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A Record of Out of the Body Experiences – Oliver Fox
February 6^th 1916, Southampton

On this occasion I experimented with a definite object, to visit Mrs X at her house in Lumsden Avenue, Southampton.  On retiring for the night, I lay on my right side, keeping as still as possible and taking deep rhythmic breaths.

I did not concentrate on Mrs X, but on the preliminary stage of the experiment, as I wanted to pass into the trance condition without losing consciousness even for a moment.  In this I was quite successful.  After the breathing had continued for some time, I noted a curious sensation in my physical eyes, as though they were rolling upwards and squinting slightly.  At the same time all my consciousness seemed to be focused upon some point situated in the middle of my brain, perhaps in the region of the pineal gland.

It occurred to me that I was ‘concentrating inwardly’, as some occult students term it.  For some time I continued this concentration, and more and more it seemed to me that all my incorporeal self was being condensed about this central point within my physical brain.  Soon I began to feel a numbness stealing over my body, extending from the feet upwards and gradually stiffening into a painful rigidity.  I now seemed to be in a state resembling catalepsy, even my jaws being bound together, as though the muscles had changed into iron clamps.

I was still in darkness, my physical eyes being tightly closed and rolled upwards; but now I had the sensation of possessing another pair, and these non physical eyes opened.  It will thus be seen that I actually passed from waking life into the proper trance condition without any break in my consciousness.

My physical body was lying entranced on its right side and facing my wife.  As I opened my ‘astral’ eyes, I turned right round within my physical body so that I faced the other direction.  Great forces seemed to be straining the atmosphere, and bluish green flashes of light came from all parts of the room.  I then caught sight of a hideous monster – a vague, white, filmy formless thing, spreading out in queer patches and snake like protuberances.  It had two enormous round eyes, like globes filled with pale blue fire, each about 6 or 7 inches in diameter.  I was certainly very frightened.  I felt my physical heart leap, and my breathing changed suddenly to jerky gaspings.  However, my reason conquered my fear.  I turned over again within my physical body, so that the monster was out of sight.  Telling myself that nothing could harm me, I concentrated my will on prolonging the trance, which the shock had very nearly broken.  In this I was successful.  My heart became normal again, and my breathing rhythmic.

Once more I turned within myself and viewed the room.  The monster had gone, but the flashings continued for a little while.  These too subsided, and then the room seemed just as usual, except for the fact that it was dimly and evenly illuminated by no visible source of light.  I then sat up in my ‘astral’ body, thus raising myself out of the recumbent physical, swung my legs over the side of the bed and finally stood up, having effected a complete separation.  Dual consciousness was most pronounced, I could distinctly feel myself lying on the bed and standing on the floor at the same time.  However, I could not see my body on the bed, perhaps because its counterpart had been withdrawn with me – but this is only theory.

My wife’s form was plainly visible.  I bent over and kissed her, and she opened her eyes, regarding me sleepily.  It then occurred to me that I had better get on with my experiment, so I waved my hand to her and left the room.

Passing through both room door and front door, I stood outside the house and paused while I concentrated all my will power upon the idea of travelling to Mrs X.  At this point I had a brief glimpse of a barely visible curtain of vibrating circular objects – resembling frog’s eggs.  I think they were a misty blue or purple in colour, but they were just on the border of visibility.

I had now lost the sensation of dual consciousness.  All of me seemed to be outside the house.  My reason told me that my physical body was lying on the bed beside my wife, but I no longer felt it there.  Small time was necessary for this concentration on the idea of travelling to Mrs X.

Almost immediately I was caught up and borne along with ever increasing velocity, passing through houses and trees and apparently taking the shortest path to the desired goal.  At the end of this journey, which occupied only a second or so, if that, I found myself beating against the fronts of houses resembling those in Lumsden Avenue.  I was like a piece of paper blown by a gale hither and thither.  The directing impulse seemed to have suddenly given out, and I could not find the right house.

At this point my body called me back.  I made the journey home in a flash and found myself still in the trance condition and experiencing dual consciousness.