You can no longer speak or move, even when you want to shout for help!

This one may not actually be a dream after all. Have you heard of sleep paralysis before? When we are asleep, during the rapid eye movement (REM) part of it, which is when we may experience dreaming, we end up having REM atonia: our bodies enter a state of paralysis while we are dreaming in order to prevent our bodies from acting out on what we are dreaming.

If you end up waking up before the REM cycle is complete, you will become aware during the atonia and thus experience sleep paralysis. The tricky part is that you will continue to dream, so a lot of people end up seeing all sorts of creepy imagined things, so if you only end up not being able to move or speak, you are one of the lucky ones.

If that happens to you—feeling like you are in a dream but actually wide awake—just that you cannot speak or move—do not panic. Just breathe normally and know it will soon pass.

If you’re curious about the phenomenon, we recommend you read more about it here!