getting stuck

[deric]

A poster Frank commented on getting stuck in the area just above the lucid dreaming area.  He said the novice when in that area might think they are in the astral proper but it is not the astral proper. It's a place where anything you think will be created but you think it's the real astral.  He then adds the way to get out is to realize everything you see is self created from your subconscious upon which it all dissolves. Has anybody had an experience like this and can they add insights tips etc.? 

[Xanth]

That's a little bit too literal interpretation of what Frank was saying.
Frank's experience is his, you have to find your own way.
This makes teaching via reading other people's experiences a bit tough.

Essentially, consciousness isn't all neatly organized as Frank would like us to believe it is.
There's no "individual" area of consciousness where one can point to and say "THIS IS WHERE YOU DREAM"... there's no such thing as the "astral proper".
Consciousness is a whole, and you have direct access to that whole at all times.  What I believe Frank was confused about (and it's the same problem that Robert Monroe faced) is that consciousness isn't linear.  Consciousness is always collective.  There essentially is no concept of an "I", in consciousness. 

The only way through this is to just experience with an open mind.  Don't jump so quickly to labeling your experiences... most people label them wrong, which then sets them even further back in understanding.

Anyway, that's my two cents.

[omcasey]

I do agree with what you're saying there, Xanth, the thing is that without a pattern there is nothing much to say. So incorporating "no pattern" with "pattern" is often the way to go when wiggling our way through these things ..and when writing, mentoring or simply dialoging on the matter. Torque is needed to talk ( lol ). I'm not sure if I am accurately understanding Deric's question but I think he is asking if we have ever shifted from what seemed a playground or learning lab area into a true consensus field. There are so many ways I could dive into this I don't quite know where to begin. First - I tend to shift myself from location to location, ie: I dematerialize and re-materialize in a new environment - far more than I experience the environment giving way to another. The latter being far more of a challenge to maintain full conscious awareness through. Truth told, with many hundreds of experiences under my belt I can recall only 3 in which the environment gave way and I lost no awareness whatsoever. But in none of these was my attention on the kind of field the experience was taking place in. This probably hasn't been very helpful, huh?