No. 11. Alexander Lelekov. Computer Programmer. Saint Petersburg, Russia

I tried all night to use the Astral Catapult that cues you when you're dreaming, but I gave up on the idea after several unsuccessful awakenings and simply fell asleep. When I'm dreaming I usually move by taking great leaps, much further than a kangaroo, about 100-300 yards. This happens regularly in my dreams, and I usually immediately realize that I'm in a dream. During one of the leaps, I realized while airborne that I was dreaming and also realized that I was able to land in a small dirty pond. As expected, I landed right in the pond and went deep under the water. And at that very moment, I found myself in the stencil, with my hands and head half stuck in it.

I got a little nervous that this attempt would also be unsuccessful, and so I immediately tried to separate from my body. I was unable to get my head or hands out, and for the first time I tried to turn around round my axis and managed to get out. Then I either slipped down or fell from the bed, but I did not feel any pain. I crawled for 1-2 meters and then felt that I could go back. I started to touch the rug and some other thing, though I don't know exactly what it was as it was dark, and, lo and behold: within 20-30 seconds I probably felt what small kittens feel when their eyes open for the first time. Everything was foggy and blurry at first, but then a picture started to appear, the room filled with light, and colors became bright and vivid. I tried very hard to restrain my excitement, and, to my surprise, was able to.

I walked around my apartment thinking about what I should do. Realizing that I did not have that much time, I decided to talk to an elderly man who would answer my questions. I decided that there would be an omniscient elderly man behind the apartment's front door, which I was about to open. And there he was, half-bald, about 60 years old, in a grey coat waiting for me. I asked him the question, "What should I do to get into the phase more often?" But he started to tell me about how he was raped as a child. And to be more precise, this was already not an elderly man, but an elderly woman. I was not very interested in hearing her story, thus I tried to move away from her, suggesting that we could talk later. But the elderly woman was persistent, and I did not want to offend her, because I thought that this was an unusual dream with its own set of rules, and namely that once you have asked an old woman a question, you are supposed to be courteous and listen to the entire answer.

I went with her to the kitchen of my apartment. The telephone suddenly rang. I got scared that the telephone was ringing in my apartment and would wake me up, which is why I immediately started to look at my hand in order to maintain. But the sensations were quite stable, and I stopped doing that. Then, me and this lady wanted to cook something in my kitchen. She said that I could heat a frying pan without gas. But I instead decided to try the technique of putting the hands together and blowing on them, and returned back into my body.

Questions: Which type of the entry into the phase did Alexander describe? Was the cueing program of any help? Which type of anchor was the leaping? Why was the onset of consciousness immediately followed by a transition into the stencil, i.e., the real body, though not completely? Which separation technique helped him to get out of his body again? Which technique was used for deepening? Which technique for materializing an object was used correctly? What should the procedure for obtaining information have been started with? What importance does a polite attitude towards elderly women in the phase have? Why was the return to body possible? What did Alexander either forget to do or forget to record right after the foul?

Answers and Comments: Alexander described an entry into the phase through dream consciousness. By and large, the onset of consciousness was facilitated by prior work with the cueing program, which, though it failed to yield results, strengthened the necessary intention to enter the phase. The leaping that accompanied the onset of consciousness may be compared with the sensations of levitation that often lead to practitioners achieving dream consciousness. Since the techniques for deepening and maintaining were not used at the moment of dream consciousness, a return to the body, though partial, naturally occurred.

Furthermore, Alexander managed to apply a separation technique that most resembled climbing out. He then managed to deepen correctly by means of touching and immediately felt a result. Despite the lack of a plan of action, the practitioner competently decided to do something useful and employed the technique of finding through a door in order to locate an animate source of information. He should have first tried to test the subject by asking special questions to determine if the object would be able to provide information (see Chapter 10).

Being polite to animate objects in the phase is the prerogative of each person on an individual basis, but it hardly has any real basis. Most likely, the return to the body was triggered by a failure to maintain, excessive thinking, or temporary passivity. Upon exiting the phase, Alexander should have tried to immediately return. However, he failed to do so, even though he had returned to the phase after exiting dream consciousness. Such a step should have been obvious due to an incomplete connection to the body.