My wife experienced sleep paralysis a few years ago. She related to me an experience in which she awoke in the middle of the night and couldn't move. At the same time, she said a small ball of light came in through the window and stood on her chest. She told me she felt like it had a personality, and its specific intent was to mock her. Since that time, she has closed herself off to all psychic phenomena in order to protect herself. Though this sort of thing (and others like it that she had experienced in the past) doesn't happen anymore, she's also lost all the benefits of being psychic.
What can she do to feel safe again? Also, has anyone ever described an experience like this to you before? She is a Pisces.
- Thomas
Dreamchaser:
What happened to your wife is actually pretty common. While it's somewhat unusual to see something with your physical eyes, many people wake up and are unable to move, and at the same time, they sense something is nearby.
When we sleep, our souls leave our bodies. There are times when, for whatever reason, our souls and our bodies do not merge back together at the same time. Sometimes we wake up and have no idea who we are, where we are, what we are doing there, etc., and it takes a minute to blink ourselves back into physical reality. When this happens, our souls hit our bodies before our minds fully awaken.
On the other hand, sometimes our minds wake up before our souls get back into our bodies. This is what happened to your wife. When this happens, we wake up feeling paralyzed. Our minds are very aware of what is going on around us, but we can't open our eyes or move our bodies. Without our souls inside of us, we aren't animated, for our souls are what make us who and what we are.
What your wife perceived as another presence was her own soul. Her human mind was very much awake and aware that there was SOMETHING in the room with her. Because her soul was not yet fully back in her body, she was unable to correctly determine what this actually was and what it was doing. It wasn't mocking her - it was just showing itself to her. For some reason, God/ Universe/ Spirit/ whatever name you use wanted her to experience this.
Please remember that our human minds will interpret whatever we see to try to make sense of it. When I saw an alien standing in my bedroom window, my mind turned it into a man with a pointy nose, brown hair and glasses. That is NOT what I actually saw - that is what my mind WANTED me to see. My mind could fathom a man in my window, but it could NOT fathom or logically understand an alien being there.
Her soul naturally entered through what your wife said was her chest, but which was actually her solar plexus chakra. I understand her fear, for this can be an uncomfortable, unnerving, and sometimes very frightening experience.
She is a truly special and gifted woman. I am sad to hear that she has shut down her psychic senses due to fear. Her psychic ability has not left her, however; she has turned it off. She was so terrified of what she experienced that she subconsciously chose to shut down ALL her spiritual senses so that nothing like this would happen again. As nothing has left her, she can choose to open up psychically again. The choice is hers.
I wish her peace-full slumber.
*****
Astrea:
Most people experience sleep paralysis at some point in their lives. In fact, most cultures have their own terms and explanations for this sort of experience. In Norway, nightmares are called the old hag.
In Cambodia, they're caused by the ghost who pushes you down.
In any case, without warning one feels a malevolent entity jump onto the chest. The victim feels an oppressive weight compressing the rib cage and often feels hands going around the throat and squeezing. The person feels he or she can't breathe. This may last from several seconds to several minutes, then the lock on the person's muscles gives way, and they're able to move again.
What seems to cause this most often is fatigue. Many college students experience sleep paralysis during finals when they're sleep deprived. It's been linked to everything from self-hypnosis to alien abductions. Without a doubt, it's one of the strangest types of nightmares.
Though very few people talk about it in industrialized societies, it's a very common experience in every culture throughout the world. Because it's different than a typical nightmare, it is no longer thought to be the same as night terrors, where the person emerges from a bad dream thrashing about, yelling and screaming, and then falls back asleep.
Most of the research confirms that sleep paralysis happens to mentally healthy people, who are thrust into a bizarre alternative world for the duration of the experience. In over 28,000 cases studied in Canada, regardless of their personal spiritual beliefs, almost every person who had the experience described feeling some kind of evil shadow or presence either coming into the room or already nearby.
Many people also report the sensation of flying, floating, or some kind of astral projection occurring at the same time. A few have even said they welcome and enjoy the experience.
Average, emotionally stable people with little or no psychic ability often experience these phenomena. Some researchers believe that a propensity for this sort of thing may be genetic, so your wife should ask the rest of her family if they've had similar things happen to them.
Sleep paralysis can be a totally terrifying experience, but it shouldn't make your wife afraid to go to sleep, especially if this happened years ago. If she's still afraid of the experience, it sounds to me like she could use some professional therapy to get over this event.
I recommend you seek out researchers at a nearby university who are doing sleep studies, and find out if she can enroll in one of the many thousands of programs devoted to studying different types of REM sleep.
Astrea:
Many times in life we hear, "You will always have what you NEED, but not necessarily what you WANT." Your spirit must have needed to experience the feeling of leaving your human body, and the suggestion in the next chapter of Sylvia Brown's book was all it took to get you there.
Even though you hadn't read it yet, your SOUL recognized the title of that chapter as something it had been seeking, and your soul, knowing that you had that reference to read after your experience, got with it and out you went!
While I don't usually recommend her books, Sylvia Brown has a wide reaching and powerful effect on lots of people. A Gemini like you would be able to relate easily to her writing and put it to good use. Synchronicity - you gotta love it!
I like your description of "getting caught." That's exactly what it feels like, isn't it? One minute you're free and hovering above the room, and the next minute, ZAP! back down into your corporeal form you go!
As a little kid, I loved that "feeling of return." With practice, most of the time we can control that event, but sometimes, when our physical ears hear a distracting noise or something else occurs to knock us back into reality, back we go. With practice you will be able to control your return better.
I find it interesting that you were visiting your mother-in-law and not someone in your own genetic family. Evidently, you and your husband got married for reasons that are even deeper than love. His family's interest in "psychic stuff" will nurture your children in such matters and help them to grow into their own abilities.
You'll never have to be concerned that when your daughter visits them, she'll be discouraged from exploring her own psychic life and power. My parents encouraged me to develop my psychic senses in a time when it wasn't nice to even discuss such things in public. Heck, it's STILL not considered a great topic at the dinner table in some families!
Your kids will get to talk about it ALL and ask questions and read and study. This is going to give them such an edge in life! Talk with your husband about how you want to present this to your kiddos, so that you are united in your approach and ready to tell them their experiences are all natural and okay.
A word or two of warning: Geminis often have difficulty staying grounded in REAL LIFE. Don't get so strung out on your ASTRAL life that you neglect what you're doing here on Earth.
You are at the beginning of a long journey to learn where your power really lies. Try to be patient with this process and take your time.