About What to Expect when Leaving the Body (FAQ)

What can you expect when leaving the Body?

Is it possible that another spirit/core occupies my physical body while I am "travelling" through the "astral world"?

It's not possible that a spirit occupies your body while you are away on astral travel. You have the same protection as you have during sleep – while asleep, to a certain degree your body is left alone as well, because you have no control over your consciousness; nevertheless you are not endangered.

Why does the room and house I was originally in change?

Because you have no physical sight. Because of the fact that you rolled or floated or stepped out of your body, you have the impression that you are still close to the physical body. But it’s not as easy as that – perhaps you are close to the physical, but nevertheless in another dimension (or however you may call that). Instead of still moving in the material surroundings, as you have the vivid impression, you are in fact moving in an astral reproduction of your room, a kind of astral layer which penetrates the physical counterpart.

Why does the outside area change?

The outside area changes because you are moving in an astral counterpart as told above. But I want to point out an additional and interesting fact:
Your outside area does not change continuously, but it changes in steps. Everytime you pass a threshold, your surroundings change in the range of "only a bit" up to "dramatically". Let me just explain what I understand by the term "threshold". A threshold is something which prevents you from having a sight of what is coming behind, like a door, the corner of a wall or a building, a street crossing etc. This ‘changing by steps’ seems to be the result of a psychic law. Using this law, you even can realize a wish to arrive at a special place – by means of imagining this location behind the threshold in front of you. In doing this, you have a chance to approach your desired location.

Do astral people ignore me?

"Why, if I am astral travelling and none should be able to be aware of my presence, are people aware of me … but not quick to give me information … even when I am polite and start with an ‘excuse me’?"

I did not understand your question quite well, I fear, but let me suppose you mean the astral people there. There are different astral planes:

In the worlds of the deceased, these people would react immediately if you speak to them, I had never such problems at these planes.

Further are existing such planes like "dream planes" or "near-earth planes", as I like to call them (no terminology is existing relating to that). These planes are crowded by people who are astral travelling unconsciously. They are all absent minded. They have their own dreamlike thoughts. If you speak to them and if they react, then they usually perceive you as an "actor" of their inner dream movie and you get an answer that seems confusing (everything which surrounds them, people and environment alike, is woven into their inner dream world in which they are absorbed – this is the same thing which happens to us if we are at the astral plane in an unconscious, dreamlike state).

I recommend you to observe this aspect for the next time you are experiencing an OBE. In addition to my respond, I recommend you to read the article: Dream Planes.

Astral mirror

...But what surprised me and scared me was when I looked in the mirror. What I saw was a being that looked similar to myself, however, it looked like what I believe an alien would look like (if you have ever seen The movie Cocoon, it looked like the aliens in that). It was mysteriously beautiful but looked sad. If I had anything else to compare it to I’d probably say that it looked sick. I have a strange phobia for aliens – dont ask – anyway, that’s why I was frightened. I then jumped back in my body and woke up.

Is what I experienced natural? What should your astral being look like in the mirror? And any advice you might have would be helpful.

What you saw is natural – in an astral mirror you can see whatever your subconscious likes at that moment. To explore: next time when looking into the astral mirror, change the appearance of your face willfully and see what happens in the mirror.

Note: what is a mirror in the physical sense? It's an object that reflects light (light understood as photons). In the astral world, you have no objects which can reflect anything in the physical sense – any reflection is constructed by imagination. In the astral world you have no photons and no light in the physical sense – thus, there is nothing which can be reflected. Everything there on the astral plane is an expression of the collective and individual consciousness and light is an expression of (inner) power which is inherent to the plane or to your state (plane and state attract each other due to the law of ‘like attracts like’ and, therefore, are identical). From the latter point of view, your astral projection was a great success! (see: Influences on your Surroundings and Materialisations)

Fascinating old streets ...

"… It fascinated me when it happened because the street seemed to be very old and just simply another place, almost like looking into another dimension."

Yes, that is the fantastic in astral travelling and that makes it a great adventure; much more interesting than a movie, because you can decide the direction where to go and you don't know what could be there at the next corner – and everything is radiating a kind of emotion or aura, every building seems saturated and penetrated with an individual character (the source is the inhabitants) and its history and purpose – every stone is telling you a lot …

Can you tell me more about the dangers? - Psychological rules

"You mention a few times on your site about the dangers that are ‘possible’ with an etheric OBE. I am curious to get specifics on what exactly these dangers are so that I can watch for them. Don't get me wrong, I totally plan on being calm and controlled if/ when I achieve an OBE, but on your site you don't give specifics on what the dangers are. So that if I AM in danger I will know it and not confuse it with being ‘frightened’. I have a little fear of the unknown, but I am fully aware and confident I can overcome any fear I have with my curiosity and commitment. If you could get back to me I would appreciate it."

If you start your OBEs, you enter a world which is ruled by psychologic features. In your case, you would enter the state and remember: "Alfred has told me that … could happen". And whoosh, this event or thing or whatever it should be would sit on your neck – you have attracted it by your own imagination!!! For that reason, it is wise to let it run its natural way and not to interfere.

Soul organs

"I'm blind, and haven't experienced a total OBE yet, but do have false awakenings quite often. My question is: Would I be able to see if and when I do ‘leave’ my physical body? I was sighted for most of my life, and dream in full color. I'm not sure if that will help though. Does the soul leave blindness behind when it wanders?"

False awakening is a kind of OBE, though yet unconscious. If you are in false awakening you can astral project by looking through your forehead – it works better than looking with the eyes – this applies for everyone. There is no doubt that you will see. When OBEing, you will see. It seems to be clear that your soul is not used to blindness but it is seeing.

For the soul, the ability of seeing or not seeing is no fact of body defect, because a soul does not have organs like the physical body (and thus, it cannot have ‘physical’ defects) – a limping soul body, for instance, is limping for psychic reasons or because the soul has become used to do so (but in this case, this will change in a short time) and the soul never limps because of a defect of the feet.

There is only one version of OBE, namely leaving the physical with the etheric body, in which everyone, not you alone, is veiled in blackness, at least up to a certain distance from the physical body. After a distance that varies individually, sight is coming by itself.

Was this my guide or a good-minded spirit?

"The first time I tried it, having gained the use of my astral eyes, I found a man in a hood next to the bed; he asked if I wanted to come out but I panicked at the sight of him. Do you think this was my guide?"

As to the man in the hood – it's impossible to classify such a spirit, because the appearance is of minor importance and can be easily changed willfully by a spirit. To be sure about that, you have to come to a telepathic/ empathic contact with the spirit (that's the only way to find out about the real qualities of a spirit).

Different kinds of astral visual perception

Different or similar kinds of astral visual perception may be used in OBEs. But such variable kinds of perception don’t have to be used in OBEs and mostly are not used, because many features in OBEs are based on physical world imitation (for instance having legs and moving with them, our appearance – we could have the appearance of bodiless spheres as well – and so on).

Some different kinds of astral sight are:

seeing a far distant object nearby or "zooming in"
seeing structures in unusually clear contrast to its substructures
seeing through walls or through the ground (seeing there lower astral planes or locations)
facing a person that is not present

Maybe there are still some additional forms which do not come to my mind at the moment. Of course there are as well different forms of thought and emotion reception as well.

Unable to pass a door or window glass

"… when I exit my body I try to leave the house and find that I am unable to, I will float around the room, and ‘feel’ my way around. Once I tried to exit out my bedroom window, I could feel the coldness of the window, and it felt solid to me, yet I was expecting to glide right through it, but I was unable to do this. Is this normal?"

If you have a "dense" astral body – which means an astral body filled and surrounded by etheric matter (which belongs to the physical body and is the basis for mediumistic phenomena) – well, if you have such a dense body you can not pass walls, the door, the window etc. There is a trick: open the window or the door in the conventional way. A second hint: do not jump out of the window – very often, this has a waking effect (because of the fear of falling down) and this would break your OBE.

Already awake but still having a perception that is fading away

"One last thing I wanted to mention, once while attempting to leave the body I was jolted awake by my dog jumping onto the bed, I opened my eyes to see a portal floating right in front of me, inside was the most beautiful landscape I have ever seen, vibrant colors, waterfall, lush greenery, it was beautiful!! As I awakened, it slowly faded away, have you ever heard of this type of experience before?"

Yes, I have heard and experienced that the astral excursion is fading away slowly while being "back awake". This "fading away" kind of astral presence can be:

A feeling of still being at the astral place (you mostly see blackness but still have the feeling of being bodily present at the previous astral location). When you avoid moving, you can be able to restart your astral excursion by intensifying this feeling.
A fading sight, as you have described it (in your case it was tunnel-like, as I got the impression, but it can be as well in form of fading colors and become more and more foggy).
An acoustic echo. You are awake but still hear the birds singing, or you hear some voices (do not mix this state with "hearing voices").

What is magic power?

Magic power is the ability to influence the cosmic flow of destiny qualities (in yoga called tattwa) by means of inner purity, mental control and action control and by means of auric light radiation.

Why to attempt AP, I don’t appreciate scary astral travels!

Most of the OBEs are beautiful, some are adventurous. This depends on your inner vibrations (= auric/ psychic state). Commonly, no one has such astral travels if he or she is not ready – or in other terms: strong enough, because to let the traveller master some obstacles is intended by the guides, in order to make the OBEer stronger and wiser.