Thread: Do you believe in reality shifting / astral projection?

Originally Posted by FryingMan

The circularity usually manifests something like this:

Person 1: AP is XYZ
Person 2: I disagree, had an AP and experienced PDQ
P1: PDQ is not compatible with XYZ, therefore what you experienced is not AP but (a dream, etc.)
P2: !!!??!???!!??!!

I see that simply as a disagreement about the nature of AP, where Person 1 thinks AP = XYZ, whereas Person 2 thinks AP = PDQ. Maybe I am missing some context (I did not read the thread from the start; I'll go back and do that).

EDIT: This thread is great! I don't know why I have been missing out on it before. But now that I'm here, I'll chip in with this bit:

I have traditionally distinguished between dream and AP, and very precisely too, since my dreams never have peripheral awareness, whereas my AP's always have that. This difference is quite staggering, because it makes every dream feel "fake", whilst every AP feels "real". But there is something else at play also, because to me an AP is not "real" simply because there is peripheral awareness. It simply feels like an actual world, exactly like the physical world does, as if there was a special sense for that, beyond the ordinary senses.

Apart from this, I am now leaning towards an understanding of all experiences existing on a multidimensional spectrum without hard borders between anything. Still, my experience of getting into an AP has little in common with my experience of getting into a dream. The latter is entirely without the "physical" whoosh, where the former always has it.

Originally Posted by Voldmer

I see that simply as a disagreement about the nature of AP, where Person 1 thinks AP = XYZ, whereas Person 2 thinks AP = PDQ. Maybe I am missing some context (I did not read the thread from the start; I'll go back and do that).

The situation is that anyone (including large groups of practitioners, "the community of APers," etc.) can assert what they think AP is, the definition is unassailable and anyone who criticizes it or disagrees with it based on personal experience that is contradictory to that definition is shot down, with the only reason given being that they disagree. Any sort of phenomenon that is defined by an unassailable, unquestionable definition, does not qualify in my mind as something serious. Holes in their logic or definition are trivially smoothed over without having to actually engage in a serious discussion.

That, plus the fact that the explanations are highly complex involving multiple hierarchies of various "bodies" and "dimensions," leads me to lean on the side of "it's all a dream."

I had a great LD last night, in fact. I took a moment in this LD to evaluate the environment, its visual vividness, tactile feedback of touching objects, etc. I quickly reached the conclusion that it was indistinguishable from waking existence. And it most definitely was a dream. Vividness and clarity are not valid arguments for (or against) AP.

Originally Posted by FryingMan

The situation is that anyone (including large groups of practitioners, "the community of APers," etc.) can assert what they think AP is, the definition is unassailable and anyone who criticizes it or disagrees with it based on personal experience that is contradictory to that definition is shot down, with the only reason given being that they disagree.

Okay, that is pretty bad. They should at least amicably agree to disagree.

Originally Posted by Voldmer

Okay, that is pretty bad. They should at least amicably agree to disagree.

That was my impression from reading what other people write about their interactions with the APers. I myself have an open mind but I have to say, every time I read the AP material, I just keep thinking, "Sure sounds like a dream!".

Take "you can't change an AP while you can change a LD," for instance. Well, LDers know quite well that dreams are driven by expectation. If there is the expectation that the dream environment will not change, then it won't change.

Originally Posted by FryingMan

That was my impression from reading what other people write about their interactions with the APers. I myself have an open mind but I have to say, every time I read the AP material, I just keep thinking, "Sure sounds like a dream!".

Take "you can't change an AP while you can change a LD," for instance. Well, LDers know quite well that dreams are driven by expectation. If there is the expectation that the dream environment will not change, then it won't change.

This is an interesting issue. First I have to say that in my experience AP's can very well be changed, exactly like the physical world can be changed; it's not set in stone. But, also in my experience, expectations just don't happen in AP's the way they do in LD's. Again, in this respect the AP seems like the physical world (to me), with the LD seeming different. (To clarify, because I'm not sure I expressed this clearly: in ordinary reality I don't suddenly expect stuff to happen, and this goes for AP's too. But in dreams I tend to expect strange stuff rather a lot). This could be taken to indicate that I myself create the difference between the AP and the LD via my tendency to expect. But that would still imply the difference exists. (I apologize if I am not being very clear here, but it's late in the day in my neck of the woods, and my stomach tells me that dinner is nearly overdue).

Originally Posted by FryingMan

Take "you can't change an AP while you can change a LD," for instance. Well, LDers know quite well that dreams are driven by expectation. If there is the expectation that the dream environment will not change, then it won't change.

When you sketch a drawing out you use different shades or intensity of shade in the pencil for example. It seems to me like you are treating AP and LD as separate things. Don't you think there could be some kind of spectrum going on here from one side of the spectrum being fully AP and the other side of the spectrum a pure dream. Not under a polarity but part of the same thing in different degrees. Lucidity works this way, there's isn't fully lucid and non lucid. There's different degrees of lucidity.

Originally Posted by RockStarHeart

When you sketch a drawing out you use different shades or intensity of shade in the pencil for example. It seems to me like you are treating AP and LD as separate things. Don't you think there could be some kind of spectrum going on here from one side of the spectrum being fully AP and the other side of the spectrum a pure dream. Not under a polarity but part of the same thing in different degrees. Lucidity works this way, there's isn't fully lucid and non lucid. There's different degrees of lucidity.

I don't really have any strong opinions, having not had what I would call an AP. I'm just commenting on what I've read about it. But, it's hard to know just what AP is, from the various definitions. Maybe it's one of those "you'll know it when you have one" things?