OBE/Astral Projection Trial Day 35

This week has been an interesting one to put it mildly. I’ve been experiencing some pretty large paradigm shifts and mental re-programming. My mental model of reality has changed due to both my daily exercises and supplemental reading.

I haven’t had a classic OBE yet (beyond a lucid dream) so I’d have to say that my theoretical knowledge of what consciousness is is further along than my direct experience. I’ve finished reading “The Power of Now” and have now begun reading “The Afterlife Knowledge Guidebook” by Bruce Moen. I haven’t put all the pieces together yet but I’m experiencing “eureka” moments on an almost daily basis. This is quite exciting! I’ll try to share some of my thoughts here..

The major point I’ve picked up from Eckhart Tolle in The Power of Now is that my thoughts are not who I am, “I am” the observer behind the thoughts. Descartes was wrong when he said “I think, therefore I am”. My thoughts are my ego, they are not me in its entirety because there is something that exists outside my thoughts (self-awareness) that can observe my thoughts. But what, exactly, is doing the observation?

I cannot just be my thoughts (i.e. mind) because then there wouldn’t be anything that would let me observe my mind. It’s like the difference between a regular dream and a lucid dream. A regular dream is my ego-mind running amuck, while a lucid dream is where I bring my own self-aware observation (i.e. focus of consciousness) – which is an entirely different experience.

To me, this points to logical evidence that we are more than just our physical body and mind, which I believe will help me take another mental step into experiencing an OBE myself. Since I am beginning to accept the idea that we are more than our physical bodies, my mind will not be as likely to inhibit an OBE from occurring. Also, if an OBE were to occur, I won’t be as “shell shocked” as I would be if it were to happen to someone with the typical atheist/skeptic belief system.

I have only just started reading The Afterlife Knowledge Guidebook today but it has already given me a Eureka! moment that also points to the fact that we are more than our physical bodies. This has to do with the concept and problem of free will. Do you believe you have free will? That is, the power to control aspects of your life?

Free will is something that has bugged me for a very long time, since I have always been a very left-brained, logical, and scientific thinker. YET, I do believe in free will… I am not a robot or a computer. Science does not currently have an answer for free will. The science of physics describes a deterministic/mechanistic universe at a macro level (Newtonian Mechanics/Relativity) and a seemingly random/indeterministic universe at a micro level (Quantum Mechanics).

The problem is that our world as seen from the lens of science does not have any room for free will. It’s like the universe had a set of initial conditions set at the beginning and everything is playing out due to the physical laws of cause and effect. Or, if you get down to very small scales it appears entirely random. This doesn’t make any sort of intuitive sense to our own personal subjective experience.

Now if you don’t believe in free will then there is no problem for you. But if you do believe in free will then you recognize that you have the power to make choices that manipulate the physical world. But from where does this choice come from? Where do you trace the origin of the chain of cause and effect?

I believe the origin of free will(s) has to come from a source that is outside this physical universe. It’s not like science is wrong – the universe is quite predictable (or completely unpredictable) under controlled experiments. But a human seems to be somewhere in the middle. I’m beginning to think that there are influences outside the physical universe that can somehow change the physical universe, and we might be one of the ways this occurs.

Take for example, the problem of our understanding of the human brain. In general, scientists believe that the brain is the origin of consciousness (I used to think so, too), but we really don’t know how it works all too well. I’m now beginning to think that the brain is more of an interface/transceiver between our consciousness and the physical universe.

This idea isn’t new of course. See Tart’s Model of the Human Mind for an interesting description; It practically begs for a Venn Diagram. Movies like The Matrix and more recently, Avatar, show that the idea can be accepted in pop culture.

This Eureka moment came to me when I got to the beginning of the “Silly Little Finger Bending Exercise” in Bruce’s book. I can sit here all day and choose when to bend my finger or not – I really don’t see how a completely scripted universe would let me do that. Again, to me, this points to the idea that we are more than just our physical bodies.

But anyways, back to my notes and observations on my daily practice.

    * I’ve been noticing some weird experiences and coincidences lately. As an example, during one of my exercises I set my egg timer to 15 minutes and then proceeded to meditate. After a period of time I became curious as to why the egg timer hadn’t rung yet and looked at how much time was remaining. It still said 15 minutes. Feeling a little weird-ed out, I decided to just let the timer be and see if it would start counting down. It did. I don’t really have any sort of logical explanation other than just self-delusion but it was certainly weird.
    * Getting into a trance state is becoming easier each day, but I’m still only capable of getting into a light trance. Some of the visualization techniques are a little difficult, but luckily I get to pick what to use for the future.
    * Next week focuses on a little more preparation for OBE’s (oops, I thought this was the last prep week). This includes creating a plan for what to do during my first OBE (the “walkthrough”), which is basically just a short trip around my room to maximize the chance of remembering the experience. I’ll also be practicing “energy body loosening” by focusing my awareness on points outside my body, instead of just inside my body.
    * It’s nice to see that a lot of what Bruce Moen talks about lines up with Robert Bruce, although there perspectives/approaches appear to be quite different.
    * I’m finding that the greater effort I put into telling myself “I remember my dreams” before falling asleep greatly determines the quality of my dream recall. It’s harder than it sounds because I can be quite exhausted by the end of the day, which can make it difficult to not fall asleep immediately after my bedtime reading. So some days are better than others for what I end up writing in my journal.

Seraphis1 wrote on Apr 16^th, 2010 at 11:09pm:


I see what you are saying but I guess I was previously listening to Robert Bruce's advice that we should err on the side of waking. His reasoning was that you don't want to get into the habit of winking out everytime you try to get into a trance. But you're right, we do it every night when we go to sleep.

Seraphis1 wrote on Apr 17^th, 2010 at 1:00pm:


haha fair enough. The point is that almost every author I've read makes the recommendation to practice trance work sitting down, not lying down for this reason. So I'm going to give sitting down a fair shot and see how it goes.

Seraphis1 wrote on Apr 17^th, 2010 at 6:00pm:

msagansk wrote on Apr 17^th, 2010 at 9:56pm:


I don’t like to use the word trick… it is a process… in the RB and RM system we are trying to separate the body and mind functions, if he body is ‘really’ asleep… and you can’t miss that the obe reflex will engage, but the mind will be aware of the event.

S.


msagansk wrote on Apr 17^th, 2010 at 9:56pm:


Great event, you really have to do a live seminar at Faber.

S.










S.

4/17/2010 - Evening session:

Special session mix: BM/AKG - cut 1 disc 1, gateway experience - cut 2 - first stage separatiion:

Got into a very deep state body numb... This time my tongue got quite swollen and had difficulty speaking for my tape… a bust of a man who favored Orson Welles appeared… didn't actually wink out this time… but was loosing contact with tape instructions but I was not following the them any… I was in a freewheeling state… The Third Eye suddenly turned on and I was looking (symbolically) through the large living room wrap around window over some nice upholstered (grey) wrap around couches.

This is my minds way of communicating through the Perceiver/Interpreter function… what is really happening is I am looking through probably the pituitary gland out under the frontal lobes into deep space… the eos procedures kicked in and I was brought back to C1.

S.

Hi M: I'm posting this because you might encounter things like this and be confused... open you mind to the many possiblities... the interpreter may help you so don't think anything is too fantastic:

4/18/2010 - afternoon session:

Special session mix: BM/AKG - cut 1 disc 1, gateway experience - cut 2 - first stage separation:

Solar plexus chakra activates… image 1940 dark blue gangster car (Packard)… front left view… grille… interpreter giving associations Dillinger… but must be a potential retrievel… connected to the torrio/capone hit on irish mobster O’Bannion in his flower shop… possible he was so surprised by the event that he does not know he is dead… energy streaming right leg… underside… purple pulsing light…


S.