I'm going to keep this short.
I had my first *real* out of body experience the other night.
I have had countless lucid dreams in the past and this wasn't anything like it.
It happened right after I initially laid down to go to bed. I fell into the gap between wake and sleep (like I have done many times). Typically this is a terrifying sleep paralysis state that I try my damnedest to get out of. Well the other night I felt the sensations coming and and I knew I was about to fall into the gap, but this time I went into a vipassana like meditation and just observed the sensations in my body...this helps one deal with the thoughts in the mind as all thoughts are reflected back as sensation in the body...
When I feel into the gap the most amazing energy (I will call it kundalini) lit up my nervous system and I was able to push this energy all around my body. Once I was able to feel the sensations clearly all traces of fear vanished. The euphoria was intense.. Extreme surges of energy in my entire nervous system. Perhaps it was just extreme or hyper awareness of the sensations..who knows. I only know I was very aware of being in this state.
What happened next was reality shattering. I sat up out of my body and got out of bed and looked back down at mine and my wives sleeping bodies. I noticed my body was breathing in a highly agitated way so I set the intention to calm the breath and I watched as my physical body began to calm down. I was then able to move around my house and observe things in their location (which I confirmed a few minutes later). I was also able to move through walls and fly around much like a lucid dream. UNLIKE the lucid dreams however this reality was completely normal. Things didn't waver when I looked at them. It was my normal reality and I was in a state of non local consciousness...as best I can tell. After a few minutes of this I was so excited about what was happening I wanted to wake back up for real and tell my wife about it... I stood next to my body and wondered how I would get back in...which apparently was enough to bring my back into my body and then I sat up in bed for real. Never lost consciousness once in this entire experience.
Now obviously I can't prove this. I'm a scientist and I'll be the first to say it *could* have been nothing but a dream like state. Sure my subconscious mind could have remembered things about items in the house that I consciously forgot. However, the sensations were so overwhelmingly real that I'm forced to look past skepticism.
At this time I am moving from the skeptical corner to the believer in the making corner. I have fallen into the gap many times and I'm certain I will get the opportunity to do this many times again in the coming months. I'm going to set up a real test involving my wife placing a hidden object in a location and then see if I can verify this...this should circumvent the subconscious explanation.
Also, we have both been clean and sober (totally) for several weeks now. One side effect of this is that REM sleep has jumped significantly with us stopping cannabis. This however wasn't like a lucid dream and my substance use has never effected me falling into the gap between wake and sleep before though it has effected my dreams and dream recall. I only mention this so more 'data' is on the table.
After the event I didn't sleep the entire night because I was so excited. the euphoria continued into the next day..and could just be a side effect of the excitement of the event.
Peace
I had my first *real* out of body experience the other night.
I have had countless lucid dreams in the past and this wasn't anything like it.
It happened right after I initially laid down to go to bed. I fell into the gap between wake and sleep (like I have done many times). Typically this is a terrifying sleep paralysis state that I try my damnedest to get out of. Well the other night I felt the sensations coming and and I knew I was about to fall into the gap, but this time I went into a vipassana like meditation and just observed the sensations in my body...this helps one deal with the thoughts in the mind as all thoughts are reflected back as sensation in the body...
When I feel into the gap the most amazing energy (I will call it kundalini) lit up my nervous system and I was able to push this energy all around my body. Once I was able to feel the sensations clearly all traces of fear vanished. The euphoria was intense.. Extreme surges of energy in my entire nervous system. Perhaps it was just extreme or hyper awareness of the sensations..who knows. I only know I was very aware of being in this state.
What happened next was reality shattering. I sat up out of my body and got out of bed and looked back down at mine and my wives sleeping bodies. I noticed my body was breathing in a highly agitated way so I set the intention to calm the breath and I watched as my physical body began to calm down. I was then able to move around my house and observe things in their location (which I confirmed a few minutes later). I was also able to move through walls and fly around much like a lucid dream. UNLIKE the lucid dreams however this reality was completely normal. Things didn't waver when I looked at them. It was my normal reality and I was in a state of non local consciousness...as best I can tell. After a few minutes of this I was so excited about what was happening I wanted to wake back up for real and tell my wife about it... I stood next to my body and wondered how I would get back in...which apparently was enough to bring my back into my body and then I sat up in bed for real. Never lost consciousness once in this entire experience.
Now obviously I can't prove this. I'm a scientist and I'll be the first to say it *could* have been nothing but a dream like state. Sure my subconscious mind could have remembered things about items in the house that I consciously forgot. However, the sensations were so overwhelmingly real that I'm forced to look past skepticism.
At this time I am moving from the skeptical corner to the believer in the making corner. I have fallen into the gap many times and I'm certain I will get the opportunity to do this many times again in the coming months. I'm going to set up a real test involving my wife placing a hidden object in a location and then see if I can verify this...this should circumvent the subconscious explanation.
Also, we have both been clean and sober (totally) for several weeks now. One side effect of this is that REM sleep has jumped significantly with us stopping cannabis. This however wasn't like a lucid dream and my substance use has never effected me falling into the gap between wake and sleep before though it has effected my dreams and dream recall. I only mention this so more 'data' is on the table.
After the event I didn't sleep the entire night because I was so excited. the euphoria continued into the next day..and could just be a side effect of the excitement of the event.
Peace