54 pm
had one of these episodes last night. Scared the crap out of me and my husband since I woke up screaming. this it the 3rd one in the past year…. Hate the feeling. someone is watching, I am trying to scream or call out and I can’t…. My husband says I moan a lot then I scream… loud….
I have always been a lucid dreamer, often entertaining others with my vivid descriptions of my wild dreams… But this experience was for the birds and I hope to not have another… But somehow I am sure I probably will, sooner or later..
nancy on Fri, 20th Aug 2010 11:51 pm
I am searching this now because I JUST woke up from SP, this had not happened to me in months, could it really be “something” lately I have been feeling some strange things going on and I have no other thought than it being some kind of evil force. I tried to fight back, and saw myself moving and pushing myself away and could not fully wake up, I was laying face down, its the worst its ever been, please help
Kaitlyn on Tue, 24th Aug 2010 12:47 pm
…this is a real thing?!?! I described this to my doctor, but she said it was just my mind waking up before my body.
Like how when you sit a certain way for a long time and a limb falls asleep, that fizziness and tickling pain, that’s how my entire body feels. I’m always held down by my forhead. It started when I was 14 1/2 and it happens at least every six months or so. The feeling I normally get is that I’m being hidden/smothered for my own protection…it pretty much scares the hell out of me. I always fight, try to swim to the surface, peel my eyes open, raise my arm to bat away the thing. Last night was the first time I failed to wake myself and I ended up sliding into a really trippy dream. And here I thought I was just strange, definately looking into this book. (And I found this article by searching for pics to post in Facebook to describe this awful thing o.O…thanks be for being led to this site.)
Ryan Hurd (177 comments.) on Mon, 30th Aug 2010 9:11 am
It’s for real! Many physicians are unaware of the connection between sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations — so I’m glad you’re educating her.
Mel on Thu, 2nd Sep 2010 7:26 am
Just had an instance of SP last night, seems to occur mostly when I’m trying to fall back to sleep or slept too long from a nap. Oftentimes I try to open my eyes and it appears as if I’ve woken up because I see my surroundings, but I am consciously aware I am still stuck in the dream and cannot move. I find tip #6 helps me the most to snap out of it, I cry out ‘O Lord Jesus’ repeatedly until I manage to wake up. The hardest part is fully waking up afterward since you feel super drowsy and sometimes drift back into it. I think getting out of bed and turning on the light is key.
Stacy on Fri, 3rd Sep 2010 5:54 pm
I am really glad that I found this site. The first time this happened to me I was in the 4th grade, I am 28 now. It seems to be happening every night now. I am terrified to go to sleep. I was able to stay awake for 3 days until I just passed out. I thought I was going crazy because I thought I was seeing aliens, ghosts I even thought I was being haunted or possesed
Jeremy Phan on Sun, 5th Sep 2010 11:18 pm
I have had this condition since I was a child and have just discovered that it’s a common condition. The best way I found found to wake up from this is either clenching/rubbing your teeth or moving your tongue.
If you are completely knocked out, you will have to let it pass.
Sylvia on Tue, 7th Sep 2010 7:45 am
!!!!MAYBE SOMEONE CAN HELP ME!!!!
Well, I’m 19 years old and have been experiencing sleep paralysis since I was a very young child. My sleep paralysis experiences are some-what just like everyone else’s… but, sometimes a little different…
I remember the first time I experienced SP, I was so young… around 5 or 6 years old. I would get them very often all through-out my childhood. I learned how to control them for the most part pretty early. I told my mom I was having nightmares but, they associated it with watching scary movies.
But, on rare occasions when I was growing up I would have a regular SP episode, after the episode would finish or I came out if it. I would try and sit up but, couldn’t. I would still be somewhat paralyzed and my eyes would feel as if they were made out of lead, I would be able to murrmurr some words but, my body would not let me wake up. And I would fall back into this sleep, but not quite sleep. I could still feel completely there in my mind, but I would dream some crazy dreams… and whenever my body wouldn’t let me wake up like that I would often be in a sleep state for sometimes 20+ hours. Until I would finally be able to wake up…
My SP episodes stopped for a couple months I remember in 8th grade, and were replaced by these dreams where I knew what I was doing, I could talk in my head and was aware of what was going on… the most insane dreams and it felt like I had control over them. But, anyways my SP came back just as strong as it was before. I get sleep paralysis EVERY TIME I close my eyes!!! Sometimes several times throughout the night… when im not able to get a full grasp on my mind. I see the same black figures (yes figures!!! i often see 5-10 black figures around me and on me!) crazy. but, I do know when Im out of the SP and I’m not seeing the figures anymore but, my body still feels 100% paralyzed. And I can either choose to go into a deep sleep and you know… sleep normal. Or I can sleep but, still have complete control over my mind. Sometimes, I can make my mind do some crazyyy things when I really focus. But, here’s the problem…
The times when I still am completely paralyzed after my SP episode… sometimes it’s 3 or 4 times a week, sometimes it’s 5 times a month… but, i always have sleep paralysis with the dark figures and so on. But, when it’s just me in my room, my body will go into this… it feels like im lead and nothing I can do will wake me up. And I often sleep for 20+ hours during this too. Sometimes, i cant come out of it for like a day and a half!!!
HELP HELP HELP
sylviA RD on Tue, 7th Sep 2010 7:55 am
Also, I just started looking into this a couple months ago…
Ive just finally grown so tired, and just almost crazy from it. I spend half of my day just thinking about how crazy the night before was. these episodes that idk what they are that are not letting me wake up have affected my life so terribly… I had to quit class cause I had slept for 2 entire days, and woke up and was barely able to crawl to the bathroom. Im just like a freaking lead bar… when it happens like that i just hate it so much. there has been a few times where it lasted for a few days… i was able to get up once or twice but my body is like the most tired thing ever. i cant open my eyes or anything. it’s miserable. i was thinking maybe narcolepsy thats brought on by SP or my LD, sometimes i have OBE… like some crazy ones. maybe idk… narcolepsy is coming from it. but, i remember i had it sometimes when i was a little kid too
Ryan Hurd (177 comments.) on Tue, 7th Sep 2010 8:07 am
hey Sylvia,
thanks for commenting. I’m not a medical doctor, but from what you’ve described here it appears that your sleep paralysis may be a symptom of a larger sleep issue, perhaps narcolepsy, or maybe something else related to sleep deprivation. For starters, see how you do on this anonymous sleep disorder survey:
http://www.umm.edu/sleep/tests_quiz.htm
as for your multiple black figures… very interesting! some people, you may be happy to hear, also see multiple ‘entities’ on a regular basis – and not all are nightmarish.
sylviA RD on Tue, 7th Sep 2010 8:51 am
yeah, i think i failed the quiz haha. but, i can sleep, i do sleep, i love sleeping besides the SP part. But, yes as i began to look into narcolepsy I thought ah! that describes what happens sometimes at night… but not during my SP episode. But, if it was a really intense or long SP episode, then it seems to bring on my continuing paralyzation.
Ryan Hurd (177 comments.) on Wed, 8th Sep 2010 9:58 am
lol, you can’t really fail that quiz because no matter what you’re learning more about yourself!
You may also want to check out this article on excessive sleeping which can due to personal habits (ie lots of partying) or a symptom of another sleep issue:
http://www.sleepfoundation.org/article/sleep-related-problems/excessive-sleepiness-and-sleep
and feel free to PM me (through the contact form on my about page) if you want to describe in more detail your experiences about multiple dark figures. I’m always collecting accounts.