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I've had a good handful of RTZ exits. The sensation really is incredible and other-wordly.

But it's the same exact world. Nothing is any different than if you had just plain woken up. You're asleep, everyone's asleep, and it's dark. Sure, you go outside and fly for a bit, looking at the rooftops of all the houses, but the sky is barren, cold and windy. Go to the moon, fly into space? Even more barren. Go and spy on someone? All of a sudden the concept seems banal. Try to do something (even more) supernatural, like knock something over or appear to someone as a vision? That might be cool, but what purpose would that serve? You might as well just get up and knock that thing down with your real body for all the good it'll do, or meet that person while you're awake.

Although I've only had about 5 or 6 of these experiences, most of them very short, I always leave them with the conclusion that anything that's worth doing in a RTZ projection is worth doing in your normal body. That includes espionage (with its associated risks) and talking to people (with its assoicated difficulties with language). Sure, later on I think, "I wish I could fly to the top of that church," but once I've actually induced the experience, it's like "ok, what was that for?" No one can see you. And what if they could? What would that do but freak people out?

I mention this in light of all the recent posts regarding if OBE's are "real" or not, especially those seeking objective evidence. I'm increasingly feeling that this is a wasteful enterprise, not because I feel they're impossible - quite the opposite - but that they're so commonly dull that it's more exciting to study how grass grows then to RTZ OBE.

Not to offend the biologists of the forum, but I bet that sounded really insane and pompous.   What do you think?

This is pretty good lol.

http://www.snakelyone.com/12step.htm

I feel bad for those of you won't be able to read this and laugh One that resonates with me is step 7 - "Humbly ask your higher self to f*%k off," as it reminds me of when I laboriously sought after my spirit guide and found a demon-angel hybrid, who said using only her expression, "you don't need a spirit guide."

[Edit: The "New Speak Glossary" is indispensible!]

One of my first wake induced experiences brought me to a department store not unlike a WalMart. What was odd was how "normal" it was. There was absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. Everything was stacked and shelved normally, people looked and behaved just as they would, everything was solid, including my body. I could even test for my pulse. Nothing was changing or behaving as a dream or astral experience, yet I knew I had travelled there through meditation.

"Boy, I can't wait to see the looks on these people's faces when I start messing things up."

I picked up a ball and dropkicked it against a display of shampoo bottles. It was an experiment. Just how real could this display fall? It was amazing - every bottle made a distinct and specific noise as it hit others near it and eventually the floor. I got a lot of weird looks, some employees dropped their mouths, and a kid said, "woah!" I started running all over the store and knocking things down. It was so brilliantly artificial, I marvelled at how my brain/imagination calculated so much detail in cause and effect analysis.

As the excitement grew and my energy rose, I started to float and the environment turned blurry, leading to a false awakening.

Have any of you had any experiences so "solid," that even your body was indistinguishable from your real one?

One of the spiritual principles we seem to have stumbled upon is reaping what we sow. Some may not believe this, of course, but it is reverberated across religions and in cultural proverbs. Our attitude towards the universe is what the univere's attitude is about us - what we give to the universe is what the universe gives back - and so forth.

But would it not work in reverse? Are we not just as much part of the universe as the rest of it and, therefore, what the universe reaps onto us it must sow from us?

I am not trying to find holes in new age logic nor trick and confuse people of faith - but there's something unsaid in that popular proverb, is there not?

I just found the Wikipedia article on the Problem of Evil and it's very thorough. It may help in our discussion.

[(sic)]

quote:Originally posted by Adrian
...as well as fully recognising the fact (sic) that everyone is on their own individual path, all requiring differing levels of knowledge and experiences, which after all is why we are all here on Earth this time around as is the case during each incarnation; we come to Earth each time for a specific purpose, and the purpose of each person is unique and individual.

These aren't facts.

Instead of bolding, italicizing, or underlining that remark, I will state it again and attempt to make the matter explicit.

These are not facts. They are assumptions. When taken as truth, they become postulates of theosophist pantheism, a very common and pervasive modern religious movement associated with the New Age.

Now, that's not a bad thing. But acting as though they are truths is done so through faith-based interpretations of experience.

There's nothing very wrong with asserting these to others, but, please, do not attempt to establish them as "fact," because A) you might be wrong (and probably are, in my opinion) and B) doing so proliferates the similar cognitive dissonance as when other religions assert their assumptions as truth.

If anyone is interested in starting a discussion in another thread regarding the implications or validity of these statements, please let me know. Whenever I bring this up it seems to go over everyone's head.

[edited for diction]

[• No opinions will be expressed unless they are supported by arguable foundations.]

Alright, I think I've got it.

Focus isn't missing as much as critical discussion is. Create a new forum section called "Exegesis" that only allows critical reflections of assertions, experiences, theories, and published works (including Bruce's treatise). What follows are suggestions for rules followed by specific examples of how they are unique from the rest of the forum.


• No opinions will be expressed unless they are supported by arguable foundations. The rest of the forum allows statements of "I believe..." without further support. If an assertion is to be made it must be supported.

• No work shall be referenced without bibliographical record. The rest of the forum allows statements of "I heard that..." without attributing specific credit. If another author says such-and-such, then quote it with the title of the published work and the page number or the website URL.

• Explanations of personal experiences will be in-depth and fundamentally precise so as to undergo public scrutiny, and will be followed by the author's own supportable opinion. The rest of the forum allows members to share experiences without personal reflection, giving license to immediately ask questions like "what did I experience..?" which are nigh impossible to answer with credulity.

• No theory of astral projection will be allowed unless supported by the author's own past sensory experience. The rest of the forum allows members to rudimentarily theorize about phenomena based on other people's experiences and not necessarily their own. In an academic setting this is dishonest.


As the last sentence suggests, these rules are derived from an academic context. They require the author's statements to withstand formal review. Since we are mostly agreed that meditation, dreams, lucid dreams, AP, OBE's, etc. fall within a continuum of awareness, anyone who has closed their eyes has something to contribute. These rules do not, and should not, exclude anybody, but provide a framework for focused and meaningful discussion.

Any thoughts?

Oddly enough, Robert Bruce offers sage healing advice on this in old thread:

http://www.astralpulse.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1922

I don't know what "strong person" means.

Apart from the multitude of raw physical strengths (bone strength, muscular strength, joint strength, etc.) and the semi-raw mental strengths (memory, concentration) there are strengths of character, with which we ascribe a certain nobility. These are but not limited to emotional stability, confidence, and willpower. But these are all strengths of resistance (against bludgeoning, distractions, opposition, etc.) such that you're not defeated by conflict.

Someone who is strong in only these areas would appear to not change very much.

Then there are unique personal strengths (talents) which are nigh impossible to accumulate. People seem to just have them sometimes, whether it's because of genetics, upbringing, or divine will. These include but are not limited to strength in mathematics, sports, science, leadership, street savvy, creativity, perceptiveness, intuition, and wit. These are strengths of inclination (towards roles and accomplishments) away from arid and lifeless boredom.

Someone who is strong in one or more of these areas is guaranteed employment and not much else. Someone who is strong in all of these areas would probably feel very lonely.

What does it truly mean to be a "strong person," then, who is both strong in resistance and in inclination? This is the strength of growth, resisting torment but inclined to ascend.

Sadly, it appears that the colloquial use of "strong person" and "strong woman" only refers to strength of resistance, for if we wanted to say someone was talented, we would simply just say they were a "strong mathematician" or likewise. What does "powerful woman" mean? That she gets what she wants? Sure, in the face of opposition, but it says nothing of what she wants, and therefore little about who she is.

Hopefully, as Kaz & Rastus say, we'll one day stop referring to individuals as strong or weak and instead refer to talents, relationships, and organizations. Material is either strong or weak. Spirit is boldy something else.

[Edited for syntax]

Gravy, are you asking, "if someone stares at you and you don't notice, are they really staring at you?" Thoughtful question. However, it's different from the tree/woods scenario because the person doing the staring will observe that they are staring.

It's possible they could be mentally disabled, though. If neither you nor the mentally disabled person staring at you notice there's staring going on, along with no one else in the vicinity noticing it, we act as though it never happened, don't we? Was there a transfer of "energy," or was there no energy because no one noticed it? When we talk about energy then aren't we really just talking about awareness? And if so, would it be possible that we're just making it up? It's undoubtedly possible. So consider that we're constantly "making the world up" inside our mind with the use of electricity and chemicals - and that these are manifestations of a quantum soup influenced by awareness through the observer effect. Then, when we consider the subjective experience of the skeptic and the person who believes they have the power to notice when someone is staring at them, they're both the same and not particularly unique at all. [Edit: Both are just sides of a manifestation of dissenting opinion.]

It's hard to say that a physicist knows more about what's real than someone suffering from schizophrenia. The physicist's electro-chemical composition allows him to discern what is objective, but what is objective may not be real (a la "The Matrix"). A schizophrenic might see the universe as a cloudy entropic indecipherable mess. Maybe that's what it really is?

Well, 19, they would probably point you to the exhaustive record of detailed experiments (like this one) that explore this phenomena with nonconclusive results.

They may also suggest that your interpretations are the result of the natural human tendency to bias. For instance, if you just bought a new Volkswagon Beetle, you might start to notice more people driving Volkswagon Beetles on the road. Are there really more people driving Beetles? Probably not, but your perception is definitely influenced because you own one. Do you want to believe in paranormal abilities, like noticing when someone is staring at you? If so, you're likely to remember the instances that confirm this belief and forget the ones that don't. This is called confirmation bias, and you'd be surprised at some of the silly and illogical decisions we make because of our tendency to do this.

The beliefs that the Earth is flat, that small fetuses exist in sperm, and that the planets circle around the Earth were the result of bias a long time go, in the face of a lack of objective evidence. Intuition alone is deceptive. It's sad, but we can be real dumbasses at times. Even Einstein believed for years that galaxies didn't move in relation to one another. People were showing him evidence to the contrary yet he persisted. Only after a long while did he eventually reconcile his belief as a "blunder." That's okay - he was human. And so are you. Did you know that within you and within everything around you is mostly empty space? Who would've thought of that two hundred years ago?

We understand so little. A good skeptic knows this and won't tell you you're fool of crap - he'll just say that you might be.

quote:Originally posted by Rastus

Write the password of the week on Adrians computer, if you can OOBE there to read it (or far view) then you get in.  The real way to seperate the wheat from the chaff!

Yes. Do this.

Hmmm, I must be visiting the wrong threads (or the right ones). Hate? Where? Members of this forum are startlingly friendly.

However, the recent controversy on paid subscriptions has sloppily exposed feelings of dissent.

As harlequin has pointed to, dissent is unwaranted in a system where speech is free.

All of us are like individual cells trying to make the judgements on the rest of the body. (thanks blackbox).

If you just did your part and posted on subjects that mattered to you, we'd have a great forum - and we do. I pity the old forum members. Read some Epictetus. (and reread italicized text in this paragraph for full effect).

quote:Originally posted by LogoRat

lol, this is so funny!

So true!

RainyDaze, can you point out specific topics of discussions that were more "thoughtful" back then? I ask this because I don't think the thoughtfulness has decreased at all, just the sense of a small social atmosphere - and the two are not equated.

The lack of thoughtful discussion is no one's fault but your own (speaking to everyone). If there's something that's not being talked about that you want talked about, why don't you post? Make it specific so as to attract specific responses. Make it mature so as to attract mature responders. Make it thoughtful so as to attract thoughtfulness. Otherwise, take responsibility for your lack of participation.

We, you and I, can make the forum better by being positive, civil, and self-reflective. We don't need to resort to tribally devisive measures. We can have a diplomatic, pleasent global village. [Edit: That includes you, Jonathan, and the 10,000 others as well.]

Beware, unorthodox views follow:

I have seen the big picture, Fat Turkey. And I'm not joking. It was, sardonically, a life-changing experience - I say "sardonically" because it was a moment of ultimate clarity, but what usefulness is clarity if it's of something you'd rather not have been made clear. And I should have lost my life or my sanity but survived with both marginally intact.

In the realm of pure white silver light, what Bruce would call the Buddhic dimension, I saw the design and sensed the intent of the physical universe. The design was pain and the intent was evil. What we consider good is actually under the bondage of evil - it serves to create uncertainty, preventing reasonable expectation, thus amplifying the impact of suffering. Evil is actually more pure when it has chained and conquered the good.

Notice, this does not quite work in reverse. Good neither chains nor oppresses, for those are acts of evil - so Good cannot chain evil. Likewise, Evil does not serve, for that is an act of Good - so Evil cannot serve Good. Good is only pure good when it serves. The only possible relationship is this: Evil oppresses Good while Good serves Evil -> Evil is served. Good is oppressed. -> Evil runs the show.

I honestly do not think of this as a belief, but as an observation. I have tried to reconcile it as a wispy belief, but I cannot deny my experience. The clarity was real. It was maddening. The creation of the universe was an act of pure evil.

Of course, this is still only a view, hinging on the experience of one man and interpretations on the definitions of good and evil. You are lucky if you can ignore it.

Watching a movie requires a certain detachment from life. Instead of worrying about your work, your family, your friends, or even yourself, you enter into a hypnotic state where you are absorbed into a pseudo-experience of what's on the screen.

Maybe life is a pseudo-experience, then? Maybe we're detached from something else in this altered state of consciousness we call wakefulness. So absorbed are we, we would have forgotten who we really are. That would explain our general confusion over the matter.

Why it's so difficult to remember, that's another question. It's not as simple as closing your eyes or looking away from the screen, is it?

Hey Mark. I am well, thank you, and I hope you are as well (if not better!).

quote:Originally posted by clandestino
Not sure what you mean here !!

I just meant I thought it was silly for someone to want to pay for something that's already free (outside of a donation context). I do see the logic - paying for a conversation commands a certain sobriety. However, it doesn't guarantee it, and only guarantees that there will be fewer members (which can either be good or bad, but leaning towards bad). After all registering a username with an email address and knowing how to read also command a certain level of sobriety, so we have a start.

I'm entering my senior year at a Jesuit university studying international business economics. I'm developing a blood vendetta against didacticism in all its forms.

I secretly harbor the delusion that it may be possible to dream tomorrow's lottery numbers. Every time I have come close to dreaming it I stop out of fear - both fear of success and the fear of failure. For some sick reason I consider this paradoxical fear worthy of study and I practice fighting it on a daily basis, such that I consider it a part time job which will pay off sometime in the future.

That's basically another way of saying that I am not only jobless, but that I have no clue about what job I'd like to have!

I'd also like to thank the moderators, especially yourself, Adrian. I know how hard it is. I was (and technically still am) a moderator at another popular astral projection forum on the net.

I now come here for the quality discussion.

Interesting. I'm trying to think of other examples where an organization tried to sell quality of discussion. Usually discussion clubs that require fees do so because there's a tangible element (i.e. events, materials, facilities). In this case it's a forum... but that's odd because the forum would still be free for others. There's just this addition of a subscription only section. How silly is that? Are people more mature about talking when they pay for it? Are they less mature when they don't?

I think it's very funny that the longer established members have equated loss of value with increase in members - as if value and people are inversely related.

Although I wasn't around back then, I've read most of the early threads and have this to say about them: 1) They were just as general as they are today. People asked "what is kundalini?" and inquired on authenticity, "did I have an OBE?" repeatedly. Therefore, 2) the focus that did exist was not theoretical but social. And 3) the most theoretical focus was because Robert Bruce was active in the forum. As the founder of the web site he's the figurehead of the topic of discussion. Every topic around his posts were "focused" because he is the focus. His posts were actually quite lengthy in order to satisfy the largely general nature of the questions asked of him.

Since Bruce coming back isn't a condition, it appears the established members want to reclaim social focus. That can be done very easily without paying $10 - they can privately email each other en masse or even go to places like Yahoo!groups. Understandably they were here first, though, and so want to exercise a sense of "ownership" over the forum by paying for it.

You silly geese. It's free.

You want more engaging theoretical focus, so you think you can achieve this by decreasing the amount of people in discussion? This is fallacious on two accounts. 1) More people means not only more ideas but a greater diversity of ideas, which only advances theoretical discussion as long as it's conducted in an orderly manner. 2) Everyone is already serious. Sure, they vary with regards to intelligence, experience, age, linguistic skill, etc., but I've never seen a member use the forum as a playground. I have been frankly quite impressed with everyone's openness and honesty - including the skeptics. It's also silly to think those of lower caliber intelligence, experience, whatever, can be filtered out through a paid service (I'm not accusing anyone of thinking that, by the way).

If you want to have social focus while retaining theoretical focus, you form the group by invitation, selectively picking people who not only get along with one another but have diversity of perspective. I don't see anything wrong with AP going this route. It's a model of classic economic efficiency; businesses use it everywhere. There would already be a sense of inclusiveness and non-inclusiveness (in the non-invitational subscription service). That would succinctly appear to advance AP's original charter (whatever it is.. advancing knowledge about AP and providing an arena of advanced meaningful discussion? sounds about right).

I don't see anything wrong with the subscription addition, either. What's wrong is the people who want it.[|)]


Why don't we discuss the nature of this apparent loss of value? The forum can also be improved other ways, like creating a rule that no one can ask the question "was this an OBE?" providing a sticky that says it's a personal judgement and there is a mysterious relationship between beliefs and the experience of OBE's. That and other rules would eliminate a lot of garbage threads in my opinion and make the forum more congenial.

[Edited for clarity.]

"Old as time."

While we're awake we're compelled to forget dreams. On the same token, we're even more compelled to forget the waking experience while we're asleep. What's the significance of this? Are these transcendental experiences akin to us remembering something? Is there something to be gained by forgetting and then remembering again?

Many spiritualists explain this by recycling (pun intended) the "great cycle" of yin and yang, dichotomy, opposites - that forgetting and remembering who we are is how we experience ourselves. This uses the logic that, if we never forgot everything, our minds would be chaotic and ultimately neutral interpretations of ourselves. Experiencing joy means forgetting sadness, and sadness means that you've forgotten joy. Sounds wise and inclusive, doesn't it? Offering hope to those in pain because happiness is just around the corner, it's a doctrine of optimism, right?

There's a sense of godlike elation when one considers pain and suffering this way. They're no big deal, really, it gives you goosebumps doesn't it? They're just steps on the path - no matter what, they're temporary. We are wise and can rest easy knowing that the oppressed, no matter what, won't be that way forever.

What kind of cheap cop out of understanding is that? Why on earth would you forget joy to experience sadness? That means you've made a mistake, doesn't it? When you're happy do you think "gosh I forgot sadness, let me experience that again." Why would you forget competency for incompentency? Isn't that idiotic? Can you imagine yourself saying, "gee I'm a master now, wish I could be a complete buffoon again." Is living the master's life boring? Forget love for hate? Isn't that a spiritual no-no, and therefore egg on the face of spiritual teachers everywhere?

These transcendental experiences call into question the implications for our feeble-mindedness. That we would forget asendence for descendence in order to transcend again, forces us to question the nature of time (cyclical, non-linear, incomplete?) and is currently beyond my understanding.

Perhaps I've just forgotten the answer.

A treasure, isn't it? Don't you wish everyone could have these experiences? They can, of course, you know that now. So why don't they? How could they not care about dreams? Shouldn't they? Instead they care about who's going to win American Idol, criticizing people, and wearing the right clothes.

I can only help but wonder that, if everyone had these experiences, then they would treat each other with more respect, with less egoism, and without judgement. I am beyond awe at these experiences, but sad that I'm only one of so few who enjoy them. I am not completely enlightened by them only because I don't understand why so many are willfully blind of dreams... I just don't get it.

Oh, stephen, I didn't realize you made two posts. That's a really interesting perspective on the RTZ experience - that it actually offers less freedom than waking consciousness. Even if we did have the freedom of manipulation, though, it would effectively nullify what the physical world stands for and make it like another astral experience. Is this worthwhile?

Would it not end a great deal of suffering caused by physical limitations? Are there any pleasures that would be lost? Is there pleasure in limitation of conscious manipulation? What would the future be like if everyone learned how to OBE? Would it be similar to computations based virtual reality, which Ray Kurzeil suggests in Age of the Spiritual Machines will happen inevitably?

(I hope that's not too many questions for this thread - maybe I should make a new one of the usefulness of objectively proving the the OBE phenomena?)