Astral projection (or astral travel) is an esoteric word for a deliberate out-of-body experience (OBE) that implies the presence of a soul called an “astral body” that is separate from the physical body and capable of traveling outside it across the cosmos.
The concept of astral travel is ancient and is found in many cultures. The phrase “astral projection” was coined and popularized by 19th-century theosophists. It has been linked to dreams and various forms of meditation. Some people have described hallucinogenic and hypnotic-induced sensations that are comparable to reports of astral projection (including self-hypnosis). There is no scientific proof that there is a consciousness with embodied activities distinct from normal cerebral activity, or that one may consciously leave the body and observe, and astral projection has been labeled a pseudoscience.
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The astral body is an intermediate body of light linking the rational soul to the physical body, according to classical, medieval, and Renaissance Hermeticism, Neoplatonism, and later Theosophist and Rosicrucian thought, while the astral plane is an intermediate world of light between Heaven and Earth, composed of the spheres of the planets and stars. Angels, demons, and ghosts were said to inhabit these astral worlds.
These bodies and their planes of existence are frequently portrayed as a series of concentric circles or nested spheres, with a distinct body traveling each realm. The concept of the astral appeared prominently in the writings of nineteenth-century French magician Eliphas Levi, from which it was taken and further developed by Theosophy and, afterward, by other esoteric organizations.
Similar ideas about the soul journey can be found in a variety of religious systems. The soul (ba), for example, is depicted in ancient Egyptian teachings as having the potential to float outside the physical body via the ka, or subtle body.
Taoist alchemical practice entails the formation of an energy body through breathing meditations, which gather energy into a “pearl” that is subsequently “circulated.”
Similar concepts, such as the Liga arra, may be found in ancient Hindu writings like Valmiki’s YogaVashishta-Maharamayana. Modern Indians who have endorsed astral projection include Paramahansa Yogananda, who watched Swami Pranabananda perform a miracle by astral projection.
Astral projection is one of the Siddhis that yoga practitioners believe they can achieve through self-disciplined practice.
An ikiryō (生霊, also read as shōryō, seirei, or ikisudama) is a manifestation of a living person’s soul that exists apart from their body in Japanese mythology. Traditionally, if someone bears a sufficiently bitter grudge against another person, it is thought that a portion or the entirety of their soul can momentarily leave their body and appear before the target of their hatred in order to curse or otherwise injure them, much like an evil eye. Souls are also thought to depart a living body when it is terribly ill or comatose; such ikiryō are not evil.
People with special abilities, known as angakkuq in some Inuit groups, are said to travel to (mythological) remote places and report their experiences and things important to their fellows or the entire community, such as how to stop bad luck in hunting, cure a sick person, and other things unavailable to people with normal abilities.
The Waiwai yaskomo in the Amazon is thought to be capable of “soul flight,” which can be used for healing, consulting cosmological beings (the moon or the brother of the moon) to get a name for a new-born baby, flying to the cave of peccaries’ mountains to ask the father of peccaries for an abundance of game, or flying deep down in a river to seek the assistance of other yaskomo.
