trying to OBE, having trouble getting results

[holy reality]

first of all what in the world are you doing taking drugs (any drugs) every single day just because you like their effect on you?

Those things change your brain chemistry for the worse if you plan on experiencing AP/OBE etc... they are designed to combat hallucinations and things like that.. I mean.. really, drugs are fine once and a while (though I'd stay way away from anything but naturally occurring psychadelics and perhaps LSD) if you need a sort of stepping stone to see what an alternate reality is like so that you can try to get there on your own, but becoming dependant upon mind altering medications that are designed to make you "normal" (ala antipsychotics and antidepressants and anti-anythings) is a horrible move to make.

Doctors hand them out like candy (and are often times paid to) without even beginning to determine whether there is indeed something wrong with your brain... Sad? Here, take one of these! Now you're stuck on a pill the rest of your life whose side effects may very well be worse than whatever was wrong with you in the first place and if you DON'T have a chemical imbalance they aren't really going to work very well and he'll just keep upping your dosage.. and even if you do have one pills aren't going to cure your depression, in the end it's up to you to make a choice to heal and move on.

So I mean, the same applies for anti-psychotics, unless you're having hallucinations during the day that signficiantly bother you, I wouldn't be taking them. You don't know what adverse effects using them every day for no good reason other than to be able to focus is going to have on you.

It'll probably only further dull your mind so that you don't even know what having a normal mind is like anymore and that if you quit them you'll be horribly more unfocused than you ever were to begin with.

I mean... drugs aren't good, especialy kinds specifically designed to alter the way your brain is functioning, don't take them unless there is a huge necessity to, and be very wary of any doctor that wants to hand you something... especially since they will probably be almost impossible to quit (especially anti depressants... which can probably kill you if you are taking high doses then suddenly stop)

I actually did quit anti-depressants a year ago.... it was hell.

sigh.. okay....

"My goal is to prove that the mind can survive separated from the body, so that I will know that I won't cease to exist upon physical death. I plan to float out of my body, float downstairs, see what people are doing on the first floor of the house, then wake up and walk downstairs to confirm that what I saw was real."

Do the card test first... even if you step out into your room it's not going to be YOUR room in the physical 100% acccurate sense, and you probably won't see what is going on around your physical body in real time, I have NEVER ever done so, despite leaving my body directly into my "room" many times... so since you haven't even entered your room yet, I doubt you'd succeede in manifesting into the physical either.

Take a deck of cards, shuffle and shuffle and shuffle and shuffle.. shut off your mind, draw one (without trying to guess what it is) tape it to your window (all the while never looking at it, and so that the face of the card is visible to people outside of the window, all you see is the back) then try not to think about it or speculate about what it is.

When OBE.. or lucid, doesn't matter, make a conscious affirmation to find out what the card is and go look for it... first time I tried... i saw it was the jack of diamonds, but I couldn't see the letters, just the guy and the diamond shape.. so I got closer and closer and then it looked like a woman, which caused some doubt, and then as I closely examined it I saw a Q on it.

Well in real life it was the jack of diamonds.. my self doubt probably caused me to project what i think possible alternatives would have been onto it, thus changing it.

I did it again and don't remember the results but it was kind of close, but not all the way there like before... I'm gonna try it again tonight having been about a week since doing it.

Doing this I think, if you suceede, will perhaps make your OBEs more realistic in nature as you are tuning into something other than your own mind to see what the real card is, even if it looks strangely or is on the wrong window, if you can find the right one that is probably going to help your chances of getting into a detailed and accurate real time projection, perhaps.. I don't know.

Also in the blackness, it sounds like you're not stepping outward, but inward... as in into the blackness of you eyelids.. I do that a lot when trying to get back into a dream I woke up out of, and it works pretty well... but you really shouldn't be looking at anything (including eyelids or inner eye visions) if you want to exit your body into your room, IMO.

Try and stay in paralysis a while and wait for vibrations, too.. and keep yourself very aware of the physical body and think about where it's lying (i.e, in your room) as you are preparing to leave it.

[Rahzul]

quote:
first of all what in the world are you doing taking drugs (any drugs) every single day just because you like their effect on you?

Doctors hand them out like candy (and are often times paid to) without even beginning to determine whether there is indeed something wrong with your brain... Sad? Here, take one of these! Now you're stuck on a pill the rest of your life whose side effects may very well be worse than whatever was wrong with you in the first place and if you DON'T have a chemical imbalance they aren't really going to work very well and he'll just keep upping your dosage.. and even if you do have one pills aren't going to cure your depression, in the end it's up to you to make a choice to heal and move on.

Well, I agree with you about antidepressants. I was emotionally steamrolled by some events earlier this year (a friend died, my grandma got cancer, a friend tried to commit suicide (failed thankfully), and about 14 events of similar magnitude....totally freakish string of bad luck) and went into a deep depression, but stubbornly resisted going on antidepressants because I wanted to feel the pain so I could study it and learn how to overcome it. But I don't think it would be a good idea to go off the antipsychotics. I go into a state where I can't even have a conversation because I forget things spontaneously and can't remember what people have just said to me. Thoughts feel even more insubstantial than they normally do and are very hard to grab onto. I meditate to help my focus, but it's not enough. I didn't mean to be that unclear on that.

Thanks for the advice. I will try the card trick, and try to focus less on the blackness of my eyelids. When I said that I have noone else to ask that was also unclear; there are some friends I have asked but none of them had any suggestions. Also posted on another message board, but nobody knew there either. Looks like I came to the right place.

quote:Try and stay in paralysis a while and wait for vibrations, too.. and keep yourself very aware of the physical body and think about where it's lying (i.e, in your room) as you are preparing to leave it.

I don't get paralysis, at least, it comes very rarely (haven't had it in over six months.) I just get real tired and then when i'm half-conscious I float out. Next time I'll see if waiting before floating out brings it on.

I didn't know that you weren't always actually in real-time when you OBEd. I'll put a card on the window and wait a while.

[Rahzul]

I'm going to detail how I try to OBE in this post, in hopes that sombody can tell me where I'm going wrong. I realize I'm sharing some information that is personal information in this post, but I have noone else to ask.

My goal is to prove that the mind can survive separated from the body, so that I will know that I won't cease to exist upon physical death. I plan to float out of my body, float downstairs, see what people are doing on the first floor of the house, then wake up and walk downstairs to confirm that what I saw was real.

Here are all the details on how i've gotten to the point where I can project, and how I project:

For the past year or so I've been doing the meditation descibed in Astral Dynamics. I haven't done any development of my energy body yet.

Although I haven't been able to use the meditation to astral project or OBE, doing the meditation has increased my awareness during twilight states of consciousness and so sometimes I find myself in trance and conscious as I'm waking up in the morning. I use these times for my experimentation for now.

What happens is this: when I feel my astral body start to loosen, I simply float out. I've never felt any vibrations except for once. It happens easily, but then I can't seem to sense anything. Everything is black, I can't hear anything, and I can't feel any walls of the house I may be passing through, so it is impossible to carry out the experiment I described above. Usually what I end up doing is floating or flying around in the void for a while, because it's fun. Sometimes I see things (never my house), but I've never had the "three dimensional" eyesight some people claim to have where they can see behind them as well as in front. Here are two experiences that are typical of what happens out there:

I floated out, and asked for my eyesight. I began to see dimly, but it wasn't a room that was in my house. My sight faded quickly and then there was nothing but the void. I floated around for a bit, until something attached itself to me. I tried to pull it off and succeeded, but if I let go of it it would attach itself again so I gave up and floated around some more.

I floated out again, and saw a line of lights shooting down vertically in the darkness. (this is the only time I've seen this particular thing, although I oftentimes see lights.) I floated over to it. The line came from so far above me that I couldn't see from where it originated, and the lights shot down the line until they were so far I couldn't see them anymore. I forgot what happened after this.

On willing myself places: I used to at least go somewhere when I tried to will myself to a place, now it mostly has no effect. I used to be able to command myself to return to my body, now I mostly do it by searching for the sensation of my physical big toe and trying to wiggle it when I find it, then moving my whole body.

Other things I think may help people figure out my problem:

I am an insomniac, or was; I'm getting better at getting to sleep.

I can't sense energy; I did at one point I think but can't anymore.

I've mentally asked a "higher self" (have no idea if it exists) to help me prove that there is an afterlife, but have recieved no help.

After the first time I left my body, I felt weird for about three weeks afterward and experienced some hallucinations during the daytime. I started to see faint white points of light whenever I closed my eyes also. Sometimes parts of my astral body would drift out of sync with the physical when I was wide awake. Mostly it was my feet; they would unhitch and drift into the floor.

After the second time, I felt weird for three days and also experienced some hallucinations for about a day and a half. Also I was able to see a blue glow around myself when I looked in the mirror. It wasn't an afterimage because it was the same color whether by my face hair or clothes. I wasn't able to see it around most other people, although there were some exceptions.

Every time I projected reduced the amount of time I felt weird and the "side effects" I got until by about the seventh time I had very few "side effects." I continue to see the white points of light when I close my eyes but those are getting fainter and fewer. I can still see a blue glow around myself, but it is very faint.

I often have hypnogogic hallucinations, and sometimes I have auditory hallucinations in broad daylight. I am on antipsychotic medication by choice because I like the way they help me think more clearly, but they don't affect the hallucinations for the most part.