Formation and Quality of the Astral Body

There is one aspect of the astral body that is little known. One may think that there is only one ‘static’ astral body, which stays unchanged just like our physical body. However, this is not the case. The astral body is formed spontaneously – that means, its quality is subject to change and depends on the person’s actual inner state.

Let me explain further: there is a reason why the astral body is also called ‘emotional body’ or ‘body of desire’ (cf. Leadbeater) – it is very closely related to our emotions, wishes and fears. In the article Influences on your Surroundings you can read about how easily astral matter responds to our emotions and thoughts. The same applies to the astral body itself: every emotion, every thought, fear or wish has a certain quality (= auric vibe/ radiation). Our astral body adopts the quality that is dominating in our actual thoughts, emotions and not to forget our inner attitude. There is a complex interaction between our psyche and emotions, energies, chakras and the aura (astral aura = astral body) and they influence each other. It may depend on the situation which aspect is decisive for the dominating quality.

This fact is closely connected to the golden rule of "like attracts like": the auric vibe your astral body adopts when separating is decisive for the kind of places and beings you are able to encounter. You will automatically attract beings or planes of a similar quality. That’s the reason why OBEs tend to be in very dull and sometimes negative places when you are in a low psychic/ emotional state, but in a higher state you are more likely to encounter evolved beings and friendly places.

The experiences below may serve to get an idea of this pattern.

"Some time ago, I often used to be in a very ‘intellectual mood’, where I felt a painful lack of depth and emotion in my life, but this was due to the lot of theoretic work for university I had to do at that time. However, I was with this intellectual attitude when having an OBE in one night. I found myself in an unknown building, there were lots of students. I went out of the building to see how it looked like from outside. Somehow I knew that this was a kind of famous university, the building looked quite pompous and had a shimmering cupola roof. The landscape around was very nice and it was bright and colorful, but somehow the atmosphere was dull. It was without any feelings. I wondered why there could be such a wonderful looking place without any emotion, how it could be possible for me to have an OBE where everything was so detailed and nice, but it just didn’t stir anything inside of me. I talked with some students and they said that they learned a lot here and that they also helped people on earth with science research and new developments, but I knew inside that this help was rather confined to only the scientific and technological view, there was no spirituality there. I concluded that my ‘intellectual state’ had driven me there and I was not so pleased about it, although the experience was interesting nevertheless."

"There were some times when I suffered deeply from fears. When falling asleep with these fears and having OBEs afterwards, it was horrible for me. I mostly was confined to close-to-body experiences then, the atmosphere around me seemed to be filled with fear and unrest. I often was chased by beings that tried to touch me, and I just had such a fear of being touched by them. It was as I had been chased by my own personified fears, or maybe they were spirit beings or psychogons, but I can’t say that for sure because in these states I hardly was calm and conscious enough to make sure what they were."

"After waking up from a promising dream, I felt very calm and full of love and faith. With these feelings, I fell asleep again. I ‘woke up’ in my room again, and I knew I was in an OBE state, although I hadn’t experienced the separation consciously. There was a women at my home – it was as if she had come to visit me. She was very kind and understanding to me (I had had some problems at that time) and we talked together. Then, as if she was to reveal something, she suddendly showed me a hidden door in my corridor that had been invisible before. This door was made of dark wood, with wonderful ornaments, and it radiated a very special and mystical aura. I was wondering why I never had found this hidden door before. I asked the woman for permission and then I opened the door, and there was a completely different place behind this door. It was the inside of an old, high building, with wooden doors and ornaments and a warm light everywhere, although it was quite dark there, but not negative in any way. I clearly felt that I knew this place, the aura was familiar to me and it was very ancient and sublime. I don’t remember what happened after this, I just know I asked the woman if I could get the key for this door so as to visit this place again. I don’t know if she gave it to me, I just was sure that I had to visit this mystical building again – and indeed, there were several OBEs after this experience where I had the chance again to step through this secret door. Interestingly, I was only able to open and pass the door when being in a positive and deep state – if I was in negative or dull states and tried to open the door, there never was a positive place behind the door or it would not open or appear at all."

Considering this, it is adviseable to watch your emotional state when trying to start an OBE. I think it is wise to avoid inducing OBEs willfully when being in negative emotional arousal, it’s better to come back to a ‘normal’ state first. On the other hand, meditation and ‘positive emotionalisation’ tend to have positive effects on our OBEs.

When being in a half-conscious or unconscious astral state, there are different aspects which can control our astral body. It can be, for instance, our subconscious: if there is a subconscious – and maybe suppressed – wish inside of us, in an unconscious or half-conscious OBE our astral body can be controlled by this subconscious wish so as to fulfill this desire. There are also other cases when the astral body seems to be controlled by a higher, knowing part of oneself. In such cases, you are half-conscious, but somehow you know where to go and what to do, although your ‘normal self’ hasn’t any clue of what it’s doing.

There is a theory about another astral body that is called the "higher astral". According to this theory, this "higher astral" is totally independent from our conscious self and instead, it can be seen as a higher existence of ourselves on a higher plane – thus, it is not formed spontaneously and dependent on our psyche like the lower astral.