Imagination · “Feel It Real”
Conway's Astral Projection
To use trained relaxation and visualization to build a vivid ‘second body’ (astral body), transfer the seat of awareness into it, and experience moving apart from the physical body.
Conway’s astral projection in 6 lines: Only after you can relax fully and visualize vividly. Lie down undisturbed; relax the body completely; breathe slow and even. With trained imagination, build a vivid duplicate body. Shift your sense of “I” into that double — feel yourself looking out from it. Let it gently rise/move apart; stay calm through any vibrations. Keep it brief; then return into the physical body, move fingers and toes, and re-orient before rising.
What it is
In the practical half of Magic: An Occult Primer (1972), David Conway teaches astral projection — deliberately inducing the experience of leaving the physical body in a “second” or astral body.
Crucially, in Conway’s system this is not a beginner technique: it is the application of skills built earlier — his relaxation, his Moon Breathing, and above all his visualization training.
The method is, at root, to relax the body into stillness, then use trained, vivid visualization to construct a duplicate body and shift the centre of one’s awareness into it, until the sense of being located there — apart from the physical body — takes hold.
Conway frames it within the occult doctrine of the astral body; experientially it is a vividly visualized, then “inhabited,” out-of-body state.
The Method
Conway builds this on his preliminary disciplines. Faithful reconstruction:
- Prerequisite: master the basics first. Conway is explicit that projection follows weeks of prior training — you must already be able to relax fully and to hold a vivid, stable visualized image. Don’t attempt it cold.
- Set up: quiet, undisturbed, comfortable. A dim, quiet room; lie down comfortably; you must be undisturbed and unhurried.
- Relax completely. Run his progressive relaxation until the body is deeply slack and heavy — the “body asleep” half of body asleep, mind awake.
- Settle the breath. Bring the breath into the slow, even rhythm of Moon Breathing, deepening calm while keeping the mind clear and awake.
- Build the second body with visualization. Using the trained imagination, construct a vivid image of a duplicate of yourself — a second body, fully detailed and sensed, occupying or rising from the position of the physical one. This is where the visualization training pays off: the double must feel real, not vague.
- Transfer awareness into the double. This is the pivotal step. Shift the seat of “I” out of the physical body and into the visualized second body — feel yourself looking out from the double, feeling with it, located in it rather than in the flesh. The conviction of being there is what matters.
- Move apart, gently. From within the second body, imagine/feel it rising, standing, or moving away from the physical body — beginning with a small, controlled movement. Let the sense of separation establish itself rather than forcing a dramatic exit; Conway stresses calm and control over strain.
- Stay calm; explore within limits. Strong sensations (vibrations, a sense of floating, a “snap” of separation) may arise; meet them without panic. Keep the excursion modest, especially early on.
- Return deliberately and re-integrate. End by bringing awareness back into the physical body — feel yourself re-settle into it — then move the fingers and toes, re-establish ordinary body sense, open the eyes, and re-orient fully to the room before getting up. (Sourcing note: Conway teaches astral projection in Magic: An Occult Primer as the application of his relaxation + breathing + visualization training, via building and entering a visualized second body. The staged sequence is a faithful paraphrase of that documented approach; exact procedural wording and any sigils/aids are in the book. Sensations such as vibrations are commonly reported in this and parallel methods.)
Source & Lineage
Magic: An Occult Primer (David Conway, 1972) is a cornerstone modern occult manual. Its astral-projection method descends from the Golden Dawn‘s “rising on the planes” / astral travel, and stands alongside the classic projection literature — Sylvan Muldoon & Hereward Carrington, The Projection of the Astral Body (1929); Oliver Fox; and later Robert Monroe.
The visualization-a-double-then-transfer-awareness route is a staple of this tradition. →David Conway.
The Traditions' versions
Golden Dawn astral travel / “rising on the planes” — the parent practice: building and entering a visualized astral form. → skrying & astral entries.
- Muldoon–Carrington / Oliver Fox / Monroe — the OBE-projection lineage, with vibrations, the “second body,” and gradual separation.
- Tibetan dream/illusory-body & bardo yogas — cultivating an illusory body and continuity of awareness apart from the gross body.
- Modern WILD / OBE induction (lucid-dream community) — relax to the edge of sleep, keep awareness, then “roll/lift out.”
- Conway’s own visualization training — the direct prerequisite skill.
Common refinements
Skipping the prerequisites. Without solid relaxation and visualization skill, the second body stays vague and nothing “transfers.” Conway’s whole point is that this is built, not rushed.
- Trying to force an exit / straining the will. As throughout Conway (and Coué), effort backfires; relaxed, vivid expectancy works where muscular willing does not.
- Panicking at vibrations or paralysis. These sensations are common and benign; fear collapses the state. Stay calm and let them pass.
- Over-reaching early. Begin with the barest separation or a single small movement; ambitious “journeys” too soon end in failure or fright.
- No clean return. Always re-integrate deliberately and re-orient to the room; sloppy returns leave you groggy or disoriented.