EXERCISE 10
astral doorway
This is a variation of the OBE technique found in many books, such as Astral Doorways, by J. H. Brennan.
Get into a comfortable position and close your eyes. Relax as completely as you can, and start a visualization. Pretend that your consciousness shrinks into an infinitesimal pinpoint of light. Then visualize that you are standing in front of a locked door. Visualize the doorway any way you want, with fancy engravings and door knobs or whatever—personalize the doorway.
Next, visualize yourself taking a fancy key out of your pocket (or from a chain around your neck) and unlocking the door. Open the door and step through the doorway. Close the door behind you, and lock the door again. The symbolic act of locking the door is for protection: lock it every time you use it.
Put the key back where you found it, and start walking forward. Imagine there is a tunnel in front of you with a bright light at the end. Imagine that you walk to the end of the tunnel, step outside, and find yourself outside your body, standing next to it.
Next, visualize a complete out-of-body experience, in all the detail you can imagine. Imagine walking away from your body to a destination. Try to imagine and remember as much detail as possible. When you are done, imagine walking back to your body. Imagine finding yourself back in the tunnel, walking back to the door. Again, unlock the door, step through, and lock it again from the other side. Guide yourself back to full consciousness and open your eyes.
Many authors say that this exercise in visualization can induce genuine OBEs, as well as impressing the idea of OBEs on your subconscious.
CHAPTER 11
the clairvoyant
By the end of July 1981, I had had 44 OBEs, and psychic experiences were piling up. I was doing computer programming for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR). One of my co-workers was LD, an ordinary woman except for her eyes. I couldn't look into her eyes because they seemed to look right through me. Somehow I got the strong impression she was clairvoyant. I talked to JP about her and he suggested I ask her. I didn't want to; she'd probably think I was crazy.
Everyone at work used a computer mail program, much like modern e-mail. One day I wanted to send a message to my boss who wasn't very prompt at reading her on-line mail. LD read her mail often, so I sent her a message that said, “Please tell PL [my boss] to read her mail.” A couple of days later, LD sent me a message that said “This is not a message.” When I asked her to explain herself, she complained that she never got any “good” mail. She sent me a noninteresting message because my message to her was so noninteresting. I got gutsy. I sent her the following reply:
FROM: BOB FRIDAY, JULY 31,1981 9:39 A.M.
So you don't want messages like “Please tell PL to read her mail,” huh? Okay. I always like a good philosophical discussion. I'll start it out with a bang.
ARE YOU CLAIRVOYANT?
Much to my surprise and relief, I was right: she was clairvoyant! She also had out-of-body experiences, and was even attending a spiritualist church. Like me, she was afraid to talk about it for fear of what others might think.
LD and I became good friends. I rarely saw her in person because we worked different shifts, but we exchanged computer mail for a couple of years. During that time, we agreed on a little experiment: To establish proof during an OBE, I would try to visit her while out of my body. When I arrived, she could see me clairvoyantly and validate that my OBE was “real.” From then on, I started trying to reach LD during my OBEs.
Literally all of the books on out-of-body experiences claimed that during an OBE everything is controlled by the person's thoughts. To travel, they said, all you have to do is to think of the person or place you want to visit, and you will be magically transported there. And I fully expected my thoughts to be all-powerful during an OBE, but I found out it wasn't that simple. The following excerpt from my journals illustrates some of the problems I had during OBEs, especially when trying to travel to a specific place. It also illustrates several points about OBEs, including clarity of consciousness and how out- of-body sight works. The topic of consciousness is discussed in chapter 19, and out-of-body sight is discussed in detail in chapter 18.
10/24/81 Sat - OBE #52
…I woke up at 8:00 A M. this morning and decided to try to have an OBE. I had no luck on my first try. I finally went back to sleep, and I kept going in and out of sleep until 9:30 A.M. I was fully relaxed and in the proper state of mind when I woke up the next time. I mildly thought about OBE, and I noticed how relaxed my body was.
I felt a twinge of vibration, and I directed my attention to it. It grew stronger, but it wasn't as strong as my first experience with the vibrations. It was more like the type I used to feel when practicing at night. “Well,” I thought, “I wish I could remember what to do next, like I usually do,” but I couldn't, and already the vibrations seemed a little weaker. Then I thought, “Well, I could arch my back, but it probably won't work.” I couldn't think of anything else, so I decided to try it. I arched my back and threw my arms back behind my head. I was immediately flung into my astral body.
When I reached the peak of my backward (downward) motion I started to sway back up again. When I reached my body again I made an effort to get away, but I got stuck to the body instead. I was fully conscious, glued tightly to my body, and amazed that my consciousness was so perfectly clear. Strangely enough, I could “see” all right. I had the astral equivalent of physical sight…I freed my astral arms, reached behind me, and tried to push myself away from my body. As I pushed, I felt my astral body being stretched from behind. I felt just like a cracker stuck in a vat of very thick honey. I felt millions of tiny streamers or ribbons attached to the two bodies (not with my hands; I just felt them there). Well, I gave it my best effort to get free, but I reentered my body after about 15 seconds.
So I came to, and thought it was the end. I rationalized that I couldn't do it again, because I was fully awake. But my stubborn side demanded that I try it again. So I got comfortable, and looked for the vibrations. They came immediately, and I used the same method to get out again. I wasn't stuck to the body this time. I sat up with no problem, again with a good sense of sight. I looked around and thought, “Wow. I'm really conscious. I've never been this conscious before. Not even in waking life. Now I'm going to do some experiments I've been meaning to do.”
The first experiment that came to mind was to test how sound worked. So I said something like, “Hello? Testing one-two-three.” Although I formed the words with my astral lips and used my astral vocal cords, no sound came out. I faintly heard a tiny voice in the background, but it was too muffled to understand. Perhaps the problem was merely my brain's interpretation of the sound.
Anyway, I looked around and noticed how things looked different in an OBE. In the past, I had often seen gray clouds during an OBE. But now I examined my sight more closely. I saw a few places where astral matter was just sitting in small bunches. And as I looked around the room I noticed that everything was normal except that now I could see different types of “glows” around everything. It was as if everything in my room had an aura of its own, which glowed a little differently from any other thing 1 also noticed that in some places there seemed to be blots, or places where the aura was either black or covered up by a blackness. Then I thought to myself, “This is foolish. I am wasting my time. I should go at once to LD's house for purposes of verifying the reality of this experience.” But then I blacked out again and once more woke up immediately in my body.
Once again my analytical self said no, but I was too stubborn to give up. I repeated the method, the vibrations came again, and I was ready for another excursion. When I got out, I was about one foot above my body. I sat up. I knew what I wanted to do: get to LD's house. I thought to myself, “Hmm. There are two possible routes I could take: through the back door or out through my window.” I heard the back door open and shut, so I directed my attention to it. My astral vision opened up a
nd I saw my mom coming in the house. I also noticed the clock in the kitchen, but it was too blurry to see the time. It was more like second sight or clairvoyant vision than physical sight. I thought, “I'd better not go through the back door; there is too much risk of being distracted. I'd better try the window.” So I looked at the window sill, then tried to go to it by pulling the image toward me. The image of the window did come to me, but when I looked again, I was still no closer to it. I tried to look at it closer. At once my eyes tried to be like a “zoom lens” on a camera. But instead of my eyes magnifying what I saw, I moved closer to it in a gliding motion. I had only glided one foot closer when I came to a stop. I tried to do it again, and it worked a tiny bit. Then I was about two feet away from the window sill.
I thought, “Enough of this moving-with-my-mind nonsense.” I got up on my knees, then stood up, preparing to step through the window. I decided to keep my eyes open so that nothing could go wrong. As I stepped through the glass window pane, my consciousness dimmed considerably. At once everything seemed strange. I was outside, but it looked so strange that I couldn't tell where I was. I looked around and saw images, possibly from an oncoming dream. I couldn't even tell whether I was on the first floor or on a second story. I recognized things, but everything seemed out of place. I saw toys, furniture, and other objects. I twisted around and saw that I was outside, to the north of our kitchen, and one story up! I became confused and eventually blacked out. I remember thinking, “I don't want to enter a dream now.” I woke up fully conscious in my body again.
I got comfortable and tried again. I immediately got the vibrations again as soon as I thought about them. Instead of flinging myself backward, I just flung myself forward and sat up in the astral body with no trouble.
I thought, “Almost every book I have on astral projection says that you can travel to a person instantly by thinking about them. I'm going to try it again.” So I closed my eyes and visualized LD perfectly in every detail. I just sat there and visualized and nothing happened. I thought at first that my visualization wasn't good enough. But I had visualized her perfectly in every detail. I opened my eyes and I was still in bed sitting up in my astral body. I thought, “This is getting me nowhere.” I started to think about LD, hoping this would work better than visualizing her. Still no results. Then I blacked out for maybe half of a minute. Then I woke up in my body again and knew it was over….
This entry shows another unsuccessful attempt at travel:
04/10/82 Sat - OBE #70
…I couldn't see my arm, so I figured that I must be out of my body. But just to make sure, I reached my right arm down through my bed. When my arm went through the physical bed again, I knew I wasn't physical. I swung my legs around, pulled away, and stood up. I tried to walk but couldn't. I was standing about four feet from my bedroom door, with my arms outstretched toward it. As much as I tried to get away, I didn't move an inch. I thought, “My only hope is to think of LD and maybe I will be transported there.” I closed my eyes and thought of LD. Nothing happened, so I visualized LD. Again, nothing happened. I thought of her personality. No movement. I imagined how I feel when I'm with her. Still no movement. None of this worked at all. 1 felt another quick motion, and 1 felt myself become physical again. 1 was totally back in my body again.
A few times I could “think” myself to another location, but these had unpredictable results:
07/10/82 Sat - OBE #79
…I closed my [astral] eyes and started thinking about LD. I opened them again and nothing had changed. I decided to try to visualize LD instead I closed my eyes, and visualized LD. “LD,” 1 mentally called. I opened my eyes and looked around. 1 was not in the same place! I didn't see LD either. I had no idea where 1 was. 1 was so overwhelmed by the change of scenery without any physical sensations, that 1 lost all consciousness….
03/25/84 Sun - OBE #105
…1 launched myself straight up in the air. 1 thought about LD and in a split-second, it seemed as if my consciousness blurred and instead of flying, I was transported somewhere at a blinding speed. That confused me, and 1 thought for a second, “No! I want to fly there.” I felt LD's presence for a second, but my confusion sent me back to my body again instantly….
11/10/85 Sun - OBE #118
…I pulled out and up so that I was in a squatting position near my body's right arm, about a foot up from the body. I knew right away what I wanted to do. I had read almost all of Robert Monroe's book, Far Journeys, so the first thing I wanted to try was to contact my guides#x2014;a process that Monroe calls, “ident inspect.” The first thing I tried was saying aloud, “ident inspect,” but nothing happened. Then I tried thinking, “ident inspect,” and nothing happened. Then I heard the friendly thoughts of another person. It was a 30-year-old man's voice, and it said, “What are you trying to do?” I looked around, but I couldn't see anybody. I replied, “I'm trying to contact my guides.” The other voice said, “Oh. But ‘ident inspect'?” I felt very foolish and laughed. I must have looked pretty foolish trying to contact my guides by saying#x2014;or thinking#x2014;the words I had read in a book. Especially since the words were just the author's attempt at describing an indescribable astral experience. And especially since I was so incompetent at using my mind as transportation. “Never mind,” I said, “It's from a book I read.”
Then I tried to pull myself toward the “ident inspect” instead of thinking about it, but I lost all consciousness. The next thing I knew, I came to in my body a couple of hours later.
To people who live without bodies, we must seem like simplistic children. When we are out of the body, we must be willing to try new things, learn from our mistakes, and not be afraid or embarrassed to ask for help. Above all, we should be able to laugh at ourselves.
EXERCISE 11
falling into a well
As always, get into a comfortable position and close your eyes. Relax as completely as you can, then visualize looking down a very deep well. Next, pretend that you fall in, head first. As you fall, watch the bottom of the well getting closer. Try to imagine the sensation of falling as realistically as possible. Feel the gravity pulling you toward the bottom. Get caught up in the feeling. If this works, you may be zapped into your astral body. If it doesn't work the first time, repeat the visualization several times until it seems almost real.
CHAPTER 12
flight school
After reading so many books on out-of-body experiences, I had great enthusiasm about astral travel. After all, why hop a plane to the coast, when you can hop the astral plane to the ghost? But I tried everything I knew to travel with a thought; nothing seemed to work. Perhaps my expectations had been too great. Perhaps science had been too deeply ingrained in me, and a part of me still believed traveling had to be more complex than thinking.
Whatever the reason, I decided to take a different approach to out-of-body transportation. Instead of trying to use my mind to teleport myself, I decided to fly the friendly skies! My first attempt at flight wasn't too disastrous, but not too coordinated either:
01/27/81 Tue - OBE #32
…Some unknown time in the night I woke up out of my body. I could not see in the physical sense of the word, yet I knew where I was; I was in our back alley, and I knew I was [astral] projecting.
I thought, “Where should I go?” and immediately decided “to EJ”—I had decided this before I went to bed…. So I took a running leap and started off in the air.
I rose above the houses quickly and was shaky for a while; I remembered many flying dreams in which I had crashed. But I decided if I controlled my mind I would be all right. I flew higher and higher, and was touched by a little fear; I was afraid to fly too high. So I made an effort to keep myself low enough for my own comfort. I could see the roofs of houses, the trees, and everything.
When I first went up, I realized I wasn't seeing physically, so I thought, “I should see.” Then I saw everything okay. I saw my arms raised in front of me Superman-style. I started to
climb too high for comfort, and I became afraid of getting too far away from earth.
With that thought, I started getting lower and lower. I descended very quickly until I was forced to land. I landed okay in some street, on the slope of a hill. I thought, “…Now I'll never get there!” The next thing I knew I was dreaming again.
Nobody ever taught me how to fly, so I was proud of my first attempt. My next attempts at flying were just as awkward, if not more so.
05/08/82 Sat - OBE #72
…I walked through the door and outside It was bright and sunny outside. The change was striking to me, since the room in which my body was sleeping was dark. The sunlight didn't hurt my eyes; it just seemed very clear and bright. I thought, “Now where should I go to take off on a flight?” I looked up and saw the branches of our hackberry tree. I walked along our sidewalk toward the west.
I went to our front yard, and I stopped and faced the east. I looked all around. I was very embarrassed to be out in the public where everyone could see me about to take a flying leap in the air in an attempt to fly. I knew that I couldn't be seen by anyone, but still I hesitated, dreading the possibility that I might be seen. Such a flying attempt would look pretty silly for a physical person. I took a few quick steps toward the east and leaped forward into a good flying position. For a second or two I was completely weightless, and I glided in midair for a few feet. But then I stumbled and fell, catching myself before I fell on my face.
I decided to try again. This time I walked further west until I was on the front sidewalk outside our house. I ran about five feet toward the south this time (away from my house) and took a flying leap into the air, after looking around for neighbors who could see. I fell flat on my face again! It didn't hurt because I was not physical, so I picked myself back up. I decided to walk to our back yard (east) and try [to fly] there once. I walked about ten feet or so and blacked out without any warning.
Out-of-Body Experiences Page 7