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I've had a while to test both the laxman and procyon. I still find myself wanting to use laxman the majority of the time since it gets me into a deeply relaxed state faster, the sessions seem more immersive, and the light show is better.

I have a flotation tank and when I don't have time to use it I've found that these light and sound machines are the next best thing. I just wish there was a way to use them inside the tank. I have underwater headphones and an underwater mp3 pouch that could fit the unit, but I doubt there is a good way to protect the goggles from the salt water.

There has been a lot of anti-gun hysteria from politicians and the media lately. One thing that isn't getting enough attention is violent crime has decreased by around 50% in the last 20 years which is huge and that's despite there being more guns then ever in the US. The safest parts of the US tend to have the least restrictive gun laws. It makes little sense that most focus has been on military style semi-auto rifles like the ar15 since they are rarely used in crimes, they might be scary looking to some but it's naive to think another assault weapons ban would make a difference when the last one didn't. I think ending the war on drugs is the most realistic chance of reducing the homicide rate further.

Here is a pretty good objective overview of crime stats between the US and the UK which demonstrates the UK has a lower homicide rate but much higher overall violent crime rate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ooa98FHuaU0

I'm very pro-gun and not a fan of either of them but Alex should have calmed down and could have done a lot better. Perhaps Alex acted like that because Piers was a total DB in an interview a few weeks with ago with Larry Pratt of Gun Owners of America.

If Obama really wants to implement significant gun restrictions that will just ensure a huge turnout for republicans in the next election. 

I have the procyon now in addition to the laxman. I'll post a full review when I've had enough time to thoroughly test them both. The procyon works but my early impressions are that the laxman is more impressive. It gives a much better light show, the sessions are more immersive and complex, the build quality is better, and I seem to get to a meditative state faster.

Thanks Lionheart, I'll definitely try that, sounds like a good technique.

I just noticed that the laxman site has 2 additional sessions that can be downloaded. 

I finally had the chance the try the laxman to project or LD and it went well. I used it 3 times this morning and had 3 LD's and vibrations where I failed to separate. That's not bad for the first try since I haven't been practicing much for the last 2 years.

The LD's occurred a little after the sessions ended. I didn't see any hypnagogic imagery when the sessions were running but when it was going I did briefly get vibrations which ended after I noticed a discomfort in my foot. So far I like the deep relax, vibrations, lovely, and highlands sessions.

The laxman has also made it much easier to fall asleep the last few nights since I have issues with insomnia. I've also been feeling great mentally and very clear headed, I'm not sure if that's from using the laxman or if it's a cordyceps supplement I recently started.

I just received the laxman the other day. For anyone in the US it's on amazon for $600. I also have a procyon on order so I'll post a comparison after I'm able to try them both for a while. I'll also compare the effects vs using a floatation tank.

So far I've tried about 4 sessions and I think I'm really going to like the laxman. I didn't get to a trance state or project yet but I've had a lot of distractions and still need to try it in the morning when I would normally try to project.  It was very relaxing and a few times it felt like I was getting close to the mind awake body asleep state. This has a lot of potential since I'm not able to get deeply relaxed nearly that fast with meditation, I would have to be in a floatation tank.

I thought for a little that it had gone bad. I was adjusting the brightness and sound settings, I think I turned the sound all the way up then the unit started freezing even after I powered on and off.  I tried re-seating the batteries then went in and turned the audio down a little and the problem has cleared, hopefully it was just a temp glitch.

A lot of the programs seem really bright even with my eyes closed so I'll really have to mess with finding the right settings there.

Thanks for the review. I just ordered the laxman yesterday, if I like it I might also get the mindlights system.

I'm decent at AP, LD'ing, and phasing since I just set my intention, meditate for about 10min, I then let myself fall asleep and my mind snaps awake later in either focus 10 or a dream.  However, I'm not good at physical / mental relaxation, getting to a trance state, visualizations, or remaining conscious during a projection attempt so I'm hoping the laxman will help in those areas.   

Thanks for the responses.

I'll certainly put more effort into gaining clarity rather than worrying about what the separation is like.  I just started reading William Buhlman's book last night where using that affirmation was recommended.  After reading how it was explained it really occurred to me that I might just be repeating it without putting much intention behind the request.

This morning I had projected and had an uneventful exit, I noticed that I was in the mind awake / body asleep state, then I floated away my bed.  I got out of my house and noticed that my clarity wasn't too good, so I repeated clarity now mentally a few times and it didn't help much; however, when I tried shouting it and putting a lot of intent behind the request it worked really well.  I also read about requesting to move to a higher plane so I tried that and almost instantly it felt like a powerful force was pulling me both back and inward at the same time, it was a little too much to handle so the experience ended. 

Unfortunately, I experienced what might be a more serious issue that I often have which is falling into unconscious sleep for a while after the projection ends.  This of course makes recalling the experience difficult so there are other parts of the AP that I barely remember.  Addressing that issue should be simple since I just need to remember to wake up and right away and write everything down.

I have been having some issues lately with not being very lucid during some projections and I suspect it's at least somewhat related to whether or not I experience intense vibrations prior to exiting.  I'm wondering if anyone has advice for dealing with this or similar experiences.

It seems when I experience intense vibrations or other exit sensations, the fact that it's startling forces me to become much more mentally alert, so upon exiting I'm more likely to be lucid.  However, the more times I project the less I experience the vibrations or they have gotten much more mild over time.   

Since I'm usually unconscious just prior to waking up in SP, it seems like I'm significantly less likely to be very lucid without those intense exit sensations that might startle me into becoming more alert.  I'm also more likely to slip into unconscious and lose a lot of the memory because I don't often wake up right away in these instances.  Basically, it appears that my separation process has become too peaceful / uneventful to the point where there isn't much to help raise my level of alertness at the start of the projection. 

In the past I used to hate the vibrations since it was frightening at first and I probably chickened out of 50+ attempts because of it, now I'm interested in experiencing it more often.  What sometimes but not always helps is affirming something like "clarity now" or spending some time focusing on a small detail after separating.

I just wanted to add that if anyone is interested in validations from authors I've read a lot of AP books and Bruce Moen seems to have the most impressive accounts of validating the non-physical. 

I can consistently do it when I have enough time and I'm able to put enough focus on projecting.  When I not really trying it happens occasionally. 

With phasing is it necessary that your mind remains awake throughout the entire process?  From what I understand so far your mind can't lose focus too much from noticing while your body falls asleep but this could be a problem for me.  I have very little trouble achieving AP when I want to but the issue is that I'm almost never conscious through the entire process. 

My normal method is to just interrupt my sleep, set my intention and repeat some affirmations, maybe meditate for 10 minutes, and then I fall asleep and after a period of unconsciousness I suddenly get exit sensations.  It sounds like phasing could be difficult for me if it requires awareness the entire time for the noticing exercise. 

When I try to project if I attempt to keep my mind awake for too long I just get restless.  Perhaps my restless mind is what wakes me up later after setting my intention at the mind awake/body asleep stage after being asleep for a little.  Is there a way to phase instead of project when at the SP/exit sensation stage?  I'm tired a false awakenings and getting stuck on exit with AP which is why I would like to learn phasing.     

Any ideas?         

Hi catmeow.  I get the radio thing fairly often it seems that it can happen to me in either SP, 3D blackness, or during a false awakening.  A lot of the times I'll start to hear it when I'm barley conscious and my mind wakes up more as I pay more attention to it.  When I hear music it usually sounds very coherent and sometimes it's songs that I recognize and when it ends I'll sometimes hear a DJ start talking which is usually a little startling.  In the experience that I mentioned I was very shocked when what I heard for the weather broadcast turned out to be exactly right.     

I started to get exit symptoms which were startling and I briefly had dual vision out of 2 different sets of eyes.  It was very strange it seemed like I had opened my physical eyes and was staring up at the ceiling and I was also seeing through another set of eyes and their focus kept moving around across the ceiling.  I got vibrations which were very strong it was frightening so I tried to end the experience but couldn't. 

All of the sudden I felt myself get very light and I floated up a few feet above my bed.  I tried to stop it and grabbed onto my bed railing to stop myself from floating up higher.  I tried touching my face with my non-physical hand and it felt extremely real but my non-physical hand also felt electrically charged.  I was blind at first but quickly got my vision.  It felt like I had a real body but the biggest difference is that this body felt very light.  I was staring at the ceiling for a little and was amazed at how clear my sight was.  I was impressed with how much detail I could see while looking at my ceiling.  I tried looking into the next room and then tried to turn over and look at my body on the bed but when I did that I woke up.  I was amazed at how acute my senses were and I felt more conscious then I do when awake.   
 

I've had 150+ projections over about 4 years and there hasn't been anything conclusive but I've had some experiences that were suggestive that they were validations.  However, I never really tried to validate AP or really do anything meaningful, I usually just experiment with my senses and doing things like floating around and flying and trying different things to enhance lucidity and longevity of the projection.  Also most of my projections don't seem to be in the RTZ.   

1.    I don't remember if this happened during SP or after projecting when in 3d blackness.  I started to hear what sounded like radio broadcasts which happens to me sometimes.  One of the radio broadcasts was a weather report and it said something about it being cloudy and raining and it gave the temperature.  It doesn't rain where I live too often and the report that I heard was right because it was cloudy and did rain.  I went on weather.com to verify the temperature that I heard and it was correct even though at the time that I heard this it sounded off so I could have picked up on some sort of ESP while in 3d blackness.   

2.   I saw my dog trying to jump up on a chair of the kitchen table which I've never seen him do before.  I went upstairs right after the experience ended and he had actually gotten up on the same chair and was trying to get at a bowl and this is the only time that he had ever done something like that with the kitchen table chairs.

3.   I was experimenting with remote viewing and I decided to try to get impressions from a random image generator for RV while OOB.  I forget where I was initially during the experience but when I focused on trying to get impressions from the image that I was RV'ing I found myself surrounded by imagery standing inside what appeared to be a church looking at a stain glass window.  After I woke up and generated the image that was the target it was a picture of a church from the outside.   

These ones aren't really related to AP and there is probably more that I'm not remembering. 

4.  I was RV'ing a random image and I got impressions that sand and water were involved and it turned out to be a surfer. 

5.  I was RV'ing another random image and I got impressions that the picture involved some kind of foreign or ancient language, some kind of stone object, a bright blue sky, and while attempting I got a fairly clear image in my mind of a coliseum like building with a large stone pillar to the right of it.  It turns out that the image was a large stone pillar with some kind of foreign writing on it and a bright blue sky in the background.

6.  While playing a game I had a playlist of over 14,000 songs in Winamp and it was set to choose tracks randomly so I had no way of predicting what the next track would be.  Suddenly a song popped into my head that I hadn't heard in over a year and I had a strong feeling that it would be next and it was.  The chances of that happening were about 1 in 14,000. 

The centauremt site hasn't had any posts in the forum for a few years so if you have any trouble building it you could try asking for help at this yahoo message board which seems fairly active: http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/floattalk/ 

I also like that the top is flat on that one but I'm not sure what the top on the float tank from the centauremt site is made of.  If it's plastic cardboard, which is listed in the supplies it might not be a problem.  I found this site that has pictures of a tank and the construction process of what I think is from the centauremt tank plans for a more detailed look at how it's built:
http://troso.com/rebirth/tank/photo.htm

I'm going to start saving for one soon.  I found this site that has plans to build a float tank which will cost around $1000:
http://float-tank.centauremt.com/

I don't know anything about construction so I kind of doubt that I could build it myself or perhaps it would work out best to pay someone else to build it with those plans.  I wonder if float tanks can be disassembled for moving because I might move a few times in the next couple years. 

I have been very interested in trying a sensory deprivation tank.  I read that some of them have built in speakers so it would be interesting to try it with something like hemi-sync.  Sessions at most places do seem expensive though so I plan on eventually buying one so that I would be able to use it any time.  Does anyone know the price range for home sensory deprivation tanks? 

If you want to end an experience that turns frightening just thinking about your physical body and waking up will usually quickly end the experience.  I've had a lot of projections and I've never had trouble waking up when I decided to end it I just turn my attention to my physical body.  However, if you're running into problems during sleep paralysis before you separate from your body that can be difficult to wake up from it.

The only thing that I can think of that might help stop projections from occurring is that you shouldn't interrupt your sleep.  That means going to sleep for a few hours, getting up and staying up for a little, and then going back to sleep.  Most projections occur when interrupting sleep, taking naps, or when you're exhausted.   

In order to avoid frightening experiences it's important to realize that in the astral thought is action.  When projecting the external environment is sensitive to our thoughts and can instantly manifest things based on our thoughts, emotions, and beliefs.  If you go out of body fearing something like demons then it's likely that will lead to a frightening experience.  When projecting if you let out a fearful emotion it can quickly create frightening circumstances which will continue to get worse as long as you keep letting out fear. 

I've found that it's best to expect to have positive experiences.  Try to plan exactly what you want to accomplish so you can keep your focus on that when out and off anything negative.  When projecting it's important to monitor and control your thoughts and emotions and stay passive.  The last few times that I encountered something negative I let out a positive emotion, ignored it, tried to stay calm, and focused my attention elsewhere and it went away.  This almost always seems to work for me.     

As for why you had experiences that weren't in the real world that is because astral projections are non-physical and real-time projections are supposed to be in a reflection of the physical world.  What you can experience in the astral seems limitless and during projections you could either be exploring your subconscious manifestations or shared realities.  These are deep topics so if you ever have the time I would recommend reading Astral Dynamics or this:
http://www.astraldynamics.com/tutorials/?BoardID=65

How about energy work?  How much does it improve the quality of astral projections?  I have only experimented with it a little and I remember reading that it helps prolong real-time projections but I'm not too sure about AP. 

This is a broad topic but please post any general tips on how to improve the quality of projections like improving lucidity, focus, control of movements, energy, memory recall, duration, senses, raising vibrations, and tips on how to deliberately do what you want and experience less dense areas like focus 27.       

This topic is very important to me because I have been able to easily project for a few years, but I want to have more deliberate control over my projections.  I'm very interested in learning to consistently access focus 27.  I've had some very lucid and amazing experiences but I often have problems with lucidity, maintaining focus, and I wish I could be more deliberate about what I experience.  It usually seems like I have little control over my projections.  In most of my experiences I usually do things like floating around, flying, walking through objects, and testing my senses.  I haven't quite learned how to deliberately move between different areas and accomplish things that I would like to do like contacting guides and creating whatever I want in f27. 

Here are some tips that I can think of:   
-Focus, remain calm, and in the moment. 
-Realize that the law of attraction is in effect and your thoughts, emotions, and beliefs can instantly manifest around you if not controlled. 
-I think it was Frank that said to be a passive observer which is something that I need to work on. 
-Monitor your thoughts so you don't get distracted. 
-I read on saltcube.com to pry your eyes open if you can't see, I tried this the other day and it worked surprisingly well. 
-Don't think about your physical body.
-I usually don't stick around my room long because I often experience a magnetic pull from my body when I'm close.   
-Repeating the phrase "clarity now" helps me sometimes. 
-This is very hard to explain but actions seem much more like mental actions than physical actions.  Sometimes it seems that rather than trying to perceive the nonphysical environment you have to allow perceptions to come to you.   
-Sometimes it helps me focus when I look down at the ground. 
-Take it slow at first and don't try big movements or actions like flying off.
-Robert Bruce said to come back with a strong emotion to improve recall of the experience. I rarely remember to do this but it works.