Disturbing Side Effects 

Sounds
You may discern different sources of sounds:

Sounds as a side-effect of Kundalini arousal or vibrational states. 
Here you inform yourself best by reading some Kundalini articles (see f.i. at the end of my index "Kundalini") 

Hypnagogic sounds:
These may be voices, music etc. - it can be of any kind.

Letter: 
"I felt a great pressure on my chest and someone's breathing, and at first I thought that was my dog, but I couldn't see anything because my eyes were closed."

That was your own breath, what you heard. 

In this state it may be that 
• you hear sounds louder as usual, 
• further that you can not identify the source of the sound and 
• further it can be that sounds are changed (not in your case). For instance the sound of a watch may be changed into the sounds of footsteps, which you hear in the room, thus totally different to those of the watch, but rhythmic nevertheless. You can imagine how horrorfying to someone these changed tick-tocks of the watch may become - you can compare the OBEers in that pre-state somewhat with Alice in the wonderland.

Accumulation of Saliva
Some times, not very often, accumulation of saliva is reported. I know this from own experience (trance technique in sitting position). As I suppose this is a mediumistic effect, a kind of repercussion, a material expression simultaneous to the ektoplasma production in the mouth. 
 

(unpublished letter): "P.S: the saliva flow really appeared in the material world! It formed a sort of stream from my mouth, over the pillow and finally on the bed."

Saliva production never was a problem at all to me, except the fact to prevent swallowing while being out of the body, because then often I was swallowing physically, interrupting thus the out of body state.

Preventive measure: to let the head hang down, to open the mouth and for the rest to ignore it. 

Feeling dizzy

Letter: "When I first started, the experience was elating, exuberating and extremely relaxing. Now, every time I try to relax and enter the vibration state, I become dizzy. I have told you already before, I have started to have sensation of spinning, at first it was even kind of interesting. But now, I don't put any effort in relaxation, because I pretty much trained my body to relax within minutes, instead of an hour like before. But I get dizzier and dizzier, to the point of feeling nauseous.

Thus i have to cut my practice short, just not to start throwing up. I'm not sure why its happening. I tried raising my head up higher, thinking that maybe the low pillow gets the blood rushed to my head, but not, its the same thing."

As I suppose you are too good in relaxing or as to say it more accurate:
when you relax your blood-pressure sinks and in your case as much that you get problems with your circulation. That's probably is the reason of getting dizzy.

Response: "I think you are right. I have always had a very low blood pressure, in fact doctors woudn't let me donate blood when I was in high school, because they though I was anemic, that is how low my blood pressure was. I managed to raise it after starting to eat good food and doing physical activity, but I guess its still quite low."

Nervous irritations

OBE Letter 395:
However, since then every time that I try to produce the vibration, or feelings of floating, I get a slight burning sensation in the stomach, and the deeper I go the greater this sensation becomes, it's blocking my way to success!


Nervous obstacles do not appear because of fear. It's a counteraction of the subconscious, which opposes against the state of concentration and inner awareness. It's perhaps by pure chance which obstacle will come the first time. But if the obstacle has appeared it becomes stronger if you fight against. Additional to that a learning effect starts, so that next time there will be a great chance that the same obstacle will appear again. You have a burning sensation in the stomach, I had an itching, it's individual but in every case troublesome.

Itching

Sometimes itching especially in the face is reported. I had this as well very often for a longer period. For a part this itching comes because once you have had it once and your subconscious produces this again as a result of expectation. I do not know any trick to prevent this bothering hindrance, except ignoring (though itching may become nearly painful). 

Letter: "I've been trying to have an OBE for some time. I just cant relax enough to achieve one I just try to relax and when I do I start to get itchy. Is there any way I can stop this?? I really wish to achieve one and this would help alot."

To sense itching is a typical symptom for deep relaxation, it is one of the last borders to OBE. I do not know something to counteract except to endure it, though it may become nearly painful. It then ceases nearly immediately and you are in a deeper state. Otherwise if you move by scratching you then have fallen out of relaxation and you do not get a second chance.

The origin of this kind of itching seems to be a body reaction on stimulus deprivation. Additional there seems to be a learning effect, causing the same kind of "OBE disturbance" at the same body location at next occasions.

Letter from Dave (12-22-00): " I noticed in your side effects page you mentioned itchyness and that there was no counter action to it. I have been astral projecting on and off for 15 years and i have recently discovered a solution for the itchyness, one which works for me anyway. Usually just before i enter the astral state, my nose itches, or sometimes i want to sneeze. I have found that telling yourself that you cannot sneeze because you have no nose works, bizare as it sounds. It may work for other parts of the skin, i am not sure. Thought i would let you know anyway."



Fast Heartbeat

Sometimes very fast heartbeat is reported. I never have observed this myself, thus I have no experience at this field. I think the fast heartbeat has an emotional background and will cease, if you become customary. 

letter 299
"I have seen your site, and I have a question. You see, I have been trying to have an OOBE, and in the second day of trying, (which was only yesterday) I closed my eyes, went into a trance, and started thinking about my spirit leaving my body. Well, my legs were feeling weird, and then I started shaking uncontrollably. My heart rate went faster, and I was breathing heavily. I started getting scared, but at the same time it felt good... Then it stopped. I really would like to know what I should do when this starts happening, I dont know where to go from there." 

I do not know what to do in this case. I suppose it is a hindrance originating in the subconscious. I am convinced that it will cease at one of the next attempts.

letter 334
"When practicing, my heart rate went way up, I had the same shaking in my body and I thought this will be it - then it stopped. Trying today, a few days after, there was nothing like it but instead, that nice feeling, Id call it touch of an angel, came to my forehead. I cant go any further than that although my fear is gone - I used to be terribly scared of those black shadowy beings which I couldnt even see but sense or just "know" them. That fear went away with reading and talking to people. " 

Further letters:     OBE letter 415     OBE letter 477

In most of the reports the experiences of fast heartbeat have not been in a pre-OBE state or in OBE but have been observed while being aware of sleep paralysis. Being not conform with this state these persons were very scared and had fast heart beat as a stress response.

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Fluttering Eyelids

.... eyelids are fluttering up and down....

This is a side-effect of a trance state. I do not know the reason why this happens. I have not experienced this by myself, but I have seen this and received several e-mails mentioning that problem.

OBE letter 441 " .... I've also noticed something else about all of these, that when your conscious for this, you seem to be drawn to looking through the third eye... at least I think that is what it is. My eyes seem to cross and point in toward my forehead, and as I feel a "lift", my eyelids flicker like crazy. Is this a normal symptom of experiencing the third eye?"

....The eye flicker is a typical trance symptom and thus a very good sign. I recommend you not to interfere in this state and not to force any desired goal. Let it develop by itself - may be you enter a state much better than any OBE (don't ask me which state, but be patient and do not interfere).

Opening the physical eyes instead those of the subtle

OBE Letter 388     I also have trouble with my sight and speech. I worry that I might wake myself up at times!!

Yes, this is a well known fact. I had my problems with swallowing (I had saliva production in the physical, as I thought - in reality it was ektoplasm). While OBEing I went with a full mouth of saliva in my subtle and when I tried to swallow, my physical swallowed instead. (I experienced this about 10 to 20 times). It very often happens that you give the order unwillingly to the physical instead to the subtle, because the feelings are so identically the body orders may be mixed.

Problems of the same origin:     OBE letter 415

A hint how to prevent opening the physical eyes:

OBE Letter 490     "......And now impressions: I clearly saw the surroundings, but not with my physical sight (my eyes were closed). I had a second sight. Trying to identify this "second sight" I created this little experiment: close your eyes, and look at the blackness in front of you. Focus your attention on an imaginary spot exactly in front of you, no matter how distant. It's like the "escape point" in central perspective. Then turn your eyeballs upwards (or downwards, or in whatever direction you prefer) but keep your focus on the spot in front of you. Your "first attention" (the one tied to physical sight) will move along with the pupils, but your "second attention" (tied only to your will) will remain focused on the spot in front of you. With practice, this will help you identify and control your "second sight". ....."

Seeing nothing but blackness

Seeing nothing but blackness very often is experienced in OBEing while in a near body distance.
What to do?

• Accept this fact
• Move forward, though not seeing. You nevertheless can sense your surrounding very detailed because of a new kind of sensory awareness, let it be called "space sensing".
• After passing the door or after a certain distance (individually different) you will have your sight from one moment to the other.

Feeling heavy

OBE Letter 436     My question is when I get the vibrations and feel myself lifting out of my body - once I'm out, I feel very heavy, like I can't move and I usually end up just feeling like I'm floating toward the ground and end up on the floor and then I feel too heavy to move my "body".

Your subtle body is linked with your physical, that's principally. For that reason always an information exchange between subtle and physical body takes place. That's a very important fact of safety, because if your physical body has problems the subtle body will return immediately, reflectively.

And now to your problem: Because of the just explained fact of information transfer, the status of relaxation of your physical body is brought to your subtle. A typical symptom of deep relaxation is feeling very heavy. (You certainly know that feeling very heavy is an often used suggestion when using induction methods, hypnosis and autohypnosis.)

Well, your subtle body receives this message of heaviness. Because of fail-interpretation you project and identify this feeling with your subtle body and now you let behave the subtle body as if it was heavy.

OBE Letter 446     ".... What do I experience? Well, I close my eyes, I see the ceiling through my eyelids, and fell 'in the oobe state'. I feel VERY heavy, and it is very hard for me to move... as if no gravity, but heavy. I usually lift my arm in front of my face, but I do not see it (I certainly feel it in front of me). I do not panic by these episodes at all. I actually try to investigate a little further, and try to move around, but this is impossible. Getting up from the bed is incredibly hard, because of how heavy I feel. Every movement is sloooooow, and almost against a force. Very strange, and frustrating. I want to go and move around......"

One very often has this feeling in the late morning in the short awake phases while still lying in bed. It is the same feeling as you try to produce by will in hypnosis or autohypnosis. As I suppose it is a kind of semi-sleep-paralysis.

Paralysis 
The exact term is ASP (awareness of sleep paralysis). The sleep paralysis is quasi obligatory for the REM sleep and nearly always observed in the first OBEs, but may vanish later on with greater OBE performance.
The ASP can be observed as well in the OBE prestage, if the starting OBE process is interrupted by fear or any other reason. 

Freezing 
Cooling oneself down after OBEing very often is observed. This effect is especially pronounced when OBE is done by trance technique. Perhaps this is a mediumistic effect, perhaps the reason is because you are not moving and stiff or because the blood pressure is very low (a typical symptom of OBEs) or all facts may act together.