Night Practice

When reading this Awakening the Third Eye book by Samuel Sagan, I read about something called Night Practice which is a technique that helps one induce themselves into a state of "Psychic Sleep".  According to Sagan, a human being is comprised of four parts:  1) The Physical Body; 2) An Ethereal Body which is the basic life force (or prana, as my yoga teacher calls it); 3) The astral body; and 4) The Ego or Higher Self. The Ego and Astral Body are linked and they form the "upper complex" while the physical body and ethereal body are linked which form the "lower complex".  Sagan claims that the physical and ethereal bodies never separate except in death.

When one sleeps, the upper complex separates from the lower complex and astrally travels and explores spiritual realms.  Psychic sleep is becoming aware of the upper complex while you sleep and using it for self-transformation.  The book includes a script and suggests that someone read it to whomever is experiencing the night practice.  The night practice can be done during the day or at night before sleep.  I guess it's called night practice because it's done laying down.

The night practice consists of many phases starting with a circulation of awareness for each body part.  The circulation starts with the vertex and continues while both the right side and left side of each body part are an area of focus.  One goes through this 3 times, each time becoming more and more aware. By the third circulation, one is supposed to be "seeing" the body part.  Sagan uses the term "seeingness" a lot.

The following phases focus on the organs, breathing from both the diaphragm and chest, experiencing the senses of smell, sound and taste, recalling the day's events, opening yourself up to spontaneous images and, finally, doing astral exercises and separating ones physical body from its astral one.

I emailed Clairvision to see if they had a night practice guided meditation that they could sell me.  The only thing they had were recordings referred to as "Knowledge Tracks", each of which included a Night Practice section.  The problem was they were around $125 each---not really in my budget.  The lady from Clairvision suggested that I make my own recording which I initially rejected.  Hearing my own voice would just keep taking me back into my own head.

I tried doing the Night Practice on my own without a recording but, really, there is just too much involved to do the technique based on memory.  So, I decided I would record my own with Garage Band which is a program on OSX that allows you to manipulate your voice.  I did so and while it does sound like me, there is a subtle reverberant echo,  I spent a couple of hours recording it and the final Night Practice recording is one hour and a half.  Wow.  That's a lot of meditation.

While recording it, however, I did give myself a lot of space between direction because I know it's going to take time in between breaths and in between shifting focus.  This is all new to me and I don't want to rush through it.

Last night I did it before bed.  A couple of times i almost drifted off.  A few times I lost focus...forgot what body part I was on or lost count of my breath but I would always bring myself back.  Towards the end, I felt extremely warm and sensed my astral body.

During intense meditations I have never had visions or seen intense light or the color of the chakra.  What I have consistently felt, however, are waves of pulsating energy and waves of light running through my body.  Often, I feel varying degrees of pressure in my third eye region.  I felt all of that last night and it was pretty intense.  I never did get to the point where I was looking down at my physical body but I went to sleep after the night practice and felt... different.

I can't recall what I experienced during sleep aside from my coworkers who, as usual, must make an appearance in my sleep, because torturing me 40 hours a week just isn't enough.  It's very rare that I don't experience anything work-related while I sleep. 

This morning when I woke up, I felt like I had a seizure in my sleep. The inside of my lower right cheek was bitten, I had a headache and felt very foggy.

Once upon a time I had a seizure disorder.  I guess you could say it was functioning epilepsy but the seizures were pretty much controlled through medication.   I took Dilantin for 17 years which worked okay.  The problem, however, was that at one point it just stopped working so the neurologist had to switch medications.  She was an advocate of Topamax which I was on for a year and half.  I am certain that my IQ dropped at least 20 points while I was on that shit.  It made me stupid, gave me double vision, I saw trails, had insomnia, became immensely paranoid and felt like i was going absolutely insane.  I don't feel that I ever fully recovered from that toxic garbage.  I actually felt that I would prefer to have seizures than take that stuff.

I ended up coming off the Topamax and shifting over to Keppra which made me want to kill myself and everyone in my path.  Seriously.  I discovered my inner serial killer while on that shit.  I knew after only a few weeks that I needed to come off it and that's when I was switched to Lamictal which I have been on for about 4 years.  My hair has fallen out since being on Lamictal.  What was once a beautiful Leo mane is now thinning.  I guess I'm really fortunate that I had a lot of hair to begin with; otherwise, I might very well be bald.  For the most part, however, Lamictal has worked fine.

I haven't had a seizure in years.  In fact, if I had health insurance I would see a neurologist to ween me off the Lamictal.  I actually weened myself off 200 mg two years ago and now take only half the dose that was initially prescribed to me.  The reason behind this was that I could not afford to pay for the full dose.  I tried getting assistance but, unless you're poverty stricken, nobody cares.  America's definition of poverty is ridiculous.  I am above their poverty line but, in no way, can afford healthcare or to buy my full dose of seizure medicine.

Back when I had seizures, I drank a lot and did all kinds of recreational drugs.  I was also very careless about taking my medication.  Now, however, I take better care of myself and am diligent about taking it daily.  This is why I believe I haven't had a seizure.  The last seizure I can recall having was when my mom was in the hospital just before she died.  I had been sleeping on a cot and not sleeping much.  With all the drama surrounding my mom, i forgot to take my medication a lot. 

I can't be sure if I had a seizure last night.  I don't feel incredibly out of it, just slightly off.  I'm certain that whatever I'm feeling today is related to the Night Practice.

I have a phone interview in just less than two hours.  It's for a really good job in San Francisco (although the hiring party is out of state).  Oddly enough I had gone through a round of two interviews with this company and received a rejection email shortly after the second interview.  Then last week, I got an email informing me that the person they had offered the job to didn't work out and was I still interested?  They seem to be in a hurry to fill this position.  Why else would they schedule an interview on Saturday? 

When I first got the rejection email from this company, I was devastated.  In my mind I had created this scenario that I was going to move to San Francisco, sell my car and work at this place.  Over the following two weeks I've realized that I don't want to move to San Francisco.  I rather like living in the country.  I've done the city thing and I'm too old to be awakened by sirens and gun shots.  I prefer waking up to the sound of a rooster.

But I will do what I have to.  By meditating so diligently, I hope to draw whatever is right for me to me.  I tend to get obsessive about things. First, I wanted this job in the city.  Then, I found out about another opportunity which is in Marin county (North of San Francisco and considerably closer to me).    I immediately got over being rejected for the first job and then became obsessed with the second job.  Now the first job is again an opportunity and I'm not as enthusiastic as I was when it was first an opportunity.  Whenever I have gone against the organic flow and have forced anything---relationships, jobs, paths--- it has not ended up well.  What I want (or think I want) isn't necessarily what's best for me and I guess that's been a bitter pill to swallow.  I'm better at accepting this now than I was ten years ago.

If this job is meant to be, it will happen.  It will be a little odd, however, speaking to a potential employer in a somewhat altered state of consciousness.