Too scared? Could use advice.

[Linaeve]

Hello, everyone. It is a pleasure to be here.

Since I was young, I've had sleep paralysis and terrible nightmares associated with it (apparently the doctors called it hallucinations while under sleep paralysis). When I met my husband, I told him all about the sensations I would get and the 'hallucinations'. He told me I should start reading some books on astral projection, because everything I've told him points to it.

Thus, here I am, confused and looking for a place that can inform/support me as I learn this.

Out of the fifteen or so real sleep paralysis' I remember clearly, only one was not a fearful one. The rest have been downright horrific. None of them have been drug induced, just so you all know. However, I've had scratchy 'sound' looking creatures spazzing above my head as I heard the usual 'buzzing' noise. I've felt rubber bands around my waist literally trying to pull me off my couch, to separate me and, so I thought, physically kill me if those rubber bands managed to pull out my spirit. I've seen an extra door in my living room, with locks and chains on it, come open a little bit with a shadow creature peeking his/her/it's head in before slowly closing the door and locking it back up (this one, I think I managed some kind of OBE, because I called out to my husband sleeping on the other sofa and we watched the door together, not that he remember it though). I've seen the grudge girl peeking at me at the side of the bed. I've felt hands claw at my legs beneath the covers, trying to pull me off the bed.

The good one: an angelic woman kneeling by my bed one day when I was extremely sick and feverish. I was tingly, couldn't move, and could only see a vague outline of her, but she calmed me and helped me sleep.

All of these start with me thinking about the next day, and if I'm trying to sleep on my back. I'll suddenly realize that (during a mild one) my body appears to be tingly. During an intense one, it'll feel as if every atom of my body is trying to shake themselves to even smaller pieces. During the rubber band one, I remember thinking if I turned my head, that would be it, I would see myself sleeping on the couch and I would be dead. I'll acknowledge the fact that I'm in a sleep paralysis once the tingling starts and I will be aware that something is going to happen, but I absolutely cannot stop the terror. The only thing I can do is keep my eyes shut and hope to completely fall asleep or completely wake up.

What I want to do is stop the fear and get over myself, and finally get to the point everyone else seems to slip into quite happily. My husband envies my apparently easy slip into the astral world and tells me not to condemn the experience, but to learn to harness some control, so here I am. I must say it again though; this isn't a simple fear, like fearing the dark, this is mind numbing terror of insanely creepy creatures killing me in ways I can't imagine.

Has anyone else had a terrifying experience, or am I alone here? Can anyone give me some advice for next time? I want to try to induce this state on purpose, but I don't want to do it without some advice and scare myself again. Apparently, astral travel can be quite wonderful. I'd like to get to that point eventually.

Thanks for reading, and I apologize for the length. If you are still with me, then you are absolutely awesome!

I look forward to meeting you all. Have a great night!

[AstralBeginnings]

Hi Linaeve, welcome.

First of all you will get many varying opinions (some very strong!) regarding negative entities (negs) on this board.  Some believe they truly exist as actual conscious beings, while others (including myself) believe they are simply manifestations of your inner fear.  Bear in mind that up until this point, no harm has ever come to you.  Yes you are terrified, but other than that has any harm come to you?  Hopefully this fact can ease your fear.  When you ease your fear, be open to the experience.  Ok so this thing is trying to pull you from your body and you are scared, understandable.  But nothing has happened to harm you.  

Alot of people come to astral projection because they WANT to first.  Others (like you) have had experiences first.  In my experience, those who have experiences before first knowing about astral projection often get scared because they dont know what is happening.  Those who know about it first and WANT it, arent scared because this is what they are trying to experience.  The difference between those who are scared and those who arent is that (again, in my view) the manifestation of negative entities is more present in those with fear that those without fear.

I would speculate that the negative experiences you have had are because you were scared of what was happening because you didnt know what it was.  This fear snowballed and manifested itself as a neg.  Now every time you experience it the fear is always present which again manifests itself as a negative entity.  The positive experience you had came about when you were ill, which (again speculation) could point to the fact you were ill and wanted to get better - this desire manifested itself as a positive entity who did as you desired.

Overall I think that what you (and everyone else) feels (be that fear or desire for something good) manifests itself to you when in an altered state of consciousness (and indeed in normal daily life, but thats another topic).

You've heard the term "face your demons" or similar.  My advice to you would be to do just that.  If something feels like its pulling you and you dont want it to, tell it to stop.  If it doesnt stop, kick it in the nuts!

Im sure other people will have other views, but this is mine.  Good luck!

[Linaeve]

If it doesnt stop, kick it in the nuts!

This had me laughing hysterically!  

Thank you for your quick reply! I'm actually dreading to sleep now in case something happens, but your first paragraph eased my fears. You're right. Aside from the extreme fear, nothing has harmed me, physical or otherwise. I always wake up okay, just weirded out.

My husband tried to tell me to project 'love' to the beings to see if they would change. I'm not entirely sure what he meant. I think if I go to sleep with the thought 'Nothing will hurt me, I'm not afraid', perhaps I can induce one... I think it's worth a shot. For whatever reason, my need to accomplish an OBE is growing stronger; there isn't a day that goes by where I don't think about it. It used to be a burden; now it's something I absolutely must do. It's a little weird to explain.   More like something is telling me to get my butt in gear or get out, kind of mentality.  

I will admit, when I start to feel the tingling, I immediately think 'oh dear sky above, it's happening again. Keep your eyes closed, keep your eyes closed!'. I also immediately start trying to move something, anything. Sometimes it will feel as if I'm moving my arm or my leg (kicking my husband beside me to wake his butt up and help!), but I really don't think I'm actually moving my physical body. I panic. I bet that clearly does not help at all with the negatives. I read a few posts on here that talked about doing affirmations; I've never heard of this. Is it a mantra, of sorts?

I am open to the experience, now. I'm trying to remain open even as I head into sleep.

I agree with you. When I was sick, I remember listening to my family eat dinner from my bedroom and wishing I could fill my empty stomach. I remember thinking something along the lines of 'I absolutely need help getting better. I know it will go away soon, but I want it gone now.'. A few minutes later, I got the tingles as if someone was stroking the entire left side of my body (I was on my side). When I opened my eyes, I could see her kneeling at my bed, and I could still see the shadows of my family moving around outside my door (my bedroom was next to the dining room), as well as hear their conversation, though it was more muffled. I was filled with peace, and my eyes instantly got heavy with sleep. I heard a reassuring whisper, and allowed myself to fall away.

Now that I think of it, there was another peaceful one, though I was extremely weirded out by it when I woke up. Do OBE's resemble this, or was this perhaps a lucid dream? I'm still not sure of the difference. Anywho, if you don't mind the length, then here it is:

I was lying in bed with my husband and daughter. My daughter was between us, as always. I opened my eyes, but was still heavy with sleep. I noticed the upstairs neighbor's (I live in an apartment) kids were running down the stairs outside the window. It was a beautiful morning; all sunshine and summer colors. I was thinking about getting an early start on my day, since my daughter and husband were still sleeping. As I thought about getting up, I felt an arm drape over my side. Mind you, I clearly thought I was wide awake at this point. I immediately felt warmth, comfort, and pure peace settle through me, even though this arm was grey and had three fingers. An alien! I didn't freak out due to the immense peace I felt, and actually started to have a conversation about how life was going for me. I don't remember the exact words now, but it was about my family and other normal stuff. I remember the alien asking if I wanted to mate, and I wanted to, but I sighed and said it would have to wait because I had things to do. I was gently patted on the head and, then I was alone. I 'awoke' to the same cheery sunshine, my sleeping daughter and husband, and to the neighbors kids running amok as before. For the rest of the day, I could NOT shake the utter despair of losing that sense of peace and wishing the alien would come back, mingled with the fear of being quite okay with sex with such a being....it was odd.

The End!  

I read, before coming to this site, that sexual arousal is actually quite common. But it was from a site where I would have to pay for the guide and had all sorts of 'fabulous' reviews...I tend not to trust those sites.

Does this sound like an OBE, or just some crazy lucid dream?

I'm going to try to go to sleep and see what happens. Perhaps I can think about the nice angel or the peaceful alien, instead of the creepy things. I'll continue to post about my experiences, as they occur, and any questions I may have, if that is okay.

[Lionheart]

 Your courage will overcome your fears. Just know that these things can't hurt you. Put your intent to seeing the beautiful things in the Astral Plane and they shall appear! 

[AstralBeginnings]

Do OBE's resemble this, or was this perhaps a lucid dream? I'm still not sure of the difference.

Yes to me it resembles and OBE - but so do Lucid Dreams   I personally think the definitions given are irrelevant.  I actually just posted this on another thread earlier...

"I think that the term OBE is misleading.  When the early pioneers of this art coined the term, I think it was likely because they felt they WERE their body, and therefore when they experienced a conscious shift, they felt that because their body was lying in bed they must have been "out of body".  In reality, as others have mentioned, we are consciousness and while in normal physical reality, our consciousness is focused "in" our physical body "WE" are really everywhere, just our focus is different."

You can see the thread http://www.astralpulse.com/forums/welcome_to_out_of_body_experiences/astral_projection_and_obe-t35241.0.html

Basically, traditionally there were 3 main terms used to describe different states of consciousness (there are more, but I am limiting them - I am not including various states obtained through meditation for example)

1-OBE - I think this term refers to experiences where you feel you are out of your body, maybe when you are floating around earth
2-Astral Projection (AP) - when you project your consciousness to other realms or planes
3-Lucid Dreams - where you become lucid in a dream

My view is that all are one and the same.  When you think (or IF you think) that we are simply consciousness then all of the above can be grouped together as various points along the continuum of consciousness.  I would certainly group together AP's and LD's - I think these take place in the same "place" (although physical spatial rules dont apply).  By "place" I mean the areas of consciousness.  With OBE's I am still not 100% sure because I have verified things whilst having an OBE from physical reality - maybe its like a less physical copy of the physical we reside in normally?

There is a great post somewhere from a guy called Frank Kepple (trust me, if you hang around long enough, like a few hours, you will hear his name!) which goes into a great description of the areas of consciousness.  So I think when you have what is traditionally called an OBE, you are just on a certain point in consciousness, one thats maybe close to the physical.  Likewise with LDs and APs - just different areas of the same continuum of consciousness.

Ill try to find the link to Franks post and post it here.

Affirmations are basically positive statements said in the present tense, for example "I will remember my OBE tonight" - normally repeated over a few times.  But you really have to believe it. 

[AstralBeginnings]

Here you go - scroll down to the part about Franks Model of the  Wider Reality

http://www.astralpulse.com/frankkepple.html

[blis]

If you can hold love in your heart as you fall asleep you should have a better experience. Love beats fear.

Maybe meditate on love every now and again to get good at building a strong feeling of love quickly. The most common meditation for generating love is the metta bhavana.

You might also try sleeping with a rose quartz tumblestone under your pillow. They're very cheap and very effective in my opinion. It works on your heart chakra and makes it easy to hold strong feelings of love in your heart.

[Linaeve]

Thank you both for the information!

I'm going to try the Metta Bhavana. It sounds like something I should incorporate into my life, regardless if I astral travel or not. I love the concept, so I thank you for responding! I have some rose quartz on my rock shelves (I love stones and have quite a few). I'm going to break off a piece and put it under my pillow tonight. Do you know much about stones? A friend of mine suggested Nuumite for astral travel, but I haven't found much information on it.

AstralBeginnings, thank you for the link to Frank! It's a lot of information, and I'm still going through it. I must say, I'm intrigued by his journeys and what he's experienced. He also writes well, which makes it easy to understand and process.

My husband is thinking of making an account on here. xD He never thought of looking for a forum to help/share his experiences with.

[blis]

Dont break your quartz! I believe the stuff is alive in a way. But even if you dont, quartz goes bang when you break it. If you've got a big rock just put it under your bed. As long as it's within your aura it should do the trick.

I've never used nuummite but you'll find that the crystals and stones that work for one person wont neccessarily work for others. We're all attuned to different things.

The grand-daddy of them all though is quartz. I've had very strong effects from sleeping with a little double terminated piece of tibetan quartz. But it would just as likely effect anyone in the bed with you too. I also had a very wacky night sleeping with a quartz point pointing at my crown chakra but I havent done that again as it was a bit too intense.

[XkeltonX]

I think what is meant by 'projecting love' is this: If you are seeing a negative, and it seems to be sending out signals of hate, or fear or anything else negative; replace the  signals being sent with signals of love. Love cannot hurt, no matter what. Pure love is just that, Pure and has no negative anything. If you see these Negs projecting fear into your mind's eye, then replace that fear with love and see if that helps.

[XkeltonX]

even if you have to physically tell yourself, "That's not hate or evil, that is love and peacefulness!" anything to make your subconscious trigger thinking about something positive.