The Differences between OBEs far from and close to the Body

Differences between Obes far from and close to Body

States close to the physical body	States far from the physical body
Occult term for subtle body: ‘etheric body’	Occult term for subtle body: ‘astral body’
The separation process is experienced consciously (often one is pulled back to the physical body again and again)	The separation process is not experienced consciously (one is ‘in the middle of the scene’ all of a sudden)
The OBE is entered tactilely (via body perception)	The OBE is entered visually
Duration: often very short only lasting few minutes	Long-lasting OBEs, from minutes up to hours (possibly with several waking phases in between)
Body sensation: heavy floating or flying not or hardly possible	Body sensation: light floating and flying possible
Mostly no vision (wrapped in blackness)	Very detailed, vivid and colorful vision
Matter cannot or hardly be penetrated	Matter can be penetrated easily
Emotions ‘normal’ like in everyday life	Emotional, often euphoric
The surroundings near the body seem to be the same as in the physical	Unknown environment, sometimes strange places, seeming like another world or time
When coming to a distance from about 5-50 meters from the physical body, the state changes to ‘astral state’ - it is possible to see, the body feels lighter etc. (or being pulled back into the physical body through the silver cord)	One stays in the astral body, never change to etheric state
When concentrating on seeing, the state can change to astral state	When concentrating on the body, one still stays in the astral state

Especially in medicine, there exists the opinion that all these happenings are occurring in our brains in a dream-like way. Representatives of dream research and of occult sciences are attacking each other with different arguments, but without any result. It is a battle between paradigms, as it is the case in many other ideological areas. However, sleep research – where this phenomenon is classified as lucid dream (LD) – has done very good science and provided methods with which a communication between test person and control person can be achieved. This works via eye movements which are performed in a manner agreed on before – mostly Yes/No answers (up/down and right/left movement of the eyes).