The Beginners Guide to Astral Travel
Astral travel is, often, a clearer and more
intense experience than meditation and lucid dreaming. Some
call astral travel OBE or out-of-body experience.
Most people who have experienced it- myself included- can
testify to it's intensity. Often astral travel is experienced
as clearly as daily (or "real") life, and sometimes even more
clearly. Senses are heightened and everything around you can
seem more real.
What Is It?
When astral travelling, we are aware that we are "dreaming"
and our physical bodies are "asleep." Through astral projection
(consciously passing from the physical plane to the astral
plane), we are able to become aware of the process of allowing
our body to fall asleep, and then become aware of passing
from one plane to another. The astral plane is an unseen dimension,
divided into seven levels, or planes,( this we look into later)
that then include many sub planes. It flows from the real-time
zone but it's usually best to consider it as being completely
separate from the physical plane.
Astral travel is a difficult concept for some to grasp. It
sounds like a load of nonsense to many. But it is very real
if we allow ourselves to learn a technique and realize our
astral bodies do exist and can travel without the aid of our
physical bodies. When we astral travel, we can fly through
the air, some say it's more like "floating," we can glide
over oceans and across the earth. We can contact spiritual
entities that can guide us along our spiritual paths, and
there is knowledge to be found that cannot be obtained through
books or other people in this plane.
No, you cannot become "stuck" in the astral plane and unable
to find your body. You cannot die and be eternally separated
from your physical body. It's a myth that this can happen.
Actually, staying in the astral plane is the difficult part,
not returning to the physical plane. We go to the astral plane
when we sleep. When your body awakes, your astral body is
united with your physical body. Astral travel is not lucid
dreaming. It includes lucid dreaming, but also includes a
conscious projection of your astral body into the astral plane,
and being self-aware in the astral plane.
Starting Out
After the physical body has fallen asleep, the astral body
always projects into the physical world. Once the energy body
has expanded, the astral body floats free and hovers just
above the physical body, but within the expanded energy body's
field of influence. Within this field, known as cord activity
range, the astral body is held close to the physical world
as it is within a field of etheric matter.
During a conscious astral projection it may appear as if you
are projecting straight into an astral plane. But there is
always an intermediary phase at the beginning, when you are
existing as an astral form close to the physical dimension.
This, real time part of any projection, may be missed if you
black out at the moment of projection. The area around the
body, within cord activity range, is flooded with etheric
matter and within thisfield the astral body is held in real
time close to the physical dimension.
Etheric Matter
Etheric matter is the actual life force substance generated
by all living things by simply being alive. It is a substance
in-between physical matter and astral matter, part physical
and part astral. This etheric matter has actual weight. It
is a very refined substance in between matter and energy and
is similar to its coarser cousin, ectoplasm.
Energy Flow
The silver or as some see it golden Cord does more than just
tie the two bodies together. It is a true umbilical cord,
transmitting information and energy between the physical and
subtle bodies. It is seen by some projectors and not seen
by others. Sometimes it is seen emanating from the navel,
sometimes from the forehead. The area the cord is seen emanating
from may depend on chakra activity. Whichever chakra is the
strongest, most active, could have control of energy flow
to the subtle bodies.
There is also the belief system of the projector
to consider and the creative power of the subconscious mind.
The cord will usually appear to be wherever you believe it
will be, courtesy of the subconscious. Once the astral body
enters the astral dimension it must have a good supply of
astral energy from the chakras in order to interact strongly
with that dimension. Clear astral memory depends greatly on
the amount of energy available. As the astral dimension is
the natural domain of the astral body, it will not fade out
of it due to a lack of energy. As in the real world, if a
person hasn't eaten or slept for a few days they don't dissolve
into another dimension. They just get weak and listless and
don't interact strongly with the physical world.
What it boils down to is this: The astral mind must have enough
energy to give it strong, vivid memories. These astral memories
must be strong enough to make a good sized wrinkle in the
physical brain, so the physical mind can recall them when
it wakes up.
For example, if you haven't slept for a few days you will
be tired, listless and your interaction with reality will
be weak and vague. If you see a movie in this tired state
you will retain little memory of it. Afterwards, you may only
remember fragments of it and your memory of it will be a vague
blur. If, however, you see a movie when you are well rested,
fresh and full of energy, it is different. You take in everything
about the movie and enjoy it. Your memory of it will be crystal
clear.
This is similar to what happens after a low powered astral
journey. The astral body lacks energy and so does not have
clear enough impressions of its journey. This causes it to
fail making its memories the dominant ones when it returns
return to the physical body. As I stated earlier, there must
be strong, vivid memories if a wrinkle is to be made in the
physical brain and the experience remembered.
Projection Training
To trigger the projection of the Astral body, while fully
conscious, there are four major requirements:
Relaxing your body 100% while staying awake.
Concentrating 100% on what you are doing.
Having enough energy available.
Pressuring the astral body to separate.
Together, these four things will trigger an OOBE.
Below are exercises that will teach how to relax the body,
concentrate, clear the mind, raise energy, stimulate the chakras
and enter the trance state.
Calming The Mind
Relaxation
You must learn and master, a full body relaxation exercise.
If you know one already it can be adapted to suit. Here is
a very simple one:
Sit, or lie down, and relax. Starting with the feet, tense
and relax them. Continue this with calves, thighs, hips, stomach,
chest, arms, neck and face until your whole body is deeply
relaxed. Go over this a few times, making sure your muscles
stay relaxed.
Note: Deep physical relaxation is the key to bringing on the
trance state, i.e., deep relaxation CAUSES the trance state.
Once you are in the trance state, projection on the astral
body is relatively easy.
Contemplation
When you begin meditation, you will be plagued with thoughts
from your surface mind, which acts like a huge Memo pad. It
carries messages, reminders, pressing thoughts, problems to
solve, unresolved issues etc. It is constantly busy, it NEVER
rests, thoughts, thoughts, thoughts, one after the other,
all clamouring for attention.
Before you attempt to clear your mind, with the breath awareness
exercise below, it is wise to deal with these surface thoughts
by the act of contemplating them. Sit comfortably, do the
relaxation exercise and think, nothing more, just think. Search
out the strongest thoughts in your mind and examine them,
try to resolve and understand them.
Note the word: THINKING. Contemplation does not involve clearing
the mind, or visualisation. It requires you to THINK, deeply
and thoroughly, about something, to gain a deeper understanding
of its nature and how it relates to you, an insight.
Breath Awareness Meditation
This is a simple form of meditation. It will clear your mind
and focus your awareness.
Sit or lie down, close your eyes, do the relaxation exercise
and clear your mind. Breathe deeply and slowly and focus on
the breath entering and leaving your body. Feel it coming
in and feel it going out. Focus your whole attention on your
lungs and the breathing process. This simple action is enough
to occupy your surface mind. Firmly push intruding thoughts
away, as they begin, before they can gather strength and distract
you.
Breath awareness occupies the surface mind and allows you
to think on a much deeper level.
Surface Thoughts
Sounds are very distracting, they generate surface thoughts.
A car horn will generate: "Who's that, what's happening?"
A door opening will generate: "Who's coming in or going out?"
The surface mind is always very curious about what is happening
around you. It wants to know all, and it wants to inform you
of every little thing going on around you. It will pressure
you to open your eyes, get up and go find out what's happening.
Don't allow this to happen. USE these annoying, attention
getting thoughts as a training aide. By learning to quash
and ignore them, your powers of concentration will grow.
Stop these annoying little thoughts as they begin, before
they can take root and grow into something stronger.
Concentration
You must be able to concentrate and focus completely on what
you are doing. Lack of concentration is the single, biggest
cause of projection failure. It affects every aspect of projection,
from the relaxation exercise, to the trance state and actual
projection.
To test your ability to concentrate: Sit and relax. Close
your eyes and clear your mind of ALL thought. Breath slowly
and deeply and count each breath, at the end of each exhale.
Hold it totally BLANK, apart from the counting, for as long
as you can. See how long you can hold it like this. Be honest
with yourself, every time a thought intrudes start counting
from the beginning again.
The Trance State
When you have attained a deep level of relaxation and mental
calmness, you will feel your body begin to get very, very
heavy. This heaviness is the main symptom of your brain waves
changing from the Beta to the Alpha level as you enter a trance.
The trance state is caused by deep physical and mental relaxation.
There is nothing weird or supernatural about it. It simply
means your body has entered the sleep state while your conscious
mind is fully awake.
Energy Body Expansion
At some point after entering the trance state, you will feel
a mild paralysis come over you. This will soon be accompanied
by a deepening vibration and a buzzing feeling all over. You
may also feel like you are huge and swollen. The paralysis,
vibrations and the huge feeling are symptoms of the energy
body expanding and the astral body loosening. This is part
of the normal sleep process. The energy body expands and opens
in order to accumulate and store energy. During this, the
astral body drifts free, slightly out phase with the physical
body.
ULTRA Short OOBE:
One of the most important things to do after a successful
exit, especially the first few times, is to keep the projection
ultra short. Ten seconds out and then get straight back into
the physical body. Please trust me on this. Ten seconds of
REAL out of body experience with a fully conscious exit and
reentry, are worth a thousand all nighters that are forgotten!
An ultra short oobe is, in most cases, the 'major' contributing
factor to a successful first time conscious exit projection
Free videos to get you started
Astral
Projection - 18 Part Audio Course
Ther are not that many books purely on Astral
Travelling but the one below is one of the better one's
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