OBE is natural and everyone does this every time they sleep. This is seldom remembered, but many do remember some experiences. Spontaneous remembered OBE is common. I've been having these since I was 4 years old. I know many people with a similar history.
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it became obvious, if you study the enormous amount of data available on experiences of duality during OBE, that the physical body mind is never left completely empty. All OBE methods project a copy of consciousness exterior to the physical body, including Bardon's methods.
To leave the physical body mind empty would be scientifically testable, if a person using this method were hooked up to brainwave sensors. Theoretically, such a person would flatline, and there would be no consciousness and hence no dream activity, etc; nothing beyond autonomous nervous system activity, etc. No tests like this have ever been done, not that I am aware of, so we must rely on experiential and anecdotal evidence until that time comes.
In Bardon's time, and up until I discovered and published my work on the mind split effect, it was widely believed that astral projection involved the separation of the animating consciousness or soul of a person, leaving behind an empty shell or husk. Some went as far to call this 'soul travel'. My work shows this assumption to be understandable but inaccurate. In this respect, Bardon's work was well in line with popular magical thought of that time, including the 'empty body' assumption.
I do not believe that Bardon's methods actually cause the animating consciousness or soul to leave the physical body and mind an empty shell. This goes against a lifetime of experience studying OBE. It takes a bit of a mind flip to wrap your head around the mind split effect and all it implies with regards to OBE, but it is supportable with a large amount of experiential evidence, and even modern scientific evidence for that matter, as per the below.
For example, Michael Persinenger's work of inducing spiritual experiences, like a sensed presence and feelings of fear (sound familiar), when certain parts of the brain are exposed to certain frequencies of EM fields. This method appears to induce an astral projection in an awake but relaxed person, causing feelings of fear and of a sensed presence. If you compare this to the mind split effect as I have laid it out in my works, this 'artificially induced' OBE type experience begins to make sense. We are all dealing with the same mechanism and phenomena.
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One main cause of misunderstanding relating to my work is simple dogma. Many people adhere so strongly to the work and methods of a teacher that the teacher's words become fact, the law, and anything beyond those words, or that appear to disagree, are deemed wrong. This is a part of a serious problem in our world today, particularly in the fields of the spiritual and metaphysical and magical, because if one respected teacher makes an error, this will be used as source material by those who come later, by writers and teachers that follow the original words of earlier teachers. In this way, error is propagated.
Science offers a better way, in the meaning of 'scientific method' and 'research' where data is continually checked and rechecked for error. This is absolutely necessary. There is also 'experiential evidence' to consider, in such things as energy work and OBE that are not easily measurable by modern scientific means. However, what is phenomena today will be science tomorrow, including OBE and energy work.
We need to learn from all of the earlier great thinkers and teachers, but we must not follow their words dogmatically. As said, everything is open for debate and testing and retesting.
Robert Bruce - 2007
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