Tactile Cohesion (Exteriorizing Sensation)

By Eugene Raphael · Technique · Liminal Light Lab

In short: Lie still and "feel" with your dreaming body instead of your physical one: hands rubbing together, the texture of the carpet, objects around the room. When that felt sensation becomes more real than the body on the bed, you're at the threshold. Touch then holds the dream together.

Everything here comes from one person (me). These are personal observations, not research findings (n=1).

What it is

What I am after is diminishing the feeling of the physical body and increasing the sensation of the dreaming body. I'm replacing first-attention sensation with dreaming-attention sensation.

Entering dreaming, for me, is separating from yourself with a real sensation of feeling. When enough of it is away from the body, it suddenly takes over, and awareness transfers to the sensory "you" you intended.

Where it comes from

It grew out of my own practice and out of the books. Castaneda describes feeling as a way to move awareness, and in The Art of Dreaming the instructions he receives about "sweeping the floor" point at the same thing: reaching out with something other than the physical body. The hand rubbing is a well-known lucid dreaming stabilizer too, but I use it differently, before the dream rather than inside it.

Step by step (how I actually do it)

1. Lie completely still. Movement resets the process.

2. Reach out and feel something. Passing dream imagery, or something familiar like the bedroom carpet. Any focus that isn't the body works.

3. Rub your hands, without your hands. Feel both hands rubbing together with strong will, almost as if using the physical arms, but not enough to move them.

4. Cycle methods near the threshold. I use four such methods and cycle between them when I feel the threshold is close. Different expressions of exteriorizing might work better than others, so it's good to have a few in your playbook.

5. Watch for the switch. At the threshold, where imagery can appear, the hand rubbing becomes dominant, more real than the arms resting on the bed. That's the cue.

6. Keep touching once you're in. Grappling around in the dark and sustaining that sensation of touch solidifies the movement of the assemblage point.

The tentacle of will

You can practice this awake. Silence your mind in your room and reach out to objects around you. Attempt then to feel the texture, with your hands but without using your hands. You may feel distinct differences between the wall and other objects.

It may be even better to feel from the center of will in the body. I used to do this. Just push that tentacle of will out and "feel" with it.

Best time of night

On night wakings, when the body is heavy and still. It pairs naturally with Waking With Intent: each time I wake, I immediately "feel" my way around the darkness.

Results

Touch creates cohesion. On the night described in Tactile Sensations for Cohesion, I felt my way through total darkness onto a rough, bumpy surface. My hands materialized, then an old shingle roof, and the whole scene burst into startling clarity. I crawled down the side of the house like a spider, felt the damp, peeling siding, and held an orange in one hand and a lemon in the other. The scenery never wavered or changed. Only my focus slipped. It was more realistic than waking life, more vivid, more concise. I find that to be a bit... odd.

Touch also works the other way. In Tactile Sensations and Dissolving Dream Characters, touch is what I used with dream characters.

Common failures

Moving. Even a twitch resets the process.

Feeling the body instead of the sensation. If the attention drifts back to the arms on the bed, start over with something outside the body.

Losing the touch inside the dream. When I start contemplating what something means and forget my hands, the dream fades.

Sticking to one method. If one expression of exteriorizing stalls, cycle to another.

And if all of this sounds like word salad, that's fair. Anyone have any ranch to go with that?

From my journal

Feb 28, 2024. Using my curled fingers to latch onto a scene:

"Curled fingers, dream views. A dresser in a room, I was looking around. Curled fingers 'helped' me during touch. It was as if the space inside my fingers could be used to latch onto dream scenes. I know I was latching on and perhaps entering."

Apr 26, 2024. Touch keeping a fresh phase stable:

"Vision blurry, dark. Worried the dream would fade, I started moving, ran my hands on the carpet, staying low to the ground… Put a hand on the stair rail and moved downstairs, staying in contact with the railing."

Discuss it

Have you felt textures without using your hands? Which version of exteriorizing works for you? Share it in Techniques & Troubleshooting.