your mind is awake, but your body is asleep. have you ever woken up and cant move? your body is paralyzed because it's asleep, but your mind is awake and experiancing everything.
i'm not quite sure what you mean when you say "how do you know you haven't just programed your mind to dream what you think your doing?"
i saw a reflection of the physical, that's called the real-time zone. it was night in the physical, so it was night in the real-time zone aswell, however things are all messed up, things are there that aren't there in "real" life and things are missing, things are in different places, there are creatures called "negs" or negative entities, they are harmless but can be frightening, they are just engative manifestations of your own insecurities/fear/etc.
i saw.. people outside my window, i never saw them before. i saw trees in my hallway, etc. all kinds of weird things. you are fully concious of your actions while astral projecting, all it is is your etheric energy seperating from your body. etheric energy is a mich higher vibration than solid thing, all solid matter is just energy at a low vibration , you see.
some people take a card, lay it face down and make sure not to see what it is, then when they astral project, they pick up the card and see what it is, then they can see what if it was right when they wake up.
i heard another story of someone taking a pic. of themselves with a digital camera while out of body, then the enxt day there was an extra blank pic. on the cam.
You can talk with people in the astral planes if both people are out of body at the same time and their vibrations are on the same frequency.
when your first exiting your physical body, its amazing. it feels like you've been hit by a train because the vibrations are so intense. you feel like your levitating, you can feel like your faling, spinning around in the air, etc. i have felt all those. when your "floating" above your body, try to roll out of it and then try to get as far away from your body as you can because there is always a direct link between you and your body, the link looks like a silver chord (that is mentioned somewhere in the bible) and it supplies you with a constant source of etheric energy. if the energy runs out, you are just sucked back into your body. you can not be hurt in the astral planes.
when someone dies, they body becomes frantic and immediately starts to absorb all the available etheric energy that is possibly can, it becomes desperate. then it exist a little while in the real-time zone untill the etheric energy source becomes exausted.
also, an astral projection can feel like HOURS and only last a few minutes. litteraly, you can feel like youve been out of your body for a few hours and only a few minutes have passed, and visa-versa.
also, there are many other beings that exist at higher frequencies than we do, so you can see them and visa-versa. you can ever talk with them.
there is always a "spirit" guide. this , in my opinion, is just a manifestation of your own subconcious, they can help you, warn you, etc etc. its basically talking to yourself, but they may or may not look like yourself.
hope you guys dont think i'm crazy!