stuck between dreams and waking

I was in the middle of reading the thread on Chakras in the Otherkin - General forum when I thought I should probably write what I want to ask, down.

I'm really not up to date on knowledge about energy work, so any pointers folks here could give me about where to look for more information would be a good thing. Right now I'm working on Dion Fortune's Psychic Self-Defense and I have a book someone else gave me, The Mentalist's Handbook, lined up after that. The thing is that I have pretty poor self-control, mentally speaking ("chaotic" describes it pretty freaking well), and so I don't want to go off and attempt to astral project to someplace where I could pick up spirits I don't want to deal with, or can't deal with (within a modicum of attempting nonviolence), yet.

...I say "within a modicum of attempting nonviolence" because I do have one system member who acts on the defensive (K.), problem is he's pretty no-holds-barred. (I'm guessing he's the one who keeps attacking/freaking out people who try to take a look into my/our psychic dynamics without my/our permission.) However, it isn't in any of our best interests for him to go out making enemies.

When I was younger, in my pre-teens and teens, I did a lot more energy-work-type stuff (in specific, meditation, clearing, shields, attempts at grounding) -- though if I recall correctly, it was one of my current system members who taught me this, before I was conscious of having a system. That was when I thought I was psychic, and it's taken me a good number of years to get a grip on...that. It was pretty stressful. During the course of my healing, for my own sanity, I had to let the "psychic" angle go and try to focus more on consensus reality.

In my second major illness, I was depressed and psychotic ("psychotic", meaning "disattached from consensus reality", not "wanting to hurt or kill people"), and in effect preferred the world of dreams to this one...which was not good, as preferring sleep to reality, in that case, was not far from being suicidal. This is especially so as I at the time was neglecting a number of self-care habits (like normal hygeine and eating) -- it was as though I'd forgotten I had a body that had needs of its own. I've since recovered from that quite a bit, but I still have the tendency to oversleep, and not know what to do other than sleep.

Now for what I actually wanted to write here about...

Right now I'm experiencing something that's a bit odd, but it's been characteristic of me at least since the second illness hit. What happens is that I'll oversleep and essentially it's like I'm lying in bed and trying to get out of bed. Basically I'm stuck looking at one place on the wall, and to my vision, my body is frozen there, asleep. It's as though I were lying there with my eyes open -- often, what I see is exactly what I would see if my eyes were open.

If I try to move my limbs, I can feel them move -- but not see them move. And I normally either can't, or I have great difficulty with, moving my field of vision beyond the initial image. I eventually get tired of laying in one place, so I end up trying to slide off of the bed, using my sense of touch. But whenever I consciously shift my eyes or try to blink, I'll be back in bed in the same position I was when I began, looking at the same place as I was when I began. And it's really annoying.

This last time I realized that as I was stuck there, maybe there could be an opportunity for modifying my energetic body. I can't quite recall everything I did; I just recall drawing out claws at the ends of the fingertips of one hand, as though my energy were clay (which technique is something I picked up through a quick skim of The Mentalist's Handbook). I figured that perhaps if I were a demon, the energy manipulation might come to me easily. It was not very difficult, and I did achieve a visualization of my hand in an intermediate stage, with a very long human fingernail. That, at least, got me out of being locked-in to my body.

I write about this because I'm wondering if anyone here, who has more knowledge on this than I do, would know what was going on; and would be willing to help me get out of these dreams where I'm locked in place. I get the idea that if I could get out of my body, instead of being snapped back to it, that this might have something to do with astral travel; but I have a feeling I'm going about it the wrong way.

I should add -- I have a problem with getting into the study of magick which I am not sure would effect me in getting into the study of energy work...essentially when I study magick I tend to become hypervigilant and have really weird (and normally frightening) synchronicities. This has in effect made me afraid to study magick. I have not been getting that sense from reading Psychic Self-Defense, which is a good thing; but I mention it here in case someone sees it as relevant to the above case.

--A.

What you're describing sounds either like sleep paralysis, or the beginnings of an out of body experience (depending on who you ask, they could be the same thing).

My suggestion to you would be to try to learn astral projection, because if you're concerned about going somewhere out of body that isn't safe, it's better to know what you're doing than to fall there by mistake. I mean it's better to learn to drive safely with a good instructor than to teach yourself in the zombie apocalypse while trying to escape from ravenous undead, if you get my meaning.

My suggestion would be Astral Dynamics/NEW Energy Ways by Robert Bruce. His site's been redesigned since I was last there, but I think these are the right links:

New Energy Ways: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.astraldynamics.com/home/new-energy-ways/using-new-full-tutorial.html">http://www.astraldynamics.com/home/new- ... orial.html</a><!-- m -->
Treatise on Astral Projection: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.astraldynamics.com/home/astral-projection-training/treatise-on-astral-projection.html">http://www.astraldynamics.com/home/astr ... ction.html</a><!-- m -->

Very, very good reads.

I second Archer's assessment. Sounds like sleep paralysis, and annoying, but largely harmless phenomena.

While Fortune is a good read, Marsh's book is a good read. He wrote the book much in the style that was common during Fortune's time interestingly enough, but once you get past the language and secret chiefs, it really is a good book. He gives a grounding in a lot of things, and either with helping you with projecting, or just ... stabilizing yourself, there should be a good starting place.

Also; hi, didn't know you were here, interesting name.

Hi!

Archer, thank you for the links! I didn't expect all of that info to be online!

Hi Ges <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_biggrin.gif" alt=":D" title="Very Happy" /><!-- s --> Yes, I habitually change my handle. This one was just one which came to me in the moment. It's actually due to Kahoku that I found my way here. <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_smile.gif" alt=":)" title="Smile" /><!-- s --> (Hope my saying that is okay with 'Hoku...I haven't been going light on disclosing all the mundane reasons why I may have been experiencing odd things. ^_^;;; heh)