The Third Eye -The Weird Eye?

If you watch any sort of anime or paranormal /Sci-Fi movies then you would’ve definitely heard of "The Third Eye".Infact its become such a popular notion that people probably take it for granted that there is one, and kudos to Hollywood and Paranormal Fiction for promoting the concept.Thanks to it I would probably conjure up images of a Sadhu shooting laser beams out of the centre of his head if someone mentioned the term "third eye opening"! . So lets look at a more down to earth picture of what this third eye might really be.

Eastern schools of thought believe that besides your regular 2 eyes that see outwards, we have a third eye, an eye that opens the gates to inner worlds.This third eye is associated with psychic and telepathic phenomena like clarivision, astral projection, etc. and indeed in most occult philosophy, spiritual development is achieved through the opening of this eye, leading to states of enlightenment and higher awareness.

The third eye is said to be located at the point between the eye brows and when fully opened reaches upto the centre of the forehead .
(The thought just occurred to me that it would make an
excellent product design case study at Ray Ban)

Biological Basis of a third Eye.

Most occult theories claim that the Pineal gland corresponds to the
Third Eye. Read on to get a brief overview.

The Pineal Gland:


The Pineal gland (located in the geometric center of the brain) is a photosensitive gland which regulates the production of melatonin which is responsible for regulating sleep rhythms. (Coincidently; or not , Melatonin supplements are available for sale and are taken to offset the effects of jet lag, but it is also taken by lucid dreamers in order to increase the vividness and  lucidity of their dreams as it increases your REM cycles.)

The pineal gland is also said to have the highest concentration of serotonin and tryptamine(or the ability to create these) ,which are neurotransmitters that are responsible for regulating mood and promoting feelings of happiness and love.
http://www.crystalinks.com/thirdeyepineal.html

There are also certain theories that claim that the gland can excrete large quantities of the psychedelic substance DMT which some believe  plays a role in promoting the visual effects of natural dreaming, and also near-death experiences and other mystical states.
 
Pineal Gland Studies:

A study (published in Nature)
was carried out in order to determine if there was any co-relation between the
Pineal Gland and meditation. Their findings were:

"we report that, together with other brain regions, pineal body exhibit significant activation during meditation process, supporting the long lasting speculation that pineal plays an important role in the intrinsic awareness which might concern spirit or soul. Pineal is known as an endocrine organ which produces substrates including melatonin and has been ascribed numerous even mysterious functions"


Mythological Theories

I had read somewhere about the pineal gland being a leftover gland that no longer functions as it used to and that as humans evolved,  the Pineal gland became dormant. This they claimed, was because in the beginning humans were highly evolved beings capable of telepathic and psychic abilities, but gradually as they became more interested in the physical world, they lost these abilities and the Pineal Gland, which was responsible for these had ceased to function as it did.

This is pretty interesting because it seems to tie up with the theories of Atlantis, and of how the Atlanteans were greatly evolved beings, who, after the fall of Atlantis left their island and founded the great civilizations of the world. Of course since there is no proof to support any of these concepts,So lets just bury them for the time being.

My thoughts on the Third Eye:

I first came across the concept of Lucid dreaming back in 1999 and I tried a ton of methods that were supposed to induce them but never could seem to have one.
After about a year of trying without success, I came across an article on the internet about a method called the Suneye Method. 

This Technique required you to wake up a couple of hours before your normal wake time, then spend about half an hour focusing on the spot between your eyes and then going back to sleep. I tried that one morning and that was  the day I had my first Lucid Dream, and that week I had 6 more Lucid Dreams using this method.

Meditating on the third eye also gave rise to some unusual experiences. I found that sometimes when I woke up early and focused on that point, my forehead would be tingling (this is quite a normal body response as result of increased blood flow to the area which was being concentrated upon), and as I was lying down in bed and drifting off to sleep, a point would come where Im just getting into the dream but then I would suddenly be pulled back awake and feel my forehead vibrating and these vibes would move to the rest of the body and become quite intense followed by the feeling of accelerating or falling at a very high speed. (will detail this later in another post) . And the thing is; that once this forehead tingling had begun, It was impossible to go back to sleep without this same feeling repeating itself over and over again. I would finally give up going to sleep and wait until the forehead tingling was completely gone before returning to bed. 

This has happened so many times that I now label this feeling of tingling as “fuzzy head” in my journals, and I’ve found that it almost always ends in Lucid dreams , vibrations or pseudo Out of Body Experiences.

So in my personal experience, I think that there is a strong possibility that the third eye exists and that it could hold the key to psychic experiences.
I recently stumbled upon a Huge book online which covers third eye opening in depth.(Will share the link here) and I plan on trying it out and seeing what happens. Feel free to download and let me know about any experiences that you have too.

Until then, 
have a  speedy third eye awakening!