Two thousand years ago, St. Paul wrote, in I Cor. 15:44, "There is, of course a physical body, so there has to be a spiritual body." (TEV). He describes an event (undoubtedly his own experience) in II Cor. 12:2 which convinced him of the truth of that statement: "I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven-whether in the body or out of the body I do not know." (RSV)

Today, in addition to our religious beliefs, we also have clinical evidence that we are a soul/body mixture and that, under certain circumstanes, the two can be separated without any negative effect on our consciousness. There is a large body of literature which documents the fact that trauma or clinical death can loosen the bond between our two dimensions so that they separate. This phenomenon is called the Near-Death Experience.

Out-of-Body Experiences are similar, but distinct in one important way. They do not require a trauma or the approach of death to trigger them. They can be spontaneous or even willed to happen. Robert A. Monroe, perhaps the most influential writer in this field and author of Journeys Out Of The Body, founded the Monroe Institute of Applied Sciences in Afton, VA in 1973. Among other things, he developed a technique through which he could teach people to go out-of-body at will.

Many young people experience this phenomenon early in life and assume that it is a natural ability possessed by everyone. In fact, it is a natural ability, but our society as a whole does not recognize it, and often discourages those who want to report their personal experiences with it.

Many people report dreaming of flying, and authorities in the field claim that these dreams may be the fractured memories of OBE's experienced during sleep. We are coming to believe that we all go out-of-body during our deepest sleep cycles, during which we return to spirit to recharge our souls, prepare for coming challenges, and deepen our integration of what we are learning in our current incarnation.

Following are stories of personal OBEs contributed by visitors to Beyond Religion. If you have a similar story, please think about sharing it with us. You can contact us at john@beyondreligion.com.