I initially thought it was because of the Garage, since that's where we were living when dad and his brother had it happen as well as my first experience with it. Then when we lived in the Cul-de-Sac, I was practicing the ability to do it on my own. And it was working.
Some may call it an out of body experience, others think of it as a near-death experience because of the circumstances for a few. And others refer to it as astral projection. Whatever your thinking is on this, I can tell you with certainty, it's real.
Dad wasn't one who was prone to make up stories of these types of phenomena. So it was a bit unnerving the first time he told me that it happened to him. Again, we were living in the Garage at the time and I was maybe 12 or 13 years old. Dad worked hard all week so when he took some downtime, it usually just meant he went to lay in bed for a bit before getting up and doing the next thing. So it was probably an early Saturday afternoon. I was in the living room watching probably MTV, mom doing something in the kitchen. My brother who knows where out and about with his friends. Sister in the main house with grandma. She spent all kinds of time with grandma back then.
Dad gets up from his nap and he doesn't look to be all that well rested. And as was often the case with dad and his stories, there's no warm-up, no preface, he just jumped right in to what he wanted to say. He starts talking about when he went to lay down, that after a while he was at that sunset time. At least, I call it the sunset time. When you're halfway between awake and sleep. Not fully asleep but not really awake either. He said he could sense a detachment from his body. That he was suddenly feeling like he was hovering over his bed and when he looked back, he could see himself laying there beneath. That he felt himself rising further up and he could see more of the world around him, that he could see me in the living room watching TV. He sort of just trailed off after that. He may have gone into more detail or he might have just let his mind wander off from the story. I can't remember exactly. We're talking about a conversation we had nearly 40 years ago. My memory's good but, come on.
Anyway, he did have those experiences again, at least that he shared with me. A few times at the Mountaintop and again at Chaucer. But I didn't really think much about them at the time. Looking back, I wish I had asked him more about what was going on, how it happened, etc.
My uncle's story, on the other hand, came during surgery. At least, what I can recall of it. I was way too young to remember what or even when he was in surgery for, but the story that I remember him telling was that he was in the operating room and he could see himself on the table, the medical team surrounding him. He said something about a brilliant white light above him and that he went towards the light. That it was the warmest, most comforting feeling he had ever known. But when he reached the apex, he heard a voice tell him, 'No. It's not your time.' Then he woke up in the recovery room.
I heard the story a handful of times when I was in my teens but I don't know if he's ever mentioned it much since. But he's often cited that bright white light as the reason why he's led a pretty reckless life through most of his teens right on through middle-age. Because he wasn't afraid to die, if that's what's waiting for him.
As for me, the first time I experienced it was also at the Garage. Honestly, it didn't freak me out as much as it probably should have because at the time it was happening, I thought it was an episode of Alice in Wonderland Syndrome that I had been afflicted with previously. Remember that also involved feeling larger and larger, to the point where the room couldn't contain me? The out-of-body experience felt the same or very similar to me at the time. However many times it may have occurred, I couldn't say for certain because again, I thought it was AIWS at the time.
It wasn't until we were living in the Cul-de-Sac where I was actively practicing and attempting to do it on my own. As I mentioned before, that's the time in my life when I really started to study up on shamanism, spirituality and meditation. Part of where shamanism and meditation converge is in the spirit world. I'm sure there's a more specific term for it but it eludes me at the moment. But nevertheless, I was actively attempting to initiate out-of-body experiences. Spirit Walking. It took a few tries before it really started to happen. And I gotta be honest, after a few successful attempts, I decided to stop altogether. Maybe I freaked myself out about it? Overthought the process? Something just made me pull back on that aspect of my training. Could be because I was doing it by myself and was worried about what might happen if I went too far? Can't say for sure what was going through my mind back then. But I haven't made any attempts at that in over 20 years.
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