I am at my grandparent’s house, sleeping comfortably. I wake up and look at the clock. It’s 1:00, and I am very thirsty. I decide to go downstairs and have a drink of water before returning to bed. I roll out of bed and begin to walk towards the door.
As I approach the door, I begin to feel like I am walking through thick mud. Confused by this otherworldly feeling, I begin to panic. I am now finding it harder and harder to breathe. Scared that I may be having an asthma attack, I try to yell for help with what little breath I have left. I can’t seem to make a sound. In fact, not even my foot steps are making a sounds, and my entire world is eerily silent. I now feel my death is steadily approaching. As I collapse on the ground, I make one final lunge for the door.
My body is so weak that I can barely lift my arm to the doorknob. I somehow find the strength to get my hand on the doorknob, but I cannot turn it. In fact, my attempts to do so produce no sound at all. The only sound is the rhythmic clinking of the ceiling fan above me. As I fall against the door, to weak to struggle any longer, I am sure that this will be the place that I die. Before my final breath, I see something out of the corner of my eye. It is my body, still lying comfortably bed.
All emotions I am feeling are immediately replaced by fear. It is a kind of fear that is stronger than the fear of death. It is a fear that comes from seeing something that you know cannot exist, something so abnormal that it shatters your mind. I let out one more silent, blood-curdling scream. I die. After my death, I wake up right where I saw myself just moments before. It’s 1:01, and I am very thirsty.
I didn’t learn what this experience was until many years later. It is what’s called a “failed projection.” Apparently, it’s what happens when your “projected double” doesn’t take enough “energy” with it as it leaves the physical body.