I've been doing more reading on the out-of-body experience. This is a hard task because a lot of the material out there on it is nonsense. At the same time, there is a lot of great material out there too.
Yesterday I discovered the Frank Kepple Resource, which has his view of the "wider reality" and his thoughts on reincarnation, God, and other topics. It is quite a decent read, at 20,000 words, but there is some good material in it. I wanted to recount a few things here that I found interesting.
1. Frank's cosmology is broken up into four "focuses":
- Focus 1 is the physical world (the one we are in now)
- Focus 2 is the dream world (this is limited to each person's inner world)
- Focus 3 is the form-based spiritual world
- Focus 4 is the formless spiritual world
I found this consistent with Buddhist cosmology.
2. Frank gives some very interesting accounts of "focus 4" reality:
It is an area of purely subjective reality. So nothing actually exists as an objective observable form. To feel your whole sense of 'body' totally disintegrate is not something you forget in a hurry. This is why I do not recommend beginners attempt Phasing to focus 4. There are no 'dangers' don’t get me wrong. But the effects are mind blowing and I do not say this lightly. Seeing my whole physical life as a *concept* changed my outlook on life significantly overnight. The notion of *concepts* is one that you will have to fully grasp in order to make headway in F4. In F4, everything is to do with subjective concepts and F4 is the source of all concepts that eventually manifest in objective reality. You can decide to merge with the underlying subjective energy that forms the concept of anything you care to think of and experience being that thing, or more correctly, the concept of that thing. You can experience being the concept of a flower, a rock, a cloud, an ant, or a human being. For the really adventurous, you can also experience more abstract concepts, like being a sound (this is fun!), or a day of the week - that's right, you can experience the concept of 'Tuesday'! There is no end of concepts that you can engage with - I told you it was freaky!
This is consistent with the World of the Forms described by Plato.
It is an area of simultaneous time, as opposed to linear time that we experience within this physical reality. So everything that is about to happen, has happened and is happening, is all happening at once within the same moment (within infinity everything happens an infinite number of times). This means of course that there is no death, no beginning or ending: everything just IS. However at the same time, there is ever-expanding consciousness. Hey, it's hard to get your head around, but who said infinite reality and the prospect of ever expanding consciousness would be easy! It's all part of the fun!"
So what's Focus 4 like? Well, you need to realise that F4 is nothing like F1, F2 or F3. It's unique. You phase into what feels like a huge interconnecting communications network. In a way it’s like plugging your computer into the Internet. But you are plugging your mind into an infinite network of other minds. There is, of course, a LOT more to it than that. But in a nutshell that’s the simplest explanation I can come up with. While it is an exciting thing to do, I have to mention that it is not for the faint of heart, or for anyone who is not totally grounded in themselves mentally.
The ‘problem’ you might say, is you can get to feeling like you have 'lost your own mind'.
Thing is, we get so used to having only ourselves in mind. And communicating in this area is fully mind-to-mind. So what you do is merge your mind with another mind or minds (now multiple merging is really freaky) and you communicate via thoughts, imagery, feelings, and so forth, in ways that are appropriate for the subject matter you are communicating about.
In a sense, though, it feels like someone is 'invading' your mind, and the more egotistical parts of you may battle against it. With me it took about a hundred attempts before I became comfortable with the process. (Frank Kepple)
The best way of thinking of Focus 4 in my opinion, is to think of it as the ultimate creative source of all that exists within our entire system. In other words, all the original plans, archetypes, models, etc., etc. of all the physical realities 'connected' to Focus 4, are held within this area.
Focus 3 is a Transition Area that is reserved for people 'returning' from their physical experience. People generally have to go through a period of shaking off all the belief constructs they brought into objective reality during their physical experience, to enable them to merge fully with the subjective reality of F4 again, at which point they can decide what to experience next. Focus 3 also has sections that serve as what could be termed areas of our 'collective unconscious' but for our purposes, thinking of it as a Transition Area will suffice. (Frank Kepple)
He does not describe the kind of "Sempiternal Rose" idea of the others but it is very similar. He describes phase 4 as a timeless, infinite Source from which everything else is derived from. In it exist endless transcendent Ideas and infinite possibilities. It is the origin of everything in the cosmos: the spiritual and the physical. His description here makes me think of the World Tree (Yggdrasil) in Norse mythology, in terms of how the universe comes into being, and of the film The Fountain.
Parallel Universes:
The Wider Physical is a very interesting area which I am just starting to get to grips with. When you are exploring the Wider Physical you come across all manner of tubular structures, astral gateways and all manner of weird and wonderful entrance structures. I now believe that at least some of these may lead to other parallel physical universes. There is not just one universe you see. While ours is vast enough, it would appear that we created many other parallel physical universes as well. Some are very similar and others are wildly different.
3. This is one I would not have expected, but it is the same as Robert Monroe. Since the Source can imagine any Idea or possibility, that means every alternate or imagined reality can and does exist somewhere in some part of the cosmos. Every alternate reality is unfolding and happening simultaneously, infinitely.
Reincarnation is a confusing issue. I used to subscribe to the notion that we all lived sequential human lives, one after the other, as did Monroe. You will find that the standard concept of reincarnation runs through his work. However I have now come to the conclusion that this is not quite right. It is fair to say, from a Focus 4 perspective, that we all certainly do experience many, many human lives. The difference is, we don't experience them sequentially, we experience them all simultaneously.
4. A very hard one to fathom. Not easy for the human mind for sure.
Frank on retrievals
I have talked about 'retrieval work' many times in the past. This is when people in F3 decide to dedicate time to helping those who are stuck in emotional loops and belief constructs lower down the F3 tree. These people are usually referred to as 'helpers'. There are also those who are currently physically engaged, yet have decided to do their bit to help those on the lower branches of F3.
5. Sounds like the work Jeff dedicates much of his time to. Fits notions that exist in culture of "gods" who descend to earth or "guardian angels."
Frank's discoveries concerning guides
I do subscribe to the concept of 'guides' in the loose sense of the word, although I tend to prefer the term 'helpers' as the former does carry a lot of mystical baggage which I tend to dislike. I did go through a phase where I thought all this guide stuff was nonsense. But my curiosity got the better of me and I thought well, let's give it a go. So I mentally dumped all my thoughts of it being just some kind of mystical nonsense and began projecting with an entirely open mind on the matter.
I suspected that someone had been following me around on my astral journeys for a while but I could never nail anything down. Matters came to a head (as my guide knew they would) and one morning I just said something like, "Look, I know you've been following me around for a while now. So let's cut all this nonsense and just make yourself known." Which he did (as, again, he knew he eventually would).
6. Some interesting material here. In culture there is the idea of the "conscience" one listens to. More mystical versions of this have Socrates listening to his "daimonion" and the Catholic mystics who listen to similar Voices. The "Inner Director" may be the activity of actual helpers - either in passing or consistently. All one must do is cultivate the appropriate level of discernment/discrimination and then open oneself up humbly to being able to receive the help/intuitions. This also gives new meaning to the idea of "muses" and similar inspirational sources for artists which exist in culture.