Big ideas · 12 MIN READ · 7 SOURCE QUOTES
Phasing
Phasing is the vocabulary Robert Monroe used in his later years to describe how awareness moves between states. Instead of picturing a second body that leaves and travels, he asked how much of your consciousness is tuned to physical time-space at any moment. Fully absorbed in what you see and hear, you are in primary phase. Let your attention wander and you are slightly out of phase. Daydreaming, meditation, sleep and the out-of-body state are further steps on the same scale, which he illustrated with rough ratios such as 90 percent here and 10 elsewhere.
In Monroe's account the physical body is a focusing device, and a discriminator circuit screens out the rest of the spectrum of consciousness so that a new human mind can develop. As you phase away, the filter loosens. He used the idea to explain the Focus levels, where Focus 10 begins a phase shift and 12, 15 and 21 are further phases, and he even replaced his own term Locale II with it, calling the old name old-fashioned and phasing the more scientific one.
The Monroe Institute's overview calls phasing a metaphor from physics and draws a conclusion: there is no such thing as leaving the body. Trance, meditation, out-of-body experiences and astral projection become variations on one theme, focus directed in different degrees away from the physical. On that view, reports with no exit, no vibrations and no view of the sleeping body belong to the same family as dramatic separations.
Monroe's later way to describe every shift in awareness: not a body traveling elsewhere, but how much of your attention is tuned to physical reality.
Key points
Primary phasing is the baseline
The baseline is ordinary waking attention. The Institute calls fully physical focus C-1 consciousness or primary phasing, and in Ultimate Journey Monroe wrote that the untrained mind makes phase shifts many times a day with little control. Inattention is the slightest shift, daydreaming a bigger one, introspection and meditation deliberate ones, sleep a shift to another state altogether. The Institute's methods, he wrote, are a way to establish and control these shifts.
A scale of ratios
In his 1992 videos and radio interviews Monroe put rough numbers on the scale. Attention slipping into thought might be 90 degrees here and 10 elsewhere. Daydreaming is further out, around sixty percent here and forty elsewhere in one telling. Meditation, a controlled out-of-phase state, is thirty to thirty-five percent phased into another reality system. Sleep he put at about ninety percent out of phase, with awareness there even if you do not remember it. Asked whether the far end of the scale is death, he said yes.
The body as focusing device, the filter as discriminator
Monroe described the physical body as a focusing device through which we perceive and act in time-space. Inside it sits what he called a discriminator circuit, comparable to the selectivity in radio equipment, which holds off the rest of the spectrum of consciousness so it does not interfere with the creation and growth of a new human mind. As you phase away, the circuit lets more through. In Gateway Voyage talks he tied this loosening to the Focus levels.
The paper demonstration
To show that phase is about relationship, not distance, Monroe held a sheet of paper to the camera in his 1992 interview. Face-on it is fully readable. Turned slightly it gets harder to read, and edge-on it is just a line you cannot read at all. The paper has not gone anywhere; only your angle to it has changed. Turned fully away, you are seeing something else entirely. These are ratios, he said, and everything in consciousness is a ratio.
Focus levels are phases
Monroe told a Gateway Voyage group that getting to Focus 10 means you have begun to get into another phase, a phase shift beginning there, and that Focus 12, 15 and 21 are all different phases. The Institute's overview agrees: Wave I of the Gateway Experience is geared toward Focus 10, and later waves gradually increase the phase shift away from the physical. It also calls the Focus numbers arbitrary signposts and admits some uncertainty about where 12, 15 and 21 divide.
From Locale II to a phasing process
Monroe tied phasing to his own earlier vocabulary. On Timeless Voyager radio he said Locale 2 was the old-fashioned name and that he now called it a phasing process. Asked which phase Locale 2 is, he answered that it lies somewhere beyond the stage we call sleep, and he described the belief system territories as the first thing met there. In Far Journeys he already described the nearest nonphysical ring as just slightly out of phase with physical matter.
Out-of-body as a matter of degree
In an October 1990 talk Monroe said most people at Focus 21 are in an out-of-body state, only a relative matter of phasing, and that they do not know they have phased that much away. In Ultimate Journey a log entry dated November 27, 1987 marks the beginning of differential phasing as the point where physical input fades, phase separation deepens and nonphysical senses take over. He also used the phrase quick switch for a deliberate near-instant adjustment of phasing.
Perception gets translated
As the discriminator opens, Monroe told a Gateway Voyage audience, you get into other means of perception that are nonphysical, and we immediately try to translate them into physical interpretations such as seeing and hearing, or into physical shapes. You gradually get past that by learning other ways of viewing things. That helps explain why accounts of similar shifts read so differently.
Why he cared: knowing, not believing
Monroe's interest in the far end of the scale was practical. Once the physical focusing mechanism stops working, he said, you can no longer stay phased into time-space and you move on, and in many cases you go to the belief system territories. He drew a line between believing and knowing that you survive physical death, and said the knowing alters your life considerably.
In their own words
Quotes are checked word for word against the recordings and documents they come from. Bracketed words correct transcription errors; “…” marks an omission.
“The moment that you stop focusing in that time-space that intently, let's call it inattention, just that much, you've become slightly out of phase with this physical time-space. … And let's say that you're still 90 degrees focused in time-space and 10 degrees into something somewhere, some way else. And then you have the stages called daydreaming, which are a little more out of phase. And then you have a controlled out-of-phase state, say, call it meditation, where let's say that you are 30 to 35 percent phased into another reality system or getting in touch with it.”
“And within that time-space physical body focusing mechanism is what I like to call a discriminator circuit that holds off all of the other spectrum of consciousness. And that spectrum is virtually endless, so that it doesn't interfere with the creation and growth of a new human mind. And this phasing of mind consciousness allows you to move through the hologram.”
“I can probably say, you take a piece of paper and say this, for example, yeah, is a — is a phase relationship, and that's totally focused. … Now, as this, I turned this, this is moving slightly out of phase, so you have difficulty seeing the print, more and more, until this way it's very narrow. You could have not even define what that is. It's just a line there. And if you're trying to read this, you're having great difficulty, because you can't even see it at all.”
“Very innocently, we all fall asleep, and then we are, say, 90 degrees out of phase. We're still in touch with time-space, but our consciousness, our — our mind is elsewhere. So that — that's a real quick version of what we call phasing. … Locale [2] is somewhere beyond, beyond the stage we call sleep.”
“When you get to 10, that's one thing; you have begun to get into another phase. You have a phase shift beginning there. [12, 15,] 21 are all different phases.”
“Most people are in an [out] of body state in 21. It’s [only] a relative phasing … They don’t know it, but they are. They have phased that much away. And it’s only a phase relationship.”
“Thus, the implicit philosophical background behind ‘phasing’ is that there is no such thing as “leaving the body” since consciousness is never really ‘in the body’ to begin with. Rather, all experiences which constitute things such as “trance”, “hypnosis”, “altered states”, “meditation”, “OBEs”, and “astral projections” are simply variations on the same theme where consciousness is focused in different ways and in different degrees away from the physical. The term phasing is a metaphor derived from physics, which conceptualizes consciousness as a waveform that can either be aligned or not aligned with physical reality.”
Important things to consider
Treat the numbers as illustrations
Monroe mixed degrees and percentages freely, saying ninety degrees out of phase for sleep in one passage and ninety percent in another, and offered sixty-forty and thirty-five percent as examples. The sources give no measured phase value for any Focus level. Read the ratios as a way to feel the direction of change from fully absorbed to far removed.
It is a metaphor, not a mechanism
The Institute's overview calls phasing a metaphor derived from physics. A waveform being aligned or not aligned is a picture that makes the idea easy to hold, not evidence that consciousness oscillates in any measurable way. Monroe presented it as a better and more scientific explanation than Locale II, but it remains a model of experience.
Phasing does not erase out-of-body reports
Plenty of participants describe leaving the body, floating above it or seeing it from outside, and the second body vocabulary fits those accounts. Phasing offers a second way to describe the same event, stressing what awareness is tuned to rather than where a form travels. Compare the two by the reported sequence and keep each speaker's own words.
Monroe stretched the scale to drugs and illness
In his 1992 videos Monroe extended the scale beyond daydreaming to alcohol, drugs and illness, which he called uncontrolled phasing, and applied the same framing to certain mental illnesses. That is a lecture-room extension, not a medical model. If you or someone you know has distressing perceptions, speak with a clinician; phasing language is not a diagnostic tool.
Use it as an attention practice
The most usable part of phasing is observational. Notice during the day when attention is fully on the senses and when it has slipped into thought or memory. Gateway exercises are the structured version of learning to establish and control such shifts; a notebook of when you drift, and what the drift feels like, is the informal one.
Hologram language is a separate speculation
In later talks Monroe tied phasing to a holographic picture, saying the phasing of mind consciousness lets you move through the hologram. That is another interpretive layer, covered on the holographic model page. The core of phasing, the scale of focus and the discriminator, does not depend on it.
Common questions
What is phasing in the Monroe Institute's terms?
Phasing is a way of describing how much of your consciousness is aligned with physical time-space at a given moment. Fully absorbed in your senses, you are in primary phase, which the Institute calls C-1 consciousness. As attention drifts into thought, daydream, meditation, sleep or the out-of-body state, you are further out of phase. Monroe described it with ratios, such as 90 percent here and 10 percent elsewhere, and used it to explain the Focus levels. The Institute's overview calls it a metaphor from physics.
Is phasing the same as an out-of-body experience?
Not exactly. An out-of-body experience is a report: someone feels they have left the body, floated above it or traveled. Phasing is the explanation Monroe preferred late in life, in which the experience is a larger shift of focus on a scale that also includes daydreaming and sleep. In an October 1990 talk he said most people at Focus 21 are in an out-of-body state and that it is only a relative phasing. The Institute's overview concludes there is no leaving the body at all.
Is phasing real physics or just a metaphor?
It is a metaphor. The Institute's overview says so directly: the term phasing is a metaphor derived from physics, picturing consciousness as a waveform that can be aligned or not aligned with physical reality. Monroe's own demonstrations are visual, such as turning a sheet of paper edge-on until it cannot be read, and his percentages are illustrations rather than measurements. Nothing in the sources gives a measured phase angle for any Focus level.
How does phasing relate to the Focus levels?
In Monroe's account each Focus level is a different phase relationship with physical reality. Speaking to a Gateway Voyage group, he said that getting to Focus 10 means you have begun to get into another phase, a phase shift beginning there, and that Focus 12, 15 and 21 are all different phases. According to the Institute's overview, Wave I of the Gateway Experience establishes Focus 10 and later waves gradually increase the phase shift away from the physical. The numbers are signposts, not measurements.
What is the discriminator circuit?
It is Monroe's name for the filter he believed the physical body and brain carry. The body focuses perception and action on time-space, and a discriminator circuit holds off the rest of the spectrum of consciousness, which he described as virtually endless, so that it does not interfere with the creation and growth of a new human mind. He compared it to the selectivity of radio equipment. Phasing away from the physical loosens it, so more kinds of perception become possible at deeper Focus levels.
Did phasing replace the idea of a second body?
It reframed it. Monroe's first book describes a second body that exits and travels, and the Locale vocabulary for where it goes. Later he described the same territory as a phasing process, and the Institute's overview says there is no such thing as leaving the body. The older terms remain in use: laboratory monitors told Explorers to release the second body to go deeper, and Gateway participants still describe an other body lifting away. See the pages on the second body and Locales for the details.
Are daydreaming and sleep really forms of phasing?
In Monroe's scale, yes. Inattention is a slight shift, daydreaming a larger one, meditation a controlled one, and sleep a much larger shift: in his telling you are around ninety degrees out of phase in sleep, still in touch with time-space while your mind is elsewhere. He said the fact that you do not remember that elsewhere does not mean it does not exist. The Institute's overview agrees these states are variations on one theme.
In Monroe’s books
Summarized in our own words; the books are not reproduced on this site.
Ultimate Journey. Ultimate Journey gives the phasing concept its own section: primary phasing is full focus on physical input, any departure is a phase shift, and the Institute's methods are a means to establish and control phases of consciousness. Inattention, daydreaming, introspection, meditation and sleep are examples.
Ultimate Journey. A log entry dated November 27, 1987 marks the beginning of differential phasing as physical input fades and nonphysical senses take over, and elsewhere Monroe uses quick switch phasing for a deliberate, rapid shift, both to move out and to return to the physical.
Journeys Out of the Body. Out of phase appears in the first book in a literal sense: in a rotation trick the nonphysical body turns 180 degrees opposite the physical one, which Monroe calls out of phase, and a hole opens that he passes through.
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