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Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 1:50 am
by drakon
Ok, more out of curiosity than anything, I'd like to share something that has been happening occasionally to me ever since I was around 13 (in my 20s now). It's started to happen again recently after a long period of absence, so I felt it an opportune time to post about it. I would like opinions on whether it could be something 'real', as in a spirit or something from the astral, or whether it's simply a hallucination. Keep in mind that I do not hallucinate or hear voices or anything like that, this is the very first experience I've had where I've seen something that's not supposed to be there. But I had also read somewhere that when you first wake up, it's possible for your brain to 'mix' reality and the dream-state, that's why I also think it could be just a hallucination. Anyway...

Sometimes, immediately after I wake up at night, I see a silhouette of a hooded woman next to my bed, seemingly just staring at me. This silhouette 'blends in' with the darkness but is very distinctly visible. The first time I saw her (this was when I was around 13), I felt extremely scared, covered myself with my blanket and turned around to the other side, then I went back to sleep a few minutes later. This is generally my reaction - I see her, feel scared, hide (lol) and then a few minutes later I fall back asleep. I am also definitely not paralyzed (as in sleep paralysis), hence why I'm able to cover myself with my sheets and turn around. But I have always been too fearful to try and look at the figure directly or try to interact with it.

This probably happens about several times a year. I'm now in a different country to where it always happened before and a few days ago it happened again here. Although this time, I seemed to be more annoyed than scared and remember thinking "fuck off, I'm sleeping" or something like that. However I attribute this over-confidence to the fact that my bedroom door was partly open, and I had the lights completely on in my lounge, therefore my bedroom wasn't as dark as usual. [happy]

So, that's it. Would love to hear your thoughts.

EDIT: I just thought about it and remembered it wasn't actually my first experience of seeing things that aren't there. When I was 6 or 7, I drove my mother crazy one night because I was seeing snakes moving around all over my bed and I couldn't sleep. I had to go to the lounge and sit on the couch, I felt better there because the snakes were staying on the floor and not coming on the couch, lol! However, this was a one time experience I believe, it was only one night I saw them, therefore I had almost forgotten about it.

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 9:43 am
by Desecrated
She is a guardian.
Keep the lights off so that she can do her work properly.
Be thankful, both in attitude and in action.

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 1:48 pm
by Rin
Desecrated wrote:She is a guardian.
Keep the lights off so that she can do her work properly.
Be thankful, both in attitude and in action.
I'm not certain that that is necessarily the best conclusion to jump to. It may be the case that you're correct, but if someone reacts instinctively and consistently to a presence with discomfort and fear, then I think that it needs to be at least considered that the presence might be a negative one.

It could, of course, just be a hypnogogic hallucination, but the persistence of the phenomenon suggests that something else is at work, to me anyway.

The problem with these kind of encounters is that they're very subjective - really the only person who can answer the question about their nature is the person having them. So I'd say Drakon, ask yourself how these encounters make you feel, and what influence do they seem to have, both in terms of their direct effect (ie. while they're happening) and whether they seem to correlate with any trends in different areas of your life (do they occur more frequently in certain circumstances? Do certain events happen more frequently before or after they occur? etc).

Particularly, I think it's important to try and figure out whether your (understandable) fearful response to the presence is just the response to waking up and perceiving something in the room with you, or whether you directly perceive that the presence is somehow dangerous or malicious.

Sorry, I know that isn't a lot of help, but that's the nature of the beast I'm afraid :p

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 3:00 pm
by Desecrated
Rin wrote:
Desecrated wrote:She is a guardian.
Keep the lights off so that she can do her work properly.
Be thankful, both in attitude and in action.
I'm not certain that that is necessarily the best conclusion to jump to. It may be the case that you're correct, but if someone reacts instinctively and consistently to a presence with discomfort and fear, then I think that it needs to be at least considered that the presence might be a negative one.
He sees snakes - very bad
Old woman shows up - No more snakes
Old woman good.

Remember in the bible how most people reacted to angels with fear, and even the disciples reacted that way to jesus after the resurrection. Being afraid of something unknown is a pretty common reaction.
It could, of course, just be a hypnogogic hallucination, but the persistence of the phenomenon suggests that something else is at work, to me anyway.
It can be his own imagination for all we know. Maybe his imagination needed that image. Real or not, it doesn't seem to be dangerous in any way.
Particularly, I think it's important to try and figure out whether your (understandable) fearful response to the presence is just the response to waking up and perceiving something in the room with you, or whether you directly perceive that the presence is somehow dangerous or malicious.
If it's been going on for so long without escalating it seems to be a stable phenomenon. Had it been a malignant entity it would had ramped up things. I've never heard of a shadow person just hanging out for years.

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 3:57 pm
by drakon
Thanks for the replies Desecrated and Rin.

I hadn't considered before that she could be a guardian. I'll start keeping the lights off then and see what happens.

I think there's a high chance my fear when I see this entity or whatever it is results from a general fear of the paranormal and occult. I wrote in my introduction on the Intro forums that I have not yet delved into actual practice of the occult because of this fear.

To be clear, the snake thing and the silhouette of the lady are I believe isolated events. The snake thing happened when I was 6 or 7, and it only happened once I think. I only started seeing this silhouette when I was around 13, so at least 6 years later. Also, I don't know if its an old woman because she is hooded and so far I've always freaked out and turned around when I see her, so I haven't had a chance to look at her more in-depth. [greensmile]

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 5:33 pm
by Desecrated
He starts talking on topic about 2.40 so just skip the intro.

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2016 7:56 pm
by drakon
That video is really informative - thanks.

What is the calming agent he talks about at around 8:30? I want to look it up but the way it's said I don't know how to spell it. It sounds like 'canonmeal' or something.

Re: Dark silhouette besides my bed - real or hallucination?

Posted: Mon Oct 24, 2016 7:48 am
by Desecrated
drakon wrote:That video is really informative - thanks.

What is the calming agent he talks about at around 8:30? I want to look it up but the way it's said I don't know how to spell it. It sounds like 'canonmeal' or something.
Chamomile tea

http://www.webmd.com/diet/supplement-guide-chamomile