Spooky asked me for my one of my experiences where I messed up a retrieval.
There's really two ways that you can fail. First, you aren't able to complete the retrieval before waking up. Second, you actually make things worse than when you showed up.

Generally, I mess up retrievals by saying some very simple words to the retrievee - such as that they are dead. It isn't the normal protocol to tell someone they are dead, but it is effective in certain precarious situations - such as when nothing else worked. I use it for the wrong reason - when I know I am about to wake up.

Here's an interesting example. A man is in a hospital bed sleeping. I walk over to him, tap on him and tell him to get up, we have to go somewhere.  So he begrudgingly gets up and walks with me outside. I ask him do you know where you are? He says no. I then say well you have reached the afterlife (or some other euphemism) This shocks him right back into bed. A female helper starts to tell me, in an angry voice, how she had spent a month or so watching him and that I just put him right back in bed.

If you are reading this and you are just starting out in retrievals, Don't despair. It takes a little bit of work to succeed at first. I started out just not getting the job done or having a low batting average. Also, as you retrieve more and more, the situations get more and more difficult - and you are bound to run into experiences where it's over your head. I find that I'm now returning to places that I didn't succeed the first time, but maybe a year after the first experience.

-mike

I've had it happen on more than one occasion where I would click out during a retrievel, and then I couldn't tell you what the end result was.

Thanks Mike!

Well yes, with those who aren't aware that they're dead I always be very careful in what I tell them. I have a sort of sense if I should tell them right in the face what's up or if I should cover it somehow f.e. pretending to be a taxi driver or sth like that.

I must say I never ever failed in a retrieval (at least I can't remember). I guess I have more than 50 retrievals. I don't know why that is. Even my first one worked pretty good, and I could follow the retrievee in some distance to see his new place. There is this theory that many did already retrievals before they become aware of it. So maybe I'm of this sort. I had a few ones which has more than one part, so that I left them, and the next day (or later) I visited them again, but as far as I remember they were already aware that they were not in the physical.

Your report shows that there is not everything ruled and fixed and planned, so there's the possibility of messing it up (which I were not very aware of, due to my good experiences), but it's an experience which brings a sort of liveliness in this business, if everything everytime works fine you come to a point where you starting to ponder if this is not all wishful thinking, because "when it's too easy it can't be true".

I got from your post you do it in your sleep? I don't remember one which I did in my sleep (oh, wait, I had a dream where I met my missed tomcat and had a vet who fixed his wound), I always specially lay myself on my bed for max. an hour, no sleep, for retrievals and exploring.

Spooky

Spooky,

That's amazing that you have a perfect record out there. There's several possibilities why I don't:
1) I do retrievals in my sleep - so there's definitely a time limit to the experience. This limit pressures me to say things I shouldn't need to say like about them being dead. Also, I might run out of time suddenly, if my wife tosses and turns in bed. I don't return back immediately, but as I said, perhaps months later.
2) I have few experiences before I learned about retrievals. I know this because when I first started OBE'ing, I would encounter people who didn't know where they were and I didn't have any sense of how to help except just talk to them.
3) My helper group has chosen for me to be kept out of the loop. Only once or twice, did my coming into contact with them precede the retrieval experience and even then no instructions were given. I believe the reason that they are hands-off is because it maximizes my learning to do it without a manual (that, and I don't read manuals too often) Also, without specific instructions, I am allowed to creatively solve problems that perhaps they may not know the answer to.

I have had easily a 100+ retrieval experiences by now (once a week for the last several years) - I consider myself to be prolific but not perfect. I know that helpers-in-training watch my efforts - perhaps, to see what not to do or to see a creative solution to an odd situation.

-mike