The hypnagogic state is when “the two evaluative functions of thinking and feeling are slowed up or even suspended for a brief time, sensation and intuition, the perceptive functions, take over and provide us with incredibly penetrating insights.”[i] The hypnagogic state can occur at any time but is more common just before falling asleep, or just after waking up. Relaxation at any time such as reverie creates an opening to connect with the Implicate Order.
“There are more examples of sudden scientific inspiration when a person is in a relaxed state of even day-dreaming. The nature of the emotion [feeling] is simply an intense feeling that a problem has been solved, but the sense of the origin of the solution is non-personal and transcendental. It is as though the sense of wonder extinguishes ‘myself.’”[ii]
[i] Pascal, Eugene. Jung to Live By. New York: Warner Books, Inc., 1992, p. 113.
[ii] Foster, David. The Philosophical Scientists. New York: Dorset Press, 1985, p. 149.
