The Twice Born ritual culminated in an intentional Near Death Experience (NDE). The duration of the “Death” was 7 days from the writings we have, which rather obviously exceeds reasonableness if the one involved were actually dead. The information that we have is incomplete, and even says so within itself, so we have to extrapolate a little. It is far more likely that what was experienced was an extended Out Of Body Experience (OOBE), which can be a dangerous thing.
There is no mention of “what” the incense used in the Marriage Chamber is made of other than “secret essences and ingredients which activate life”. It is likely have included hallucinogenic compounds, and perhaps metabolism slowing ones such as what is used today to medically induce a coma.
There are other known cultural examples of such practices, such as a “Spirit Walk” practiced by some Native American tribes. They use such things as Peyote and fasting, combined with meditation to induce an out of body experience for “enlightenment” purposes. Some tribes use a sweat lodge in the process as well.
There are also those who Lucid Dream naturally, or sometimes with the assistance of a drug such as DMT. Often such dreams take on a nature in which the dreamer is completely aware of their existence being in what is called the Astral Realm or Plane of existence. Doing so is known as Astral Travel. I did quite a bit of such when I was a small child, up until I was around the age of 14. When I returned to my body after the last such dream I recall, it was with enough force to move my bed a few inches across the floor.
Many who Astral Travel are very aware of their connection to their body, which is maintained by a “silver thread”. Some are consciously unaware of it. The Twice Born ritual describes it as a “spiritual umbilical cord”. If this cord or thread is severed, your body dies. In addition to this, re-entrance of the spirit to the body is more easily done if the body is in the same position as it was when you departed it. For this reason, those who are able to initiate such experiences “at will” are or should be reluctant to do so while awake, unless an attendant is present to ensure stillness of the body. The Twice Born ritual refers to the state of the one performing the ritual at this stage as the Enwrapped One, indicating some form of swaddling of the body, perhaps intended to hold it perfectly still even when unattended.
There is no definitive “line” between an OOBE and an NDE, but ordinarily NDE is used to describe an unintentional experience such as my own which occurred as the result of a severe car accident. Those who have experienced an NDE are often called NDE’ers. An NDE’er will often report floating above the scene, observing their own body or other people and things at the scene. It is their descriptions of things they could not have been aware of at the time through their five senses that is used as confirmation of the reality of such an NDE.
An OOBE or NDE can be thought of as an altered state of consciousness, including an altered location either dimensionally or within this dimension. Some who travel the Astral Plane intentionally use it as a method of Remote Viewing as well.