The brief transition between wakefulness and sleep we experience each night has been known by many names: the ‘borderland state’, the ‘half-dream state’, the ‘pre-dream condition’. Its technical name is the hypnagogic state and, along with dreaming, it is one of the most fascinating altered states of consciousness we can experience without the use of drugs.

In the hypnagogic state, visions, voices, weird insights and unusual sensations greet us as we drift out of consciousness. Faces may appear, threatening or comical. A landscape may open up, with distant mountains and wide, expansive vistas. Geometric forms, jewels, diamonds and intricate patterns may dance before our mind’s eye, not unlike those seen under the influence of certain psychoactive substances.