The Astral Plane

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Planes of Existence…

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The planes are inter-dimensional and exist inside of each other. The physical plane is the outside dimension. Therefore, there is the tendency to look outside for support. The greatest support, however, comes from within. The planes are all in existence at once, and we can access the planes all the time. It is a matter of tuning your focus to the energy of the planes. All of the planes are contained within the Tao. Likewise, your Essence or Soul exists on all the planes simultaneously. There are seven different planes of existence, and sentient creatures follow a certain order of movement from one plane of existence to the next. The planes are layered on top of one another as if you were looking through many different layers of clear cellophane with some print on each different page that all makes one picture. They are all taking up the same space, the same time, and yet they are different layers and different experiences of being. There is the all-encompassing plane that we might call the seventh level, which is the Tao. The Tao is the All-That-Is, the universal consciousness. That is the place of all vision and all wisdom. That is at the very top, whereas the physical plane is at the other end of the spectrum. If you were to layer all of the planes together, the one at the bottom would be the physical plane. The plane next to that is the astral plane and then there follows the causal plane, the akashic, the mental, the messianic and the buddhic planes, all of which have different levels of existence and different types of lessons to be learned. 3

The Physical Plane…

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While you are occupying a physical body, your primary awareness is focused in the physical plane. However, a part of you exists simultaneously in all of the other planes of existence, including the universal consciousness. In other words, there is a part of you that is the Tao. Otherwise, you would not have consciousness.

Once you have learned how to bring higher degrees of essence through your chakras and into your body, you have developed the ability to work with the higher planes. One of the best ways to access the energy of the planes while you occupy a physical body is through meditation. To contact the higher planes for healing, all you need to do is to acknowledge them and then ask to feel the energy of that plane. It is helpful to have some understanding of the energy of the planes in order to work with them more effectively. This discussion will focus primarily on the astral plane.

The physical plane is the outermost plane. It is the most isolated one, by virtue of its properties of space and time. On the physical plane, energy vibrates so slowly that it appears to be solid matter. Bumping into things is a good reminder that you and the object are separate. In the higher planes, energies can merge and separate at will. 5

The Astral Body…

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The "double" of the human body, usually regarded by occultists as its animating force, providing the body with "consciousness".

The astral body has a luminous, shining appearance, and is capable of passing through physical matter. The act of willed separation of the astral body from the physical is known as astral travel. Occultists believe that at death the astral body leaves its physical counterpart and finds a new existence on the astral plane, Some parapsychologists believe that ghostly apparitions are astral communications between persons who have just died and those who are dear to them. The astral body is often depicted as being joined to the physical body by a silver cord – etheric umbilical cord – and some subjects who undergo out-ofbody experiences report seeing this cord.

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The Astral Plane… The plane just inside the physical plane is the astral. This would be the place you access in dreams, in meditation, and between lives. Things are more fluid on the astral plane. It often feels unreal. Your body may feel strange or big. These are signs that you are existing in the astral. Flowers, birds, and butterflies are mostly of the astral plane. These could be referred to as "bleed-throughs" between the planes. There is a lot of "bleed-through" between the physical plane and the astral plane. Since flowers are birds are more astral based, they do not conform to the laws of the physical. Flowers are used in funerals and weddings to prepare for the shift of energy to a higher level. Certain types of music are also supportive. When you connect with nature, you are more connected with astral plane activity. 8

The astral plane is the place of most guidance. You receive astral guidance through dreams, through spiritual guides on the astral who are usually members of your entity between lives, and through power animals and devas. So channeling and guidance and spiritual support and guardians that people feel they are in touch with come from the astral plane of existence. Astral plane guidance is also the least effective. The astral plane is very emotional. That is why you usually experience your spiritual guides in the form of moral support, cheering, inspiration, and so on. Astral guides can influence your pendulum, tarot cards, rune stones, and so forth. They will use whatever tools are available. When using these types of tools, repetition helps with accuracy. The astral plane corresponds with the emotional center. When connecting with the astral plane through meditation, it can be seen as a turquoise/green/blue light. It is foggy and dreamlike. It sort of feels like a jungle with high humidity 9

The word astral means "of the stars." In our culture, we've been imprinted with the notion that heaven is above and that when we die, our souls leave our bodies and float up into the stars. In some ways, that is a correct assumption, except the astral plane is not "up." The astral plane exists everywhere that the physical plane exists, except that it is in another dimension. When you die, your spirit floats out of your body and moves to the astral plane. The astral plane provides the objective space to review what has been learned on the physical plane. It provides the needed rest break and the overview that is needed in order to move to the next step of the learning experience which is the next lifetime. The astral plane is also a space where sentient life explores the physical plane before taking on physical form. Likewise, when a soul fragment completes its cycle of lifetimes on the physical plane, that essence moves to the next level of existence which is the astral level. So the astral plane is a place to complete and assimilate everything that has been learned throughout the entire physical plane existence in order to rise through the other levels of existence and back to the Tao. The astral plane is also a place for individual soul fragments to recombine into 10 the combined consciousness of its entity or soul family.

So the astral plane serves as very multi-use plane of existence. There are many different things that can happen there. Some people enjoy their experiences on the astral plane more than others do because the movement is very, very fast. Your spirit moves at such an incredibly rapid speed on the astral plane that light itself appears as solid. Think of something moving at the speed of light being so slow that it becomes solidified, so of course someone who is solid cannot see someone who is astral. They can image it with their psychic abilities. They can imagine what that person might be like and sometimes it comes as a vision to them to see how that person may have looked in a past lifetime. But they are not literally seeing that energy, and it is incredibly difficult to measure. In fact, there is no technology on this planet that is advanced enough for that type of energy to be measured. 11

Because of the fact that the astral energy is so fast, your spirit when it leaves the body or before it enters a body is vibrating at such an incredible speed that it is beyond the solidity of the physical plane. Thus, it can actually go from place to place, from timeframe to timeframe, and see what has happened in various parallels of existence. Between lives, you can also explore what has happened in the past and in the future. You rise above the timeline so to speak. This is difficult to comprehend from the physical plane because we are living at such a slower pace. The truth is that because of the fact that light is a solid, you can walk back and forth across it so to speak. So on the astral plane, you have a much more objective perspective about life, what it meant for you, where you are going, who you are, who you've been, your different parallel selves, and so on. You can explore your parallel selves that have branched off and gone off into different parallel universes of perspective to see how they have come back together again. 12

All of the various "you's" that have gone off onto different tangents during your lifetime recombine and become part of one self again. You also have a chance to decide where you are going next. All of these important questions take place between lifetimes. Older souls are much more comfortable with the astral plane experience than younger souls. Souls who are very, very young spend very little time on the astral plane between lives whereas older souls will take the opportunity to fully re-evaluate their lives and their parallel selves. They will even take the opportunity to serve as spiritual guides for their friends on the physical plane while they are between lives. The universe is extremely flexible. It has many different parallel perspectives and can move in any direction that is necessary. If you can imagine something, it probably can exist in the universe because after all, you are a piece of the universal consciousness. Anything that you can imagine being in the universe, the universe has imagined and therefore has put into place somewhere because it want to learn from it and grow from it. 13

Astral Tip: If you usually have trouble waking up and feel scattered in the morning, it's possible you're leaving some of your energy "out there," and not bringing all of yourself home each morning! So, if you manage to think about it when you're just waking up, imagine a huge astral hand just going back to wherever you were, gathering your energy up, and bringing it 14 back to you as you snuggle warm and toasty in your bed!

Astral Travel is different to normal dreaming. It is an extraordinary experience. All who have experienced it can testify to its lucidity and magical quality. Conscious Astral Travel is experienced as clearly as we experience our daily life. It is even experienced more clearly at times: our senses seem sharper and the environment somehow more real. But Astral Travel is a natural possibility that anyone can develop through practice. The Gnostic Movement teaches how to Astral Project (to pass consciously from the Physical Plane to the Astral Plane) with successful results. One such practice of Astral Projection allows us to become aware of the natural process of going to sleep. If we manage to be aware of this, then we become aware of our departure into the Astral Plane as well. So when we are Astral Traveling, we are aware of the fact that we are physically asleep and that our physical body is at home in bed. We know we are actually in this other plane, as opposed to the dreamer who only realizes they were not in the physical plane upon waking the next morning. While Astral Traveling we make conscious decisions – like where to go, 15 what to do, or who to meet.

In the Astral the sky is not the limit. One can fly way beyond the blue sky, into deep space exploring the planets. One can consciously project to any part of the world through concentration... We can fly through the air, having a birds eye view of what is below, traveling across the surface of our huge planet... Imagine being able to glide over the ocean like a seagull, or being able to penetrate into it and breath beneath it like a fish... We can meet enlightened beings, even of distant ancient traditions, who can help guide us along the Spiritual Path. Or we can even attend esoteric schools and temples to learn about the mysteries of life and death... There is all sorts of hidden knowledge one can acquire through Astral Projection, knowledge that cannot be acquired in every day life, from other people or books. This is the reason why many want to Astral Travel – to acquire knowledge through experience about ourselves, the Earth, the Universe, or anything we want to. All of this is available to us through Astral Travel. It is something worth experiencing and verifying. 16

Late night TV is a definite no-no when you want to create a positive, enriching astral experience. Why? Because television fills your chakras with often-violent and emotional images that are not yours. When you go out onto the Astral Plane, you go out through those chakras, and you carry those images with you--creating Astral TV! (And you thought you watched enough of it in your waking hours!) This is one big reason why most people get stuck in the lower layers of the Astral. We recommend starting with one or two nights a week that are no-TV nights. If you're going to be home, play music instead, read a book, write in your journal, work on a craft or a project, play games with your children. This is commonly known as "quality time," by the way! An hour or so before you go to bed, stop whatever you're doing, get ready for bed, and take some time to meditate before you go to sleep. This can be just a few minutes, or longer if you are a dedicated meditator. Do your meditation sitting in a chair with your feet on the floor, rather than lying down. 17

Close your eyes, breathe slowly and deeply and imagine connecting a beam of light from the base of your spine to the center of the earth. You can use this grounding to release the cares of the day down to the center of the earth. Just breathe and notice what comes up: an image of your boss, your mother, your children, a problem or project to solve. Just let them all release down to the center of the Earth for now. You don't need to take them with you in your dreams, too.

Now, imagine creating a big ball of energy over your head. Imagine that it is a magnet for all of the life energy that you have given away or left behind during your busy day. Watch the ball fill up with your life essence, then imagine bringing the ball down through the top of your head and through your body. Let that energy fill in every cell, then radiate outward to 18 fill in any gaps in your aura.

Now you're ready for bed. Make sure your sleep is comfortable – an unhappy body will prevent the spirit from going out very far – and decide before you fall asleep, exactly what you want to do on the Astral that night. Do you want to look up an old friend? Work on a book? Create a new job for yourself? Visit Gandhi or Buddha? Take a stroll on Mt. Olympus or go to a psychic class? There are a lot of fun things to do out there, but pick just one for now. As you fall asleep, just think quietly of where you want to go, or what you want to do on the astral.

When you wake up the next morning, allow a little time to write down your dreams, or to meditate and let the images come to you. Write down any impressions you get. Don't be hard on yourself if you can't remember or if your dreams are different than you planned. Just note down anything that you do remember and go from there. As you pay more attention to your astral space, you will be more conscious of your experiences, and you will be more conscious "out there" 19 as well--also known as lucid dreaming.

Above all, have fun and give yourself permission to play 20 in your dream space.

We hope you have enjoyed this presentation. You can find a complete listing of our courses on our website at http://www.cms.edu/descrip.html The College of Metaphysical Studies (CMS), located in Clearwater, Florida, has been a leader in metaphysical and spiritual education since 1986. CMS was formed after extensive evaluation of the educational needs of the Metaphysical, New Age, New Thought, Neo-Pagan and modern spiritual communities. We are authorized by the Commission for Independent Education, Independent Colleges and Universities, Florida Department of Education to operate as a private, nonsecular college and to issue Associate, Bachelor, Master and Doctorate Degrees in metaphysics, religion, spiritual awareness, spiritual and holistic healing, esoteric studies, parapsychology, and the entire allied metaphysical field. CMS trains and certifies ministers, spiritual and holistic healers, teachers, pastoral counselors, mediums, intuitive practitioners, past-life regression facilitators and administrators. Certification is by the New Awareness Ministries, International (NAMI). (See the next slide for contact information) 21

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