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apples and oranges.

i don't remember who it was, but someone did have a penis avatar at one time.

look at the dates of this thread though.  this is a dead discussion.

people see and hear all kinds of strange things in the borderland states.

there are lots of 'superstitions' that have built up over the years that are based almost entirely on weird sensations people have in these states.  like 'being ridden by a witch' or an 'incubus' or 'succubus', these are considered nowadays to be either "lower astrals" (whatever that means) or energy sensations associated with the change in perception from physical to non-physical.  there's a cool book out there called "The Origin of Psychic Phenomena" by Stan Gooch, it touches on a lot of the different experiences people have in altered states.

calling the tapping and arms up a reality check isn't really appropriate because they aren't.  but they are the closest equivalent for what the OP was asking.

just wanted to clarify

One simple group of AP "reality checks" would be to tap your fingers on the bed as you're falling asleep at night or put your arms up perpendicular to the bed with your elbows bent at 90 degrees. 

The idea is that as you drift off the sleep and lose consciousness momentarily, you will stop tapping your fingers or your arms will fall, which should wake you up.  Then you start again.  This helps you learn to maintain awareness in the "borderland" state between awake and asleep so that you can in turn maintain that thread as your body goes to sleep.

i would say that ideally you'd want to be in first person.  the reason is simple, you're trying to "convince" your mind that you really are in this visualization.  when you do 3rd person visualization, it's a lot more like normal daily imagination (day dreams even).  i think first person would probably be more effective for projection type stuff.

your neurotransmitter levels play a role as well.  particularly serotonin.  it is low at night, making focusing (and not falling asleep) difficult.  it's at it's highest first thing in the morning (which might make you too alert).  afternoon serotonin levels have been ideal for me.

the real question is, who cares?

you're having experiences, keep going and explore!

seriously bluremi, that's a brilliant insight.  i didn't even think about that.

lol.  you old hippie.   

there is no ill intent friend.  i want to make that clear.

i may have a lot of stars, but i'm not really the "golden child" of the pulse.

i too found my awakening through psychedelics and find many more "kindred spirits" who have been that way as well.

you sir are not lacking in any way.  every perspective is valid and equally important.  just because i've got pretty words doesn't mean my perspective is any more valid than yours and I hope I didn't imply that it was.  I was hoping that this sentiment was expressed in my rant, but I don't think it was clear.  I guess I was just intellectualizing and trying to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.

Everyone knows that sleeping with purple quartz crystals in your ears is the only reliable way to project.

you sir, or madam, are a genius.  lol.  incidentally, amethyst under the pillow is said to assist in projection, lucid dreaming and dream recall.

sorry, i didn't really read your question.

the idea is that the sigil symbol is representative/symbolic of a universal archetype that taps into the "medium" of reality and the specific energy associated with that symbol.  it's like creating an astral magickal tool.  so you can take the energy from a physical tool, like a crystal or dagger and recreate that object in the astral.  likewise, you can create a tool in the astral (or "otherworlds") and symbolize it's energy in the physical.  so in essence, a sigil is an astral tool, whose energy is universally recognizable and there is a physical equivalent represented symbolically through the sigil.  i can't speculate on the actual substance of the energy, i think that has to be intuitively understood through experiences with it, which you seem to be doing.

the runes, or elder futhark (in some traditions) were said to be the archetypes of reality, the structure of our universe (kind of like sacred geometry as far as "purpose").  i think it was odin (but i could be wrong) plunged into the underworld and retrieved the runes which was for some reason a very painful and torturous affair.  it was so bad that his skin was like ripped off or something and his blood dripped onto the runes that he brought back which energized them and is the reason that the most powerful runic symbols are painted in red, or, if you can stomach it, blood.

I'm not going to continue this debate because I feel that it will quickly get out of hand.

But, let me say this.  I'm not disputing the practicality of spoken language, I am speaking idealistically, conceptually.  That doesn't mean that people should allow themselves to get boxed in by a certain nomenclature though. 

[FOR ME]

In response to OP:

Alcohol makes me fuzzy, marijuana makes me too interested in too many things to focus well enough for projection.  FOR ME the most successful mindstate is that afternoon lull, when your blood sugar is low and you could probably take a nap.  My mind is still relatively alert but it is just "weak" enough that I could take a nap if I wanted too.  I also find that I'm kind of shut down for up to 3 days after a night of heavy drinking.  A beer or two is no problem, but getting sloppy drunk closes me off "psychically" for a few days.  I have found that lots of water and green tea seem to remedy this situation, or at least help me get over it more quickly.

But I say, if you find it easier to attempt to project the morning after drinking, then that's what you should do.  I guess ideally you don't want to have to rely on the alcohol induced state to project (it really limits your opportunities for successful exit), but if that's what works, do it.  And that goes for everything in life.  If you found a way that works for you, keep doing it.

What dogma? Which rules? Who's whining? I find it amusing how 'some people' can climb onto their soap box with a less than valid sense of superiority on this subject and dissect members here with offensive, ambiguous statements instead of discussing ideas. If anything should be classified as whining, would this not pass with flying colors? Ideas come with semantics because we as humans tend to communicate. Body language and fecal throwing isn't a great method to convey ideas so we have to settle for those poisonous words. If you don't want to discuss ideas, why come to a 'forum'? Mind you this isn't attacking any specific individual, this is just directed to that group of 'some people.'

You obviously didn't understand a word I said then.

Perhaps I was on a soap box, but it was a soap box in defense of the honest to goodness genuine explorers. 

It was actually a very appropriate discussion of the IDEAS associated with the realm of AP/OBE/LD/Phasing and more so the realm of experiences with consciousness.  It wasn't about any person, but rather all students of AP and the like from a generic, "bigger picture" perspective.  (Omitting of course my personal statement at the end, but as I pointed out, there is a difference between my personal opinion and the insight I provided on the state of AP information - the two don't have to be in harmony because truth is relative). 

My point is that, as with ANY form of knowledge, people get complacent and are taught to think about specific knowledge in a very limited way.  In the realm of science they call this "specialization".  What that means to me is, "a smaller box".  This is probably the single biggest flaw in honest science, the lack of interdisciplinary research.  We need people who are familiar, if not expert, in numerous different fields to really understand the far reaching effects of something like altered states of consciousness.  So, to limit the experience of those states to specific nomenclature and "rules" isn't doing anyone any good.  But, that is the nature of the human world.  We try to simplify and deconstruct everything so as to have a streamlined, repeatable process.  Unfortunately, we often lose the intangible essence of the subject, it's life force, as we become more mechanical in our discussion and explanation of it. 

You are right that this form of verbal communication is efficient and reasonable/rational as compared to poo flinging and body language.  But, compared to the experience of another person's consciousness, language is almost more primitive and brutal than poo flinging.  This is a persistent problem in all fields of knowledge (as I touched on).  The main reason is that the human experience of reality is radically subjective.  In fact, I don't even believe in the existence of "objectivity" per se.  In my mind, objectivity was spawned when language became the primary human mode of communication.  Each person has such a subjective experience of objects that no two people will ever have the exact same impression of any object (abstract or concrete).  So, in order to simplify the process and make communication feasible, objectivity was introduced (or evolved naturally) as a short cut, an assumption of the simplest common elements of any object.  But that's not really true, it's just a metaphor.  The word apple is just a metaphor, a symbol for this thing we call an apple.  But an apple is a different object to everyone.  To me, it's nostalgic, wonderful, juicy, a provider, all because I grew up on an apple orchard.  Xanth on the other hand has a completely different experience of an apple, he hates them.  Obviously our definitions of apples are different, but the objective (or concrete as i like to call it) metaphor of an apple, a metaphor that reduces the object to it's simplest common elements (common to all people) lacks the full depth of what an apple really is.  And that is something that no one can teach you, it has to be experienced to be known.  AP is no different, and because it's such a personal skill to develop (because you're dealing with YOUR MIND and ONLY YOUR MIND), dogmatic language poses a very formidable barrier to successful projection.  In this realm of study, you have to assume that all is possible and be willing to try it all or you have to become very familiar with the way your consciousness reacts in different altered states so that you might create an effective plan of technique that will most easily accommodate your particular style of "consciousness" (which is again, infinitely personal and subjective, no one will ever have the exact same conscious experience as you).

Soap boxed.

[EDIT: That was a little intense in retrospect, so I apologize if I came off as too emotional or offensive, it really wasn't my intent; I just wanted to clarify myself]

You do sound closer to real that what I usually hear here kid. Not to knock other members, but dang, there  does seem to be a lot of whining, rules/etiquette and misconceptions bout 'AP' as y'all call it. I'm sixty years old and been trailing the stral for at least fifty of those. Some straight, some buzzed, some after party, but ALL of em take me to the same place. Maybe that's just me, or maybe that's just the truth of it.

By the way, my friends who travel there, say the same thing...

I won't disagree that some people have trouble expressing that their statements are their opinion/experience and not hard fact.

However, I can't remove all blame from the people who read these statements without being critical and recognizing that it is just one person's opinion.

In truth, this is probably the most subjective experience someone can have and no one way works for everyone.  I've been talking about this a lot lately.  In order to be successful, one has to understand not only their own consciousness but how their consciousness responds in different altered states.

Like all traditions, AP/OBE/LD/Phasing (whatever you want to call what you do) is not immune from orthodoxy and dogma.  Whether you're trying to be scientific or spiritual about it, you still encounter the dogma (or nomenclature if you wanna try and make a poison sound pretty) built up by presumptuous teachers and naive/ignorant students that perpetuate something that they don't fully understand.  It's no one's fault, it's the nature of human civilization at this time.  I suggest stepping back and noticing that these "whiners", with their rules/etiquette/dogma are just normal folks who are embarking on a journey that is largely unexplored in any systematic way and that lacks any clear, concise and repeatable directions (which we have unfortunately be trained to expect and in many cases are only capable of learning in such a way).

It's no one's fault.  They're trying their darndest to really understand this experience and do it.  Why should you or I say that they are doing it wrong?  

(I thought you ought to know that I pretty much 100% agree with your sentiment though - the dogma is the poison of this skill; it is so limiting that I think at least half, if not many more, of the people that try this fail and quit.)

everyone experiences time from past to future...  that's the illusion of physical reality as a human.  time moves from past to future.

this reminds me of an episode of Community from last week where Jeff got Abed the "actual briefcase from pulp fiction" (though it turns out to be a fake) and no one is allowed to open it till Abed gets there.  someone asks brita what's inside it and she says "what?! do i have 3-D vision now?" and annie says "well yea, you do" and brita says "don't act like you know me!"

(she said 3-D instead of X-Ray)

lol

now that that little tangent is over... tl;dr

There aren't really any tricks to overcoming that fear.  It's a really intense unknown that you're studying and practicing.  The only real solution is to just "man-up" and take the plunge.

Welcome to the Pulse.

welcome

The more you work with energy development the more sensations you'll feel.  I've felt all kinds of weird stuff over the years. 

If you're interested in the development of your energy systems I highly recommend Robert Bruce's NEW Energy Ways (which can be found for free on his website, www.astraldynamics.com) and a great book called "Kundalini Activation: A Gentle Guide to Chakra Activation and Spiritual Growth" by John Selby (http://www.amazon.com/Kundalini-Awakening-Gentle-Activation-Spiritual/dp/0553353306/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1301587679&sr=1-3). 

Monroe's "Journey's Out of Body" set.

It's only 6 tracks (much better than the gateway series' 36!), geared specifically toward achieving OBE.

Robert Bruce has used this set in his online AP/OBE courses.

foreigners.....lol pauli. 

i meant that he further contemplated and explored the idea of focus levels more deeply, which resulted in a more succinct version of monroe's theory, but it was still an expansion of the understanding of the theory.

of course, i don't buy either theory so.....

The geometry of the structure is beyond amazing. 

For example, the first known pyramid construction (the pyramids at Giza) contains within it harmonics of not only every element in our modern accepted periodic table (plus more), but also measurements of the Earth (in any way you can imagine, it's circumference, mass, orbital period, rotation period, etc. etc. etc.), many of the "golden ratios" and other mathematical constants and anomalies (like pi and phi), measurements of the Milky Way and even the universe as a whole.  One researcher (Joseph P. Farrell) paints a picture of the great pyramid being a giant "death-star" type weapon that uses scalar wave technology (which is why it has all these harmonics correlations with the Earth and galaxy and universe, it acts as an analog computer with all the necessary data programmed into it).  Another researcher, Christopher Dunn, using the same acknowledged measurements, concluded that the great pyramid was literally a power station that seems to come right out of the imagination of great electrical engineers like Nikola Tesla. 

So I would be of the opinion that not only were ancient Earth based pyramids NOT temples and burial chambers (a laughable hypothesis in light of these astonishing mathematical discoveries), but they were likely brilliant "spiritual technologies/machines".  And with the amount of precision that the builders used, I find it hard to believe that they arbitrarily chose a pyramid as the shape of their structure.  I am quite sure that there is a level of physics of which we are almost totally unaware.  All it would have taken was for one scientist to discover a different way of measuring the cosmos than Einstein did with General and Special Relativity and we would have a completely different world-view.  It's not so hard to imagine that the ancients came upon a different, but equally valid, way of understanding the universe and have shown us their insight through these structures. 

There is a lot more going on with pyramids than we think.  Nevertheless, it's probably on API because it's pretty and noticeable.

Frank Kepple expanded on focus levels and sort of "re-invented" them.

I'm aware of the criticisms of sitchin, but it doesn't change the fact that he was one of the first people to really propose this idea of ancient aliens in our modern scientific times.  He brought back an area of research (ancient high civilization and alien visitation) that had been stomped out by orthodoxy and for that I will always admire him.  Also, the criticisms aren't that definitive, no more than sitchiens work.  Kind of a 'my word against yours' type situation if you ask me.

Ange,
I would say that there isn't really a difference.  Its a consciousness gradient.  People try to define certain states as different from the others by calling them ap or ld or whatever.  But, a gradient or continuum if you like, has an infinite number of points, an infinite number of possible states for consciousness to inhabit.  In this case, trying to identify one single state as ld or AP is not only dumb, its impossible because no one will ever experience the EXACT same state that one person calls AP or ld.  So, I like to look at it all as different angles of perception of the same thing.

Loosely though, you could say its based on the degree to whichever you are consciously aware and have disassociated from your body and awareness of it.