Like outer space, I suspect the “astral” contains vast swaths of emptiness. When someone makes an astral temple, they are not mowing down an astral forest and building on someone else’s territory, they are starting with astral nothingness and producing within that nothingness our human concepts of time, space, depth, and physics. Nor will “space” in the astral “run out”, for the astral (while not infinite) is also not constrained by concepts of physical space, as we understand it.
Building a personal astral space is quite easy. Like any castle you want it to be protected, but basic protections (likely all that you will need) are simple to put up.
To visit an empty swath of the astral to build upon, do this simple exercise:
Become very relaxed through any technique you like. Enter a trance-like, almost sleepy state. If you don’t know what being in trance feels like, try following some Youtube meditations that bring a person to great relaxation.
Close your eyes and imagine a door. Any sort of door will work. Because this door was created by you, only you can open and close it.
Stand before the door and say or think, “this door will take me to an empty astral space that I can use as my own.”
Know these words to be true.
Then, open the door and step through it. Close the door firmly behind you. Do not be alarmed if the door disappears; it is a magical door, and it will come to you whenever you call it.
Chances are you will find yourself in a black empty nothingness space. This is quite normal. Like God in Genesis, create a world from scratch. You do not need to create an entire planet (that is likely beyond most of our abilities!). Try this method:
With force of will, decree that earth and sky be created. All around you, ground and atmosphere will appear.
Call upon a great, impenetrable sphere to surround this space. Don’t worry about making it all huge, you can alter your space however you want later on. The sphere will surround this area you have created and prevent any creature from entering or exiting without your permission.
Walk around your area and change it. You may find you don’t have the energy or will to enact changes as you please. This is okay: working in the astral takes actual energy, and the more you do it the easier it will become. If you do have the energy, try growing trees, creating benches or houses for you to enjoy, carving rivers or waterfalls, or whatever you like (Minecraft is not a bad comparison to building an astral space).
An important part of your astral space is that it allows you to directly work on the astral. If you are trying to grow astral limbs or other appendages, you can exercise them here. You can use this space to gain experience with working in the astral, or to build an astral temple where you can invite spirits and gods to enjoy themselves.
Whenever you are ready to exit, call your door to you. Simply think of the door and wish it to be next to you, and it will be. Open the door, walk through it back to your regular imagination, and firmly close it. Remember that nobody but you can open or close the door.
Remain in your relaxed state for a little while and readjust yourself to physical reality. Centering exercises help with this.
Return to your inner space whenever you like by going back through the door.
Here are some notes:
Astral vs Imagination
- Your imagination has no rules and imagining things typically requires little effort or energy.
- Your imagination is static. For example if you imagine a garden, the next time you imagine it, the garden will be the same. It does not change or grow on its own.
- When you imagine something, it simply becomes, like a hologram.
- In your imagination, all beings and creatures are automatons
- Your imagination is a seat of power through which many things can be accessed.
- You do not need to ‘center’ or ‘readjust’ after a simple daydream
- Building in the astral can take actual energy and willpower
- Astral spaces have “rules”; even gods need wings or magical artifacts to fly
- Astral spaces will grow and develop independent of your input. If you plant an astral garden and return to it a week later, it will have grown or withered.
- When you attempt to build something, you may have to spend more time on it than just clicking your fingers and saying “become”.
- In the astral, beings and creatures have minds of their own. You can create many friends and guardians, but you will note that they will actually do things outside of your direct control
- After visiting the astral, a period of readjustment is very much recommended.
Using the astral space as a place to honor spirits
Build a beautiful temple or palace (or natural space) that the spirits you wish to honor would enjoy. Imagine it filled with the most wonderful offerings and delicacies. Invite different spirits to come and enjoy what you have laid out.
If you wish, use this as a space to speak with spirits. Do not let any spirits through your personal door, under any circumstances.
When you are ready to leave your astral space, tell your visitors this visit is over and ask them to leave in peace. Imagine that they simply teleport away back to their homes.
Enjoy using this astral space for practice
You can quickly build all sorts of thought-forms directly in the astral, although whether or not they will be of use outside your temple is another matter. Practice building defenses of all sorts, casting magic, and viewing or testing astral limbs.
Deleting an astral space
If you grow tired of what you have built, you can become a destroyer god and simply eliminate it and start anew. If for some reason you wish to close this space permanently, fold all of its space and time down in on itself like a paper box, until it becomes nothing. Summon your door, walk through, close the door, and destroy the door.
Let’s start with a big fat
DISCLAIMER
- Growing astral limbs can have actual, physical effects on your physical body. It can cause soreness, pain, inflammation, rashes, or other symptoms.
- Growing astral limbs can suddenly make you uncomfortable where you once were not – if you grow a huge astral tail, it may make you suddenly uncomfortable sitting down in small school chairs.
- Growing astral limbs can cause damage to your astral body that will need healing.
- Taking care of your physical body takes care of your astral body, to a degree. Since you don’t have any physical wings or horns or tails to take care of, you will need to spend extra time taking care of these astral appendages.
- You will have to adjust many grounding/centering/cleansing exercises to ensure they do not erase your astral changes.
- Trying to shapeshift your entire astral body is a bad idea. What we are talking about right now is making some sweet dragon spikes or growing cute astral kitty ears. I am not talking about shapeshifting your entire body, which has far more serious magical repercussions.
Begin with a personal cleansing of any sort to clean off any psychic gunk you are carrying around.
Decide what you want to grow. Just choose one small thing, like little demon horns or a fox tail or a glittering forehead gem. It can be whatever you want.
Enter a relaxed state until you feel you are in touch with your astral/energetic body. You do not need to physically ‘feel’ anything. If it helps you, prepare a magical ritual to get you in that ‘zone’.
Say or think, “I am going to make changes to my astral body.” Use your magical will to announce this to the universe and feel the little ripples of power as you do. You have full control over your astral body; you can change it as you please.
Say or think, “I am going to grow some kitty ears/dragon spikes/demon horns/etc.”
Imagine exactly what you say to be so. Imagine yourself with the cutest chobbits ears of all time, or a massive lizard tail, or whatever you like. Channel the power you have connected to and pour it in to the area, watching it take form as if it were liquid metal being poured in to a mold. Fervently will this all to happen and understand that external power is entering and enlarging your astral body.
At some point you will likely feel “done”. Use a spell seal (“so mote it be”) to close the ritual. Your goal is not to create and perfect the entire addition right now, you just need to make the base for it.
At this time you may or may not feel your additions (likely not, if you cannot feel energy in the first place). But don’t worry about this. Trust that your magic has been done. This ritual is only necessary to start off an astral addition; after that, focus and willpower should do the trick. (Strictly speaking, this ritual is not necessary at all, you can just skip to the next step. But I think it helps to get things started).
Now, it is time to do the detail work. Begin to behave as if this astral addition was part of your physical body. Think about its appearance, and how it moves, and how it affects your body. Flap your wings, swish your tail, perk up your ears. The more thought you put in to this, the more 'solid’ and real your astral addition will become.
Once you have given a little more substance and shape to your addition, try testing it out in an astral space.
Removing astral additions
To remove all astral body mods, do a thorough cleansing and centering that erases all astral additions and resets your energetic body to match your physical body.
Reactions from other people
Most people do have a sense of the energies around them, whether or not they realize it.
It is foolhardy to believe that whatever additions you make to your astral body will just be aesthetic. People will begin to react to them. For you, cute horns may be just for fun; in a Christian community, it could cause people to react badly.
I may want to transform in to a terrifying Minotaur now and then, but my need to maintain my relationships with friends, family, and teachers is greater.
Additions may also have a greater effect on you than you may initially realize. As above, so below – what we add on to our astral selves will affect us. This is why we bother to cleanse ourselves in the first place – the astral junk that sticks to us has a real effect on our bodies and minds. If you are interested in astral body mods, start slow with something small and see how you like it, before you try and turn in to a full harpy or something.