The Path of the Soul

I've been trying unsuccessfully to astral project for a long time now, using product after product and method after method. Unfortunately except the Hemi-Synch which did "something" (but not much), everything else was really useless for me.

A few days ago I got in the post William Buhlman's latest set of CDs called How to have an out of body experience (check out the link if you want to see what is all about with the full description of the program), and finally last night when I went to bed, I popped in the first CD and started listening to it.

William Buhlman was actually the first who got me interested in astral projection with his book Adventures Beyond the Body, a book which I treasure even now.

So I've started listening to the first CD, where Buhlman was talking about his first AP experience, was giving the list of what you can feel as you're getting closer to have an out of body experience and the last track was a 30 minutes visualization exercise.

While listening and following this exercise track, my body started to feel first twitchy, then I felt a light tingling all over the body. Then it became lighter somehow (part of the exercise was to imagine we're floating on a cloud) and eventually the body started to feel heavier, and sinking in the mattress.

And then I heard a loud pop in my ears like a cork being pulled out of a bottle. Sadly this brought me out of trance but boy I was so happy: these were the exact "symptoms" that Buhlman listed in one of the previous tracks on this CD, right down to the popping in the ear.

I knew I was closer to an AP than ever before. And this was only an exercise for practicing visualization, it was not the 'real deal' yet.

Now I can't wait to start listening to the rest of the CD and practicing with one of the methods Buhlman describes in the CDs.

I've read at the Astral Pulse forum a while ago (and even Buhlman mentioned) that not every technique or method works with everyone. You have to try to find the one that works best for you. So far it seems I've been trying the wrong techniques - for example listening to any form of Binaural Beats seem to cause me headaches.

But the guided voice is what really seems to mostly resonate with me, so I'll keep on using the Buhlman CDs and report back on how I got on. I can't wait to have my first real astral projection!

Saturday afternoon, a bit after lunch, I've decided to have a quick nap. I don't think I've actually slept anything, at some point I remember hearing a light snoring (must have been me?) and woke up. I was lying face down, on my stomach, with one arm under me.

As soon as I woke up from that light snoring (still not sure if it was me, or just noise that I heard in my subconscious), I've decided to try the breathing technique, so I breathed in and out a couple of times, slowly, trying to feel my body go heavy on the outbreaths, and suddenly I felt something like vibrations, more like small tremors coming from my heart area and expanding around my chest and upper body. It was a very light feeling which started to increase, but I got excited, as I've never felt this before, so the vibrations left as fast as they came.

I was so disappointed and by then completely awake, so I knew there was no use in continuing the exercise at this point. Yet this is a step forward, as it's the first time I consciously felt these tiny vibrations. They started very lightly, like when you are on a train shaking along with it, and they were increasing bit by bit. I really wish I didn't get excited at the moment, when I realised what was happening, as now I might have missed my chance at my very first conscious OBE...

I was reading some posts at the Astral Pulse forum, and came across a thread discussing another technique for OBE, called the Vehram Method. The discussion was quite exciting around it, so I've decided to check it out, bought it and gave it a try. It was only $10, so it won't break my bank if it doesn't work.

The program basically advocates reaching an OBE using 3 main stages. The first stage is to place the body in the proper hypnagogic state. I've started with this two nights ago. Basically the first step involves auto-programming of the body to wake up at given times. Once you awakened during the night and you're still groggy and ready to go back to sleep, it's very easy apparently to get into hypnagogic state, meaning mind awake and body asleep.

Well for me it seems that this step worked quite nicely. Both nights I tried this, I woke up not once, but 2-3 times, lol. I slept very lightly throughout both nights, and funnily enough, I was not sleepy at all during the next day. Maybe it has to do with the fact that you actually program your body to wake up, rather than being woken up suddenly by an external factor, so the body uses its internal alarm clock to put itself in the waking position. When I went to sleep I used strong cues and feelings for this. I put myself in a state of light alert (re-living the feeling that I used to have whenever I had to catch a plane early in the morning, meaning that I had to wake up in the night, usually around 2 am. The fear of missing the plane is a strong motivator indeed!).

I managed to achieve this waking up both nights I tried it. What didn't work so far is step 2, trying to bring my body into hypnagogic state. The more I tried, the more I became wide awake and had trouble getting closer to falling back asleep. Maybe instead of really trying, I will have to simply let myself go back to sleep. But then the problem is to retain the consciousness of the mind, while my body does go back to sleep. Oh troubles...I'll have to sort this one out somehow...

What I really liked about this book is the way it was in detailed explained the process of going into hypnagogic state, of how one should really feel. I've never read anything like this before. Everything else is usually dry, telling the facts, the mechanics of it. Here you could actually feel as you were reading along. You know exactly what you're supposed to feel when you're getting there using the trick the author describes in the book. Now that step 1 is done and I could achieve it twice in a row, I will try out the next step and will report back.

Note: after posting this, I've checked out the thread on Astral Pulse about the system. This sentence caught my eyes:

"Due to an intense desire to practice the system, I am waking up more than 5 times a night now, with no signs of sleep deprivation."

Yes, I think I'm on the right track here...

I've just finished my third session, I used the same track as I used yesterday, and here are my findings.

First of all, it is now 2 pm, this is the time I could meditate today. Plus I wanted to try meditation at a different time in the day, to see if there are any differences, since usually I meditate after 6 pm.

This time I didn't have that strong numbness in my hands, all went well, I got quite fast 'under'. One of my problems usually with meditating is that if I hear a loud noise, or my heart skips a beat for some reason, I get jolted out very fast from meditation. Not so today. I heard a car hoot twice, and although it was loud, I didn't react at all. Also I had twice get this 'heart skips a beat' feeling, but contrary to the past, I went right back in the meditative state. Quite nice feeling to be able to continue the meditation. Which was again, very short, even though it lasted almost 40 minutes. Not sure why I feel it is so short, but I really wish it lasted at least one hour!

At some point, when Monroe said a few times 'Focus 10', 'Focus 1o', I had a strange feeling like my whole body was floating, and just once lightly rocking back and forth like on a swing. The whole thing must have lasted just a few second. It was like I had no chair under me. I couldn't recreate this feeling though during this session again. Not exactly sure what it was, but it was quite a nice feeling. I think I never felt so light before in my life!

And finally two after-effects. I dressed quite well as I knew that the body temperate goes down during the meditation, yet still, I feel quite cold right now. And I'm extremely sleepy. I'm yawning as if it were time to go to bed. And it's only 2 pm, there's a long way to go until bed time. I don't remember having this sleepy feeling after my session yesterday. I think I'll go take a nap after lunch.

I absolutely have no ideas if these are feelings I should feel - experience or not, but again, I'll write down everything, each detail, maybe a pattern of sorts will emerge eventually?

I woke up this morning just before the alarm, and I was in that drowsy state between sleep and total wake up. At some point I decided to turn off the alarm, which is on the nightstand at the other side of the bed (on hubby's side), so I rolled over and hold out my hand to tap on the alarm. Saw that it was 7.50. At that moment I woke up and realised that I haven't really moved, and then proceeded to turn off the alarm. Time was 7.55. Did I just have an out of body experience for a second?

Then I remembered that I had a similar experience while a kid. Once I was very thirsty, and I held out my arms to take a glass of water. Only to wake up and realise I didn't really move and there was no glass of water, I was in the bed. And it was no simple dream, I actually felt myself go through the motions of moving my arm to grab a glass of water.

I've read in one of the OBE books that one of the major triggers for actually having an OBE is a strong need. And being thirsty is listed as one of those needs that might trigger it.

This morning was nothing earth shattering, but it was an interesting experience. I understand now a bit more about when it's mentioned that one needs to be very very close to falling asleep/or just having woken up when the actual mind didn't start yet functioning. It's really difficult getting there consciously, as one either falls asleep for real in the process, or wakes up completely (having the daily thoughts intrude in our mind), so the state can't be achieved anymore. At least now I know what feeling to strive for.

I have a go away - come back relationship with astral projection. I keep trying it for a while, then I give up. Now I'm back again at it, wanting to try it out once again.
An interesting post has been made on the Astral Pulse forum, which got me thinking, because it is also valid for regular meditation, which I do at times.

When we meditate, we always try to get the body to relax as much as possible, almost to 'go to sleep', while keeping the mind busy - not with day to day thoughts, but with whatever it needs to be focused on during meditation. However I've tried it today the other way around. I did get comfortable, while focusing all the time on relaxing my closed eyes instead, forget about the body. Just relaxing the eyes, getting them close to the stage of before falling asleep. This would be the first stage in one of the ways to get an OBE. I'm not there yet, but it was definitely an interesting experience. 25 minutes passed practically instantly. My body went at some point numb by itself, without me trying to focus on getting it there. And while I was focusing all my time on resting, relaxing my eyes, for some reason the mind chatter, the daily chit chat was gone very fast from my mind today.
Hm, very interesting, I'll try meditating this way for a while, even when I'm not trying to project.

I loved this quote from that forum regarding the usual way of getting the mind awake and the body asleep, had a chuckle at it:

"I believe 95% of you out there who have trouble inducing an OBE fall into this trap. You spend all of your time focusing on preparing the PHYSICAL BODY for an OBE (which doesn't get to experience it), and less time on preparing your MIND for an OBE (which does get to experience it).

That's like washing your brand new car for your vacation to Disneyland, and then you take the train there instead."

The whole post is talking about OBE but I can really see the benefits of this different technique for regular meditation as well.