The jumpstart reflex and spontaneous OBEs

I originaly wrote a large chunk of text yesterday about this but didn't feel like finishing it, so I just closed the window and it was apparently lost forever -- but then a train of thought as I was in waking-up-trance this morning showed me the reason I don't have spontaneous OBEs every night. It's actually quite basic, but I thought it might be helpful to some.

There is something that happens throughout the night. Usually after a dream, you'll wake up momentarily in a trance for a few minutes, where a couple of things happen...

- You process the dream and continue it -- this is what happens when you become lucid towards the end of a dream; while you don't know that you're dreaming, your rational mind affects the scenario through decisions. That would be what we call a "semi-lucid dream."

- You will be temporarily receiving sensory info. It's extremely important, if you want to have a spontaneous OBE or lucid dream, that you deprive yourself of sensory information as much as possible, otherwise the dream landscape will be overridden, you will focus into these perceptions and you'll stay in-body. Ideally, turn off all lights, prevent any sounds from being heard and make sure you're comfortable, don't move.

- You will be judging your current state and if anything at all is on your to-do list that is a high source of stress, you will try to wake up.

Going from unconscious sleep to conscious sleep is almost unnoticeable. In the short conscious sleep phase (that "trance moment") comes a decision making process that is hard, but not impossible, to override, which will either result in you going back to sleep, or you triggering the "jumpstart reflex" -- where you take a deep breath, move your arms and legs, and sit up in bed.

In order to have a spontaneous lucid experience, you need to get to a point where:

1. You are not so tired that you'll be unable to mentally process a dream. If you are, then you need a lot of willpower, almost inhuman willpower, which is hard to come by even if you're determined. Being tired causes the body to make you go into this "protective cocoon" where you rest in idle slumber. We don't usually remember this, but it's one of the most pleasant feelings in the world... It's a bit like when your mom comes to wake you up for school, and you say "Please, five more minutes!" and she says "yes" -- it's very hard to fight the urge to sleep.

2. You have not been resting for so long that you're sore or dried up.
- Eyes -- don't sleep with contacts on, and sleep with closed eyes!
- Nose -- don't let it get obstructed
- Mouth -- try being in a position where it's closed, and breathe through your nose (Note that smoking, which irritates the mouth and nose, tends to make things very unpleasant. Tobacco is definitely an OBE killer because of how it dries you up, causes your breathing passages to be obstructed, etc...)
- Neck, shoulders, arms, legs -- avoid cutting circulation, and make sure you're in a position you can maintain for several hours. Even if it feels fine for 30 minutes, once you fall asleep, you may become uncomfortable. Muscles that are contracted secrete lactic acid which builds up and will make you sore after a few hours. The fix for that is drinking water, but if you have to wake up to go to the bathroom, it's not ideal!
- Lungs -- Always have breathing room so that you don't go into sleep apnea. If you have pressure on your lungs, you'll require effort to fall asleep, this will tire you out even more, cause you to fall into unconscious sleep, where you won't be able to breathe as fully as when you were conscious, which is actually dangerous in the long run.
- Bladder -- empty.

A typical (alarm-less) 8 hour sleep would probably have around 6 cycles...

"Minicycle" 1 -- Hypnogogia. This is the first dream of the night, as well as the cycle for consciously induced OBEs.

Cycles 2-3 -- Unconscious sleep with dreams ; usually during these cycles you are way too tired to exert any willpower and have an experience. Dream memories are rare.

Cycles 4-5 -- The "right time" for spontaneous OBEs ; tired enough to stay asleep, clear minded enough to process dreams and eventually have an experience.

Cycle 6 -- The "last cycle" ; it ends with a period of trance that usually results in the jumpstart reflex. By this cycle you're usually refreshed enough, yet lying still for 8 hours will have caused you to build up an uncomfortable state that'll make you want to wake up.

The ideal time, most people will agree, is around that 3rd-4th sleep cycle, you wake up, stretch, eat, make yourself comfortable and go back to bed. You'll benefit from the fact that you are tired enough to sleep, but not so tired that you'll dwelve into unconsciousness right away. You don't get this urge to move because your muscles are relaxed, your mouth isn't dry.

It's not enough to just do that, though. You need to nurture two behaviors.

First, awareness in trance. We always go unconscious. It's important to become acquainted with the fact that when we are asleep, we actually have the ability to perceive and act. Your mind doesn't shut down, it loses its will to be active along with the physical brain. Willpower alone might not do the trick, so you might need external means of reminding you to be conscious. Alarms throughout the night can help. I think a tape where you record your voice and tell yourself that you're asleep and need to become active would produce excellent results if you mix it with a strong determination to become aware in the sleep state.

We hear everything that occurs around us while asleep, each sound is processed, evaluated, and either it is discarded or it produces a reaction. I read a study about this, hearing your name produces a strong reaction, so does hearing a phone ring. Alarm clocks, loud sounds follow, and habitual sounds (cars passing by, creaking wooden floor, etc) are last. Giving yourself a cue is a great way to gain lucidity, provided that you don't discard the sound as unimportant ; the mechanism is originally meant as a defense mechanism, so that you get woken up by things that sound dangerous or important.

And second, suppress the "jumpstart" reflex. What you basically want to do is remind yourself not to move when you wake up.

Waking up is done in (at least) two parts. First, your mind wakes up. Your vision is disconnected from the eyes, you are blind, your body feels like you're lying in a river of cotton, everything is perfectly still. This is a state of medium to deep trance.

In that state, your thinking processes resume from their idle state. Something invariably needs to trigger these. That something can be:
- A dream. You continue it, process it, as I said above.
- A stimulus from the five senses. Light behind your closed eyelids. A sound. Something touching you, or an uncomfortable feeling (hunger, full bladder, etc). A smell. A taste. (though that probably won't happen unless someone sticks food in your mouth while you're asleep, lol)
- Maybe something else, I don't know. Lists look better with 3 items in them.

In the case of a dream, "Wait... This doesn't make sense" will usually be the trigger that'll wake your brain up.
In the case of an external stimulus, you'll start processing whatever is bothering you.

Either way, this will cause you to go back to your physical body, and you will feel compelled to "jumpstart" it. It's like there's a sudden jolt that goes through from the feet to the head, causes you to feel your entire body at once (maybe it's a sudden reaction to feeling your body again, like when someone suddenly turns on the lights in a dark room), that'll cause you to move, find your point of balance so that your eyes are horizontal, take in deep breaths to speed up your metabolism, etc.

The trick is to avoid the jumpstart mechanism. Do not let your body move, do not let it happen. As soon as your mind wakes up, remember not to move, remember to focus away from the body.

It's best if you are just at the end of a dream. Do not go looking for your body, do not try to feel it, instead, focus on the dream self, and stabilize it.

From there on, you are in the correct state for an OBE, it is absolutely effortless.

It's just about being there at the right time, and preventing the body from waking up using any means possible.