Described as similar to taking a vacation while not leaving one’s home, astral projection is an intentional technique by which the person achieves an out-of-body experience (OBE). This transient experience involves the self seeming to become separated from the body and viewing the body from an elevated perspective. In many cases, intentional OBE experiences have an additional characteristic of enabling the self to travel far distances, seemingly across the globe or universe.
The term “astral projection,” within the Western esoteric tradition, describes such a purposeful OBE by counterpoising the astral body, or human consciousness or soul, with the temporal body. It derives from the 19th-century mystical traditions of theosophy, which claim that people have seven bodies ranging from the lowest physical to the higher mental and spiritual bodies. At this apex is the astral body, which separates from the physical and voyages across vast interior realms.
The spiritual element, commingled with a sense of weightlessness and elevated consciousness, invites introspection and a search for deeper meaning. Through astral projection, people seek out places they could not ordinarily visit and sometimes commune with nonphysical entities ranging from spirits and gods to those who have departed life on earth. In other instances, astral projection is simply an opportunity to expand consciousness and attain personal growth that can be used to inform thoughts and actions in the physical plane.
Astral projection is considered relatively safe, given the intentional way it is pursued. This differs from unintentional OBE, such as near-death experiences, which can leave people with a disempowering sense of lacking authority over one’s mind and body.
One professional healer who utilizes the intentional OBE as a technique with patients describes astral projection as occurring through an astral cord, or a light-filled tube that extends from the third chakra, or human solar plexus (upper abdomen), to the soul, or third chakra. This connection is similar to how mothers connect with developing infants via an umbilical cord. Envisioning this cord and connection in a relaxed state of meditation allows her patients to extend out of their body into the astral plane, where “all consciousness resides.”
A related technique involves focusing inwardly on the various parts of the body, from the feet to the head, to access the multiple chakras they represent. This engenders an enfolding sense of bodily relaxation. Visualizing one’s surrounding space in great detail, awareness centers on the third eye or the space between the eyebrows. Fixating on a specific point in the room, in detail, a visual of oneself as an element often appears as the spirit begins its journey.
Alternatively, a rope can be visualized from a ceiling, which is used metaphysically to pull oneself out of their body. As one starts to project, the sense of release from stress and weightlessness enables one to see things in one’s subjective life from new viewpoints and often to work out and resolve traumas from the past.
As with any activity, astral projection is a technique that experienced practitioners become adept at navigating. Exploring with complete curiosity and no expectations is possible and equally possible to return to specific destinations in one’s out-of-body travels.
Brent Fouch's Wordpress Blog 