How do you know when you're in the Astral realm?

[dust8879]

The other night I woke up and instantly tried to project. I heard this whooshing sound and tingling go through my body. The next thing I know everything went silent and stopped. About 15 seconds later I found my self in some dream-like environment. I know that at the very least this was a lucid dream, but how would I ever know if I went to the astral realm?

I wish the astral realm had signposts. I read in Ophiel's book that the astral realm has a glow to it, and you'll recognise it when you get there. Once I became lucid in a dream, focused on my hands and then the whole environment started to glow with light purple and green colours.  I don't think this was the astral glow but it looked nice.

So my question is, how do you when you've arrived at the astral realm? How do you know when you've left?

[Stillwater]

I wish the astral realm had signposts. I read in Ophiel's book that the astral realm has a glow to it, and you'll recognise it when you get there.

This person experienced their projections with a glow because that is what they expected. There isn't anything in particular, like the sky is purple, or everyone is flying, etc that tells you that you are experiencing a projection.

The way I see things, there isn't much difference between a lucid dream and a projection, other than how they start, and that the lucid dream tends to have more of a narrative to it, before you go off on your own someplace. There really isn't anything about what you see in a projection that differentiates it from a dream; it is more about your perspective at the time. What I call a projection is when your awareness and wakefulness is identical to or greater than your waking state. You see the same things at times, but you don't feel the same way as a normal dream. And this sense of alertness allows you to take charge of the experience and set your own agenda, or, if you aren't careful, your subconscious will do it for you.

[Xanth]

It's actually REALLY SIMPLE:  If you're experiencing a reality which you recognize as not being this physical reality.  Then you're projecting. 
This includes the times when you're experiencing a reality you recognize, such as your bedroom.  It's non-physical.

[Micael]

If I can intrude a related question that perhaps was what OP meant to say, how do we know we're sharing our experience with other individuals, other consciousness?

[Xanth]

If I can intrude a related question that perhaps was what OP meant to say, how do we know we're sharing our experience with other individuals, other consciousness?

How can you OBJECTIVELY know?  Simple:  You can't.

You have to be comfortable with that possibility, or else you're going to drive yourself crazy. 

[Stillwater]

Sounds lame... but you will have a feeling of authenticity about the others. You will know that you aren't in the presence of things you invented. But that is just a feeling of course, and still one that may fail sometimes in the face of your own creative genius. The only true way that I know of is the old "bring back information you didn't have before" trick.

[Micael]

I see...

It's an important point in my journey because so far even though I've had dozens of lucid dreams I'm not even sure if I had more than 2 or 3 encounters with other entities, if that. My experiences also tend to happen in desert cities or environments, mostly there's not even any 'thought forms' around. This is a personal cause for the expectation of a distinction between a lucid dream environment and a shared environment.

[Fusions]

How can you OBJECTIVELY know?  Simple:  You can't.

You have to be comfortable with that possibility, or else you're going to drive yourself crazy. 

Ask their email or have a shared dream with someone from this physical reality?

[Xanth]

Ask their email or have a shared dream with someone from this physical reality?

While those options are on the table.  They're not exactly easy.
I'd venture to say there aren't very many people on this forum who could successfully accomplish either of those.

I'm not trying to be mean or anything, just being a realist.

[Micael]

Ask their email or have a shared dream with someone from this physical reality?

Yes but that would be too optimistic, if you can meet non-physical consciousness from elsewhere that are naturally matched to you so you can have a true interaction with another out there, consider yourself blessed. 

[AAAAAAAA]

While those options are on the table.  They're not exactly easy.
I'd venture to say there aren't very many people on this forum who could successfully accomplish either of those.

I'm not trying to be mean or anything, just being a realist.

It's easy if you know how. As long as you've got everything set up, it's not as complicated as it seems. If two people can astral project, chances are they can meet up. The tricky part is knowing for sure if the person you meet is the same person you've made an appointment with. There's a way to know that too.

[Stillwater]

True, but one thing you learn when you do behavioral experiments involving animals, is that the complexity of interactions and the variables involved increases by a factor of 3 or so for each of the first 5 animals added. So if you want to do a parapsychology experiment, it is best to have only one animal (yourself) involved. When you add that second person, you start to add the difficulty of meeting, the difficulty of what constitutes a meeting, the difficulty of collecting data between the two parties, and questions about what the effects of the irrelevance of time and space has if any (for instance, when you successfully meet your friend, were you actually meeting them 10 years from now in their perspective?) All of those queer difficulties and questions disappear when you try something more mechanical, such as reading a number someone has placed in a designated space.

Now if you try it yourself, or read the attempts of others, you will also see that even that setup isn't without its own issues though. What most people seem to meet is some sort of metaphor when they reach the spot where the number should be, such as a chessboard, where the number ends up being 64325 (64 spaces, 32 pieces), or more commonly, utter dreamlike nonsense, such as a statue of a goose with 2 heads with no obvious interpretation. There are apparent successes (read the famous "Miss Z" account from Charles Tart for a classic example), but a staggering amount of misses of many sorts. It can be done, but you are entering a bewildering fun-house when you actually make the attempt, at least that was my experience.

[AAAAAAAA]

My experience:
-Call friend on the phone (same time zone as me)
-Set a place and time in the astral to meet
-If both successfully project that night, figure out whether you have met the person you intended on meeting or not
-Usually works as long as both people have successfully projected

[Astralzombie]

My experience:
-Call friend on the phone (same time zone as me)
-Set a place and time in the astral to meet
-If both successfully project that night, figure out whether you have met the person you intended on meeting or not
-Usually works as long as both people have successfully projected

I am highly skeptical. I do suppose setting the location at your grand clocks locale will bypass the difficulties with having to set both a time and a place. This would be a major convenience since time and location are both subjective perceptions...in the astral.

[AAAAAAAA]

I am highly skeptical. I do suppose setting the location at your grand clocks locale will bypass the difficulties with having to set both a time and a place. This would be a major convenience since time and location are both subjective perceptions...in the astral.

I apologize. By "time" i meant the time at which we both choose to project. That would be at night when we would normally go to sleep.

[Xanth]

I apologize. By "time" i meant the time at which we both choose to project. That would be at night when we would normally go to sleep.

That's just it though, if you do some research into this very thing... you'll quickly hit many roadblocks as well.
Stuff like this just doesn't work out well. 

[AAAAAAAA]

That's just it though, if you do some research into this very thing... you'll quickly hit many roadblocks as well.
Stuff like this just doesn't work out well. 

It does though. I meet someone in the astral almost everytime I go o_0

Besides, although i do a lot of research, i personally like finding things out for myself rather than REsearching something. Yes, research helps a lot, but to me, research is more of a "stepping stool". It gets me started in something, but continueing with that something and eventually making my own discovery is a much more accomplishing feeling.

[Astralzombie]

It does though. I meet someone in the astral almost everytime I go o_0

Besides, although i do a lot of research, i personally like finding things out for myself rather than REsearching something. Yes, research helps a lot, but to me, research is more of a "stepping stool". It gets me started in something, but continueing with that something and eventually making my own discovery is a much more accomplishing feeling.

I don't like doing this but it's one of your favorite tactics so I will go ahead and correct you. While your generation (or maybe it's only you) may consider research as sitting at a laptop and skimming internet articles, some of us know what real research is. The re in research may imply to some that all it entails is looking up the findings of other people, but it really means to recreate their experiments and possibly improve upon them if capable. This means that a researcher has effectively conducted their own experiments and now qualifies as  someone with personal experience. You'll learn one day that you'll be expected to do a whole lot more than just read someone else's work and familiar words will have an entirely new meaning for you.  

We aren't going to allow this game of who's smarter continue much longer so please consider if that means anything to you.

[Ellury]

One of the things I've always wanted to do once I AP, is go to my boyfriends house and see if I can get him to be aware that I'm there. : P It would be great confirmation if the next day he woke up and said "I had a dream you came over last night".  and then I could be like. "That wasn't a dream. >: D"

[Xanth]

One of the things I've always wanted to do once I AP, is go to my boyfriends house and see if I can get him to be aware that I'm there. : P It would be great confirmation if the next day he woke up and said "I had a dream you came over last night".  and then I could be like. "That wasn't a dream. >: D"

He would probably only remember it as a "feeling" or a "sense" that you were there, but only within the context of an unremembered dream.
Stuff like this is extremely hard to do.

I've had more luck meditating on someone, then they call me the next day.  I've certainly had that happen more often than not.  But I've never done what you're looking to do, at least not successfully.
As for my fiance and myself, our dreams never seem to line up.  LoL