11-25-2024, 04:45 PM
When I was 18, in 1976, I read Robert Monroe's book entitled "Astral Projection". I followed his guidestones and works about electric dreams and levitating out of one's body. He warned of malevolent entities that one might encounter, and even cautioned that some of those entities could attack and prevent the reunion of your spirit (if that's what you choose to call it) and your body.
Well. That last bit frightened the shit out of me, so I was reluctant to advance my OOBE experiences. I read more of Mr. Monroe's works, and discovered there were self-enforcing procedures a person could practice to fortify their defences when travelling outside the body. So, for quite a while, I engaged the electric dreams and lifted out and then practiced the power field which Monroe espoused.
Around this time, I started to experience what is now called "Sleep Paralysis". I didn't know this term then. I felt that malevolent entities were attacking me in the fine border between sleep and wakefulness, and I was frightened to the point where I would get up from bed whenever the thrumming of energies up and down my body indicated the electric dreams and OOBE was soon to happen. I had many nights of little sleep, but, hey, I was young; sometimes I did that on purpose. I wondered if I was being abducted by aliens.
I consulted a shaman. I was living in Venice, California at the time. The shaman looked the part, and didn't charge much and had good pot. He set me upon a series of mental exercises that I would perform at night when I was in that cusp between wakefulness and sleep. This went on for several months. As I "progressed" the shaman began encouraging me to go all in with the OOBE. Just to let it buck, that I had enough skill and defensive weapons. I started doing that. I continue to have occasional "sleep paralysis" events. A colleague of mine assured me that if I prayed, that the disruptions would cease, that they were demonic in nature. This man was in a physics class with me. He set me on the course of reconciling science with religion, and to this day, I believe that they are compatible, just using different language to describe similar phenomenon.
I was and still am fairly spiritual, but I didn't want to pray and wipe the slate clean. I thought there was experience in the mist that was important, that needed exploring and documenting.
Since then, I have fully immersed in the "electric dreams/sleep paralysis" and it no longer frightens me. I don't know what I think it is. Part of me considers it to be an aberration of the subconscious, and the other side believes that it just might occasionally tap into the unmeasurable void. Just occasionally now, I fly. It is painless and without fear. I still don't choose it; sometimes it just happens, for no reason that I can measure or understand.
Well. That last bit frightened the shit out of me, so I was reluctant to advance my OOBE experiences. I read more of Mr. Monroe's works, and discovered there were self-enforcing procedures a person could practice to fortify their defences when travelling outside the body. So, for quite a while, I engaged the electric dreams and lifted out and then practiced the power field which Monroe espoused.
Around this time, I started to experience what is now called "Sleep Paralysis". I didn't know this term then. I felt that malevolent entities were attacking me in the fine border between sleep and wakefulness, and I was frightened to the point where I would get up from bed whenever the thrumming of energies up and down my body indicated the electric dreams and OOBE was soon to happen. I had many nights of little sleep, but, hey, I was young; sometimes I did that on purpose. I wondered if I was being abducted by aliens.
I consulted a shaman. I was living in Venice, California at the time. The shaman looked the part, and didn't charge much and had good pot. He set me upon a series of mental exercises that I would perform at night when I was in that cusp between wakefulness and sleep. This went on for several months. As I "progressed" the shaman began encouraging me to go all in with the OOBE. Just to let it buck, that I had enough skill and defensive weapons. I started doing that. I continue to have occasional "sleep paralysis" events. A colleague of mine assured me that if I prayed, that the disruptions would cease, that they were demonic in nature. This man was in a physics class with me. He set me on the course of reconciling science with religion, and to this day, I believe that they are compatible, just using different language to describe similar phenomenon.
I was and still am fairly spiritual, but I didn't want to pray and wipe the slate clean. I thought there was experience in the mist that was important, that needed exploring and documenting.
Since then, I have fully immersed in the "electric dreams/sleep paralysis" and it no longer frightens me. I don't know what I think it is. Part of me considers it to be an aberration of the subconscious, and the other side believes that it just might occasionally tap into the unmeasurable void. Just occasionally now, I fly. It is painless and without fear. I still don't choose it; sometimes it just happens, for no reason that I can measure or understand.
