2 Proven Ways to Induce Sleep Paralysis

Method 1:

1. The first step of inducing sleep paralysis is to get yourself ready for sleep. Go to the bathroom beforehand, be on your bed half an hour earlier than your regular timing. Being too tired will not work since you will simply go to sleep.

2. Lay down on the bed and flex your muscle for five to ten minutes to get them exhausted enough for you to not want to move.

3. Lay on your back, get comfortable since you are going to stay in this position for another quarter hour or so. Close your eye (having the lights turned off will help as well) and don't move. This is critical, should you move, flex again and start over.

4. Now that your eyes are closed and body staying still, focus on a point about three inches in front of your face. Straining your eyes might help. At the same time, imagine having some sort of energy flowing into your body, try to feel that mystique energy. Soon, your body will feel slightly weird. This means you are in the right direction.

5. Stay in this position and continue the imagination longer. At this step, you will still be able to move. Moving will mess it up. Focus more energy gathering in front of your eye and building up. Your body should be completely relaxed. Stay that way for another ten minutes or so. Being calm is key here. No matter what, try not to fall asleep.

6. Your limbs should start to feel floaty as if they aren't attached to your real body, that they are just there. Alternatively, you will start to feel like your arms and legs are dead and are dangling from your body like they aren't part of you anymore. Continue to picture that your body is no longer you, that you are mere thoughts. If you have heard of out of body experiences, imagine something similar.

7. Eventually, something will click and you have this weird messed-up feeling that is difficult to describe. You will know it's sleep paralysis when you experience it. As it spread across your body or even become stronger, a strange feeling of uneasiness and emptiness will engulf you. For the final check, try to move your arm or forcefully do a kick.

Method 2:

Another way for how to induce sleep paralysis is through sleep deprivation.

1. Set an alarm clock four hours after you fall asleep. Wake up to the alarm and prepare to experience sleep paralysis as you drift back into sleep. Do this in the middle of the night when you are about to go to sleep.

2. Go to bed as per normal. Dress comfortably and keep up with your good sleeping habits. Avoid caffeine or alcohol before bedtime and activities that will make you fall too deeply asleep such as from rigorous exercise or heavy meals.

3. Wake up to the alarm. Get off the bed immediately, push yourself to do so. Keep yourself awake, busying yourself with mild activity, maybe browse the web or re-read this instruction, for thirty minutes. Just don't fall back asleep. Grabbing something to eat or drink at this point isn't really tested yet, so experiment.

4. Go back to bed. Thirty minutes has passed and now it's time to go back to sleep. Choose another position from the first sleeping position you did. Be it on your back, on your belly, whatever it is, you don't want to be as comfortable.

5. Lie very still. Minimize your movement to trick your brain into thinking that you are asleep. With enough luck, your body should go to sleep before your consciousness did. Thus, you have induced sleep paralysis. Closing your eyes and focusing at an imaginary point in front of you will help to trick your brain, too.

6. Sleep paralysis. Check if you are indeed in paralysis by trying to do a kick or by moving your arms. Now that you should be in the state of sleep paralysis, enjoy the terror and the follow-up hallucinations. Once you had enough experience to get into the state frequently, try experimenting with out of body experiences or lucid dreaming.

Relaxing too much

If you are too relaxed, you will end up falling asleep soundly. If you feel that you are starting to drift off to sleep as per normal, pay a little more attention to keeping your mind engaged. Counting sheep could keep your conscious enough but it might not work for everyone.

Not relaxed enough

An active mind will not reach the hypnagogic state. If you have been laying in bed awake for the last two hours, you probably need a change in strategy. The mind is too active in that case and a different technique is necessary. Experiment with what works and what doesn't. As you think too much about your failing to fall asleep, it will then only keep you more awake.

Losing focus

When you start to drift off into the early stage of the sleep paralysis, you might start to panic or afraid of the experience. Once you start to move a muscle or two to fight against the paralysis, you will end up awake or even too distracted to achieve the state. Firmly set your mind on the target that will not tense up your muscle or move even an inch against the incoming unsettling sensations. With enough time and experience, you might just desensitize the fear away.

Not recognizing the dream

In practice, you might just end up skipping the focus step and straight into sleep. You might still be aware that you are on your back, lying comfortably on the bed, only that you are dreaming. Half the steps are for you to remain completely motionless, so often you enter the state but not realizing it. As you experience more of the sleep paralysis, you will start recognizing the subtle hints in shifts of what you are going through.

False awakening

Another variation to the failure of recognizing the dream. You could have a dream of waking up, causing the whole process to get instantly derailed without you realizing it. Get into a habit of a reality check after you wake up to make sure you are truly awake or simply hallucinating it.