I would like to start a debate on whether you think OBE/Astal Projection/Phasing is something that happens internally within our minds or externally and actually leaving the body. I know there is not much empirical evidence into this subject but please share your thoughts and opinions.
To start I have found quite a difference with traditional astral projection and phasing. When I do traditional astral projection most of the time I am very aware of the separation process and feel as if I'm actually leaving my body. Again after I leave I can turn around and see my body. When I am still near my body in what many people call the real time zone (RTZ) I notice past energies. For example if I had just rearranged my bedroom then projected, my bedroom in the astral would still be in its old layout. I am curious as to whether the energy that was held in place put a "mark" on the astral or whether this is the way my mind most readily remembers it. And was me seeing myself in bed just a memory? Now onto phasing. When I practice phasing I am never aware of a separation process. Instead my experiences seem to have more control over me than I do of them and they are normally more spiritual experiences. These experiences always start off drifting off into the blackness behind my eyes then all of a sudden I'm there. I don't see "past energies" and I don't remember the separation process. With my experiences I lean more towards traditional astral projection as actually leaving the body and phasing to be something internally. The main evidence to back up my ending statement is that when in a traditional projection I have had several experiences where I have verified information unknown to me at the time. When phasing I have never had such experiences.
Please do not reply to my experiences but give your own opinion into the debate at hand.
External....
and for evidence?
-Consistency of OBE descriptions, from experiencers all around the world, including those who had previously never read any literature about OBEs;
-Dutch scientists succeeded in weighing the physical body before, during and after an OBE. There was a control group and they found that there was a small but definately measurable weight decrease during exteriorization;
-Charles Tart's experiments had shown that there is no measurable discreet brainwave state needed for successful OBEs to occur, suggesting that the brain may not have much to actually do with OBEs in the end... his control involved sealed papers with 5 digit numbers on them. The papers were not opened until the night of the experiment, randomly, and placed high above normal line of sight, and in a different location than his subject. He only counted data as a successful OBE, when all 5 numbers on the target were identified correctly;
-My own experiment with an Empath... he could sense two of me in the room, like I was in 2 locations at once, and I had not told him about my OBE until after.
There is alot more evidence out there besides what I have listed...
Hi Colden,
Just to clarify, are you truly interested in the more specific question of whether OBEs are internal vs. external, or are you mainly interested in whether or not OBEs are paranormal in nature? It would be hard to do an experiment which "proved" that OBEs are external. If a projector verified numbers on paper (or conversations or any number of verifiable things), a sceptic could merely claim that the person's experience was clairvoyance or remote viewing.
What if OBEs are paranormal and people have astral bodies which can exit the phyical body, but the astral body dies when the physical body dies? OBEs are definitely fun and fascinating, but my main goal is to have some experiences which are personally convincing of the paranormal - Robert Monroe's "knowns".
I apologize if my questions take your post off track. I'm a newbie here with fewer than 10 OBEs and I don't currently have any verification experiences yet. However, I will share any that I do have. As a side note, my next door neighbor has posted a piece of paper with a word on it on the wall of one of his rooms which doesn't have any exterior windows and I'm going to try to read that paper during some of my next OBEs. Wish me luck!
Cheers,
Atraveler
Great post Synergy. I myself have convinced a friend that astral travel is real and also proved to myself that it is something external from the body/mind. He was a sceptic so I asked him to place a playing card face up somewhere in his house and permission to enter his house during a projection. I projected that night and later told him what card I saw. This was great evidence for the both of us.
I think my mind is already made up that this is an external event but that creates bias on the subject. I am really interested in hearing from someone that thinks this is something that occurs within the body and the evidence they have to support it.
correct me if im wrong...but i remember listening to an interview with some guy on "coast to coast radio" on youtube, and he was talking about how Robert Monroe and two of his students ran a bunch of tests to prove that astral travel INST just in your head....ide have to find it again and watch it to remember exactly what they were talking about and the test they ran...but it had to do with two guys practicing meeting up in the astral plane and talking about it through a microphone WHILE they were project (wich he talked about how much practice they had to do just to be able to talk while still projecting) and had everything recorded. so both guys met up, and were explaining what was happening while it was happening, and were in to separate rooms so they couldnt hear each other, and both had the same thing goin on(sorry im bad at explaining things when im high lol)
so i say external
as for phasing....can someone please explain to me what it is?! :) i will be truly grateful
for phasing read http://www.astralpulse.com/frankkepple.html (http://www.astralpulse.com/frankkepple.html)
cool thanks
I'm not sure that phasing exactly falls into what I would call OBEs, as I have experienced them anyway. I admit, I never really knew what phasing was until I read that article, however I have done it on many occassions..... exactly like he explained it - snippets of images etc appearing in front of my physical eyes, but with them closed - I have even totally immersed myself within them, and saw complete landscapes.... the most common of which seemed to be a scandanavian type village in a valley between two mountains. I could see tufts of smoke coming from the chimneys of the challets. My vantage point was on a pathway, on a foothill of the mountain on one side of the valley. But every time I have experienced these visions, I always knew I was still in my physical body (perspective wise anyway, as I like him believe that we always exist on all levels, and only tune into them separately) but, when I have an OBE, I am fully outside of the physical... in fact one experience I had, I actually moved out of my body, through my closed eyelids, in full waking consciousness.... so in that way, yes I did leave. These other phasing type experiences were more like what I would term remote viewing, though I don't have much experience with RV, and whether or not my comparison is valid, but I do know that I feel very much within my physical body, to the point that I can actually move around and not disturb the imagery.... except for opening my eyes of course.
Am I missing something? Does phasing produce full OBEs and maybe I just have not gotten that far with that method? Or are the experiences possibly different in nature (phasing being more like RV) ??
For willed projections, I usually just use progressive relaxation, starting with my feet working upward, and then willing myself to separate while intensifying the vibrations and sounds (I dont know exactly how I intensify them, I can just do it, like I fall into the feeling more and more)
I have had the same experiences with phasing and believe them to be completely internal and similar to remote viewing. I myself have wondered if I am doing it correctly because I am aware of my physical body and can move around without disturbing the imagery as well. When I OBE im out and about with no conscious awareness of my physical body unless I desire to return.
brandon89lee,
I'd love to listen to that MP3 audio you were talking about. That would be totally awesome. To do that those guys would have to be incredibly advanced. Let us know if you can find it. I'm hoping it's external; I just wont be convinced until I experience some verification myself.
Cheers,
Atraveler
The vast majority of my experiences are traditional "exit technique" OBEs. I occasionally phase, and it IS different from remote viewing.
With remote viewing you feel as if you are still in your physical body, but are watching a scene from a distance without being actually "in" the scene. With phasing you actually transition into the scene.
So with phasing, one moment you are watching the scene, ie one moment you are "outside" the scene. The next moment you are actually "in" the scene and can move around just exactly as if you had done a traditional OBE.
I have spent hours lying in bed (whilst ill) watching scenes, moving images etc, without actually stepping into these scenes. phasing is the act of actualy stepping into the scene. It takes a "knack" which is hard to describe, but when you do it you know you have done it.
Colden & Synergy you seem to be "remote viewing", not phasing I guess. You need to "step into" the scene. I know exactly what you are referring to, because I have done what you describe, being able to move around in bed and maintain the image. But this is not phasing. With phasing you actually move int o the scene and there is a transition from being "outside" the scene to being completely "inside" it.
The results of phasing are exactly the same as the results of a traditional "exit technique" RTZ OBE, except that the location you find yourself in is different. With phasing you move directly into an "astral" environment. With OBEs you move into the RTZ and then often quickly into the astral.
The term "external" is confusing. But by "external" I mean "concensus reality". In other words all parties involved share the same experience. This definitely does happen, I have done it my self, I have had "concensus reality" experiences, where i shared dreams or brought back info about the physical world which I wouldn't have known.
But as atraveller said, this doesn't prove life after death it just proves ESP.
But in my experience, phasing and OBE are very similar and both are different from RV.
Synergy, this is a quote from you on another post
QuoteRe: OBE..CAN YOU ENTER ANOTHER BODY?
« Reply #9 on: Yesterday at 19:24:45 »
I don't think it's possible.... because I don't believe you ever really leave your body. You just tune into different frequencies of reality, which are always present whether or not you are tuned into them. For some of these levels, you have a corresponding subtle body to experience that level through (etheric, astral, mental) and above those, you exost as pure consciousness....
In this post you said it is external but in the statement above you don't believe you ever really leave your body. ??????
Quote from: Colden on August 04, 2008, 19:18:13
Synergy, this is a quote from you on another post
In this post you said it is external but in the statement above you don't believe you ever really leave your body. ??????
External in the sense that it is not made up by your brain (ie: a hallucination, or made up imagery) As that is what I had taken 'internal' to mean.... when medical professionals and neuroscientists etc refer to this type of phenomenon as being internal, they mean generated by the physical brain.
...but what I meant by never actually 'leaving' your body, is that you always have an astral body, and you always have an etheric body, and they always exist on their respective levels... as vehicles used to interact with those levels. They are called the 'subtle bodies' However, you don't leave them vacant or empty while you are awake in the physical... just like you don't actually leave your physical body vacant when you occupy one of the subtle bodies during projection. You always inhabit all of your vehicles all of the time.... and they are all superimposed on one another, not actually higher or above each other.... the only thing that separates the levels are their base frequencies. Physics already shows us how at a very deep level, vibration is at the center of everything.... think of frequencies being akin to RF (radio frequency) where we need a tuner (radio) to listen to a particular channel, but the antenna is always receiving all of the frequencies. So when we project, we are just consciously tuning into the base frequency of that channel (or plane of existence, or level, or dimension... however you want to call it) but you always remain in the physical too, though you just 'tune out' your physical surroundings in order to concentrate on the different level. However, a good example of you being still in the physical consciously, is that if anything were to happen (someone calls your name, or an alarm goes off etc) you will hear it and consciously respond to it, by detuning from the other place and focusing on the physical again.
So it's external in that it is not a brain generated experience, and it does take place in a very real external realm, but you never actually leave your physical body to go there.
Thanks for clarifying.....I agree with you. :-)