The Higher Self and transcendent experience, including OBEs

[TraineeHuman]

Posted by sway (here)
... i proceeded to welcome friends, ex colleagues, and friends that i dont know. the friends that i dont know were mainly males, with one female that stood out. i recall saying to her, girlfriends can be back stabbers, and that i hoped she was a good friend. i also, recall explaining to ex colleagues WHY. i quit my job. i said, i can make money anywhere, i dont need to do it at a downtown, multi national company. i can do it living in the country too. mostly i was walking around, being befriended by a few people, mostly they were good looking males, my age joining me for conversation, or for the moment. those are the good feelings, of friends that i dont know....the feeling these people gave me were - very "comfortable to be around" them, but still a feeling of "getting to know you again", with a bit of i "wish they are always around and never leave".

...

i am not sure if it was meditation or maybe a deeper part of me, (or guide?) that tells it to me like it is. i was having a hard time adjusting to a life change and my (get over yourself) was in my perspective to let go of what i think i want, and enjoy what happens.

I would question whether these were purely dreams, rather than OBEs in part.

It seems to be the usual pattern that pretty soon an astral traveler wants to meet with others in the astral, and exchange information and companionship. Pretty soon after that, it's usual to develop astral acquaintanceships with others who have very similar interests or talents to yourself.

I remember when I started out I had a whole number of groups of such friends, particularly in North America. I guess that was partly because I needed people who were asleep (but "awake") at the same time as I was. When it was 10 p.m. here in Eastern Australia it would be 4 a.m. or 5 a.m. or 6 a.m. in the Western states of that continent. Because the cities didn't have gigantic signs up with their names, I used to know most major US cities by their bridges.

One day I noticed that not everyone in such an astral group of friends had a silver cord -- which of course meant they weren't currently physically alive. You'll probably come across that sooner or later too.

There are many places to go and things to learn. It depends so much on you. Like attracts like, so if you want to go "higher", you need to be "higher", e.g. happier (I don't mean through alcohol or drugs), more ego-free.

[TraineeHuman]

Posted by Gekko (here)
Hello, and thanks for the thread. I admit I've only read pieces here and there, but I wanted to share a lucid dream which I had a few nights ago. Possibly the very first I've had in which I was able to "test" myself and attempt to get my bearings.

************

I'm walking through some kind of Russian mill town which is situated near the base of a volcano. The sky is very dark, covered by layers of rapidly moving clouds. I'm heading back to a commune of some sort where I have been staying a few nights.

I stop and look up at the volcano. The peak is covered in snow and I notice the beginnings of a sunrise, purple tinged with pink amid swirling smoke and darkness. A few times I see the sun poke out from behind the clouds, still veiled in black smoke rising. The words come to mind: "lavender sunrise". I vaguely make out a series of flags and cell phone towers dotting the peak, with blinking red lights. They're swaying in a violent wind. I am partly in awe of the sight, and partly uneasy considering the possibility of an avalanche.

When I reach the place where I'm staying/living, the dream becomes somewhat lucid. I'm not totally aware of my waking identity, but there is the understanding that this isn't "reality". I ask the people there questions (I don't remember what those first questions were) but they are reluctant to give me answers. I walk into an adjacent room where I see a closed door and a boiler on the far side of the room. Testing myself, I swing the door I had just passed through partly closed, blocking my view, and imagine that the boiler won't be there when I look again. When I look, the boiler has disappeared.

Excited, I walk back into the main room, and as I do, I become aware of a nagging sensation in my REAL (waking) leg. I have a vague understanding that if I move the leg I would wake up and the dream would end. Since I already dreamed of this place many times during the night, I feel it important to ask them what its meaning was and why I'm here. Again, they seem reluctant but just as they're about to answer, my leg moves and I wake up.

************

I find it fascinating that lucid dreaming (or this dream, at least) seems to occur in a delicate intermediate space between waking and deep sleep. Similar to what I experience as hypnagogia, but deeper in the sense of having imagery and characters, rather than the symbolic internal dialogue which usually happens.

If I may ... The volcano obviously represents a gigantic change and personal breakthrough that you're currently resisting. The dream suggests you should simply let it happen. You know you really want it to happen. After all, you're spending your time at the base of the volcano -- conveniently, so close to it that you can't help being affected by it hugely when it erupts. You won't die when it erupts, but the old you will. Take the plunge. Sounds very impressive, very positive.

[soleil]

hi th, not sure if this question is related, i suppose it is. when i do energy work on myself; such as feeling my awareness in my body or attempting to move my body in energy only, my body twitches big time. for example, rbruces rope method, and once i was writing with my hands energy(just testing out my movements) and i will twitch and snap out of my mindset/trance. am i being too forceful with my movements?

[Gekko]

Posted by TraineeHuman (here)
If I may ... The volcano obviously represents a gigantic change and personal breakthrough that you're currently resisting. The dream suggests you should simply let it happen. You know you really want it to happen. After all, you're spending your time at the base of the volcano -- conveniently, so close to it that you can't help being affected by it hugely when it erupts. You won't die when it erupts, but the old you will. Take the plunge. Sounds very impressive, very positive.

I do do feel, and see the necessity for, a breakthrough. With all my fervor. The past few months my personality has been running much as it always has, with the usual neurosis, but there is something else happening too. I'm becoming more deeply aware of when I close down... watching myself closely, seeing what thinking patterns and events trigger which emotions, and noting where those reservoirs of potential (whether 'positive' or 'negative') are. Sometimes it's as simple as looking someone in the face and feeling what's there, instead of habitually lowering my gaze. I'm at the point where I can bring those things just below the surface of expression or catharsis. I recover more quickly from negative spirals, and on some days I even find a sort of joy poking through in the presence of crowds (something that used to leave me drained and depressed by the end of the day).

I would protest that I don't know what this breakthrough is, or more specifically, what it would look like. I'm standing at a crossroads with paths leading in every direction; not just in terms of what I should do, but everything about what I am, inside and out. I mean that literally. Perhaps it's not anything I could conceive. But then, it leaves the question of how to let such a thing happen. Maybe I'm too intimidated to know at this time.

Thanks for the insight.

[TraineeHuman]

Posted by sway (here)
hi th, not sure if this question is related, i suppose it is. when i do energy work on myself; such as feeling my awareness in my body or attempting to move my body in energy only, my body twitches big time. for example, rbruces rope method, and once i was writing with my hands energy(just testing out my movements) and i will twitch and snap out of my mindset/trance. am i being too forceful with my movements?

The fact that the twitching is coming up means your awareness is bringing it to the surface to get rid of it. If you see this type of energy in the astral, it looks a bit like a printed electric circuit. People can acquire that type of energy around them by doing such things as playing video games or card games or wasting time in various ways, as well as through doing anything robotic -- which I believe can include self-programming such as visualization exercises/techniques. That energy is all robotic energy. In a sense it's harmless. But in another sense it's something that a person working on their growth needs to get rid of, because the robotic energy sometimes blocks or impedes what's truer and deeper in you. It's a certain kind of facade.

You just have to watch that energy when it comes up, and let it all run itself out. The end result will be that you'll have more true control of yourself, in a good sense, such as it will be very hard for anyone to ever make you a sitting duck. Just allow the twitching to do what it does, and simply watch it, and know it isn't the real you.

[TraineeHuman]

Posted by Gekko (here)
I'm becoming more deeply aware of when I close down... watching myself closely, seeing what thinking patterns and events trigger which emotions, and noting where those reservoirs of potential (whether 'positive' or 'negative') are. Sometimes it's as simple as looking someone in the face and feeling what's there, instead of habitually lowering my gaze. I'm at the point where I can bring those things [to] just below the surface of expression or catharsis.

If you keep on being very aware of yourself, as you have been, surely that will keep the momentum towards your breakthrough going, and building -- if you don't run away at some point? After all, whatever you put your attention on keeps getting bigger and bigger, surely?

I would protest that I don't know what this breakthrough is, or more specifically, what it would look like. I'm standing at a crossroads with paths leading in every direction; not just in terms of what I should do, but everything about what I am, inside and out. I mean that literally. Perhaps it's not anything I could conceive.

May I suggest it's always the mechanical -thinking mind that asks: "How?" Instead, why not just be, and stay with whatever's there and already in process? Honestly, your ego is what is intimidating you or making you feel confused. The ego isn't who you really are. A crossroads in every way, in every direction of your life? Wow! How wonderful. The feeling that all hell is breaking loose is the best sign that the breakthrough is already starting. You simply have to continue and not give up. The ego has some life-force (it's a living entity) and a little awareness/consciousness. It knows exactly what levers to pull to get you to regret ever taking the plunge. And it seems clear you are already taking the plunge into the "abyss" of shedding some identities. You're already starting to do it. The ego fights you and will fight you with all its might, now. Maybe more vigorously than ever in your life before. Don't be fooled. Bear with the pain and discomfort and fear and confusion -- and just feeling ever so rotten. Face them head on. To get a big breakthrough you have to show what you're made of. Bear it! Stay at peace. Please, none of this feeling a victim because of your discomfort that you don't have a road map.

By the way, thank you. In this thread we like to look at the heart of how the ego operates and what it is, particularly through real-life examples.

Let me digress for a moment to a different point. It's paradoxical, but the biggest breakthroughs take you to a place of having no identity -- at least in the area(s) of your psyche where the breakthrough will occur. And if you can't get to "no identity" (which I doubt), I guess an identity of being "the greatest (in the world)" would be the most preferable, over any other identity. But far better to have no identity, and use only "portable, demountable" identities that your intuition keeps creating afresh for you from moment to moment.

In this thread I've stressed the importance of continuing to bear silence, emptiness, stillness during meditation. You just let the Silence come into you and stay. That higher stillness, or silence, is the key to everything. It will open up your intuition. Your intuition will show you the way, show you what new identity you need (if, indeed, you need any at all) in each moment. The intuition is very creative, always. But you have to listen to the silence before you will be able to hear it.

Essence is what matters, and what survives eternally beyond one's death. Essence is the really big "picture" re you, and is certainly not the particular form that you are, nor any of the details regarding you. Freedom means, in part, being content "just" with the essence. There is such a thing as formlessness. I've been continually aware of it most of my life. It's a higher plane than the world of forms. I've tried hard to make this real to members earlier in this thread.

And if I may, I'd like to ask why should it matter so much whether you can see "the" path for you to go ahead on or not. Do you need to plan everything you do, or what? Firstly, the Higher Mind (the intuition), and indeed even the Divine Mind, usually only reveals the next step to one, or maybe the next two steps. Secondly, until the veil that hides your Higher Mind (your soul, the eternal you) from "you" has been fully removed, you're not really seeing the real you most of the time, but the illusory veil instead. One of the drawbacks of having free will is that you never have enough information to know which is the best possible choice, or why it would be that. Either you have to live with that uncertainty (if you're honest), or you surrender to the Divine and freely give up your free will.

[powessy]

Posted by sway (here)
hi th, not sure if this question is related, i suppose it is. when i do energy work on myself; such as feeling my awareness in my body or attempting to move my body in energy only, my body twitches big time. for example, rbruces rope method, and once i was writing with my hands energy(just testing out my movements) and i will twitch and snap out of my mindset/trance. am i being too forceful with my movements?

Hello Sway
First of all thank you traneehuman for your explanation in this matter.
I just want to ask Sway how long has this been going on, would you say since the beginning of the month.
If this sounds about right then, I will explain whats happening. I am going to try and conduct my comments in a different manner from here on out.

[soleil]

powessy, its happened before, but i dont always do energy work as priority; so it just happened to happen when i Was actively doing energy work recently.

i do admit to playing video games, my fiance bought a few new ones recently as well.

[powessy]

Posted by sway (here)
powessy, its happened before, but i dont always do energy work as priority; so it just happened to happen when i Was actively doing energy work recently.

i do admit to playing video games, my fiance bought a few new ones recently as well.

Sway
It is possible that the video games and other things are interfering with your attempts as "TH" had mentioned.
I have been sweeping the internet for weeks now reading from site to site, here is a link to "Dream Views" there are thousands of dreams here from kids and adults alike. http://www.dreamviews.com/content/ "select the dream journals" I realize that you are using a rope technique and are not trying to astral project but many of the kids here on this site play some serious video games it shows in the dreams they have I am not sure this is the problem.
Try not to use the rope technique. just focus an energy band starting on your feet working it upwards to your head try this and see if this helps.
try not to use anything right now that requires your hm to work outside your body.

[TraineeHuman]

The following is most of a PM from sway, which I'm quoting with her permission, and my response to it.

i did (again last night) dream about my grandpa. which is roughly two nights in a row. i was again somewhere like a subway (subs) shop, and when i left i saw my grandpa in parking lot where my weird little car was.

In dreams, a person's car always symbolically refers to the course of their life, or their life jouney or life situation. Interesting that you currently consider yours to be "weird" and "little". I guess weird allows you freedoms, and I guess maybe in relation to grandpops you were considering yourself a little girl. The fact that you parked your car suggests your life journey is kind of stuck or weighed down a little. Presumably the conditioning related to your family, since gramps was also "parked" i.e. stuck there.

Well, whose inner life isn't stuck due to conditioning from their family -- or used to be until they got free of it? Fortunately, your dream (and therefore your HM) is identifying there's an issue you currently need to face in some way, and break free of inwardly. The family conditioning is holding you back. Do you know what sort of person your parents had "decided" you should be while you were age one, and four, and six? The older a person gets, though, the more practical they become regarding career choices, among other things. (Sorry if that sounds awfully uncool.) It can be very tough, unfortunately, to separate the useful, practical part of your parents' advice from the part that's not really you at all. Trouble is, while you're young you don't know who the real you is, including in the sense that you probably don't know what line of work you would best be suited for, in many cases. Maybe that's not true in your case, sway, but I'm giving an example of how parents' advice does have a very positive side to it in spite of any of their baggage.

I wonder why in the dream you seem OK with having the Subway version of food. In the astral, "food" = awareness. Sounds a little to me like turning your back on some classy traditional restaurant that can serve you truly good quality "food". Just notice that your dream says you're settling for Subway food.

the police were there, inspecting me/himand our cars i think but they advised they were leaving and my grandpa was insistant on leaving NOW. so i insisted to help him, we were moving fast (like on rollerskates) so i held on to him to keep him up and safe. when we were at the bottom of a hill (now near pavement) his sweaters, socks and blankets where strewn all over the place in a mishandled manner. so i urgently picking them up for him to put in/on his trunk. then i went to my car, which was more like a two seater that looks like it attaches to a motorecycle but it wasnt...and my brother was there.

I suspect "the police" were guides or other evolved beings (or they represented some piece of honest truth), and gramps wsn't ready to hear the truth they wanted to say.

It sounds like your brother is stuck in a similar place to you, as far as family conditioning goes. Maybe you could brainstorm with him regarding what that conditioning was? One of the best clues to determing what the family "curse" might be like (I'm using the word "curse" as a humorous exaggeration) is as follows. Look at what you and your brother are determined not to be like. Opposites have a way of becoming variations of the same exact thing in this situation, via your shadow self. You become what you resist.

is this likely to be 2visits from him?

Probably. Being a grandparent, he'd be there just to re-confirm your lovability and worth. Even if he's not there, the dream is reminding you of your worth and lovability in spite of the negative impact of that family conditioning.

im really trying to grasp the mediumship thing....so im trying to understand what the difference is between obe, dreams and talking to spirits? what im experiencing, in your POV.

ive had 5 or 6 ghost/spirit/unexplainable experiences in my life. one, i saw a woman in my periphery, four times my possessions were moved around in a extremly odd fashion ( for me) and i was once pushed by a spirit in my friends house. i havent had anything happen since i was about 22-23 yrs old now.

Well, "spirits" means either beings or entities in some dimensional level at least a little higher than the physical. In most dreams other than nightmares, as far as I know you go to the upper mental ("upper 5D"). I guess "spirits" can be at a lower level. Also, where you go in OB travel may well be a lower level than that. Most travelers seem to find "their" level, but on the other hand I would go to all levels, and it sounds like Bruce Moen did something similar perhaps.

Also, quite often mediums, channelers, clairvoyants etc may pick up (part or all of) a dead personality that the original owner has been smart enough to detach from and "eject" after death. But it will still seem like an intelligent being, and like that person. Many of the readings that some psychics do regarding departed loved ones are probably only tapping into the departed personality and not the real person. That personality has a "database" of most of the memories the person had in their last lifetime.

By the way, you need to let go of any sorrow or longing about losing grandpops. And of any other unfinished business with him. That will only delay his journey of return to the sublime peace of dwelling in/as his HM.

[soleil]

side note, i was in the shop but i wasnt eating in it. :D

[TraineeHuman]

Whatever I say about the Divine Mind is going to be misleading for anyone who hasn't had certain experiences. Those experiences need not have been experiences of the Divine Mind itself. But they do need to be of some higher consciousness. They need to be experiences where at least a glimmer of the Divine Mind's light really has shone through. Such experiences will be more vivid and unforgettable than anything else in one's life.

I also feel that maybe there's value just in stating, to anyone interested in spirituality, that true (inner) freedom is only possible with and through the Divine Mind. I guess for some people that might at this stage amount to a challenge to them. Do they realize that the true inner freedom we all thirst for isn't realistically possible, not without an extraordinary leap? What is real freedom anyway? How do you know when you have it? Is it freedom to do what you like? If so, are you perhaps a slave to your likes, and to avoiding all your dislikes? And is there such a thing as purely individual freedom when no man (nor woman) is an island? Doesn't freedom mean being part of something that's really good that's bigger than just one individual? And why is it that all the greatest geniuses claimed they were only taking dictation?

Then there's the fact that the seeds are there, in every human being. Even if it may not be clear what the Divine Mind might really be like, some sort of process and growth towards it is going on, amazingly enough, even if that process might take lifetimes plus. Anyone can still choose to have the strong intention to get closer to the Divine Mind, and to ever so courageously follow that intention -- come what may.

Or, can you simply take the step to living by pure intuition? Jack Kerouac wrote a book called Dharma Bums, based on the experience he and a friend had of basing absolutely every choice in their lives for a number of years on the arbitrary roll of a dice. I suggest that isn't freedom. But maybe some rather rare ones of you can tone down the ego, or have already done so, so much that your intuition is basically clear and true, and so you can let the intuition take over -- your whole life. That intuition will still probably be rather imperfect, but it might be just enough to keep pointing you in the general direction where true inner freedom lies. Maybe it'll be a pretty rusty and 100% reliable compass at first, but still you'll see how it will correctly point, say, "East" as distinct from "West".

Intuition also involves looking inside yourself and finding and mastering the world deeper within, and gently taking control of all the forces and energies within yourself. First and foremost you do this by learning to constantly observe what is happening within.

You have to start somewhere. It will sure be a patchwork job at first. Do it, and the higher Forces (and beings from formless dimensions) will smile on you and lend you support. They will teach you and inspire you -- because you may seem to have bitten off more than you could chew, but that's where the helpers are very willing to come in. But it will cost you the discomfort of having to give up, say, as far as practicable all of our habits, eventually. Well, you said you wanted freedom?

That includes, as far as practicable, all the ancient ego-habits you'd long ago stopped noticing you have. All the shadow habits. This will and does for some time require endless work, endless application of your intention and will, endless more self-watching and flowing. Did I say flowing? Must mean everything gets lighter, including all your burdens. And it means learning to be better and better at giving. Giving more and more, and then some (but not being a soft touch). How broad and deep can you go?

And by the way, you do all that, and I'll bet the higher Forces will make learning to astral travel a cakewalk for you -- even if they have to literally pull your astral body Higher.

[TraineeHuman]

Why does the ego exist? And why does evil exist? By now we've briefly explored, sometimes indirectly, some aspects of what the ego is, and some aspects of how it seems to work. That includes the shadow aspect, which we all have, and which shows up when a person unwittingly allows the ego to be in control of them at a certain time.

Several months ago I also asserted that desire is generally the root of the ego. Can we go deeper than that? I feel it's time. Let's start by noticing something that happens as a result of living in limitation, as we currently do (when we're not one with our HM, or with something even higher). In being stuck in such a world of limitation, absolutely everything we attempt to feel or know or see will be self-limiting.

We have to start from somewhere, though. And we have all put ourselves into this physical world of severe limitations -- and that's a fact. We've done so with the aim of ultimately outgrowing and mastering those limitations. To do this at all, we needed some kind of working reference point to begin from. That reference point, that "self", was the ego. How can the ego even begin to help us learn those lessons, though? The ego was just what we were stuck with, initially -- it was all we had at that point. How, though, could the ego, unwittingly, prepare the ground for something higher (the HM) to eventually step more and more into its place?

The ego could make this possible only by making mistakes, which we've then learnt from, again and again. I believe that's the only way. Does anyone out there have a better idea of a way to achieve the miracle of growing out of severe limitations? If you do, I'm sure certain Higher Forces would be glad to create a new kind of universe somewhere to try your idea out.

Eventually dissolving all the limitations. Miraculously, turning all the ignorance or lack of consciousness or wrong consciousness into all-consciousness. That's the omega point -- that kind of secretly underlies everything that leads up to it. A kind of "anti-shadow you" -- the antithesis of your shadow self. Anyone whose consciousness saw things absolutely truly would be incapable of evil.

What can we do practically to speed up this learning process? The first thing is to keep looking at ourselves very, very deeply. We need to see for a fact that, for instance, our "personality" is really a conglomeration of many smaller sub-personalities. These come from who knows where -- past lifetimes, conditioning, our own ideals or dreams. Looking deeper still, we need to become very aware of how little control of all this we have.

Not only do we have little control, but if we look very honestly we will soon figure out that the forces within us -- for good and for evil -- are gigantic. Jung talked about how all sorts of Archetypes live within us. They're not made of cardboard or something -- they're alive and intelligent. These Archetypes are huge -- they're universal, as big as the universe. They are much, much bigger, greater than what the "normal" human in our society conceives themselves to be. The only way to overcome the power of the archetypal evil in us is to find something greater in us that's positive.

This is ultimately the reason why it's so important to begin to find your HM. And to consciously, actively put it in antithesis to your ego, so that it strongly overshadows the ego. Once you do, the super-forces of good in you and coming through you will become stronger than those of evil, that manipulate you through the ego.

Otherwise, forces which are or seem Demonic may take root in a person -- as I take it the Horus-Ra thread attests. On the other hand, positive forces of and for good can come to "possess" a person. But these do it with the person's full cooperation and choice. That's ultimately where we all should aspire to be, I suggest.

By the way, it isn't absolutely necessary to learn to "talk" to your HM or hear it "talk" to you, the way NancyV or sirdipswitch or, presumably, powessy do. You can bypass that stage and go directly into receiving fragments from the Divine Mind, which is at a far higher level of consciousness than the HM.

In my (probably) next post I'd like to talk yet again about intuition. In the light of this post, I trust it'll now be clear that cultivating the intuition is in fact to cultivate a truly gigantic Force for good in your life.

[TraineeHuman]

In this thread I've very frequently referred to the importance of constant self-watching, including staying right in touch with whatever you feel inside you at each moment. Once you're able to do that all the time, you've indeed united with your HM at least, and any suffering or unhappiness in your life eventually becomes lighter and lighter. And as I've said before, I'm not exaggerating when I say "all the time", until it becomes normal to you. But it's not a "practice", not a chore at all, like some sort of homework. It's not about effort, but about letting go of effort and using something far subtler -- though you do initially use some will, and later a much subtler form of (Higher) will. Constant self-watching is a way of being (more) truly alive and awake. It's also a very important component, if not the most important one, in eventually getting into permanent union with your HM. There's a video in the recent thread
https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...l=1#post766153
which explains various aspects of how to do proper self-watching extremely well and easily.

Kiran also ties this in extremely well with what I've talked about as feeling the aliveness. Also with what we've said earlier in this thread about the crucial importance of self-acceptance, unconditional self-liking, and self-forgiveness. In this video these and some other "spiritual" "practices" we've mentioned are explained in ways that hopefully will give you insights into many of the most important issues. And Kiran reminds us that it all brings greater fun, or as I would say, it eventually brings huge bliss, even if it may mean sacrificing some pleasures or comfort zones in exchange for that bliss.

She also often makes it clear that these sorts of practices, and meditation, aren't stodgy, tight-assed "disciplines" primarily, even though I guess it's true that a certain amount of self-discipline and self-denial is involved. But it's not the main thing in the foreground, and it's also in some ways the opposite both of stodginess and of flakiness.

[TraineeHuman]

Intuition doesn't work accurately if you haven't deconstructed and defused most of the ego's action. Until that time, the ego is the point from where the very powerful negative Forces mentioned in my second last post have leverage over you. The easiest way I know to contact the very powerful positive Forces is through intensive meditation. These positive Forces strengthen the true intuition.

In my own experience of meditation, what happens is that I go deeper and deeper into a stillness that seems to be so very much "nothing" that it goes way beyond time and form and then even beyond the subject/object distinction. OB to the highest levels, if you like. All distinctions collapse, except that the seeming emptiness that is left turns out to be the true "I". The totality of creation and life could be wiped out and extinguished, and this true "I" is still very contentedly there. Nothing else is as certain. To me, intuition is a type of aftertaste of that, which I bring into my life in the physical and into my life in levels only slightly above it. It's part of the gigantically great joy of the true "I" reaching into the lower world we live in.

In addition to strengthening the positive, though, we need to defuse the negative. The two areas of work are mostly not reciprocal. After I first experienced Source fully at sixteen, it was particularly harrowing for me to handle the demands of "normal" social interaction. As a result, for two decades I was exceptionally nervous and stressed on the outside while hugely at ease and at peace on the inside. I was outwardly nervous because couldn't everyone see how insane and petty so much of what they considered normal life actually was? When I did psychological tests at that time, the scores I got suggested I wasn't neurotic, unlike the scores of most of the population. But there is a special kind of suffering in adjusting to not living in suffering within yourself and yet playing the game of normal/ordinary. Witness Kiran's suffering, in the video above, after going fully into Source and then immediately after, when she returned to the world of the physical body and society. It took about three decades before I began to learn how to play the normal/ordinary game and outwardly demonstrate the gigantic ease which had always been there deeper inside since my first experience of Source. One day I hope to bring the profound peace down into the physical so fully that, I'd like to hope, wherever I go people will somehow feel a strong peace in the air.

When intuition works without the interference of the ego, it's like a light, like lightning, that flashes on and puts us in strict sight of, or direct contact with, the truth. This is a more direct knowledge than that from the senses or the mind. For a long time of working with intuition, it comes to us only in flashes, with darkness all around. Please note: it is we who must become broader and grow bigger, in order to be able to receive it less partially. Becoming broader in this sense can enable an individual to bypass the need for various reincarnations. Those would have been needed to make that individual's consciousness more rounded, more fulfilled.

Especially we need to open up our inner part, and make it much better at listening and receiving. Again, the need for solid, intensive meditation, plus practice practice of exercises, such as all the exercises I've described in this thread. Can we be big enough inside to receive the whole universe? And then, to hold that realization while learning to keep our feet on the ground? Can you swallow an elephant?

[TraineeHuman]

It occurs to me that some members may not have had any or much serious "training" in the basics of meditation. I'd like to recommend the following videos to any such members:
http://www.adyashanti.org/cafedharma...php?file=video

Here adyashanti explains how the essence of Stillness is "allowing everything to be just as it is". This was also what the Buddha used as the primary instruction for what the basis of meditation is. You'll also find it in videos by anyone coming basically from the Advaita Vedanta tradition, such as Andrew Cohen, for instance. "Allowing everything to be exactly what it is" takes some trial-and-error practice for most people.

Actually, feeling the aliveness in you is another way to get into Stillness too, but it's best just to do one or the other -- and not worry about thinking about them.

[TraineeHuman]

There's an interesting view on why astral projection/travel/bilocation is difficult for most people in part of the material in pumashared's thread in General Discussion entitled: Your opinion? The Revelations of an Elite Family Insider (2005). The document containing Insider's replies to questions that pumashared links to is:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/403303/The...y-Insider-2005

The two excerpts from Insider's comments are as follows.
Insider: "The [physical] body [consciousness] forces you to experience empathy, hate, remorse and all other emotions, together with desires and passions, to confuse you, make you forget yourself, become a dumbed-down version of yourself. They have their foundation in this material/physical world. The more you let them be your masters, the stronger you will chain yourself to this world, which is contrary to your duty, yet do not loath them, respect. I channel them to a place where they can be used for something substantial."

"... your physical body ... rebels every time you reach higher to that realm. Physical body has the task to let you experience this reality and whenever you search for the other, it resists. It is it´s duty so respecting it and gently taming it is the best approach. Also beings will accompany your thoughts and try to divert them, again it is their duty, show respect and that will be recognised by them. Never see them as malicious or evil, they only react to your actions. There is not a force which does not want you to be what you really are, the opposite is true but they also have their tasks that they must fulfill. This is about a material part of you."

I see the first excerpt as referring to the ego -- which is always strongly attached to the physical body and also to a physical-mind image of oneself. The second excerpt is also about the ego and how it can attract "hostile" or deceptive entities or beings who can't actually harm you unless you let yourself be conned into believing they can -- and then, through your power, maybe they can.

Does anyone have any comments or reflections?

I have almost always preferred to enter the astral or mental worlds from above (e.g. from deep meditation), and not from the physical which is below (though very intertwined with these). That way, I'm entering from a space of Silence that, initially at least, is beyond the ego, and therefore not subjected to the above difficulties.

[TraineeHuman]

The Upanishads are full of verses that talk about Oneness in various ways. The following extract from near the beginning of the Maitri Upanishad asserts that the only real intelligent/aware being that inhabits the physical body is "eternal, unborn" and so on -- which amounts to them being the Higher Self/Mind at the very least. If this is true (and I claim to know it is), that casts a whole different light on who/what it really is that goes traveling beyond the body. Here's the extract from the Maitri Upanishad:

Now, the Vālakhilyas are reputed as free from evil, of resplendent glory, living in chastity. Now, they said to Kratu Prajāpati : “Sir, this body is like a cart without intelligence (a-cetana). To what supersensuous being, we ask, belongs such power whereby this sort of thing is set up in the possession of this sort of intelligence? Or, in other words, who is its driver? Sir, tell us what you know!”

Then he said to them:—

“He, assuredly, indeed, who is reputed as standing aloof, like those who, among qualities, abstain from interaction with them—He, verily, is pure, clean, void, tranquil, breathless, selfless, endless, undecaying, steadfast, eternal, unborn, independent. He abides in his own greatness. By him this body is set up in possession of intelligence; or, in other words, this very one, in fact, is its driver.”

Then they said: “Sir, how by this kind of indifferent being is this sort of thing set up in possession of intelligence? Or, in other words, how is this one its driver?”

Then he said to them:—

"Every truly awakened person is a partial individuation of the supersensuous, self-limiting Person. Verily, that subtle, ungraspable, invisible one, called the Person, takes up residence here [in the body] with a part [of himself] without there being any previous awareness [other than his], even as the awakening of a sleeper takes place without there being any previous awareness."

[jtcribbs]

Hi Gekko, most of my lucid activity is also on that intermediate stage between waking and coming out of deep sleep in early morning. I'm getting more a sense that our higher bodies, astral bodies and higher, basically need a "recharging" for most of the overnight and then coming out of that waking consciousness can basically turn back on. What happens as people develop great skill at OBE appears to be them gaining that waking consciousness in their astral body before they manage to gain waking consciousness in their physical body...

It's important to lay down to sleep with intent at the start of the night and often you find later your waking consciousness in lucid dream then doing what you intended to do at the start of the night. As if the memory of that holds, the bodies get a recharging, and waking consciousness turns back on right where it was thinking...

[TraineeHuman]

Posted by jtcribbs (here)
Hi Gekko, most of my lucid activity is also on that intermediate stage between waking and coming out of deep sleep in early morning. I'm getting more a sense that our higher bodies, astral bodies and higher, basically need a "recharging" for most of the overnight and then coming out of that waking consciousness can basically turn back on. What happens as people develop great skill at OBE appears to be them gaining that waking consciousness in their astral body before they manage to gain waking consciousness in their physical body...

It's important to lay down to sleep with intent at the start of the night and often you find later your waking consciousness in lucid dream then doing what you intended to do at the start of the night. As if the memory of that holds, the bodies get a recharging, and waking consciousness turns back on right where it was thinking...

Yes, indeed. I agree completely. When we sleep we re-energize ourselves. More specifically, we go through a certain cycle of states. One of these is that of deep sleep. This is when the physical body does virtually all its self-healing, and probably when most of our psychological/emotional healing occurs also. During deep sleep, our brain operates with delta waves -- slow, extremely low frequency waves. Of course, the brain is not the mind or the consciousness (the HM). But when people are awake, usually the only ones who manage to experience delta waves are very experienced meditators. Also, there are studies that suggest that the most effective psychic healers are individuals who can drop into delta (while awake) within a matter of minutes, and that they do their healing while in that state -- which is a state of full connection with the HM and probably, I expect, of connection with the Divine Mind.

By the way, whenever a person dreams their brain waves become what are known as theta waves. These are not as deep or slow as delta waves, but they're the second slowest type of brain waves.

I'll make a post shortly saying more about the relationship between the consciousness and the energy bodies, and the effects of this on our daily life, both waking and sleeping.