I’ve astral projected a few times from dreams in which I became lucid, meaning I realized I was dreaming but didn’t wake up, so continued my dream with full consciousness and control. Then I transitioned from the dream world to something more “real”, seemingly independent of my consciousness, seemingly able to be perceived similarly by other consciousnesses. But I had never experienced a conscious astral projection, meaning “leaving” my physical body, so to speak, without doing so from a sleeping state. Proficient astral projectors can exit their bodies consciously during meditation. That’s my ultimate goal.
On Friday, March 8th, I awoke around 4:30 am, unable to go back to sleep since I had already slept 8 hours. I was on the couch in my brother’s apartment in Boca Raton, FL, where I was vacationing for a week.
I closed my eyes, trying to let my body fall asleep while my mind stayed awake, and after a few minutes of hypnagogic imagery, a scene unfolded in front of me and came into focus. I was walking down the street of a city, light brown sidewalks, light brown buildings, sunny day.
Everything was a bit foggy and out of focus, so I said, “Clarity now!” and everything took on a sharpness of focus not possible in this physical world. I looked at my hands and my palms were glowing, glittery with energy. For some reason my fingers were short and fat.
There were two people on the sidewalk coming toward me, the first about 30 feet away, the second about 50 feet away. I was fully aware that my physical body was asleep on the couch, and I wanted to try out my “super powers”.
First was zoom vision. I wanted to zoom in on the second pedestrian’s face, so I thought it, but nothing happened. Then I said “Zoom” aloud and my vision zoomed directly up to his face. It was in full detail as if I were standing directly in front of him, yet I still knew I was 50 feet away, and I had no difficulty walking normally while my vision was zoomed in. I was still fully aware of my immediate surroundings. I remember thinking it was strange that I could be fully zoomed in on his face but feel completely comfortable walking down the street, all the while knowing fully that my body was asleep on the couch, in a different world. It was almost like I had dual vision, one vision focused on his face, the other focused on the sidewalk and where I was going.
After I passed him I turned left around the corner and wanted to use my super fast running power. I ran faster than physically possible, as fast as a car, perhaps ~50 mph. It was awesome.
Then I stopped and decided to fly. I was having difficulty levitating, so I said “Up” aloud and easily rose halfway up the buildings, about 100 feet in the air. At this point a hawk came near me, from the left. It was large, brown, and absolutely beautiful. The detail was astounding. Things turned a bit to slow motion, and our movements were dance-like, slow and fluid. I reached out and touched one of his tail feathers and he turned toward me slightly. I reached out my hand and a finger to get him to land on it. I had a quick flash of a thought and worried about him biting my finger, and right as I had that thought, he bit my finger with his orange beak. It didn’t hurt, but I felt the pressure, and he flew off.
I flew around a bit more then started having difficulty staying in the air, sinking slowly toward the ground. I realized this probably meant my experience was almost over, so I started recounting all of the events so I would remember them completely. I was worried I’d forget when I woke up so I went over them a few times.
Instead of returning to my body, I lost focus and drifted off into a dream. I don’t remember what the dream was about, but when I did wake up, about five seconds later I remembered my experience and went over the details in my head several times so I wouldn’t forget. And I didn’t.