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When the topic of astral projection and lucid dreaming comes up, I hear people making all sorts of claims about what astral projection means and what lucid dreaming means.

Lucid dreamers can get attached to their preferred skill and think it’s better than astral projection. Astral projectors do the same.

In the end, there is really no battle. They are very similar in their end result, but they take different routes to get there.

Explaining Astral Projection

Astral projection occurs when you consciously enter your dreaming body, also called your astral body, while remaining completely conscious of the process.

A great example of this is people in meditation. They will sit down and allow their consciousness to enter their dreaming body without blanking out or losing consciousness.

There are many techniques to achieve this, including the popular rope technique, where you visualize yourself climbing up a rope, higher and higher out of your body.

Often during astral projection, you will find yourself close to your physical body once you have moved into your dreaming body. This is certainly not the case all the time, especially if you attempt to astral project with a different destination in mind.

However, this effect happens much more with astral projection than it does with lucid dreaming.

Why might this be?

Explaining Lucid Dreaming

In lucid dreaming, you become aware once your consciousness has already moved into the dreaming body. You are not aware of the whole transition. You are in your dreaming body already, and then your conscious mind wakes up and realizes you are in the dream world.

Because you have already moved into the dream world, your scenery will often not be your room, or around your physical body. This is because you have already moved to another place in the dream world.

You can certainly travel back to your room, or wherever you fell asleep to attempt to view your physical body.

WILD – Astral Projection or Lucid Dreaming?

WILD stands for Wake Induced Lucid Dream, and this is where the already overlapping line gets more blurry.

A WILD is when someone lays down and attempts to fall asleep consciously, being aware of the whole process along the way.

So technically this is actually astral projection when done perfectly. However, for most people, they lose consciousness even for small periods when transitioning. It can be very hard to spot because the realms are very subtle, and memory of these times can slip away easily if not locked in immediately afterward.

Many astral projectors and those in the lucid dreaming community will disagree when I say WILD is actually astral projection because they are so used to seeing it as a technique for lucid dreaming.

Others will see that the lines start to blur here, and we don’t need to split hairs past this level.

I do find it helpful to understand the simple difference between lucid dreaming and astral projection though.

Lucid dreaming = becoming conscious while already in the dreaming body

Astral projection = being aware of the entire transition of consciousness from the physical body to the dreaming body. Or put in another way: falling asleep consciously…

Do you agree with these definitions? If not make your voice heard in the comments. If so, still make your voice heard!