Re: Summerlander, what made you a skeptic?

[12padams]

As everyone here knows summerlander's official belief is "the phase is a state in which you are conscious within an amazing 3d world created by your subconscious" (note, summerlander has not said those exact words but I made them up from what I know of him) I should mention however that he is slightly open to the possibility that all our minds are linked somehow which may explain possible telepathic experiences while out of body/ in the phase.

He hasn't always been like this however... Just a year ago when he was a member on astral pulse he made posts which refected a totally different side of him. He stated that he could visit people within the phase and help them. For example he states he is going to enter somebody's mind realm in this post: http://www.astralpulse.com/forums/we...0313#msg280313

My question is: What made you change and when did you change. When did you stop paying attention to your "hits" and when did you Finnally "accept" that the phase is entirely in your head?

[Summerlander]

Hi!

Good question and your post is not far from the truth.  When I first started (entering the phase), I thought that my soul was really leaving my body.  The experience was so real and having listened to others claiming to know for sure that we are not just our bodies I figured that it can only be true and the experience is the proof. 

I'd like to mention here that I started practising phase induction when I first heard of Robert Monroe in a Michael Powell book called "Mind Games".  It included a summary of the method that Monroe describes in his first book: Journeys Out of the Body.  Curious, I decided to try it and found myself experiencing vibrations, and later, a full-fledged OOBE.  Eventually, I bought Monroe's book and admired his approach and honesty (the same, however, cannot be said about his following books and the people who got involved).

I started to think that Spiritualists and New Agers were the most open-minded people around and became a member of sites like Astral Viewers (though later I found out that even those who were open to the "Astral Projection" concept as being a reality could also be close-minded about many things and were often hostile towards those with opposing views). 

The name "Summerlander" came from an experience I had where I landed in a magical and colourful land.  At the time, I hadn't even heard of Summerland (or upper astral plane as some called it) but found striking similarities between my experience and the way in which, in a book about the afterlife, an alleged spirit of a dead person described where he was to his family members through a medium.  It was a place that convey happiness, love and harmony.  A colourful place but not really a place... a state of mind.  Cottages and rainbows struck a chord with me...

Soon, I found myself attracted to esoteric cosmology and liked the idea that the phase provided a glimpse of an afterlife.  Still, I've always been somewhat fickle and never held onto any belief system 100%.  I met the sceptics and listened to what they had to say.  Their arguments were equally valid.  I was also curious about what science had to say on the subject.  It painted a different picture.  The brain is more complex than anyone can imagine.

But it was the experience in the phase, the more familiar I became with it, that started to open my eyes more and got me to question things.  The phase often reminds me of how people take the world too seriously.  People no longer laugh together when a horse poops and it absolutely stinks.  We no longer mock each others voices in harmless fun because it is now considered disrespectful.  We no longer laugh at nature for the meaningless circus that it really is because everything has to have meaning.  why be so serious about things?  We need a reminder that conceptual reality only exists in our heads and we have the power to shape it as we see fit. 

I came to the realisation that I wasn't separating from my physical body at all as nothing was actual in the phase.  How did I discover this?  Well, I found that even the perception of space could be altered just like objects and people.  I also began to pay careful attention to what was presented to me in the virtual world of the phase.  I found evidence of a mishmash of thoughts and memories.  I saw things as an artist that I had never seen before but were paradoxically familiar and felt like I had created them somehow.  This tallies with the subconscious view.  The subconscious mind largely governs the phase.  Soon, I realised that memory, expectation, motivation and desire were powerful catalysts in that state of mind.  Another one: belief.

If you believe in something, you will see that and nothing else.  That becomes your reality.  If you have doubts, as I was having at the time, you will see that.  Example: even when I was open to esotericism, I pondered the possibility that the phase world was a hallucination - next time I entered the phase I translocated to a strange room and found a word engraved on one of its walls: hallucination.

I also noticed that when I daydreamed, there were certain thoughts running through my head which seemed congruous with what I had been experiencing in the phase.  Then, the penny dropped... the phase state is the lucid experience of thoughts (both conscious and unconscious).  The phase itself was teaching me and I was evolving intellectually.  More and more the notion of spirits and an afterlife sounded ridiculous.  I realised that the phase does not provide proof of any of that but that people were the ones interpreting the phase in ways that differed from one another.

That is what made me a sceptic.  Then, I discovered Stephen LaBerge and Michael Raduga.  Both of their views resonate with me.  What attracts me the most to this site is that it is concerned with what's practical first and foremost.

The telepathy issue remains.  There is still no evidence strong enough to convince the entire world that it is real.  Is it real?  I don't know.  All I know is that I was getting a string of hits at the time and thought I could help that member of Astral Pulse. But one cannot escape the possibility of coincidence or the biased interpretations that people have to reinforce their beliefs.  Associations can be made in so many ways!

I think it is healthy to look at the full picture rather than just swallowing what things seem like without scrutinity and reason. Note that everything I suggested to Darina was still in a hypothetical tone.  Even then, however, I was already a sceptic.  A true open-minded sceptic!!

Is the phase entirely in my head?  I don't know.  I'm sure most of it is (if not all).  Of course, one can argue that the brain picks up external frequencies or that all matter is somewhat quantum entangled since the big explosion.  But, I have logically reasoned this with a question:  If when I daydream it seems like I am vaguely experiencing the content of the phase, and taking into account that in the waking state I cannot read other people's minds, why should I be able to do so in the "full-fledged" phase?

What you see depends on where your mind is at.  Hence the proverb: "What bread looks like depends upon whether you are hungry or not".  LaBerge conducted an interesting experiment with inkblots and later people observing films where they would have to describe what was going on.  The individuals' backgrounds, beliefs and expectations massively influenced what they saw.  We create our own worlds even when we are awake...

[12padams]

Very interesting... But like you, I still have the issue of being unable to fully close of the possibility of it being partially external. You see I really want the answer, my life is devoted to it yet it's also causing me a lot of stress. You can say "forget about it and enjoy the phase for what it is" but it's not that simple because if it's anything more than what's in your mind then I am completely dead for not being open. It also annoys me that I am stuck in a situation in which I can't properly tell you the full story about things and constantly have to censor what I say (not my phase experiences but other things in my life proving there is more than the physical world).

I mean just today a member from the group I am in (that's one of the things I gotta censor) got some more proof. The others have been trying to convince him and I that we have powerful entities inside us. So he was speaking to one of the female believers on msn (he is partially skeptical like myself) who said that they could communicate with the entity inside him. He agreed and she began talking to the entity. The results were amazing!!!

She was told by the entity inside him that he could manipulate electronics. She then told him to get his amp out so the entity within him could make a knocking sound on it. She said the entity was going to make a knocking sound and boom it happened just like she said. He even recorded it and you can hear the knocking sound that came out of the amp in the recording. He even turned on the amp later on to see if the knocking sound was just some type of technical glitch that occurred randomly... It wasn't! It only occurred when she spoke to the entity in him and told it to knock through the amp which it did at the moment she told it to over msn.

Things like this drive me nuts. I can't close off the possibility of the phase being more than in your mind which is why you now find me at spiritual forums. I wish I knew the truth but things just aren't working correctly. From what I have experienced personally in the phase I can almost confirm the people there are controlled by your subconscious mind but then there's all this proof I am receiving that nonphysical entities really do exist outside our minds...

None of us can come up with a definite answer yet an event is coming soon that should confirm the "spiritual" side is true if it happens. If it doesn't happen it doesn't confirm that the scientific side is true but it doesn't completely block out the spiritual side either. I just wish this uncertainty would end so I could just focus on the truth.

It's sad that it's gotten to the point where I don't believe two members from my group who can astral project at will say they meet each other in the astral/phase and recall exactly what they did together perfectly upon awakening. Me not believing them is a direct insult... I wish I could believe but when I can't come with them myself due to the entity within me not wanting me to go with them because it's "against his plan" it makes me struggle to believe them.

Anyway I guess you all know where summerlander and myself stand so there we go... What do the rest of you think about everything?

[Summerlander]

It also annoys me that I am stuck in a situation in which I can't properly tell you the full story about things and constantly have to censor what I say (not my phase experiences but other things in my life proving there is more than the physical world).

Either there is a reality that transcends the physical realm or the latter is all there is but we as human beings only perceive a limited portion of it.

Things like this drive me nuts. I can't close off the possibility of the phase being more than in your mind which is why you now find me at spiritual forums. I wish I knew the truth but things just aren't working correctly. From what I have experienced personally in the phase I can almost confirm the people there are controlled by your subconscious mind but then there's all this proof I am receiving that nonphysical entities really do exist outside our minds...

These so-called proofs are only appearances.  The question is, would what was demonstrated to you withstand the most rigorous tests?  This is where people have failed to prove the authenticity of the supernatural and why a sceptical portion of us doubts its existence.

It's sad that it's gotten to the point where I don't believe two members from my group who can astral project at will say they meet each other in the astral/phase and recall exactly what they did together perfectly upon awakening. Me not believing them is a direct insult... I wish I could believe but when I can't come with them myself due to the entity within me not wanting me to go with them because it's "against his plan" it makes me struggle to believe them.

Yes, these people can make you feel guilty.  In fact, "guilt" is often a weapon used by cults to cover their tracks and make those "stubborn people" they are trying to convince that it is their fault they don't understand or that they are rude or out of order for doubting.

You are entitled to your opinion.  You are entitled to your scepticism.  In fact, it is understandable for anyone to ask questions and demand solid evidence before they buy into an idea or belief.

If they feel insulted or want to give you that impression then it's their problem not yours.  From where we stand, they are the ones who have failed to prove to the world that the entity is real.

When I was a kid, I was told to go to bed on Christmas eve or Santa wouldn't come to drop off the presents.  My sister would tell me I couldn't see him and on top of that she was a great ventriloquist who convinced my youthful mind that my toys spoke.  She also told me they were shy and only spoke when she was present...

I liked those times.  They were great.  Magic was real.  The world has changed since though.  These people get found out all the time:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlfMsZwr8rc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7yDLRib ... re=related

Anyway I guess you all know where summerlander and myself stand so there we go... What do the rest of you think about everything?

In the phase state, the brain is getting diminished or no sensory input at all.  It is viable to believe that during this time, our minds make up false realities, dream worlds...

Their building blocks come from schemas and the many mental associations with what has already been experienced... plus throw creativity and imagination into the mix.  Theoretically, three areas of the mind are at work and make things happen during this state: the unconscious, the pre-conscious, and the conscious.

Consider that even the unconscious mind can influence our behaviour in wakefulness...

We are not aware of all our thoughts (fact).  In the phase, we uncover some of them and not always in their original form.  Another thing to consider...  although our perceptual experience of the external world is mostly diminished or completely severed, we are also free of its distractions.  That is the time when we can intrinsically see things clearly in our minds.  We have access to material that's been accumulated through the course of our lives.  We are also presented with a greater ability to problem solve...

12padams, you can set up as many experiments in order to fathom the full picture about the phase state.  You can try telepathy with cards or attempt to see if shared dreaming occurs when two sleeping brains are making physical contact.  But such experiments will only give suggestive results over a period of time.  Both hits and misses will have to be accounted for.  The process may even raise more questions than answers.

Here's what you can do to try to put your mind at ease though.  Simply enter the phase, and, as you explore the depths of your mind, realise that you are part of the whole puzzle.  Ask the questions that you want answers to in the phase.  In the phase, perception of the real world may be severed, but, it can take you to places that can provide you with different perspectives.  The phase may even give you access to a cosmic consciousness, the roots from which you come from, ultimate reality.

If that, in the process, gives you access to the minds of other individuals, if you realise that there is no external because you are part of a universal unit, then your question about the phase has already been answered.