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"Astral projection" is a belief construct. When people project, what they perceive is a graphical representation of that belief construct. All the notions of astral planes and all notions of sub-divisions, etc., etc., they are all belief constructs. Devils and demons are belief constructs. Near Death Experience "past life reviews" are belief constructs. All religious beliefs, and such like, they too are all belief constructs, along with zillions of others.

Frank, would your 4 focus levels also be considered a belief construct?  After all, I think you have said elsewhere that the ultimate reality is subjective, not objective.

Background: I am a novice at OBE's but I have gotten out on 4 separate occasions and moved around my house. I have been meditating for about 2 years and specifically got into aiming for an OBE around 1 year ago, inspired by Robert Monroe's works.  I have been through the first 4 waves of his Gateway CD's, doing each of the 24 exercises several times over the course of a week before moving onto the next.  I had some success in particular with remote viewing.  However, my OBE's were not directly related to listening to these CD's. 

My method: I wrote down all conscious OBE's that I recall in my diary immediately after the experience.  Here is what they had in common:  I have only been able to project in the hypnopompic state i.e. while coming out of sleep, and in general have had many brief but unusual experiences during this state aside from OBE's.  My method is:
1.   I verbally repeat an affirmation 5 times to myself as I am close to falling asleep for the night: "I wake up slowly and deepen my hypnopompic state to have conscious, positive out of body experiences that I remember." 
2.   My alarm rings a couple hours before my normal wake-up time in the morning.
3.   I get up briefly and go to the bathroom.  Others advise being active for more like 45 min. so you don't just fall back asleep, but I personally find it hard to fall back asleep even with just a bathroom break.
4.   I lay back in bed and repeat my affirmation 5 times again.  I also try to get into the borderland state but typically not much happens before I fall asleep.  Sometimes, I fitfully go between dreaming and waking.
5.   On a successful morning, I begin to wake up around 15 min. before my usual wake-up time, and my dream merges into an OBE.  For example, in my first OBE, my dream ended off with falling into water and my legs then floated up above water.  Then, I woke up to find my astral body in the same position with only my head still integrated in the physical body.  From there, I exited and "walked" slowly around in my bedroom, with pretty good control of movement and thoughts.

This method does not usually end up in an OBE, but with persistence for a few weeks it finally did work a few times.  I think it's also important that I spend 1-2 hours every day on reading/watching material on the subject and meditating.  I am wondering if anyone has more advice on hypnopompic OBE's i.e. while waking up, as this seems to be what works for me at the moment.  But it's hard to remember to try for an OBE when you are coming out of sleep (unlike having an OBE while falling asleep i.e. hypnagogic, where you lie down and do a method right before the OBE).