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Post by snowballrox on Nov 4, 2008 11:03:09 GMT -5
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innerfire
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--Unknown--
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Post by innerfire on Nov 4, 2008 13:05:23 GMT -5
I'm not too versed on AP to say for sure, but I do know off hand that in general, most of Skywind's stuff (the first link you posted) is fairly legitimate. I'd wait on what others who know more about what they're talking about say first though.
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Post by leodragon on Nov 4, 2008 16:55:56 GMT -5
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Post by snowballrox on Nov 4, 2008 17:51:01 GMT -5
What I want to know is it realistic, can other people go with me, and can I design it the way I want it?
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The Devil's Advocate
Author
Respected Member I will deflate your theories and claims with ye olde pointy stick of logic.
Est autem fides credere quod nondum vides; cuius fidei merces est videre quod credis.
Posts: 1,552
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Post by The Devil's Advocate on Nov 5, 2008 12:23:10 GMT -5
Frankly that depends. Given that I can count no fewer than 4 different 'definitions' of the astral that are at least reasonably 'commonly held'. That's a major question. Some areas of 'that big picture out there' are very, very, very bad for you. Not all of them because they're inherently out to get you, but some of them are the mental equivalent of hopping down to the under water part of the great barrier reef and trying to stay down there for hours without SCUBA gear. Not exactly a good thing.
I do not Astrally Project. I don't need to. I've got other skill sets that essentially let me scan to produce the exact same information gain and communications.
For the first article, as with most articles his statements seem much over simplified and largely ignore things I've had the misfortune of being beaten over the head by. It ignores the dangers ("Oh you won't die or be possessed") I wouldn't count on the last one, and their are worse things than death. It's a very simplistic view but the basics appear sound. I don't much care for his take on empathy (as a natural empath he's got it completely wrong) but he does accurately summarize the progression most LEARNED empaths follow. Nothing in the article should be taken as universal. It seems to treat a narrow band of psionic experience and assume that's all there is.
For those of you going "wow, DA's loosened her stance on the Astral" no, I haven't but as I said. I've done some more research and realized that frankly there isn't a single codified definition of what this word "Astral" means in terms of psionics. It's actually not as standard a term as everyone seems to think it is. They do have many things in common... but no one can seem to agree which part of that 'big picture' is actually the Astral or if the big picture itself is the astral (I don't know about you, but I just call it "reality". Just because not everyone is aware of it doesn't mean it's not part of reality. After all we don't know everything that goes on in the bottom of the ocean or jungles of Africa do we?). The part I used to call the Astral (after 'showing' it to a few people) is universally agreed to be a very bad 'location' or 'layer'. What it's called depends on who you ask.
~The Devil's Advocate
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Post by snowballrox on Nov 5, 2008 14:15:04 GMT -5
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The Devil's Advocate
Author
Respected Member I will deflate your theories and claims with ye olde pointy stick of logic.
Est autem fides credere quod nondum vides; cuius fidei merces est videre quod credis.
Posts: 1,552
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Post by The Devil's Advocate on Nov 5, 2008 14:54:12 GMT -5
How did it make no sense? I thought I was relatively clear. What parts are you having issues with specifically.
And you cannot PHYSICALLY go to the astral. You can't build a house there. You can't hold garden parties there. It is not the physical world. Frankly there isn't even a solid consensus on what the astral IS. I've asked around and gotten 4 different answers that people were absolutely certain was 100% correct and they're contradictory. It's like asking "where is Georgia" and getting "In the United states" and "In the Caucus region south of Russia." Who's wrong? Well that depends on whether you mean Georgia the country or Georgia the state. "This specific area of the stuff we can't see touch, taste, or otherwise measure is the astral" says one person... someone else points to another area and goes 'that is I'm 100% sure of it!" and someone else says "no it all is."
I have not run into a portion of the 'big picture' that part of reality we can 'access' via Psi that lets you build a house or manipulate physical reality from there. He really hasn't defined what he means by 'the astral'. He seems to be talking about a very limited area, and does not seem to take into account telepathic analytical overlay. Are you 'showing someone something you made on the Astral" or just projecting something at them.
In other words you're not going to get a simple answer out of this because there isn't one, and that article is a painful oversimplification that leaves out huge chunks of what a large number of people term the Astral. It is a very fluffy depiction of 'out there', and like all fluffy depictions it leaves a great deal to be desired.
~The Devil's Advocate
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Post by wolfdancer on Nov 5, 2008 14:58:21 GMT -5
Frankly the safest path to what you seek is either "dream walking" or imagination and telepathy...though many seem to have difficulty with those. They are the safest routes in my experience. I did follow DA's comments and she has a good point about the definitions of the astral being different and the conditions of each being somewhat unique with their own consequences. I do not know of any other "alternate dimensions." I especially do not know of any that I would recommend. Psionics should not be used as an escape from reality, but an extension of it. It sounds like you are wanting to use this "castle" the same way I used to use sleep or reading. As a short term escape, they work great, but they don't actually don't work well at all for dealing with the situations of life and reality. I really wish they did.
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Post by leodragon on Nov 5, 2008 16:08:37 GMT -5
Frankly that depends. Given that I can count no fewer than 4 different 'definitions' of the astral that are at least reasonably 'commonly held'. That's a major question. Some areas of 'that big picture out there' are very, very, very bad for you. Not all of them because they're inherently out to get you, but some of them are the mental equivalent of hopping down to the under water part of the great barrier reef and trying to stay down there for hours without SCUBA gear. Not exactly a good thing. I do not Astrally Project. I don't need to. I've got other skill sets that essentially let me scan to produce the exact same information gain and communications. For the first article, as with most articles his statements seem much over simplified and largely ignore things I've had the misfortune of being beaten over the head by. It ignores the dangers ("Oh you won't die or be possessed") I wouldn't count on the last one, and their are worse things than death. It's a very simplistic view but the basics appear sound. I don't much care for his take on empathy (as a natural empath he's got it completely wrong) but he does accurately summarize the progression most LEARNED empaths follow. Nothing in the article should be taken as universal. It seems to treat a narrow band of psionic experience and assume that's all there is. That is not focus. It was just a general overview of Astral Projection. You are pointing to things that it lacked, which were not very relevant. It was a simplification, because the other things are not the focus of it, and he defines what the astral is in a specific context, which is generally used and the context that I refer to it as. In that area it is nothing more than a plane created from a type of thought form. It exist on the conceptual domain as consciousness. It is created from conceptualization, which are thoughts and thought forms. Consciousness or the mind exist in an abstract state and is a collection of conceptualizations working together, so in this regard, the astral is seen as nothing more than these conceptualizations joined together or the domain that they exist. It is a Jungian view which incorporates consiousness existing on a non spatial and non temporal domain. To say otherwise you would have to prove that there exist something beyond the mind or consiousness, and even then, consiousness existing on a quantum non spatial and non temporal domain is only theorized. Psi is linked to this mental processes and therefore linked to consiousness since it is physically impossible for the brain to create these affects, so if you say that psi is real and follows that outline, you would have to assume that it lies on domain that allows it to work outside the constraints of time and space, or you would have to prove and explain how the brain can produce psi affects. All that being taken into consideration, the Astral Plane is nothing more than a connection between there being a conceptual domain or a plane created from consiousness or nothing more than a byproduct of the human mind. In order to say otherwise you would have to prove that something exist beyond the mind/body, which veers into religion/spirituality. Keep in mind that the interpretation of sensory information becomes overall perception, and that perception can be impacted by prior held ideas and models of how the world operates, and that, in the case of ESP, that the mind breaks down, interprets, and decodes the information that is being sensed and perceived in such a way as can be understood, so people can percieve and interpret the information in various ways, so your perception of various different types of energies can be nothing more than your mind interpretation of information. That being the case, you can't very well argue that other such things exist based upon your perception or a group perception of something or something that has not been proven to really exist. The article presents the astral plane as a plane that it as affected/shaped by thoughts and emotions, so they are portraying the plane as a mental counterpart or conceptual domain that intersects and overlays this one. All the article is doing is giving a brief introduction to it. As far as the ability to scan the astral, everyone does that when you telepathic/empathically scan a person. You are scanning their mind, which is an abstract and conceptual thing. It doesn't actually physically exist, unless you are referring to the brain, which again creates major paradoxes. It exist on that mental domain, which can be thought of as the Astral Plane if the astral plane is a domain of conceptualizations or thoughts and emanations and formations of the mind/consiousness. Astral dangers are nothing more than psychological since the astral plane is a psychological domain. The person uses terminology that seems alludes to spirituality and new age mysticism, but they state that the astral plane is a non physical, non temporal and non spatial, plane/domain that is shaped by thought/emotion and can be traversed psychically through the mind, so the person is simply stating that the astral plane is a mental plane/domain. That was it, and then it list some methods. It don't go into the other aspects of it because that was no the focus and there was no need to, and all other definitions of the Astral Plane are built upon the belief of there being others, which comes down to spirituality/religion. You would have to prove that such a thing actually exist or else it a is belief in other things. The Astral Plane being a conceptual or mental plane is tied to consiousness being possibly on a non spatial or non temporal domain, and I am not speaking about self awareness. I am generally referring to Bohem's idea of an implicate order in which consiousness is matter and vice versa and not a product of Self, personality, or anything like that. The brain is made from matter, therefore, it has consiousness which ties into the firing of the neurons and so on and so forth. A, on that level, would be a conceptualization which exist within consiousness in the same abstract way on the same abstract domain. The Astral Plane, in this context, is associated with that domain. Saying that there are non mental layers, planes, dimensions, or whatever you are saying is based off of belief. Being mental in nature, the dangers are mental themselves, and therefore, purely psychological. I have heard you say "big picture" alot in which there are multiple layers of reality which are not mental or psionic nature. Can you prove that these layers or this "big picture" exist independent of consensual perception and belief? Now, if you mean that these different areas are different areas in this psychological domain, I could understand that, but your prior post on the subject implies that you believe that there are overlying layers that are not physical that are not mental composed of some type of energy in whatever context that you use that term. How can we determine if these actually exist beyond your belief/perception and the consensual perception of others you have spoken to who could have been influenced or influenced the other thereby impacting perception overall. Notice I said perception. Multiple people perceiving something does not make it actuality or their interpretation correct. If psi is a conceptual thing, consiousness, interacting with another conceptual thing, another consiousness, and the Astral Plane the domain, then any type of work with psi has the same impact, so if you say the Astral Plane is dangerous, then you say psi is just as dangerous. The person need not put dangers, which are interpretations of prior belief systems, in an article that simply stated that the Astral Plane is mental, and all other variations of the Astral Plane are belief driven, because you can't really prove them beyond subjective experience. Also, you ARE astral projecting, you just don't define it as that. If a person exist in x location on the conceptual domain and you exist on y, in order to percieve them or scan them you would have extend your awareness to person in x location if they are not emanating anything that is in your range. Your awareness/consiousness/mind is expanded or projected to that the thing, so you are PROJECTING an aspect of your consiousness to that person on that conceptual/mental domain. The mind doesn't exist in physical space, unless you say it is the brain and you run into multiple paradoxes in relation to psi. If the Astral Plane is defined as the mental counterpart to things and the mind exist on this counterpart, then contacting another thing on this domain is interacting with that domain, which is why I keep saying that if you say Astral Projection is dangerous, then don't practice psi. The difference is that you are not fully projecting, or OBE'ing. Your consiousness/mind/awareness is expanded outward, but not fully projected. If an aspect or your self is not projecting to that place, and nothing is being emanated, how do you think you are getting information from that place? A part of you IS going or PROJECTING there, you are not OBE'ing, though, it is a incomplete form of projection and probably a type of bi location. There is NO difference between the dangers of other psi abilities and astral projection. For the purpose and context of the article, I think it is okay. I have not run into a portion of the 'big picture' that part of reality we can 'access' via Psi that lets you build a house or manipulate physical reality from there. He really hasn't defined what he means by 'the astral'. He seems to be talking about a very limited area, and does not seem to take into account telepathic analytical overlay. Are you 'showing someone something you made on the Astral" or just projecting something at them. Uhh... Psychokinesis. Psychokinesis is consiousness affecting matter. If consiousness is an abstract thing that exist on a conceptual domain akin to the concepts that composes, wouldn't that mean that a person is affecting matter via applying a conceptualization or a form of consciousness in such a way as to interact with it, so is that not an astral thing manipulating physical reality? All astral creations are mental or telepathic creations, and how one perceives things like that via ESP is affected by interpretation and perception, so how a person perceives one creation may be different than one perceives another. It is actually the same thing in telepathy. How you percieve the information that is sent impacts how you decode and make sense of it, which can play into analytical overlay. OBE's are projections of consiousness in which consiousness is interacting with physical objects instead of a conceptualization. It is the same as RV something, just in a more complete fashion. I wrote psionslair.t35.com/obevsastral.html , so, of course, I think it is legit. The astral plane is kind of simple to understand. It is just a mental plane. Whatever you percieve/imagine happens on that plane. Trying to pick out and map out parts of it is impossible, because it is not geographical or even spatial. You can't say its on a particular location, because it is totally non spatial. It doesn't have physical limitations because it is non physical, and yes, you can build a house or whatever you want. I have an entire mansion on the astral plane. Whatever you imagine is real, on that place, so if imagine a house, on the astral, it becomes an actual thing on the astral plane. All a person really needs to know is that the astral is a place that is a mental representation and you can do whatever you can imagine there. There is no location and there are no limitations whatsoever, because it doesn't technically physically exist. People get confused because they take their perception of a particular thing to be an actual thing. You can't map out the Astral Plane, because it is a conceptual/mental plane, which, in itself, is non spatial and non temporal.
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Post by snowballrox on Nov 5, 2008 16:48:04 GMT -5
Is nobody getting what I mean? what I think the astral plane is is a lucid dream that you don't randomly wake up from. From my experience, I've created castles in lucid dreams. Lucid dreams are very realistic, but what I mean is that when you project, can you INDUCE what you dream? I'm getting confused.... I use lucid dreams as an escape from reality... But what leodragon's article said is the stuff I'm looking for. I'm going to his websites forums for awhile... He makes the most sense here...
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The Devil's Advocate
Author
Respected Member I will deflate your theories and claims with ye olde pointy stick of logic.
Est autem fides credere quod nondum vides; cuius fidei merces est videre quod credis.
Posts: 1,552
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Post by The Devil's Advocate on Nov 5, 2008 20:14:16 GMT -5
Leodragon. Your definition of the astral is only ONE of FOUR that i have encountered. And all of them have had very, very persuasive arguments for being 'the astral' and very DIFFERENT explainations of Astral projection (if not OBE). What actually makes you think yours is the right one? And if you say 'people agree with me' I will likely strangle something because people agree with the OTHERS too. It's getting to the point I want to strike the term "Astral" from the language and have done with it!
~The Devil's Advocate
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Post by leodragon on Nov 6, 2008 7:27:40 GMT -5
It is a Jungian view which incorporates consiousness existing on a non spatial and non temporal domain. To say otherwise you would have to prove that there exist something beyond the mind or consiousness, and even then, consiousness existing on a quantum non spatial and non temporal domain is only theorized. Psi is linked to this mental processes and therefore linked to consiousness since it is physically impossible for the brain to create these affects, so if you say that psi is real and follows that outline, you would have to assume that it lies on domain that allows it to work outside the constraints of time and space, or you would have to prove and explain how the brain can produce psi affects. All that being taken into consideration, the Astral Plane is nothing more than a connection between there being a conceptual domain or a plane created from consiousness or nothing more than a byproduct of the human mind. In order to say otherwise you would have to prove that something exist beyond the mind/body, which veers into religion/spirituality.You can use a variation of what is called Occam's Razor, in which when there are multiple hypothesis, the one with the fewest assumptions is seen as valid. What I want to know is it realistic, can other people go with me, and can I design it the way I want it? Yes, you can. You can create anything that you want. You can even create beings. This isn't the best place to get information on Astral Projection and the astral plane due to the fact that a lot of people here don't have a lot of direct experience in that area, or are somewhat biased on it or assume that there observation, and therefore, conclusions created from these observations are accurate, which is not the case. Observation is affected by perception, so if the perception/interpretation of something is more or so symbolic of the information and not the information itself, the conclusion, taking the perception/interpretation as literal, would be flawed. Perception is the mind's interpretation/mental representation of information. Being conceptual in nature, the astral plane would be strongly affected by perception and would manifest in such a way as you can interpret and percieve it, but it is a symbolic representation of the information and not the information itself, so it can't be taken as literal, which confuses people. They believe that their perception of the astral plane is reality, when that isn't the case at all. It is basic sensation and perception. Your mind takes information from a sensory organ and decodes it and interprets it into a perception. It is a virtual model of the information that is being presented and not the actual thing itself. Think of a video camera. The video camera is sending information to whatever displays the picture. Say it is recording a plate. The plate is not literally being transported through the camera, but the information recorded by the camera is being sent which is then decoded and displayed in a virtual model of that plate. Same thing. People, in psi and AP, believe there interpretation of that information to be the information itself, and therefore, get hung up on trying to define their perception as reality, which is not the case. You can't define the Astral Plane based upon your perception or your experience, because it will be what you percieve or expect it to be, and perceptions and expectations vary, so you get a crap load of various definitions. That is where the problem comes into play. People try to define it by their perception/experience, which you can't do for the reasons I outlined above.
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Post by snowballrox on Nov 6, 2008 13:06:45 GMT -5
No, creating beings isn't what I mean. What I mean is can my friends JOIN me on the astral plane.
And for DA, Leodragons definition is the only one of the "4" Im looking for.
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Post by leodragon on Nov 6, 2008 14:30:20 GMT -5
No, creating beings isn't what I mean. What I mean is can my friends JOIN me on the astral plane. Yep. I have my own little astral place, and I used to go there with a group of friends. In order for them to join, though, they would have to know where to go, and since the astral plane is non spatial, they would have to lock onto a particular imprint or thing. They would have have to know where its at or how the place "feels" or anything like that. If they don't have a method to get there, or the directions so to speak, they won't be able to get to your "creation". Like I make a place on the astral and it has the imprint of x. In order to get there, they would have to know to project to x, or else they couldn't get there, OR they could just project to you, if they know you by "signature" or whatever you want to call it. They would project to your location on the astral plane, and if your at the place you created, at that place. I have a little astral hang out that people can reach me at. If I am astral projecting, I am usually there. I am not much for exploring, really, so people who know how to get there can drop by. I astral project when I need a break from here, or if I want to be alone. Alone isn't really alone, since I am an empath. Even when I have my barriers up, I am still conscious of other people's minds or presence, and its irritating and I feel crowded sometimes, so I just kinda of just leave or astral project to my get away, and I'll make it, at that moment, so it is just me and ONLY me. Lock down. I go to the Astral Plane for a breather, to get a way for a little while, or relax most of the time. Generally, it is not locked down. I am not really into the exploring. I typically stay in my little "domain". Dreams are virtual representations of the word. Conceptulizations and such put together by the subconsious mind. They exist on the Astral Plane. The astral plane, in this context, is defined as the conceptual domain in which the mind/consiousness resides as an abstract thing. In a dream state, a person's awareness is primarily shifted to this dream and not really the physical senses. The sensations within the dream are caused by the mind's representation of that sense. Everything in the dream is virtual and not real. It is taking place completely on the conceptual level and has no physical counterpart whatsoever. That being the case, it exist on that domain or on the astral plane, if that is what the astral plane is defined as. So, the dream exist as a domain created by the subconscious on the Astral Plane. You aren't projecting anywhere. The mind is detaching itself from its physical senses and withdrawing into that virtual representation within your mind, which lies on that "mental level". Well, it can be thought of as an inner projection. People can travel back and forth between these landscapes. That is generally called dream walking, and is just a form of mental communication, really. You are fully projecting into an aspect or creation of the mind, which is the dream, so you can simply just have another person reach you in your dream or go into theirs, or you can solidify that creation that was in the dream, so that it exist when you project back to it astrally. That is actually safer than exploring. You are in your own domain in your own creation, and probably won't really run into anything.
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The Devil's Advocate
Author
Respected Member I will deflate your theories and claims with ye olde pointy stick of logic.
Est autem fides credere quod nondum vides; cuius fidei merces est videre quod credis.
Posts: 1,552
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Post by The Devil's Advocate on Nov 6, 2008 17:32:50 GMT -5
You better be worried about it if you want to wind up in the wrong place. Just because you ignore whatelse is out there. The other places that have been termed the Astral are all valid locations. I've seen them all EXCEPT Leo's which is the most complicated and is assumed rather than demonstrated to exist (Therefore by his argument and Occam's razor his is the least likely to exist.) It's VERY easy to end up in the 'wrong place' in the grand scheme of things, and it's very easy to trick yourself into thinking you've gone somewhere or built something that doesn't exist and then project the concept (not the creation) at someone and share the IDEA, and have that idea have no bearing on any tenuous grasp on reality.So if you actually want to pull any of this off you BETTER be aware of what else is out there, even if you don't agree on what it's called.
~The Devil's Advocate
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