For all you OOBE'ers out there........... if during OOBE you have seperated your conciousness from your physical body and this is the basis for proving that we will survive after death because we don't need our physical bodies to survive........and our bodies are just vessels for our "souls" or whatever so we can spend our time on earth ........ then shouldn't this scenario be possible...

2 people are in a room together.... and they both go into OOBE... walking around the same astral plane together they decide hey instead of returning to my body, I will return to their body instead and they can take mine........afterall our body is just a vessel and I don't need it to survive so I can just go back into any vessel I so choose especially if it's empty at the time without a conciousness since its in OOBE at the moment .......         walla, we just found the key to immortality since we can just shift bodies forever................and if this is not possible, that just says to me right there, our conciousness is DIRECTLY linked to OUR physical body and we need THAT BODY to SURVIVE!

the other thing I thought of was...........lets say I was in OOBE........and I was out sitting on the moon chilling and back at home where my physical body was, someone takes a gun out and shoots me in the head...............am I now just stuck in permanent OOBE forever?  a jail cell if u will

anybody have the answers to these questions..............:)

I believe it may be possible to occupy someone else's "vessel" as you call it. Robert Monroe projected to the future, around the year 3000, where they were able to occupy any living body there was. Fish, birds, humans, grass, trees, cingle celled organisms... So I think it may be possible, we just don't know how to do it yet.  The facts at the current moment are that we are "connected" to our physical bodies. By the "silver cord." But maybe this will change in time. Monroe sure thinks so.

To answer your other question.  Dying while out of body would be in no way shape or form the same as getting "stuck in a permanant jail."  If this were to happen, there would be no transition into the "afterlife", because you would already be in it.  If you consider the afterlife to be a prison, if you consider "existing"  to be a prison, then yes you would be stuck in prison. Because you are and will always be you, you are consiousness and that will never change.

For everyone reading this.. I have been talking to "DigitalSkeptic" for a few days now. He desperately wants to believe in the afterlife, and even after talking with me for ten hours he is still unconvinced. I do see a change in his attitudes and thoughts though, I do think Im making a good impression on him. He is begining to be more open to some of the ideas I am bringing to him.  I am not trying to force anything on him, but he wants me to convince him beyond a doubt so I am doing my best. If anyone else has somthing they can add that would be great.

I will echo what oob dude said here.  The current theory is that while OOB, there is a "silver cord" that connects our consciousness to the physical wherever we go.  It is said that the cord can only be cut in death, in which case there is no coming back to that physical body (except through divine intervention - i.e. near death experiences).

Do I believe there is an infinitely long magical cord connecting our souls to our bodies?  No, not me personally.  The concept is valid but not as pure science.  Many who are OOB do not notice this cord, others have reported it.  I prefer to see the OOBE as a shift in our awareness, not traveling for real in a physical vehicle in a new world.  It is, to me an exlploration in terms of shifting our perception to get the sense of traveling.  This is difficult for many to understand.  I believe that we travel in a vehicle (physical or astral) as long as our consciousness chooses to see us as individual beings limited in this fashion.  Monroe spoke of the astral vehicle blurring in contours with time, losing its human shape.  Ask laffingrain - she has bounced around a California hillside as a "ball of light."

OOBEs are a good way to begin to appreciate that we are more than our physical bodies.  I have not been convinced that the OOB state, traveling in the astral, is essential though, compared to opening our minds to the possibilities, meditating and exploring by using our intent to shift our consciousness.

Matthew

You can not take on another's physical body, your soul is  energetically attached to your body. As for Roberts experience , this would be a merging of his higher consciousness, meaning his higher self was showing him how to merge and that it is possible. It may come to pass when each soul has reached a high enough evolutionary level that at will we all be-able to project our consciousness into living things, but where a long long long long way of that!

Hello digital,

We actually have at least seven frequencies of our body within the same area as the physical.  When astral projecting only one (?) is used.
Many believe that in deep love or lovemaking, two souls can switch briefly for the experience of more fully knowing and enjoying their partner. Some of that swirly, swooning feeling around the solar plexus  and heart may have to do with such a close-quarters switching. But they generally switch back pretty soon.
So until you have time to study and experience these truths, the information you get will come sort of piece-meal, bits here and there that need to 'cook' together.
I admire your intensity and persistence!

Your friend, Betson

Digital,

In "Journeys out of the Body" Robert Monroe reports an experience of inadvertantly returning to someone else's body rather than his own.  Montoe worries that his antics with those present might have caused great embarrassment for the dispossessed person.   Monroe does not comment on what happened that guy, while he took over his body.

Hi Digital,

Bob Monroe also said that we don’t really go out of body, but instead follow a line of consciousness that penetrates downward from the spiritual or higher vibrations of our being into the physical.  Or in other words, it is the spiritual that creates the physical.  We use our energy fields to sense things in much the same way as we use our physical senses.  It makes sense to me that when Bob indicated he entered another being that he used his energy field as a way to completely sense the other persons energy field, thus it felt to him as though he had entered this person’s physical body.  While I do think all things are possible, this is what makes sense to me.  I also believe that our scientists are now coming up with theories that support this idea as well.

You are the only one that can convince yourself of the existence of what we call the afterlife.  My advice would be to read as much as you can while looking within your own heart and mind for truth.  Don (Berserk) has recommended several books in his posts such as Howard Storm, Matthew also has many resources regarding consciousness I’m sure he would share with you as well.

Wishing you many fruitful blessings in your search for truth.

Kathy

that makes a lot of sense what you said about the energy field Kathy. a few of us have been discussing entities who need retrieval attached to the energy field. I would not say the retrievers are possessed. they are directing the entitiies to move on towards the light by the energy of thier thoughts. this sometimes takes a few days.
I believe this was one of Monroe's early obe experiences before retrieval concepts were born at TMI.
when I read that experience Don, I wondered the same thing. I assume there was some sort of closeness of their energy fields, or some reason that we don't understand yet how that would be possible and I haven't read of it happening to but one other person in all the books I've read on the subject. so must be too rare to worry about it. maybe he apologized? I mean, the ultimate invasion is embarrassing ::)  but it would be similar to entitiy attachment, although this one of Monroe's appears he is a novice at this point,  and I liken it stories I've heard of drunks entering the wrong house on the block because they don't have all thier wits about them. being a novice some very funny stuff happens and apologies or making up for something we have done would be on the menu in some cases. I believe theres intentional harm versus unintentional harm to consider.

love, alysia