Everyone has some idea of what astral projection is, even if we don�t usually truly understand it. You�ve almost certainly seen it in a film or read about it somewhere. You�ve probably even heard it discussed among people you know. Even though you may have some vague concept of it, you probably didn�t know that it�s something that you � and everyone else in the world can do and have done before, even if you didn�t know it.

So what exactly happens during astral projection? When you astral project, your astral body comes out from your physical form. Most often this happens during sleep when your body is resting. Your conscious mind rests while you sleep too; but the subconscious is still going strong � and it is the source of your astral body which then leaves your body and goes out exploring the universe.

Many children actually astral project without being aware of what they are doing. It happens usually when the body is relaxed or even when they are asleep. Time and distance do not mean anything when talking about astral projection. The astral body can travel without these considerations.

Let�s explain the astral body. This is an invisible and non-physical version of your physical body which is the product of your will and your subconscious desires. Your astral body always comes home to your physical one because of an unbreakable bond between them which is called the silver cord.

The astral body is immediately connected to the physical body upon entering it with this silver cord, this cord cannot ever be broken except through death. This cord actually protects the physical body from losing the astral body.

Are you trying to figure out where you go to when you do this astral projection? Well the astral body travels to what is called the astral plane, which turns out is the invisible duplicate of the Earth. This astral plane rapidly vibrates more than the physical Earth does and these particular vibrations go all the way to the Earth’s core. There is another belief though that another dimension or alternate reality is the meaning of astral plane. One thing most agree about on this subject though is the fact that the astral plane is composed of several layers.

It is perfectly alright at this stage if you are concerned about possible hazards in doing astral projection. The answer to this is both no and yes. We have already mentioned these facts that the astral body always returns to the physical thanks to the silver cord, also that everyone can do astral projection. You just need to make sure you have your mind right to do this though. This means that your basic thinking skills should be strong and sound, this way you will be able to know exactly what you want and even more important where you want to go.

Let me caution you here, if your mind is in a dark place or not right then it becomes dangerous to astral project. If you are taking drugs or drinking alcohol it is not wise to astral project because you could wind up in some bad places. The lower levels of the astral plane contain the places that are bad.

This is why it is so important that you know exactly what you are doing and where you are planning to go. The goal you are trying to achieve is not just astral projecting, but conscious astral projection where you are aware of what is going on.

There are a number of ways to get prepared to do astral projection prior to starting it. Several professionals can be found to assist you in learning various techniques so that you get to the point where you have better control so that you have a gratifying experience, but on this note people usually rather be in their own house while doing astral projection.

There are several books on this subject and you can locate other aids to help you online. One type of aid is that of hypnosis recordings that are created for astral projections to get you into the desired state of mind. This helps you get totally relaxed along with taking you through that various levels. This is often the preferred method over a professional approach, because you can replay the recording as much as you need to get your subconscious mind to get the message about when it is alright to begin to astral project and leave your physical body.

Sound technology can also be helpful. There is a technology known as binaural beats, which plays a variety of frequencies in each ear. These frequencies are slightly different and as a result relax the body quickly. This places the mind into a deep meditation making it easier to astral project.

You can expect the first few attempts to not be as successful as you would like them to be. Astral projection takes some practice to perfect it and get the results you want. Remember that you have the ability already, all of us have the ability to do astral projection, we have just over time forgotten the method and just need to tune our own natural ability to do it.

Do you still not totally believe this is for real? Well have you ever had dreams that you were flying or had the sensation of falling? The flying was your astral body actually traveling through the various astral planes. The sensation of falling is the astral body coming back to the physical body after it traveling around. Astral projection really exists! Take time to tune your natural abilities and you will see that anyone has the abilities to perform this and reap the benefits from it.

Out of body travel has been recorded in the annals of history, dating back several centuries to the times of the ancient Egyptians. They called the soul, or the astral body, “Kha,” and often reproduced images of it hovering over or beyond the flesh-and-blood body. It was shown to be airy and translucent, and often haloed by light.

The ancient Egyptians were fascinated by the astral body, and experimented with many methods of controlling it in order to visit other planes of time and space while the physical body stayed behind. It is suspected that it is through astral projection experiences such as these that they were able to learn the skills necessary to build the pyramids using only the materials they had at the time, which is something that still baffles scientists to this day.

Meditation is the first element that the ancient Egyptians used for out of body travel. They recorded this as concentrating on nothing more than the visions they would see with their eyes closed and being nearly asleep. The flashes of patterns and lights that they would see represented the beginning of their journey to another plane in space and time while traveling in their astral body.

When this state passed, the astral body was said to then enter into an emergence phase, which in turn caused the physical body to hum or tingle and then feel very heavy. The ancients believed this feeling of tingling and heaviness was actually the feeling of the astral body pulling away from the physical body, and initiating the out of body journey into the unknown.

The techniques for accomplishing this varied, but the most common practice seemed to be to simply “walk” out of oneself, beginning through the mind’s eye, followed then by the shoulders and chest, hips, legs, knees, and finally the feet until there were two entities – a physical body and the astral body.

This separating of bodies, then allowed the astral body to pass freely through solid objects, it could also hover and fly about without being effected by the lack of oxygen or changes in the atmosphere.

The ancient Greeks also recorded instances of out of body travel, and expanded on the strictly meditatively-induced state of the ancient Egyptians to include out of body travel by way of physical or mental trauma. The ancient historian Plutarch of Queroneia, for example, cited the case of Arisdeu who, after suffering blunt trauma to his head after a fall slipped into a coma for three days.

During this time the experience of Arisdeu included seeing his immobile physical body on the ground, although he was able to freely move about. He was able to travel out of body to previously unimagined places. After adapting to this new environment, the spirit guide of Arideu met him and assisted him and then advised him of the projection of his astral body into other dimensions.

After some time exploring and learning what he could about this altered state of existence, he felt himself forcibly pulled back into his physical body, where he then spent the rest of his life trying to apply the information he learned while on his out of body journey.

Ancient Egyptians and Greeks are not the only cultures to record the history of out of body travel. The history of the Native Americans contains many full accounts of similar occurrences. These include meeting spirit guides and spirit animals advising on the traveling of the astral body. Native Americans have for centuries burned and then inhaled the smoke of particular plants to help relax the mind to the point required for out of body travel.

The human body has the ability to explore different horizons of time and space. This has been recorded since the beginning of time. We are able to channel our consciousness into a spiritual body. However, many modern individuals have forgotten this wonderfully natural gift. Many have forgotten how to alter our consciousness to the point that we can release it from the confines of our physical limitations. However, with practice we can join with our spiritual guides and self on the higher planes of existence.

The door is within each of us, we simply need to remember how to reconnect with the higher more spiritual side so that we are once more about to journey out of body to those higher planes. The possibilities are unlimited. It is a natural process and once we rediscover this inside ourselves we can gain in the potentials of understanding our higher self.