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>These are serious hallucinations and I am alarmed by how they are brushed aside. Most meditators think they are astral projecting. This is not examination or i
by kagakuninja 3y ago
>These are serious hallucinations and I am alarmed by how they are brushed aside. Most meditators think they are astral projecting. This is not examination or insight. This is delusional.
Do you dream at night? That is a hallucination. People can learn to be aware during dream states, this is called lucid dreaming. There is nothing delusional or dangerous about that, although the experience can be terrifying for people unfamiliar with the experience.
Out of body experiences are simply a special form of lucid dream, in which your imaginal / energy body seems to be located away from your physical body. There can be a sense of the imaginary body moving. This is just dreaming involving the proprioception sense.
The term "energy" can spook skeptics like yourself. The best explanations I have read is that it is just a mentally constructed sense of the body. Your brain right now has constructed an imaginary model of your body; this can also happen in dream states.
Your body is real, your mental map of the body is not. It is yet another form of hallucination which we all experience on a daily basis. Meditators will experience various forms of "energy" as their practice deepens, and this is also totally normal and not usually harmful.
Many of the explanations and mystical claims about energy and out of body experiences are questionable of course.
The mind is way more freaky and amazing than you realize, and labeling unusual states of consciousness as "delusional" is very limiting. It's your life...
- jules22 3y agoI don't disagree with most of that. I studied a fair amount of science, including psychology and cognitive science. I know you can cause unusual states with meditation and you have a right to. Choosing to experience an out of the body experience or a lucid dream is fine. But believing that you are actually visiting or seeing a remote location is a delusion. Quite a few meditators think they are getting psychic powers with meditation, not just unusual states of consciousness. Look up siddhi.