ࡱ>     !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~Root EntryZ O2 2] CONTENTS CompObjVSPELLING& ... 9 Preface & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ........& & & & & & & & 10 Acknowledgments & & & & & & & & & & & .& & .& ........& & & & & . 11 Introduction & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ........& .& & & & & . 13 I. Testimonials & & & & & & & ..& ..& & ........................& .....& & & & & .. 14       !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~CHNKWKS TEXTTEXT!FDPPFDPP$FDPPFDPP&FDPPFDPP(FDPPFDPP*FDPPFDPP,FDPPFDPP.FDPPFDPP0FDPPFDPP2FDPPFDPP4FDPP FDPP6FDPP FDPP8FDPP FDPP:FDPP FDPP<FDPP FDPP>FDPPFDPP@FDPPFDPPBFDPPFDPPDFDPPFDPPF Nothing Better Than Death Insights from Sixty-two Profound Near-Death Experiences by Kevin R. Williams webmaster of www.near-death.com Nothing Better Than Death: Insights from Sixty-Two Profound Near-Death Experiences Copyright 2006 by Kevin R. Williams. Library of Congress Card No: 2002092764 ISBN: Hardcover 1-4010-6412-4 Paperback 1-4010-6411-6 E-book yet to file All rights reserved. Feel free to distribute this free ebook as you will. The author requests that the contents not be altered in any way. Printed in the United States of America Edited by Glenn Williams Published by: Xlibris Corporation 436 Walnut St. 11th Floor Philadelphia, PA 19106-9969 www.xlibris.com To order hardcover or paperback copies of this book, visit this website: http://www2.xlibris.com/bookstore/bookdisplay.asp?bookid=15695 Or phone: (888) 795-4274; fax: (215) 923-4685 **************************************************************************** In Memorandum To my beloved Mother, Phyllis Scofield, whose tragic death during the writing of this book, taught me a lesson about life and death that I had never known before. Although death brings overwhelming tears of joy to those who cross over, it also brings overwhelming tears of sorrow to surviving family and friends. This is true even for those who have, at the same time, overwhelming tears of joy knowing that there is nothing better on Earth than being dead. ***************************************************************************** Table of Contents Forward & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ...................& & & &       !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~      !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_`abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~ 1. May Eulitt & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .........& & & .& & & ...14 2. David Oakford & & & & & & & & & & ........& & & .& & & & & ...18 3. Rene Turner & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ........& .& & & & .. 29 4. Karen Schaeffer & & & & & & & & & & & & ..........& & & & & & 32 5. Linda Stewart & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .& ............& & & 36 6. Ricky Randolph & & & & & & & & & & & & .& .........& & & & & 39 7. Kerry Kirk & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ..& ........& ...& & & .. 45 8. Brian Krebs & & & & & & & & & & & ...;.........& & & & & & & & 48 9. Joni Maggi & & & & & & & & & & & & & ..& ............& ....& & & . 51 II. Near-Death Summaries & & & & & & ..& & ..................& .........& & ..& 55 III. Research Conclusions & & & & & & ..& & & ............................& ..& & 95 1. Life Before Birth & & & & & & & & & & & ...;& .....& ..........& & ... 95 2. Life & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ...& & & & ......;.....& & & & . 97 3. Humanity & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ;............& & & & . 99 4. Religion & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .& .....& ......& & & . 101 5. Spirituality & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .............& & .& & & 104 6. Future & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .....& & .....& & & & & 109 7. Science & & & & & & & & & & & & & .....& & .....& & & & & & .110 8. Death & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .....& & .....& & & & & .111 9. Life After Death & & & & & & & & & & & ...;..& .....& & & & & & 116 10. God & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ;& ..........& ..& .....& & ... 120 11. Heaven & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ..........& ..& & ......& & . 123 12. Hell & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ..........& & & & ........& & .124 13. Reincarnation & & & & & & & & .....& & .....& & & & .& ...& & & 126 IV. Questions and Answers & & & & ...& ...& & ..& & ............& ....& .....& 130 1. Aren't NDEs merely the products of the dying brain? .......;.......... 130 2. Doesn't the only truly compelling proof of being out of the body come from extreme remote viewing, where the experiencer views things from great distances from their body? ..................................................................................... 134 3. But, isn't self-awareness only a function of the brain? ...............& 135 4. Doesn't the fact that NDEs are different suggest they are not true? & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .......& .......& . 136 5. Doesn't science make the existence of God unlikely? ................. 144 6. Doesn't life outside this physical universe seem unlikely, and wouldn't that rule out the possibility of a spiritual universe?.....144 7. What are you hoping to learn from researching NDEs?................. 145 8. What kinds of NDEs intrigue you the most? & & & ...................& 145 9. How would you describe a typical NDE? & & & & ........................ 146 10. What aspects of the NDE catch your attention the most?................146 11. Did the NDEs you researched take away your fear of death? & ..... 147 12. Did you look at life differently after you first read some of these NDEs? ................................................................................... 147 13. What do you enjoy most about researching NDEs? & ................... 148 14. What do you think is the most important information you learned from researching NDEs? ................................................... 148 15. What do NDEs tell us about the future? & & & & & ..............& ...... 149 16. What happens to those who commit suicide? & ...............& .& & . 153 V. NDEs and Religion ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,& & & & & & & & & & & .................& ... 157 1. NDEs are not unscriptural & & & & & & & & .............& ....& & & 158 2. NDEs are not of the devil & & & & & & & & & & & .....................& 164 3. NDEs and the Bible affirm God is unconditional love & .................. 173 4. NDEs and the Bible affirm universal salvation & & & ..................& 177 5. NDEs and the Bible affirm reincarnation & & & .................& ......... 194 VI. Appendix & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ...& & .& ..................& & & .. 216 Life and Death Quotations & & & & & & & ..& ..............& & ...& ,& & & . 216 Notes & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ...............& ....& & & . 223 Bibliography & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & ..& & .................& & . 230 Recommended Websites & & & & & & & & & ..& & ....& & & .......& & . 231 Recommended Videos & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .& ...& . 232 Near-death Support Groups & & & & & & & & & ..............& ...& .& & & 237 Art Credits & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .............& .& ...& & & 242 About the Author & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & .........................& & . 244 Forward It all begins for us at birth. We are thrust from the womb onto the carousel of life, carried away in a blur of activities from childhood to adulthood and then to old age. Each of us have our dreams, our relationships and we go to school; we work and play, day after day, week after week, year after year. Life is certainly busy. And yet we tend not to think about the fact of our inevitable death. It's kind of scary. It doesn't seem to make any sense that we will no longer exist as we know it. The fact is we will die and there is no way to avoid it. Like the child being born, we have no choice but to yield ourselves to the unknown. Like the seventy billion who have already passed this way through life, we will join their ranks at the rate of 130,000 a day. And in that same day, 400,000 new lives will be born. The cycle of life and death continues at an ever-increasing pace. The fear of death has given rise to a host of speculations about an afterlife. Religions, philosophies and cults have multiplied over the millennia, all trying to answer our need for comfort about this seemingly absurd fate that awaits each of us. And now science has turned its gaze toward the matter of death. Beginning in the mid-1970s, noted researchers such as Raymond Moody, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, Kenneth Ring, P.M.H. Atwater, Michael Sabom, and Melvin Morse, have brought the subject of NDEs to the popular front. In 1981 and again in 1991, George Gallup Jr. conducted a poll on close brushes with death. He was astonished to find out that some 8 to 12 million people in the United States have had an NDE. This is a population about the size of New York City. NDE researchers speculate that the figures may even be higher since the experiencer is often reluctant to talk about it. -- NORMAN VAN ROOY from his documentary, Shadows: Perceptions of Near-Death Experiences, Part 1 (1994) Preface Socrates had this to say about death: "To fear death is nothing other than to think oneself wise when one is not. For it is to think one knows what one does not know. No one knows whether death may not even turn out to be the greatest blessings of human beings. And yet people fear it as if they knew for certain it is the greatest evil." Thousands of years later, NDEs are showing us that death is indeed the greatest blessing of human beings. According to a great number of people who have had an NDE, there is nothing better than death. One experiencer, Dianne Morrissey said, "If I lived a billion years more, in my body or yours, there's not a single experience on earth that could ever be as good as being dead. Nothing." (1) Such insights into life after death are intriguing to say the least. After years of researching the NDE and gathering various accounts from books and visitors to my website (www.near-death.com), I have collected a few of the most profound of these insights to profile in this book. I first learned of the NDE in the early 1970's after reading the groundbreaking book by Raymond Moody, Life After Life. His findings were a major factor in inspiring my own research into the NDE. Since then, I have read every major work concerning the phenomenon and many of the not so well known ones as well. As a result, I have developed a deep love for things concerning the NDE and the afterlife in general. Because of this deep love for these things, I am committed to bringing to the world the truths I have discovered about life after death. Many of these truths are universal. You will find these truths even speak to your heart and tell your mind of their truthfulness. Because many of these truths are universal, practical and of "common sense", I am confident they are in fact true. Before learning of the NDE, I became a fundamentalist Christian. This brand of Christianity is known for believing the NDE to be  of the devil. As my knowledge of the NDE grew, I came to realize from what I researched the fact that God is not limited only to just those who profess the Christian faith. The NDE expanded my mind into understanding the vastness of God's love for all people, no matter what their religious or cultural persuasion. Since then, my heart has been burdened to reach Christians all over the world, to show them the truth of the NDE in order to increase their faith as well. The purpose of this book is not to promote religion, but to promote the great truths and spirituality found in the NDE. One of these truths is that God is not limited to any one religion or even religion at all. God cares only about a person's heart, not a person's religious affiliation or church membership. The NDE reveals that the way to heaven is through love because love is God. Love is not limited to only one religion or culture because love is universal. This truth is too immense and profound to be fully understood or embodied in any one religion. I am not the source of these truths. I consider myself a person who has picked the most beautiful flowers from other people's gardens to create one of my own. Neither the gardeners nor I matter much, but it is the flowers themselves that matter most and the life force making them so lovely. Read this book with an open mind and heart. The information in this book has the power to transform your life. You will find you do not need to have an NDE in order to be transformed by the NDE. Within these pages, you will find the truth of the NDE is already within yourself. Acknowledgments I first learned of spiritual concepts at a very early age from my grandparents Walter and Marie Williams, who taught us Sunday school lessons in the Nazarene Church. They planted the seed of love for the spiritual that has, over the decades, grown into a tree of life. I am deeply indebted to them and their love. They taught me at an early age the love of Jesus, which has never left me. Now, in their advanced age, it is I who am caring for them out of love. Without their early guidance, I am not sure where I would be today. I want to acknowledge my father, who taught me the true meaning of being a Dad; my mother, who is now in heaven with her father and Jesus; my brothers and sisters, who taught me companionship from a very early age. I especially want to acknowledge my brother Glenn, who lead me to spirituality at a time I really needed it. An excellent writer and editor, he has supported my research by editing this book, for which I am truly grateful. Without his help, this book would have been extremely more difficult to produce. Although my siblings and I ultimately have embraced different religious philosophies, it is the love binding us together I cherish most. I thank them for the love and support they have given me. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Stephen Hoyer, who provided me the near-death experience of the late May Eulitt and also recommended to me Xlibris as a publisher. I must also acknowledge those NDE researchers who have had a tremendous influence on my life. As mentioned earlier, Dr. Raymond Moody's groundbreaking work, Life after Life, was responsible for me becoming interested in NDEs. Dr. Kenneth Ring has been a big help with his research and has graciously allowed me to use a large amount of his material for my website. I thank P.M.H. Atwater, whose work I greatly admire, for listing my website in her Complete Idiot's Guide to Near-Death Experiences -- a book I have deemed "Book of the Year" on my website. I would also like to thank all the experiencers who selflessly allowed me to profile their profound experiences. These include Linda Stewart, May Eulitt, David Oakford, Rene Turner, Karen Schaeffer, Ricky Randolph, Kerry Kirk, Brian Krebs and Joni Maggi. I am forever indebted to these individuals. Introduction The following is a brief synopsis of my understanding of reality based upon the higher knowledge I have researched in NDEs and their application toward my understanding of science, religion, metaphysics, and philosophy. How we began: In the beginning, there was nothing but one universal, collective consciousness, which people refer to as "Spirit" or "God." Within this one Collective Consciousness are infinite points of consciousness. All things that ever existed in the past, and all things existing now in the present, and all things which will ever exist in the future, currently exists in an eternal spirit form as one of these infinite points of consciousness within the Collective Consciousness. Our spirit is a fractal of God. This means our spirit is both a part of the Whole and the Whole itself. Like a drop of water from the ocean, we are part of the ocean. Like a drop of water from the ocean, the very essence of the ocean is contained within us. The origin of species and dawn of humanity: Then, at some moment outside of time, came the desire for individuality and self-expression. This led to the creation of the cosmos and souls. The vehicle for our spirit is our soul. In the same way, the vehicle for our soul is our physical body. Our spirit is the eternal part of God. Our soul is a temporary vehicle for our spirit to experience individuality of existence between the physical realm and the spirit realm. The human body evolved from ape-men millions of years ago and it will continues to evolve until it is able do those things which fully evolved people from our past, such as Jesus and Buddha, have achieved. At some point millions of years ago, souls descended upon these ape-men and began influencing to come down out of the trees and eventually form societies. Then souls began inhabiting the bodies of these ape-men. Thus, the dawn of humanity arose on this planet. Humans were created in the image of God: Humans are three-dimensional beings: body, soul, spirit. The divine nature is as a manifestation of life, light, and love. The Bible mentions a trinity of personalities: Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The Bible also mentions a trinity of human-divine unity: Body of Christ, Mind of Christ, and Spirit of Christ. Science and metaphysics describe human awareness in terms of consciousness (mind), subconsciousness (soul), and the collective unconsciousness or superconsciousness (spirit). What happens when we die: After death, our soul body leaves our physical body. The physical body decays and is lost forever. As a soul, we can then experience in various soul realms as we did every night on earth in our dreams. While in the soul realms, our soul body is the vehicle for our spirit. Our soul mind functions as our conscious awareness and our spirit mind plays the role of the subconscious mind. Ultimately, we will want to leave the soul realms and enter into the higher spirit realms. When that choice is made and the soul actually enters into the light, the soul merges fully with the light and soul body is shed much like the physical body was shed at death. The memories of the soul remain forever in the mind and the individual is now once again a pure spirit in the spirit realms. As a pure spirit, we exist once again in pure thought form in the mind of the one enormous and fantastic dream called "God." Humanity is evolving in mind, body, and soul: As human beings, we have been evolving on a biological level for millions of years. Between Earth lives, we spend "eternities" in spirit form in various spirit realms. We also return to these spirit realms every night during our dreams. The reason we choose to come to Earth for another relatively brief human experience is because we are also evolving at the soul level. Through the cycle of birth, death, life in the spirit realms, and rebirth into flesh, we are learning valuable lessons that only Earth lives can give. The goal for every human being is to evolve into perfection in a manner similar to that attained by Jesus, Buddha, and other great spiritual leaders. Ultimately, the day will come when the world will be filled with perfected human beings. It will be a time when humans will be able to live as long as they want and perform feats which today we would call "miraculous" - like walking on water. In such a state of perfected evolution, humans will have become "liberated" from this evolutionary cycle and will no longer be subjected to reincarnation. As taught in the mystical forms of the great world religions, liberation is attained by "becoming one" with all things and all people (i.e., "God") through the practice of unconditional love. This spiritual state of one-ness occurs when a person "awakens" their higher spirit-self and brings it into their conscious awareness. In Christianity, this liberation is referred to as spiritual resurrection or spiritual rebirth or being born again. In Buddhism, the state of liberation is known as Nirvana. In Hinduism, it is known as Moksha. In Gnosticism, this liberation occurs through attaining gnosis. All these concepts describe the same thing. It is the liberation of the spirit from the flesh. It is also the symbolism behind the crucifixion of Jesus. Practicing love for one another is the way to heaven on Earth and heaven within: Jesus taught people that the way to attain liberation is through the practice of unconditional love. Love brings about a one-ness between people and is necessary to attaining the higher dimensions of consciousness. Practicing unconditional love leads to the manifestation of the spirit within us and in our lives and brings our spirit into conscious awareness. It is an awakening of unconditional love within us and is the manifestation of our holy spirit within us. However, it is not enough to merely believe in love. Nor is it enough to merely know about love. To be spiritual beings living in a physical world, we must live love, manifest love, and become the embodiment of love. We do not get there by focusing only on the love and sacrifice of Christ nor through worshipping him. The Christian life involves taking up our own cross and following in Jesus' footsteps by practicing unconditional love: We can practice unconditional love by crucifying our self-centeredness through self-sacrifice and self-denial for the sake of serving others. "Crucifying the flesh" also means to put to death the desires of the lower self - the animalistic desires - to allow our higher self, our spirit, to come through. The "beast" we are evolving away from: This lower nature within human beings is the unevolved animal nature within humanity that humans have been slowly shedding for millions of years through evolution and reincarnation. The nature of this unevolved beast within humanity is manifested as self-gratification, self-indulgence, self-centeredness, selfishness, self-importance, self-righteousness, self-delusion, self-condemnation, and the constant clamoring for self - ego (symbolically known as the "false god," the "devil," and the "beast."). Discovering a higher reality and the supremacy of love: It is the illusion of separation (i.e., that we are not, in fact, all part of one giant Whole), which is the source of many of the problems humanity has faced. This constant desire for self apart from the Whole must be overcome in order to become the spiritual beings we really are. We are actually spirit beings having a highly evolved human experience. Everything on the physical and soul level is slowly evolving toward perfect unity with the Whole. Here in the physical realm, we are "enrolled" in a "World-School" for a class called Introduction to Eternal Life 101 to learn how to live with and love the people around us forever. NDE research reveals an open secret about our lives on Earth. Life is a test. It is a gigantic examination that we will be graded on after death. There is no judgment except self-judgment and we should not even do that. There is no condemnation but self-condemnation and we should not do this either. The life review after death is for our educational benefit, enlightenment, and soul evolution. The life review is where we discover what we have been filling the void within us our entire life. The more we fill our void with love for others, the more we have evolved as soul. The love we have found within our void is what draws us into the light. However, not everyone enters the light immediately after death. There are many reasons for this and they can be found within the NDE testimonies on this website. In general, it requires many human experiences (i.e., lifetimes) until our higher spiritual nature is brought into our consciousness awareness. In the end, no one is lost. There is no eternal damnation. Nobody completely "flunks out" of God's University of Higher Knowledge. God's love is "tough love" as well as unconditional not wanting anyone to be lost but to attain at the physical level what we are at the spirit level. Life is about loving everyone and everything unconditionally forever as individuals and collectively as a Whole which is God. Testimonials Life is eternal; and love is immortal; and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothing save the limit of our sight. -- R. W. Raymond 1. May Eulitt The following is one of those very rare NDEs shared by several people at the same time. An excerpt is described in the words of May Eulitt to Stephen Hoyer, Ph.D. from their book entitled  Fireweaver. (2) To read the full account, visit this web page. May Eulitt, along with her cousin James and friend Rashad, were struck by lightning. The three of them find themselves in a large heavenly room where they realize they can communicate with each other telepathically. Then a warm, golden, and embracing light enters the room and the three of them enter into a beautiful valley. They observe a multitude of tiny bubbles drifting in the air which they learn represent souls. Because the three of them are of different religious backgrounds, the beautiful valley has a different interpretation between them. To May Eulitt, the beautiful valley represented heaven. James viewed the beautiful valley as the "Gulf of Souls". As a Buddhist, Rashad saw the beautiful valley as Nirvana. Then an angelic being came from the light whose identity was unique to each of the three. May Eulitt viewed this angelic being as a kind of Viking Valkyrie. To James, the angelic being was his late father. To Rashad, the angelic being was Buddha. Each of the three also received a different message. Ultimately, they were told that they had to return to their bodies which they do. (3) 2. David Oakford In the early summer of 1979, David Oakford was 20 years old and having problems dealing with his life situation. His childhood was not designed to enable him to properly deal with life in general. He had no self-esteem and everything he did to find peace within just did not work. He was pretty miserable and he felt lost and unloved. He turned to drugs and alcohol. He needed to find the peace within himself and he felt it calling him. It was at a party that David took an overdose of drugs and had an NDE. His NDE is one of the most profound you will ever read. The following is an excerpt from David Oakford's NDE. You can read his entire account in his book entitled  Soul Bared. I laid down to use the stability of the earth in an effort to maintain a hold on reality. I knew I had to do that in order to be able to come back down. The next thing I knew I was riding in my friend's car. I thought we went up north, crossed the Mackinaw Bridge and came back again. We rode past my childhood home and I saw my parents sitting on the porch. I felt drawn to the trees. I could see and feel their strength. I saw their roots going deep into the ground. I mean I actually saw the tree roots physically reaching below the ground. I told my friends about the car ride after the experience and they told me the only place I went was to the chair they carried me to after I passed out on the porch. I did wake up in the chair my friends say they put me in a bit later. When I woke up I could feel the organs in my body working, each one separately as well as all together. I could not see my friends anywhere. I could see in all the rooms of the house at the same time. The stereo was playing the Doors Absolutely Live album, except the volume was way too loud for me. Since I did not see any of my friends around I got up and tried to turn the music down, but could not. No matter what I did the music kept playing. I knew the stereo too. I had a real problem with the noise. It was tearing at me and I could not figure out why nor could I adjust the volume. I called out to my friends and nobody came. I tried to unplug the stereo but that did not work either. Every time I tried to touch the cord to unplug it I could not grasp it. It just kept on playing "LA Woman" and the sound rattled my very being. I ran all over the house calling for my friends, yelling repeatedly that the music was too loud but I was not heard. I pleaded for the music to be turned down. I tried to go outside but I could not feel the doorknob. I could see the daylight outside but could not go outside. I ended up hiding in the bathroom in an unsuccessful attempt to escape the noise. I looked in the mirror and could not see myself. That frightened me greatly. I went back into the family room and saw my body sitting in the chair. It looked like I was sleeping. I wondered how I could be looking at myself. I got a bit scared then because I could see me from outside of me, from all different angles except from the inside angle I was used to seeing myself. I was alone. I was confused and very scared. I tried to get back into my body but could not. I could not touch the ground either. I was floating. I rose up into a spot above my body and kind of just hung there. I could no longer move. I called out for help and nobody came. I tried to go out the door but like the stereo I could not touch the doorknob. I was scared and alone and did not know what to do. I did not understand what was happening to me. I asked God to help me. I did believe in God then, but I was kind of angry at him because of the crappy life I was experiencing. I reasoned if God were really the omnipotent and omniscient being I was taught he was he would not have let me experience the pain I had experienced throughout my life. I thought if there was a time I needed God, it was now! I was not disappointed with the result of my plea for help. I looked over by the door to the outside and saw a beautiful being standing there. His feet did not touch the floor. His feet just blended into thin air. He looked both female and male and was young. I could not tell his/her sex. His hair was curly and he was about my height. He had this glow about him too. The glow was green close to him, then blue, then pure white in the upper areas. He said, "I am here to help you" but when he spoke his mouth did not move. I did not actually hear him speak with my ears. I felt what he was saying. When I saw this being and he spoke to me, I was no longer afraid. I actually felt peace and comfort like I had never felt before. I felt the peace I was searching for throughout my entire life. The feeling was very familiar to me, like I had felt it before but not in this life. This wonderful being called me by a name I do not remember. I told him he must have the wrong guy and the name he used for me was not my name. He laughed and said I was a great "master" and I had just forgotten who I was. I did not believe him, because I did not really know for sure what a "master" was then and if I were this great master I would not have had all the problems I had. I felt I was an evil being because that is what I was told in my life several times by many. He told me his name, but I do not remember it. He told me he had been with me always and told me he knew I had a very hard life and he would help me understand why if I really wanted to. He told me he would help me remember who I am. He said he would understand if I did not believe him and offered to prove to me he knew everything about me. He told me things I did when I as a child proving to me he was always with me. He told me about things I had only thought about. He told me I could go anywhere I wanted to go and he would show me how to do it if I wanted him to. He said that if I needed to come back and see my body I could. My body would be fine because I was still connected to it somehow. When we spoke to each other we did so telepathically. The expression on his face was a happy one all the time. I told him I would like to see the pyramids in Egypt as well as the southwest United States. He told me all I had to do was trust him, think about where I wanted to go, and we would go. I thought about the pyramids and we were there in an instant. I do not know why I chose the pyramids, the thought just popped into me so I went with that. While we were there he told me some things about the pyramids and Egypt I do not remember now. I really wish I could remember what he explained while we were there because I do know it was highly significant and had to do with humanity's future. The energy was the lowest in areas where there were man-made structures, the cities of the world. The energy I saw came from the human beings living in the cities. It was explained to me that humans are the basic producers of energy in cities because of their relatively low vibration level the energy is lower in general. I could see the higher sources of energy in the cities though. I was shown people who had higher energy levels and some of them actually talked to the being I was with. I saw dark souls during the time the being and I spent on Gaia. The dark souls were earthbound spirits who refuse to go to the light. They prey on the energies of humans still in human form and try to use those souls to prevent the evolution of spirit. I was told I was protected from these dark ones as long as I chose to focus on the love in me. The dark ones did not even try to affect us, in fact they gave us nasty looks and went away. I was told I would know these dark ones when I see them and I was told to tell them to go to the light. The light is a porthole to the place all souls go if they choose. I could see energy around the humans too, all different levels and colors. The being explained the human energy to me. He said the energy coming from humans is what spirits use to evaluate the spiritual condition of particular humans. He said the lighter and more brilliant the color the more advanced the spirit is. He said seeing the "aura" around a spirit is useful in determining how much a particular spirit needs to work on his development. He said the higher beings know where to go and what to do to help an earthbound soul so they may advance themselves if they so choose. He told me all souls have this energy, this is why I could see it on every human I saw. He said I was of the same energy type as he but my vibration is lower when I am in human form and in time my energy would raise to match his intensity provided I chose to take the initiative to consciously evolve my soul. He told me there is much to this planet that spirits can see which humans do not see with their eyes because their vibrations are so low. He showed me life in the trees that I could see as a spirit but could not see in my human form. He explained that beings of higher vibration do live on earth but they are not human, they are part of earth itself. He explained these beings were the caretakers of physical life on the planet. He said these beings take care of what we call nature. There are beings taking care of the plant life, the mineral life and the waterborne life. These lower echelon beings work together to ensure that all aspects of nature is protected and remains healthy. When the planet was evolving, these ethereal beings were the ones keeping the balance of nature. He explained to me that the planet we call earth really has a proper name. He told me the earth is really called "Gaia". He said Gaia has its own energy and that Gaia is really a true living being. I asked if this energy could be seen and he said that we have to be away from Gaia to appreciate and see it. He said humans are the ones who can manipulate Gaia's energy through their choices. He said if humans choose to live in harmony with the energy on Gaia, it is good for Gaia. He said if humans abuse Gaia, they hurt Gaia by altering its energy structure. I was given an example of how humans have deforested the planet and reduced the energy available faster than it could be replenished. He said Gaia was very strong but has been weakened considerably since humans have chosen to use the resources in a manner inconsistent with the laws of the universe. I asked him if we could go into space and see Gaia's energy and he said yes. He said there were no limits on where we could go. I concentrated my thought, trusted, and we then went into what is known as space. Away from this planet I could see Gaia all at once. It was so beautiful. I could see the aura around Gaia. The aura affected me greatly. I felt a deep love for this beautiful place. I could hear Gaia move and was told the sound was the energy flowing in and out of Gaia. My special being told me that Gaia is the most unique planet because it is designed for humans to live on forever. It was created for spirit to play, learn, and grow. He said the balance of nature on Gaia allows spirit to be in human form when a spirit lives in harmony with nature. Nature exists to compensate for the decreased vibration and was created for spirits to adapt enough to adjust and be in the physical human body while still having access to energy that will help them advance. He explained that humans were designed by God to live eternally on Gaia and are not supposed to "die". He said "dying" is a human created earth term meaning little in the world of spirit. The reason humans supposedly die is that they have fallen away from the balance of nature and allow themselves to be affected by what they create that violates the natural laws of the universe. He said humans have fallen away from living in balance with nature. He said they must relearn about the harmonic balance if they want to survive as a race and live on Gaia forever. He said it was still possible for humans to learn about this harmony and it is the next overall goal of humans on Gaia. I was told humans would eventually realize they must restore the harmony but great damage will be inflicted before humans will fully realize what they have been doing to Gaia and work to reverse what they have done. We traveled past all of the planets in our solar system. Near each planet I could hear the energy just like on Gaia. I saw the auras around each one of them too. I saw spirits on all of them as well. My friend told me all planets are places for spirits to live, learn and thus evolve. I saw great cities on each and every one of those planets. It was explained that other life in the universe is not readily seen because the beings were all of higher vibration and most spirits in human form have yet to attain the higher vibration required to see them. The being told me each planet has a theme for learning and any of them can be chosen by a soul when we are between physical lives. He said we practice on the other planets to be ready to live on Gaia. He said Gaia is the ultimate experience for a soul. It is ultimate because our souls evolve faster here than anywhere else. It was said the lessons we need to learn are difficult to learn without having a physical form. He explained how we pick a physical life on Gaia. He explained to me I picked the parents I was born to so I could learn what I needed to learn to grow enough to come back and do spirit work on Gaia after I attain a certain level of growth. He said I was being told all of these things so I could help souls come together and return Gaia to harmony. He explained some things to me about God that I do not remember. They had to do with the universe and the size and structure of it. I do remember he said God is not to be seen for he is everywhere. He told me God loves Gaia deeply, much as a man loves his wife. He talked about Jesus too. He told me Jesus was a master God sent to earth to teach humans how to act toward each other and find their way back to the path of harmony with each other as well as with Gaia. I was told Jesus is the being entrusted by God to ensure souls evolve. He said Jesus is of the highest in vibration than any other soul. He said God holds Jesus in the highest of favor because he was the best example of what humans need to do. I then got to see Jesus. I saw his light. Jesus' light was the purest I have ever seen. There was no need for words. There were only love feelings I cannot even begin to describe. I was told that loving one another is what souls need to do in order for peace and harmony to be the standard on Gaia. I was told there is a hierarchy in the universe dedicated to preserving the harmony of the universe. I was told humans are an integral part of this harmony and the free will we have is a part of souls allowing humans to provide service to the universe. After he explained those things to me I was able to see our whole solar system all at once in full color. The planets were all in a line and I could see all of them from Pluto to the sun. I felt very blessed and very important. I was given this great gift and I did not really understand why. There I floated, a person who went out his way to inflict pain on other souls, yet I was never asked about what I had done. In fact I was given the honor of being given answers to questions most people wonder about all of their lives. I thanked this loving being for explaining and showing me what he did. He told me there was more for him to show me if I was ready to experience it. I told him I was ready. I did not know why I was chosen but I was not about to question why. It just seemed small to me then. We started to head back toward Gaia. We went to a place in the shadow of Gaia. It was a great city in the clouds. The city had these beautiful white buildings as far as I could see. I saw spirits living there all of which had vibration but no real physical body. These inhabitants went to and from the buildings - going to work and play too. I saw a place where spirits went to get what I thought was water. There were no vehicles there. Spirits seemed to get around the same way my being and I got around, by flying. The city had no boundaries I could see. This was a place full of life of all kinds. There was nature there, many pure plants, trees, and water just like on Gaia but more pure. Nature there was absolutely perfect. It was untainted by human manipulation. This place was just like Gaia only without the problems and negativity. I felt this was what is called heaven in earth terms. I saw spirits going to and from the Gaia and the city. I could tell the development of the spirits going to and from by the energy they emanated. I could see that animals came to and from earth just like humans do. I could see many spirits leave Gaia with guides and could see spirits returning to Gaia without guides. The being told me some of the spirits passing were the ones doing the work with humans on Gaia. I could make out the type of spirits doing the work and the spirits coming to the great city to become replenished to eventually go back to Gaia to experience and further evolve. I could feel the emotions of the ones coming back for replenishment. I could feel some of them were sad, beaten and scared, much like I felt before my being came to me. My being took me into one of the larger buildings. Inside I saw many spirits working. They were doing things similar to jobs on earth. When we walked by the spirits, they looked at me. I think they were checking me out because of the being I was with. We went upstairs and I saw spirits that knew me. They greeted me and asked me how I was doing. They gave me advice that I do not remember. I thought I was going to be given a job there, but the being knew I thought that and told me there was something I needed to do first. I was ecstatic. I was in heaven despite everything I had done during my life on Gaia. I was experiencing what most people only dream about. The love I felt there was the same love I felt when I saw Jesus. I had been searching on Gaia for what was really the same place I was in then. I was searching on Gaia for the feeling I had that very moment. I had found what I spent my whole life searching for. I was truly happy. I was home and I knew it. I was ready to stay and do whatever work I was given to do. My being took me to another building that was special. It was bigger than the rest and had the greenest foliage I had ever seen growing on it, decorating it like a shrine. We went inside a set of double doors glowing with life. The inside was decorated with a wood paneling the being told me was "living" wood from the trees growing at this wonderful place. He led me to some big double doors and told me to wait on this bench while he went inside. A bit later he came out of the room. He told me to go into the room and said he would wait for me and to not worry. He cautioned me to ensure I was truthful with the beings in the room. He said they were not judges, rather they were the ones who evaluated a soul's development based on a soul's history. He told me to remember who I was and to refrain from fear. I knew I had to leave this being sooner or later but I was glad he would wait for me. I was a little scared to leave him, but I felt I was protected and knew I would be protected here. I went in and saw a group of several spirits seated at a table. The table was made of the glowing wood and was perfect in every way. The spirits around this table had the highest vibration I had seen so far with the exception of Jesus. I looked at these beings and recognized them. I do not know where I recognized them from, but they all had a familiarity about them. They just looked at me. All of a sudden, I saw my parents on earth before I was born. I saw how they came to be together and watched them have my brother and sister before me. I saw their positive and negative sides and evaluated them according to what I knew I needed to do on Gaia. The beings asked me how and why I picked these particular parents and asked me to tell them. They said I knew how and why I picked them and asked me to tell them why. I do not know where it came from but I did tell them how and why and they agreed with me. I picked them to help them on their path as well as to achieve my learning. I saw my soul go to my mother and go inside of her. I saw myself being born from an observer standpoint as well as having the actual experience. I proceeded to see my entire life from the observer point of view and from the points of view of those my actions affected. I felt the feelings they felt directly resulting from things I had done to them. I saw both the positive and the negative things I had done as they had truly happened; nothing was left out or presented inaccurately. I experienced the harshness of being born again. I experienced leaving heaven and the transit to Gaia. I saw myself as a helpless infant who needed his mother for everything. I experienced my father's love as well as his anger. I experienced my mothers love, her fear and her anger as well. I saw all of the good and bad from my childhood years and re-experienced what I had done then. I felt all of my emotions and the emotions of the souls I had hurt as well as loved. From all of this I learned it matters deeply what choices I make on Gaia. I learned just how powerful we humans are and how we can affect each other in positive and negative ways. It was amazing to see how my innocent actions had such a powerful effect on souls I had no idea I was affecting. The experience was one I will never forget. I experienced the whole spectrum of feelings of my life in a relatively short period of time as we humans see it. Where I was, time did not really exist. I could see how I became what I had become on Gaia and why I became that way. Everything I did in my life affected the evolution of the souls around me. I saw the reasons for all of my actions and understood why I did what I had done. There was a place for all of my positive and negative actions. There was no action necessarily wrong, but there were actions I took that did not enhance positive growth. I was both a victim and a beneficiary of my actions. This was not a fun experience to go through. I could see how wonderful it could be if one chose to act to affect other souls positively most of the time. Afterward, the beings in the room asked me questions about what I saw and how I felt about my life up to then. I knew I had to provide an honest assessment - I could not lie. I hesitated when they asked me whether I affected others more positively than negatively. I thought about lying. These beings knew what I was thinking and I had to tell them I felt I could have done a better job on Gaia. I knew what I had come to Gaia to accomplish and was well on my way to doing that but I knew I was not finished yet. They agreed and told me that I still had many things to do and that I may want to go back and do them. I was told it was understood how difficult it would be for me but it was necessary for the universe for me to finish. They said it may be wise to go back and live my life how I had originally planned it. They said I had set lofty goals for my life on Gaia and the events in my life were achieving the goals I had set. They said I originally came to Gaia to learn and share with others using the gifts I have accumulated over several lifetimes. They said I am needed on Gaia to help souls bring themselves and Gaia back to harmony. They said I have great potential to affect other souls, to help them grow and Gaia is the best place to do that. I was told the events I had experienced thus far were preparing me to make a large contribution to the universe and my experiences were not to be considered personal attacks in any way. I did not want to accept it. I wanted to stay. I told them that. I told them I was tired and wanted to stay because life on Gaia is hard and unforgiving. I felt going back would be dangerous for the universe because I was not advanced enough in my spiritual evolution. They said that was precisely why it would be in my best interest to go back to Gaia. They said I was more advanced than I give myself credit for. They said it was possible for me to stay but I would need to finish my work on Gaia sooner or later. The type of work I was destined for can only be done on Gaia. I could stay if chose to but I would only be prolonging the completion of what I needed to do for this universe. They explained the fastest way to finish my work would be to go back to Gaia as soon as possible. I was stunned to say the least. I resorted to bargaining but it was no use. I still did not like living on Gaia and did not really want to go back. These beings understood me but remained firm. I had a decision to make that was really the hardest decision I would ever make. I did come back to Gaia and am now living the life I was (later in the experience) told I would live. Believe it or not, I ended up shelving this experience away, classifying it as a really vivid "trip". It was not until I evolved more that I realized the gift I was given. I share this experience now because I feel it can, if so chosen, spur thought and foster choices affecting the planet in a positive way. If I learned anything from this experience it was that every choice I make is duly recorded, noted and will return later, when I leave here again. My goal is to save people the pain I felt in my review and hasten the evolution of humans on Gaia, helping Gaia as well as the universe. I am one who had a near-death experience and was given a choice to return to this planet in a physical sense again. I chose to return out of love for this planet - a love so great I would give up the slot I have "back home." I did this also in order to help to heal the place through the sharing of what I was shown of the in between and through the choices I make, (hopefully loving and kind ones). Without the free will to return I would not be here in the physical doing what I am doing. The physical pain, war, poverty, pestilence, horror, rape, murder, abandonment etc., etc., etc. which is here on this planet is the result of humans coming here and making their free choices in order to learn and evolve. Unfortunately learning does tend to create a mess at times and the physical pain etc. is a part of that mess. It makes sense to me that the same free choice concept is instrumental in cleaning up the mess. I liken it to camping and choosing to clean up or not clean up the mess one makes. If you choose to clean up your mess, this helps the planet to stay as is because one does not contribute to the mess. If one does not clean up it adds to the mess. If one cleans up his or her own mess and then some, it contributes to healing the planet. In my near-death experience I was also shown there are many souls in "heaven" who are more than willing to come to this place regardless of the state it is in. I was shown if I did not choose to return I would be in the schools existing in heaven, working toward the growth I need to accomplish regardless of the form I am in. That was an attractive choice to be sure except I had a problem with how long it would take me to grow enough to do what my soul wishes to do. (I have a burning desire to experience other places in other universes and to do that I need to grow more.) The prerequisite for that is ensuring my soul has the IQ for it. It is my understanding that a soul can choose to remain in heaven and operate on the level he/she (whatever) is on to infinity, but I seek more because I know without doubt there is more. At any rate, the idea remains that for this place to start feeling and looking like heaven is to create the love felt there here. I would like to see that on this planet and I know it can be done. If I need to, I will come back here all over again to make it happen. (4) 3. Rene Turner On February 1982 in Newcastle, Australia, Dr. Rene Turner left her optical instrument repair firm after a day's work. She got in her car and drove down the highway on her way home. As she came to a stoplight where a road crossed the highway, she slowed down to a stop. Here, her memory ends. Her partner, who was riding with her, reports, "As we approached the lights, they changed to green. As we went into the crossing, the car aquaplaned and hit a large power pole just after the intersection. Stuart, who was laying on the mattress in the back of the panel van, was thrown forward into the back of Rene's head, driving her into the steering wheel." At the hospital, the professor of neurosurgery reported Rene's death to her parents and said they should be grateful because she would have been a vegetable had she survived. During this conversation, a young frightened nurse rushed into the office and blurted out, "She is alive! She sat up and spoke!" The professor chastised her for interrupting them and lectured her about how "dead bodies" can move and make noises. But the nurse was emphatic; "She sat up and said, 'Don't give me any more drugs!'" At this point, Rene's mother took the professor by his and Rene s father s elbow and marched them down the corridor. They found Rene in a back corridor where she had apparently been placed so the nurse could remove equipment prior to her transfer to the morgue. She was found in a deep coma and breathing. She remained that way for ten days. The following is Rene Turner's NDE in her own words: I don't know when the above events in my experience took place. I have no memory of the process of dying or leaving my body. I was moving headfirst through a dark maelstrom of what looked like black boiling clouds, feeling I was being beckoned to the sides, which frightened me. Ahead was a tiny dot of bright light steadily growing and brightened as I drew nearer. I became aware that I must be dead and was concerned for Mum and Dad and my sister, and somewhat upset with myself as I thought, "They will soon get over it," like it was, in passing, just a fleeting thought as I rushed greedily forward towards this light. I arrived in an explosion of glorious light into a room with insubstantial walls, standing before a man about in his thirties, about six feet tall, reddish brown shoulder length hair and an incredibly neat, short beard and mustache. He wore a simple white robe. Light seemed to emanate from him and I felt he had great age and wisdom. He welcomed me with great love, tranquility, and peace (indescribable) - no words. I felt, "I can sit at your feet forever and be content," which struck me as a strange thing to think/say/feel. I became fascinated by the fabric of his robe and tried to figure out how light could be woven! He stood beside me and directed me to look to my left, where I was replaying my life s less complementary moments. I relived those moments and felt not only what I had done but also the hurt I had caused. Some of the things I would have never imagined could have caused pain. I was surprised that some things I may have worried about, like shoplifting a chocolate as a child, were not there, whilst casual remarks which caused hurt unknown to me at the time were counted. When I became burdened with guilt, I was directed to other events that gave joy to others, although I felt unworthy. It seemed the balance was in my favor. I received great love. I was led further into the room, which became a hall. There coming towards me was my grandfather. He looked younger than I remembered and was without his hare lip or cleft pallet, but undoubtedly my grandfather. We hugged. He spoke to me and welcomed me. I was moved to forgive him for dying when I was 14 and making me break my promise to become a doctor and find a cure for his heart condition. Until that moment, I had not realized I had been angry with him! Granddad told me that grandma was coming soon and he was looking forward to her arrival. I inquired why she was coming soon as she had been traveling from her home in Manchester to New Zealand to Miami for continual summer for a number of years! Granddad told me she had cancer of the bowel and was coming soon. Granddad seemed to have no grasp of time when I pressed for how soon. (Grandma was diagnosed three months later and died in August. I had upset my mother by telling her about it when I regained consciousness). After Granddad and I had talked a while, he took me further into the room that became a hall again. We approached a group of people whom I started to recognize. The person who first welcomed me came and placed his hand on my shoulder and turned me towards him. He said, "You must return. You have a task to perform." I wanted to argue. I wanted to stay. I glanced back at Granddad and was propelled quickly towards the entrance. At the threshold, all became blackness, nothing, no awareness. I awoke from my coma slowly, over several days, half-dreamed memories of familiar voices and glimpses of faces. The clearest moments were several occasions where I would awake from deep sleep to find a nurse with a syringe and refuse any drugs. I had no idea why! I had three lots of surgery to repair my face, skull, and eye socket. I left the hospital with pain, double vision, Anosmia, and damage to eighth cranial nerve. It left me with nausea and a disturbed balance. I was for two years angry at G-d for sending me back in such torment with a task to do and with no clues or instructions, except for one thing. I was given a clear message I have no idea how to pass on. It is this: "It is time to live according to your beliefs, whatever they may be - to put your house in order because the end times are upon us!" This can't be my task. There was no booming voice or any way I knew the message got there. I am also unsure of the identity of the gatekeeper - no nametag and no introduction! It took me five years as a zombie before I was able to rehabilitate myself. I have gainful employment, formed the Head Injury Society of New Zealand in 1987, and am paraded as the example of how well it is possible to recover from acquired brain damage. I still don't know my task - still have pain, Anosmia, Diplopia, etc. The memory of the near-death experience is more real than what I did yesterday. (5) 4. Karen Schaeffer Karen Schaeffer experienced one of the most unique NDEs I have ever read. In it, she is shown the future, but is given the option of changing it. Here is her experience in her own words: As a teenager, I had several psychic experiences often occurring in dreams. As I grew older and life more hectic, these experiences diminished - almost disappeared until the pregnancy of my first child. Shortly after his birth I had the most horrific dream that I would be in a terrible car crash that would take my life. For months I was terrified and was extremely cautious and on the look out for that monster vehicle. By the time my son was 7 months old, I convinced myself it was only a dream... nothing of what was to come. I had a brand new teaching position, a baby, a home and my husband to take care of ... I had put too much energy into this thing. Then it happened. I had left school right away that day. I wanted to pick up my son from his grandmother and hurry back to school to watch a baseball game. It was a picture perfect way to spend the afternoon with my son. As I was exiting the freeway with usual caution, I made a left hand turn on a light that had been green for some time. This was my lucky day I thought. Then in an instant I was gone. Immediately I was in the most beautiful serene place I had ever been. My grandfather, another person whom I had known in a previous life, and a guardian were ready to help me with the transition. They told me of the accident, showed me the site. It was my time to come home they said. The overwhelming love and happiness of that place was so inviting. I could feel myself becoming lighter each moment. In a fit of fear and panic I began crying. No, I couldn't be dead. What would happen to my son? He was seven months old! He would never remember me. His father didn't even know how to take care of him. I didn't want him raised by his father's parents. No, no, no ... this was not the time to go. They were wrong. In an embrace of love they calmed me by showing me that my son, my entire family would be okay after my death. My mother could lean on my grandmother. It would take time, but she would heal. My husband, hurt, sad, and lonely would also heal and eventually find love once again. Death is part of the lessons we are to learn on earth, and my death was an important lesson for those involved in my life. I was shown my funeral, taught how to be near those I loved and told I could eventually communicate with those whose spirits were open. I could accept this. They would be fine. I was feeling lighter all the time. But wait... my son. I couldn't leave my son! Babies need their mommies. I needed to be his mommy. I couldn't let go. So much patience was shown to me - so much love. My guides explained that the feelings I was having were still a connection to my human side. Once my Humanness wore off, I would feel light as air, utter happiness, and extreme love. Words do not do the feelings justice. They worked to help me throw off my human weight. The feelings were so great and seemed to pull me in stronger and stronger; yet my connection to my son was so strong. We wandered in this beautiful place for what seemed an eternity. We discussed my life. We discussed religion. We discussed secrets of the soul that as humans we must forget, lest we'd never be able to thrive on earth. All the while I was in awe. Some things were just as I always dreamed an afterlife would be. Some things I was just plain wrong and I remember thinking, "Wow!" Where were my other loved ones? When could I see my other grandparents who had passed? In time - they were on a different plane. When my transition was complete I could choose to go to other levels when I was ready. Every now and then thoughts of my son would make me heavy once again. I couldn't bear the thought of him growing up without a mother. I was told others would be a mother for me. First grandparents, and then they showed me Jake's life. He was the most beautiful boy, so happy, but with a touch of sadness that seemed to pierce his soul. This was his lesson to tackle. He knew coming into this life the main lessons he was to learn. It was meant to be. I saw a new mom for Jake when he was about 7 or 8. A beautiful woman, kind hearted who definitely cared for Jake, and treated him well, but she was to have her own child with my widowed husband and the love she showed for her own child was different and unequal to the love she showed for my child - her stepchild. This isn't what I dreamed for Jake. This couldn't be. I was happy for my husband. He was okay. He was happy. My son was a different story. Other lessons were learned in the constant-patient job of transitioning me to the other side. I had to let go. At times I became hysterical and then moments later I was calm and serene. I saw a girl child who had been meant in Jake's place, but before conception, plans changed and there was a need for Jake's spirit to take her place. There was much upheaval that Jake could help mend (and he did). At a time when I felt the closest to accepting my death, I experienced a resurgence of sorrow and pain, longing for my son, for my life. I couldn't let go of my human life. My guides tried their hardest. They never gave up. They never became discouraged. It is unbelievable the amount of patience and love they exuded. Finally, my hysteria was calmed by a higher spirit who seemed to envelop me in love. My guides were instructed to allow me to return. Despite their pleas to allow them more time, they were told that at this point, my spirit would not rest. It was best to let me return, to settle my spirit, learn further lessons. My pleading won my return for the time being. I understood that before my descent, my friends and family had lessons being postponed, but they would have to learn the lessons resulting from my death at some time later. Arrangements were made for when, where, how my spirit would return and which lessons I was to have enriched or acquire new. Some lessons learned in my arrival on the other side would have to be forgotten, and it was not good for my soul to know when I was dying again or else as a human I would focus on only that, especially as the time neared. The last things I remember were being taken back to the accident site, and just before my descent, I was told when my children were older it would be time to come home for good. I accepted it immediately, but then, wait! What qualifies as older? Does it mean only a few years older? Teenagers? Will I live to see them marry and have their own children? This was a difficult aspect to deal with immediately after the accident. I had a life with my son again. I had to spend it right for I had no idea how much longer I had left. I was told I was lucky to survive. A large utility truck ran a red light and hit the driver's side of my tiny compact car. Despite wearing a seatbelt the doctors say I would not have survived if it were not for the airbags to open, something that is not supposed to happen in a side impact. The first year after the accident was an attempt to live the best I could, the happiest I could. I was suffering however from severe pain from a fractured shoulder bone, broken ribs, and two hip fractures. I was told the pain should disappear in six months to a year at the worst. Three years later, the pain has not gone away. The second year however seemed to be the worst. I became so suicidal. All I wanted to do was to return to this place, this life so awesome, so love-filled, and so joyous. My son, and later my daughter were the only things that made me go on. I was here for them. Today, only three years later I have accepted my return to earth, long to return to my after-life home, and struggle to find peace and happiness until my time here comes to its final end. (6) 5. Linda Stewart Linda's journey to understand God began in the rugged environment of a Texas childhood filled with "rattlesnakes, tornadoes, and hellfireanddamnation." Her early concept of God was molded by the pervasive, extremist religious community of the Bible Belt, exemplified by the Southern Baptist religion practiced by her parents. The wrathful, vengeful God as taught by her religion instilled in Linda a deep fear of God, death and the afterlife. Her lifelong search for a loving God and release from the paralyzing fear of death culminated in a brief journey to Heaven after a debilitating illness. The NDE transformed Linda, showing her that God is only a loving God, who does not judge and punish. She came to understand the Oneness of all existence; this understanding has permeated her life with peace and the unfaltering knowledge of God's goodness. Linda now spends her time counseling, lecturing and making television appearances. She has written a book entitled, Entertaining Angels Unawares , which is in the hands of an agent who is seeking a publisher. When I finally gave up my will to live, relinquishing my life unto death was sublimely easy after my long illness and loss of everything that had made life worthwhile for me. The decision to leave this world hung suspended in an extended moment of absolute quiet. Passionless, I watched my spirit leave my body as a feeling of "otherness" engulfed me. I felt a strange detachment from my physical body and the life I had created. I was no longer connected to a pitiful, suffering mass of flesh. I was not that body and yet, I still existed but in a new state of being. Gone was the wrenching pain that accompanied my every waking moment. The strain of expanding my lungs to gasp for air had disappeared. Fatigue, which had weighted my life for years, had lifted. Depression no longer drained my mind of hope. Sight and sounds did not sear my head with pain, leaving me emotionally bereft. And yet, I still existed. I felt weightless and calm. Although I knew I was not in the lifeless body lying on my bed, and that the eyes and brain I had previously identified as mine were in that inanimate object with which I no longer identified, I was still aware of sight and thoughts and sensations. I observed my new reality with tranquility. Slowly I looked around and below me I saw a vast, endless blackness. Like a void or black hole, I was irresistibly drawn toward the darkness. Gradually, I felt myself sinking toward it. I thought, without fear or any emotional reaction, "Isn't that strange?" I had been so afraid I was going to be judged and sent to either heaven or hell. But it appeared I would simply disappear into the dark nothingness. As even my new awareness waned, I yielded to the heaviness overtaking me as darkness filled my mind. My vision became obscured as I began to merge into the blackness. Offering no resistance, I released my hold on any remaining shred of consciousness and personal identity. At the very moment I felt the last of me disappearing into nothingness. A powerful, energetic force swooping beneath me, lifting me, and carrying me upward suddenly buffeted me. Barely conscious, my only awareness was a sensation of rising. I seemed to be traveling upward at an unimaginable speed. A clean sensation of wind rushed over my face and body with tremendous force and yet there was no discomfort. Vast distances seemed to fly by me. The higher I rose, the more my head cleared. I became aware of a deep sense of peace and warmth permeating my senses. Confused, because the energy enveloping me had a definite presence, I tried to see what was happening and who was carrying me. Who or what cared so deeply for me? I felt peaceful and loved immeasurably. I knew I was in the arms of a being who cherished me with perfect love and carried me from the dark void into a new reality. As my mind cleared, scoured of the remnants of mortal, past associations, I was finally able to open my being fully to spirit and my vision cleared. With the eyes of my soul body, I looked to see what held me in such love and I beheld a radiant, spirit being, so magnificent and full of love, I knew I would never again feel the sense of loss. I have no way of explaining how, but I knew the Spirit was Christ. It was not a belief, perception or understanding, but my recognition of Christ came from my new perspective of spirit. I did not see the Spirit as I had seen Jesus of Nazareth depicted in paintings, but the innate knowing of my heart remembered and acknowledged Christ. The radiant Spirit was Christ, the manifestation and expression of pure love. Because of my Christian education, I knew no other name to call what I felt as I looked at him. Others might have called him Buddha, or Yahweh, or Great Spirit in the Sky, but the naming did not matter, only the recognition of absolute love and truth was important. Safe in the gentle yet powerful embrace of his love, I rested, secure that everything was okay, exactly as it was supposed to be. Ascending ever farther, I lifted my eyes to see a great light in the vast distance. With Christ as my guide, I rapidly approached the light. Ecstasy filled my soul as I looked at the radiance, many-fold brighter than a sun. The light was everywhere and everything, the brightest I had ever seen and dazzling beyond description. Brilliant enough to blind or burn; yet I was not harmed. The light moved over and through me, washing every hidden place of my heart, removing all hurt and fear, transforming my very being into a song of joy. I had thought the love I felt from Christ was complete, yet, the light toward which we were soaring was the fulfillment of my search, the loving Source of all that exists, the God of truth and unconditional love, the origin of creation. My understanding of love was forever changed. The majesty and glory of that vision was an ineffable moment defining forever more, the direction of my new truth. I was home and I wanted nothing more than to remain in the light of God. Christ had delivered me into the light and I stood in the presence of God. I was filled with complete knowing: The light was love and love was God. Waves of consummate love emanating from the light obliterated every burden I carried and every thought keeping me from knowing God. I was made aware of my purity. With new clarity, I realized I had been walking through life ghostlike, wrapped in a shroud of fear, huddled against illusions. I stood like a lover, open to the liquid flow of golden light filling my empty shell to overflowing. There was no limit to the outpouring as I came to the rapturous awareness of the infinite nature of God's love. There was no place that God did not exist and I was within God. I am an inseparable part of the light. The truth, of who I am, indeed, who we all are, is perfect love as a creation of God. All of God's creation is one creation and I am one with creation. God and I are one, Creator and created. I had spent a lifetime of fear of judgment and now, standing with God, I had been known completely and found faultless. I knew God regarded me as perfect. God loved me because love is the totality of God. God loves without limit. Finally it all made sense. God could only love me because God is only love, nothing other than love. The only reality is God; there cannot be another and GOD IS LOVE. I had reached my true home. I turned to Christ and said, "This is beautiful. I am home. This is where I want to be. I want to stay." And Christ answered, "You can stay for a little while and then you must return." (7) 6. Ricky Randolph In December 1982, Ricky Randolph, a Georgia Department of Corrections Correctional Officer, was involved in a hunting accident and had an NDE. Since then, he has had many psychic experiences that were verified by family and friends. Ordained as a Baptist minister at age 17, his life, even in childhood, was filled with psychic events. The following is his unique NDE in his own words. It can be described as unique for a very good reason and that reason is miraculous. As the saying goes: "Miracles happen." I was looking forward to this morning, as I had planned a hunting trip on the ninety-eight acre farm, bordering the Chattahoochee River, my family and I lived on. I arrived home and gathered my gear trying to get as early a start as I could. My wife had already left for work as most people do who have normal working hours. I usually called her when I was going hunting but being in a hurry on this particular morning I didn't. I had about a two mile hike to my tree stand and arrived there around 10:15 am. My stand was about 20 feet high on the front side facing a thick patch of pines. The backside faced the river below and dropped off to huge boulders in the river below. I tied off my rifle to be pulled up after my climb to the top and began my upward ascent. I reached the top and positioned myself to pull my rifle up. Then without warning I heard a snap! I would later return to this site many times to reflect on my life. On one visit with a friend I measured the distance from the top of the stand down to the boulder I landed on - eighty feet! As I began my fall to the river below I could see the river coming up fast I knew this was the end for me and though it was just seconds before impact, it was as though I was in slow motion. So many thoughts raced through my mind. My wife, my daughter, my family, and no one knows where I am. Would I ever be found? Then, darkness! How long this darkness lasted I don't know. Then something wonderful happened. I felt myself leaving my body. I was floating a few feet in the air above the river. I looked on my body with mixed feelings. I was bleeding from my mouth, nose, ears, and saw a trickle of blood underneath me on the boulder. As I was reflecting on the state of my body, I felt a pulling and began to rise very fast! I was traveling at a high rate of speed upward through the atmosphere. As I left the atmosphere, I looked back and could see the earth. Such a beautiful sight. It was so brilliantly lit. As I looked ahead I could see the planets. I thought to myself this cannot be. Where is Jesus? I was never told anything like this could or would happen when I died. Faster, and faster the speed was increasing. I saw other star systems and galaxies as I raced onward. I entered what seemed to be a hole of some sort. It was long and dark. However around me I saw streaks of light made up of every color in the spectrum. I saw a faint light growing brighter and brighter in the distance up ahead. As I entered the light I felt it all through my being. I was not afraid anymore. Then all of a sudden I was standing before a massive set of steps. They led up to what seemed to be a bridge or walk of some kind. In the distance I saw a sight so magnificent and astounding - city made up of what seemed to be glass or crystal. The lights were of many colors radiating from it. Never have I ever seen such a sight. I began walking toward the city in a daze of unbelief. So many questions raced through my mind. I had to know where I was. What was happening to me? I reached the front of the city and saw a double door looking to be about thirty feet or so in height and width. It shined as if it was polished. As I stood there wandering, the doors began to open. I took a step back and looked inside. I could see what appeared to be people walking about on the inside, much like they do in a mall here on earth. These people though were dressed very different. For one thing, they all seemed to be dressed in some sort of robes with hoods. I entered through the doors in amazement at what I was seeing! The inside was massive. It seemed to be square in shape, with a balcony all around leading down to different levels. I walked up and looked downward over the balcony. It seemed to go on forever. As I looked up I saw many passing by me, yet no one seemed to notice me. Then as one was approaching me he suddenly stopped. He slowly raised his head and I could see his face. He appeared to be human in every respect but one. His eyes. No pupils! Yet they seemed to change colors in colors of blue! His hair was snow white. I wanted to speak but before I could he turned and pointed to a long hallway. Though we never spoke I knew I was to go down this hallway. Then as if nothing had ever happened, he continued on. I knew I had to as well. Something was beckoning me forward. I walked a long walk down to the end of this hallway. I did not turn to the right or the left. I knew, somehow, my questions were about to be answered. Again I saw before me a massive double door. It seemed to be of some type of metal - whether gold or not I could not tell. Suddenly the doors opened. I heard a voice, though not as we speak, but from inside of me it seemed, to say, "Enter." I did as I was told and the doors shut suddenly behind me. I was afraid for the first time. Total darkness. Total silence! Then after a space of time the length of which I could not determine, a bright light began to glow in the room. Brighter and brighter it became. It was somewhat above me and in front of me. I tried to look but was almost blinded from it. I held my hands up in front of me and could make out the appearance of a figure setting on some type of seat. Then without warning it happened. "What have you done with your life?" The voice penetrated my very being. I had no answer. Then to my right I saw what seemed to be like a movie, and I was in it. I saw my mother giving me birth, my childhood and friends. I saw everything from my youth up. I saw everything I had ever done before my eyes. As my life played out before my very eyes I tried to think of good things I had done. I was raised in church and had been very active in church functions, yet as I pondered on this, I saw a man in his car that had run out of gas. I had stopped and given him a lift to a local store about a year ago. I had bought him some gas as he had no money and helped him get on his way. I thought to my self, why am I seeing this? The voice was loud and clear. "You took no thought to help this soul and asked nothing in return. These actions are the essence of good." I saw all the people I had hurt as well and was shown how my actions had set in motion the actions of others. I was stunned! I had never thought of my life having an effect on the actions that friends, family, and others I had met would take. I saw the results of all I had done. I was not pleased at all. I looked on until the events came to an end. Indeed I had done so little with my life. I had been selfish and cruel in so many ways. I was truly sorry I had done so little. Then again loud and clear I heard the voice speak again, "You must return." I did not want to return though. I was content to stay and longed to stay even after the things I had seen and heard. "I have so many questions," I replied, "things I need to know and don't understand." "You must return and help others to change by changing your life. Physicians will want to perform surgery on you. Do not let this happen. If you do you will never walk again. One who brings answers to the questions you have will visit you. When I call you will come again. You will recover from all that has happened if you do these things. Look and see what lies ahead." I turned and saw the earth in turmoil. Wars and death, terrible sights! Cities fell and new ones were built. I saw the United States and a volcano exploding covering many cities in darkness. I looked on and saw the collapse of our government, as we know it. People killing for food and water, horrible sights. I saw what seemed to be a giant explosion in the earth s atmosphere and much land was destroyed. I looked on and saw a new type of people, younger and of a peaceful nature. The cities were few that were left, but these people seemed to be content. "It is time for you to go," I heard again. But I wanted to see more. Then the doors opened and I felt myself almost be carried down the hallway. I passed through the doors of the city and felt myself shooting through this hole I had came through. Faster I went, unable to stop. I entered the atmosphere of earth and saw the river below. I saw my body still lying there motionless. Then it was like an electric shock so tremendous I felt my body jump. I opened my eyes and saw the trees above and the skyline. Then, Oh God, the pain. I was struggling for every breath, choking on my own blood. I managed to roll onto my stomach. The pain was all I could bear. I looked at the sky and saw the sun was lower than I remembered. I looked at my watch. It was 5:30. My only thoughts were how could I get help. I noticed my rifle was not far from me, still attached to the rope I had tied around my waist. I began pulling it toward me. I managed to grab hold of the barrel and pulled it up to me. I fired a shot about every ten minutes hoping someone would come. It was getting late and I knew I would not make it much longer, so I began crawling on my stomach, pulling myself with the stock of my rifle. I managed to crawl up a trail running down to the river. As I crawled and crawled, the pain was so great I passed out many times. Through thick brush and briar patches I crawled. I wanted to give up I was so tired and in so much pain. I knew though I had to make it at least to where I could be found - I hoped. I looked out in front of me and saw the road I lived on through the trees. I could hear sounds in the distance. "Yes, thank you, God," I thought to myself. I finally found myself at the road and began a feeble cry for help. I was too exhausted though and just lay there in the road. My father-in-law was returning from work and found me lying in the road. "It's all right," I heard him say, "help is on the way." That was the last I remembered until I saw the lights inside the ER. A doctor stood at my feet. "Can you feel this?" he said. "Feel what?" I asked. He had been sticking my feet and legs. I was paralyzed. "We cannot help you here, son," he said. "We are sending you by ambulance to a hospital that can handle your injuries." Whether from the pain or medication, I was out like a light. The next afternoon, I awoke to find two doctors standing at the foot of my hospital bed. They introduced themselves as my attending physicians and proceeded to explain to me that I must undergo surgery at once. The bones in my back that were broken were putting pressure on my spinal nerve causing paralysis. Then I heard the warning I had heard before. "Do not let them perform surgery, or you will never walk again." I understood completely, but knew they would not. I told them I must see my wife and daughter first. My wife arrived with my daughter shortly after the doctor s visit. I told her what they had said. She advised me that I must realize they were doing what was necessary to help me. I did not know how to tell her what I had experienced. I tried to tell her it was my belief I should not be operated on. Although she disagreed, she honored my wishes. When the doctors returned and I told them of my decision, they were very upset! I listened to lecture after lecture. "OK," one of them said, "if you never want to walk again, that's up to you." Then they left. That night I lay upon my bed and wept sorely. Was I insane? What was I doing? A light began to fill my room. "You will be well," I heard a voice say. Then it was gone. I composed myself and dosed off to sleep. Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. Then one morning I felt a tingling in my feet! I was over come with joy. I told the nurse I wanted to get up and walk. She stared at me and said, "We'll see, we'll see." I knew I was healed without a doubt. The nurse put a call into my doctor and the next morning he stopped by. "So you think you can walk?" he said. "Yes," I replied. "Well, we will see." A few hours later, I was taken down to the Physical Therapy room. They carried me down and raised me up to a vertical position. The nurse helped me in front of a set of parallel bars. I gripped the bars and placed my feet firmly on the floor. One step. Two steps. "My God, he's walking!" the nurse said to the nurse who had brought me down. The next few days were hard. I took many trips to Physical Therapy and had numerous x-rays done per my doctor s orders. My wife and family were all amazed, yet I knew. I had been told. The rest had to be true as well. My doctor was more amazed when he found no bones pressing on my spinal nerve! I use his quote: "This is not normal! It seems a higher power has done for you what we were going to try and correct with surgery. I have never seen anything like this before." Since that day, my life has changed and I have been able to help others in ways I never dreamed. I wanted to share this with all, as it is what has led me onward in my quest for Truth. (8) 7. Kerry Kirk The NDE reveals that God is not concerned with a person's sexual orientation, but is concerned about a person's heart. The next NDE involves a lesbian who learns this very fact while having an NDE. The following happened to me during the summer of 1981. I was nineteen at the time. It was a time in my life when I had pretty much decided there could be no God, no great being in control of the world around me. If there were he wasn't doing a very good job. I didn't realize it at the time, but once I had made this "decision," I started going downhill. I became selfish. That is, self-centered, but not very self concerned. I should mention that I had been having episodes of tachycardia for several years. I was never diagnosed (up to that point) with any kind of heart defect. Had I been asked I would have denied any problems with my heart. I thought it was very normal to get light headed and almost pass out during periods when my heart would race. Duh! One evening I was in the back seat of a car traveling to San Francisco from Los Angeles. All of a sudden my heart began to race and the nausea hit. Next everything started spinning and I could see lots of colors. Then I had a sense of blackness come over me. Like a dark damp cloud. I was terrified. I have never been so scared. In my fear I said, "Jesus." Immediately I witnessed a fight. It seemed there was a battle between a being in white/light and this blackness. Immediately following, the light overtook the darkness. I found myself on my face in worship in front of this being of light. I felt a warm feeling. The most intense love filled me. It was an energy that penetrated every fiber of my being. I had never felt such a complete and total love. It was that unconditional love I hear many people talk about. I know there was conversation between us but I can not remember what was said. I feel like it was a time of healing for me - kind of a regeneration if you will. In the next instant, I was floating above the car moving down the highway looking at myself in the back seat. I knew it was I sitting there, and yet I was up here. I wasn't afraid or confused. Everything was as it should be. There was someone there to my left. I don't think it was the same being I had just been with. He (I had a sense it was a he) seemed to be in a white robe or something. Funny, I never really looked at him. His identity didn't seem to be important. I think he was there to guide me. I didn't make myself go, it was more like he took me or led me. We began moving through space. I was aware of this because the stars and planets were passing very quickly. It was very exciting, I felt so free. The order of the next [series of episodes] I am unsure of. I know each was a distinct episode, but it is hard for me to put them in an order or time frame. The next thing I knew there was a white "room." I can't say it had walls but it seemed to be somewhat enclosed. Maybe its boundaries extended to the edge of the light that filled it and that is why I call it a room. There was a man in a white robe behind a podium with a book on it. I knew it was the book of life from the Bible. I remember thinking, "Uh oh, that stuff was for real." I suddenly realized that the "God" I had been presented wasn't anything like the reality. I saw it doesn't matter if you call him God, Allah, Great Spirit or whatever, He is the same thing. The different religions just have different ways of explaining the same Creator. I also realized that little voice inside us prompting us to do good things comes from this Creator, it is that light of love inside each of us. I don't remember specifically being told this; more like I just knew it. I came to a place, maybe a room, maybe a space. I was shown my life. If it was my entire life, I do not remember all of it. The only part I remember now was just the last week or so. Since I had given up on God. I saw how selfish I had been. I felt the pain I had caused one person in particular and it bothered me very much. The things I had the most guilt for was hurting other people, lying, not being sensitive to their feelings, just being selfish. The fact I was a lesbian didn't even seem to matter then. That was surprising to me, given what I had been brought up to believe. There was another room or area. It seems like there were others there, I sensed some were female, some male, but I can't say I recognized anyone. I was shown a diagram. I could see it represented choices. A choice leading to other choices which then lead to other choices. Basically, actions have consequences. I began receiving "all knowledge," or at least that is what it felt like. They were there teaching me. This didn't come to me as words like you and I speak. It was more as complete thoughts. When I think, it is generally in words and pictures, this is how I received the information. As complete words and pictures in my mind. As I could form a question in my mind I had the answer. Not just the answer to that question, but the why and how and the answer to every other question the answer would bring up. EVERYTHING in the entire universe fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. EVERYTHING MADE SENSE. I remember thinking, "I have to remember this." I looked over to the right and in the distance I could see a beautiful valley with lots of people. There was someone looking out over all of it I felt it was Jesus. I then looked down and saw a line. My foot (Yes, I did have a spiritual "body" as did the others I encountered) was stepping over the line to go to be with the others. Then I was told, "If you cross that line you can't go back; it would mean you would have to die." Funny as it may sound, up to that point I didn't realize I would have to die or was about to die. It never occurred to me. I didn't realize I was separate from my body even though I had seen it in the car. I felt complete. I remember laughing and thinking this isn't how I pictured death. I said I wanted to stay. I was then told the people I was with (in the car) as well as my mother would not understand and it would hurt them deeply. I understood. At some point I was shown a map and was told to leave and go to Virginia. The angels were singing and it seems like I could see the clouds all lit up (it was nighttime). The next thing I knew I as sitting in the back of the car. I could hear the most beautiful music. I didn't tell anyone what had happened to me for a long time. I felt out of place the next several days. I wanted to go back. I knew instinctively that I could not do anything to bring it about though. I tried and tried to remember everything I learned when I was filled with knowledge but it isn't there. (9) 8. Brian Krebs Some people have reported having an NDE while experiencing an alien abduction. The most famous case of this kind comes from Betty Andreasson and is documented in Raymond Fowler's book, The Andreasson Affair.(10) Other experiencers have seen alien-type beings during their NDE. There appears to be a connection between these aliens and the beings of light reported in so many NDEs. The following NDE is from Brian Krebs and describes just such an encounter. I had my first near-death experience when I was a child, perhaps two or three. This would be about 1953. It involved me drowning. My memories of it were of seeing my body below me. I remember seeing a bright, warm, loving orb above me. I panicked Dad and Mom below. I didn't know it was anything to talk about and no one would have believed me. It never was a thing I felt I had to relate. Then in 1971... I had been knifed with a stiletto that severed an artery above my liver. I remember looking up and seeing a light. I then looked down at my body and then I was confronted by at least two beings. They were human in appearance and they seemed to float in midair. I realized I was far above my body and not in any earthly space. The beings tried to keep me from going to the light. I don't know why, they just seemed terrified and didn't want me to go. But I did. I shot up like an arrow through what can only be described as a tunnel. I saw the tunnel as a peripheral blur of stars and I saw a loving light before me. Then I stopped. I was there with this orb of glowing love and understanding. It didn't seem foreign to me. It was not frightening. It was totally assuring and there was no feeling of anything but my awe and the love and knowledge and wisdom this orb projected. In size, it would be not like looking at the sun, but looking at the earth when you are on it. It was immense and total, and its power was love. I felt a presence next to me, a man, and he asked if I was ready for my life review. I said yes. All of this not a verbal thing, but just a knowledge. Then I saw something like an HO scale train set below, a city. I went to this city and I went through my life. I went through every moment and every feeling. I was not afraid as I was still in the light. I talked with the man about my life. But I do not remember any specifics. I then remember standing, as it where, in the light of the Orb of love. I felt the goodness and love and knowledge of it. My mind was in a state of deep, deep, concentration of thought. I then went to twelve beings of greater knowledge. They were in front of me and stood in a row. They were not human. They had no feelings of anything like judgment or authority, but seemed strong in themselves. They seemed taller than I did and they wore silver white robes. They had white skin, large heads and large eyes. I do not remember them having a mouth. Above them was a spirit. It was like a star as we see one from earth, but in size it appeared the same size as the heads of the beings. The spirit went to my left and hovered above the first being. I remember it was like a video of knowledge springing from the being s hands, which were held in front of them. Each being had something to relate. They opened the knowledge they had when the spirit moved above them. The last told me what I could do if I came back and the significance of it. I only remember seeing young man with his head back in pain as if his neck was injured. I said, "Oh! Aaron! My son!" They said, "No, not that son." And I realized whom they meant. (In 1978, my only other child was born a son). Then I made the decision to come back to earth. And I remember it was such a hard decision. It was so difficult because everything there was so beautiful and there was so, so, much love. I had the feeling of freewill, yet a feeling of duty was present - of obligation. And the second I realized that I shot back into my body. After two near-death experiences and having studied many NDEs, I am convinced there is order to the experience. I do get angry when people come to conclusions about the near-death experience because they think it is not orderly and therefore find it to be a part of our imaginative minds. For the ones that have not heard this, here goes: Rule 1: At any given microsecond, you may return to your body. You have a trauma of some kind making you leave your body. You might feel a vibration. You might feel nothing, except that you are suddenly out of your body. Rule 2: Nobody remembers every single detail and the meaning to it while having an NDE. So, now you are out of your body you may look down and see your body. You may take off for another room or zip back into your body. You may go into the void. This is the home of many a grim story. See, after death you may end up quite stuck in this void. It lacks one thing: love. It is the hell the Pope just figured out. It is not being of love, not recognizing it. Those who are stuck there may frighten you by just being or by intentional gestures to frighten you. They are stuck and they are confused and they will put the "HELL" in hell. Rule 3: Beyond this point your soul must be convinced your body is dead. See, sometimes things happen which doesn't cause death. I mean we all ultimately live to tell of NDEs, but we must be convinced the body business is behind us to go further. So, there you are outside the body. Now those who love you might show up. They do so for a couple reasons. One, they may want you to stay, that is, go back to your body. Or they may want you to think of love. I just love the way George Rodonaia said it. While describing the void, he said that he thought, "I am, and if I am, why for not can I be happy?" And he was. Then he thought, "If I am, and I can be happy, why for not then can I feel love?" And he did. You see, the way out of the void is simple. You must think of love. Now if you are a Christian and you think of Jesus and you see Jesus as love, then you will be thinking of love and to think of love. To recognize it as a reality, that is the key to getting out of the void. Now, you are in the void and you think of love and you are love and you will see love, just a speck, but you will concentrate on it and then you will connect with it. This connection is called the tunnel. It is a pathway to the Creator. I recently heard someone talking about taking some sugar and some water and mixing them together. The sugar would disappear and the water would become sugar water. But in time the water would evaporate and the sugar would remain as sugar and the water would turn to vapor. The point was that the sugar had the memory of the water and the water the memory of the sugar. As I thought this out, I tried to think how to explain it better. Being of a scientific background, I thought, "Okay, let's put the sugar and water together in a test tube. Let's mix them. Then to speed things up, let's add heat, which makes vibrations and causes the water to turn to vapor. But wait. Let's put a rubber stopper in the test tube and a glass tube leading to another test tube. That would allow the water to reestablish itself as water in the other tube." You see, then you have water with a memory of the sugar and the sugar with the memory of the water. You also have a very good model to explain how to get out of the void. As the tube concentrates the water, so the tunnel concentrates the spirit. Now, many things can happen in the tunnel. Say for instance you get depressed and you gobble down too many pills. You would choke if not for the washing of booze you gave them. You might end up in the tunnel off to the side where you are requested to think. So you sit there thinking. Some other soul would pass right on by that, not notice, or may notice. Things, earthy problems can be worked out there, out of the void and in the tunnel. Ultimately though, if you don't return to your body, you zip right past all this and end up at a point that you may refer later to the end of the tunnel. It may be though that you are in one of the rooms of the tunnel or zones. There you see a garden, a river, a gate, and someone will appear to help you decide whether you should go on or think a while or talk or be reassured enough to return to your body. But, go through the gate or over the river past the decision to go back or stay and think, and you end up at the end of the tunnel. There at the end of the tunnel is the Creator. Rule 4: If you make it to the end of the tunnel you will feel more love and acceptance and wisdom and knowledge and understanding than you ever have. And you will remember it. And you will not leave it out of your description of your experience. There you are and there is love - overwhelming, pure, beautiful love. Now let's not forget Rule 1, that you may at any time zip right back into your body! You should begin now to see why there are so may "different" descriptions of the NDE: because a person may go only to a given point and the description of what they saw will be limited to that level. So, now you are there in front of the Creator, and you might well see your Higher Self. You will then go through a life review. You do this in the light of the love of the Creator. In this love, you see all you have done wrong and right and the effects of it and you are unafraid because the Creator's love is there. There is nothing but the truth. That accomplished, you may (Rule 1) zip back into your body. You may then do whatever you think you need to and those descriptions vary. One consistent theme is that you have spirits to help you. I, as Dannion Brinkley did, had twelve "spirits" giving forth information about the past, the present and the future. They may help you decide to stay or go back to earth. Once the decision is made, zipppppp, you're back. (11) 9. Joni Maggi One does not have to be near death to experience an NDE. NDEs are induced through such methods as extreme stress, deep meditation, drug hallucinations and right temporal lobe brain stimulation. The next NDE comes from Joni Maggi. It occurred while she was in an altered state of consciousness. Close your eyes for a moment and try to imagine you are face to face with the sun! What an extraordinary feeling! I thought to myself, "How can I be face to face with the sun and not feel the burning heat?" This first thought shocked and puzzled me - to be thinking in the way I would normally think. It was literally so bright I could not sustain the gaze, so I turned away. At that moment I noticed a silver cord, attached around the navel area going down, down, down to a person I saw lying on my bed. It was I! I had a curious non-interest in it. Suddenly, I was in dark outer space, floating as it were on my back, in what I can only describe as total "bliss" (one of a few words, which I'll explain later, I had never understood before that point!) I'm not sure how long this ecstatic feeling lasted but it was what I suppose is called Cosmic Consciousness or cosmic bliss. I knew the Universe is upheld by love (though if you ask me now I would not be able to explain that!) I knew the planets are alive and conscious. I knew they would never bump into each other on purpose or cause any damage - there was no violence but rather a total harmony in their existence. I then looked down and could see the earth  far, far away and down in this dark sky. I knew it was a place of violence, a realm shrouded in darkness and difficulties so to speak. At one point I saw what I could only describe as a group of beings - perhaps beings of light would describe them best. I then zoomed over to them - literally willed myself over to them (Swoosh!) and was there instantaneously. They were seated (?) in an oval circle and there seemed to be a leader of some sort at the head of the group. First of all, I felt the most overwhelming love coming from them! It cannot be compared to anything here on earth. For one, I felt it was an inclusive group - rather than an exclusive one. (Here on earth we seem to have trouble letting new people into groups but there it was as if all of them at the same time were welcoming me!) I heard them - in my mind - say, "Welcome Home! You have been on such a long journey!" I had the feeling they were sharing life experiences and learning from each other, as if in a sort of classroom. I didn't have time to find out, because at this point I said to the leader, again telepathically, "I cannot stay! I have to bring up my son!" with real sense of urgency. (At the time my son was 4 years old and I knew somehow I had the absolute obligation to bring him up and take care of him. Years later, when I thought of this, I understood we live in a "moral" Universe.) I immediately started coming down again. And as I was coming down, I saw - as if written on the entire dark sky this message: "There is nothing worth worrying about! Not even death!" And again I knew - or understood in an instant - that death is exactly like falling asleep. What happens is you let go of daily consciousness and slip into another. Or for that matter, like waking up - you let go of sleeping consciousness and find yourself in our recognized reality. It was an incredible feeling of peace to know there is no death! All of a sudden, I was awake and I literally ran to my table to write everything down because I knew the "veils" (another new word for me) were going to fall and I would forget or lose the feeling of the experience. I had the feeling a shaft of light had come down through the top of my head. The top of my head was literally tender! The third word I came to know was ""grace" (which up to that point I thought meant the prayer Christians say at the dinner table). I had been an atheist - or agnostic - up until my experience but after that, though the veils did fall down again, I have spent the last 20 years, trying to recapture that feeling, that absolute knowing. I feel closer and closer to it all the time now. I felt I had been "given a gift"" of tremendous value! I could not, and can not to this day understand how that works or what that means. I only know I had been in a state of emotional crisis - I was living at the time in South America and undergoing a painful separation from my husband so I found myself alone, depressed and with a very young child. I had also been asking myself the question, "What one thought gives peace?" for a very long time. Somehow, I feel that my earnest and extremely deep need to find an answer to the ups and downs of life was answered in that unspeakably profound experience. This is the first time I am sharing my experience so openly with others because my family and friends of course at the time did not believe me or understand me. Plus the fact I myself had lost contact with the light and only years later did I start to remember it and piece it together again coherently. Now, it is probably the most important thing I can do - to remember it and to share it with others. If it hadn't been for the experience I probably would not have pursued the spiritual path with such relentless passion as I understand there is a spiritual need which cannot be filled by any other thing than... how shall I call it? The spirit. I also know it was real! Actually, I could say it was the only real thing that has ever happened to me. At this point I cherish sharing my experience with others and hope to learn afresh from their experiences to continue to get a wider and wider appreciation and understanding of this phenomenon. I still have many unanswered questions: Why was I "blessed" with this experience? (I think it was because without it I never would have been able to go on, but even so, who "gave" it to me or how did I receive it?) Why are other people not given the same experience, though some search for it so longingly? And it has only whetted my appetite to know more - everything! Everything about our life purposes, life after death, etc.! Unfortunately I cannot, as I mentioned, retrieve the feeling of it and sometimes I still forget and find myself in darkness and pain. But just remembering it and sharing it helps me - and who knows, maybe others - to know more and more about it, especially now that these phenomena are coming more and more to light! (12) Summaries  Normally we do not like to think about death. We would rather think about life. Why reflect on death? When you start preparing for death you soon realize that you must look into your life... now... and come to face the truth of your self. Death is like a mirror in which the true meaning of life is reflected. - Sogyal Rinpoche NDEs vary from person to person based on many factors: religious bias, cultural background, historical time period, etc. They also vary as to depth of experience. Some people only experience the out-of-body phase of the experience, while others go well beyond. What follows are brief summaries of the rest of the NDEs that are a part of my research. Such a format helps when doing comparisons between experiences. Each summary is given in the present tense to give the feeling of the NDE as it is happening. Josiane Antonette Born in France and trained as a nurse, Josiane had an NDE in 1966. Afterwards, she became aware of her ability to "communicate with the other side." For over 30 years, she worked with the dying and the living, in hospitals as a chaplain, universities as a teacher, as a spiritual counselor, healer and ceremonial leader. Her understanding of living, dying and the spiritual realms has touched many people. In her book, Whispers of the Soul, she describes her NDE. She is also the author of another book entitled Matters of Spirit and she is the founder of The Bernadette Foundation. Josiane leaves her body and sees her life pass before her eyes as in a movie. She momentarily reenters her body and sees restless spirits around her who seem lost. Suddenly, light beings appear and she is surrounded with love. She receives a vision of the earth appearing lifeless and gloomy on one side. On the other side, the earth appears sunny and full of life. She watches as the darkness takes over the whole earth. A voice tells her this is the world in the absence of light, love and free will. The darkness of the world is then replaced with light and beauty. She sees the solar system united by a transparent web of unparalleled brilliance. The voice tells her to never forget what she has seen. She becomes filled with an overwhelming love as she merges with the light. She returns to her hospital room where her lifeless body is. There she meets her deceased cousin along with other beings of light. As they leave, Josiane begs to go with them. Her cousin tells her she has work left to do here on earth. With this, she enters her physical body. (13) Mellen-Thomas Benedict Mellen-Thomas was an artist dying of cancer. In 1982, he succumbed and had an NDE. He was dead for over an hour and a half. During that time, he rose up out of his body and went into the light. Concerning his NDE, Dr. Kenneth Ring noted, "His story is one of the most remarkable I have encountered in my extensive research on near-death experiences." Mellen-Thomas leaves his body and discovers he has 360-degree vision and consciousness. He travels toward a brilliant light, but halts his experience to ask questions. He sees the brilliant light transform into several avatars such as Jesus, Buddha and Krishna. The light also transforms into a mandala of every soul from earth. Mellen-Thomas refers to this as our "Higher Self matrix." He sees the earth surrounded by a grid-like structure connecting every human being to this "Higher Self matrix." His consciousness expands to fill the universe all the way to the Big Bang and beyond. In the void between an infinite number of Big Bangs and universes, he becomes aware of the fact he perceives all things through God's perspective. He experiences the full consciousness of God in infinite knowledge. Here, all his questions are answered. He experiences all the levels of heaven and hell. The process of consciousness expansion reverses and his consciousness deflates to its original condition. He expects to be reincarnated as a baby, but is surprised to find himself back in his own physical body. (14) Dannion Brinkley In 1975, Dannion was talking on the phone during a thunderstorm. A bolt of lightning hit the phone line, sending thousands of volts of electricity into his head and down his body. His heart stopped, and he died, but in the process, he had an NDE. When he revived in the morgue after twenty-eight minutes of death, he had an incredible story to tell. He was told of events that would shake the world before the year 2000 - including the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the Persian Gulf War. Of the 117 revelations that he recalls, 95 have already come to pass. His book, Saved by the Light, describes his NDE and his revelations of the future. Dannion leaves his physical body and watches as a friend tries to revive it. He is sucked through a tunnel and into a paradise of brilliant light. A being of incredible love and light appears and Dannion experiences a life review. He is taken to a "city of cathedrals" where twelve beings of light appear. Each of the twelve beings represents a human personality type similar to the zodiac. One at a time, they each present to Dannion a kind of video screen foretelling some future event. He is drawn into each of these screens to actually experience the future event. Afterward, he returns to his physical body. (16) Beverly Brodsky Raised in a conservative Jewish family in Philadelphia, Beverly went through her teens as an atheist. Since learning of the Holocaust at age eight, she had turned angrily against any early belief in God. How could God exist and permit such a thing to occur? In 1970, her questions were answered when a motorcycle accident led to an NDE. Her NDE is found in a book by Dr. Kenneth Ring entitled Lessons from the Light. Dr. Ring describes her NDE as "possibly the most moving in my entire collection." She leaves her body and floats over her bed. She is met by a radiant being of light she believes to be the Messiah or an angel. Holding hands, they fly through the window and out over the Pacific Ocean. They travel through a tunnel forming in the sky toward an incredibly bright light she identifies as God. She has a very intense discussion with God and learns some important answers to questions plaguing her mind. She also begins to remember knowledge she once had before being born into the world. As soon as all her questions were answered, she becomes one with all knowledge and God. She tours the universe and all its wonders. She is filled, not just with all knowledge, but with all the love of God. She experiences ecstasy beyond her wildest dreams. She then returns to her physical body. (17) Don Brubaker Happily married with three children and a busy broadcasting career, Don rarely thought about life after death. After his heart attack and NDE, all of that changed. Don was clinically dead for 45 minutes during which he experienced the glory of heaven and the fire of hell. His book, Absent from the Body, describes his afterlife journey. His NDE is unique because he actually travels back in time to experience one of history's greatest moments. He leaves his body and travels through a tunnel. A large, eerie red eye peers at him and he realizes it to be his own. While in the tunnel, he is stricken with panic and believes he is in hell. A voice, he identifies to be God's, tells him not to fear. He has been chosen to write about what he is experiencing. He is told he must testify about the reality of hell. Afterward, he is drawn into a vast, flaming "oven" filled with other people. They laugh as they realize the flames are not painful. Suddenly, he is alone in the dark with God communicating to him. In an instant, he is aware of everyone in his life whom he was ever angry with. Afterward, he floats in a glorious deep blue sky. Christ appears shining a tremendous amount of light. Christ gives him a choice of staying or returning to the physical world. Thoughts of his family cause him to choose to return. Before he returns, he is taken back in time to witness the crucifixion of Christ. (18) Grace Bubulka Over twelve years ago, Grace was a nurse experiencing an NDE that changed her life. It wasn t until ten years after her NDE that she felt comfortable telling others about it. Now Grace shares her NDE with others through seminars and lectures. Her book, Beyond this Reality, describes her profound experience with the afterlife. She hovers above her body and watches as doctors try to save her life. She travels through a tunnel toward a bright light and notices she is a speck of light traveling with an infinite number of other specks toward the light. She enters into the light and merges with it. In the light, she becomes ecstatic. An infinite sense of all knowing comes to her while in the light. The light reminds her of her obligation to her children and she knows she will have to go back. She has a life review witnessed by everyone in the light. Afterwards, she returns to her physical body. (19) Edgar Cayce The book entitled There Is A River, describes the true story of a devout Christian and Sunday school teacher, Cayce (1877-1945) was a man who had out-of-body experiences amazingly resembling NDEs. In 1910, the New York Times carried two pages of headlines and pictures in which he was declared the "World's Most Mysterious Man." In 1954, the University of Chicago accepted a Ph.D. thesis based on a study of his life and work. He is also considered to be the father of holistic medicine by JAMA, the prestigious medical journal. He was a wonder to the medical community because of his ability to diagnose and specify a treatment for gravely ill people often hundreds of miles away through his out-of-body experiences. He gave roughly 14,000 hypnotic readings in his lifetime which are kept at the Association for Research and Enlightenment. Each reading involved going into a trance resulting in an out-of-body experience. Once the hypnotic suggestion is made, he leaves his physical body and travels through a tunnel with a brilliant light at the end. The sides of the tunnel reveal to him the various afterlife levels appearing to wind around in a wheel formation. The first level of the tunnel is inhabited by horrible looking beings similar to what one would see in a nightmare. Higher up on the next level, misshapen forms of human beings appear with some part of their body magnified. As he travels through the tunnel, beings on either side of the tunnel call out to him for help, trying to get his attention. He knows that any deviation from traveling through the tunnel toward the light would mean he would not be able to return to his body and he would die. Farther up the tunnel, he sees gray-hooded beings moving downward. Up higher on the next level, more gray-hooded beings appear except they are moving upward. The color of their robes get lighter and lighter as he moves up. The next higher level resembles the physical world with houses, trees, etc., except everything is motionless. As he rises higher through the tunnel, there appears more light and more motion in what appears to be normal cities. Rising higher, he sees more light, more beautiful colors, more laughter, and beautiful music. In the higher levels, there are no houses and such, only a blending of sound and color. Suddenly, he comes upon the "Hall of Records," an enormous building without walls or a ceiling. Here an old man hands him a large book containing the records of the individual he is giving a reading for. According to Cayce, this record is the person's so-called "Book of Life" which every person is constantly filling by thinking, speaking and doing. When he completes a reading, he would then return to his physical body. (20) Cecil P.M.H. Atwater is one of the most respected researchers of the NDE phenomenon. In her latest book, Children of the New Millennium, she presents the first serious look at the NDEs of children. One of these children was an eleven-year old named Cecil. He and his brother were swimming when they had a problem. He tried to get his brother out of the water, but in a panic was pulled under several times and they drowned. His brother died; but Cecil had an NDE. He leaves his body and travels toward a brilliant light. He travels into cities made entirely of light. Each city represents a kind of cosmic grade in school where people progress. Three men appear as a welcoming committee to escort him to the first city. He hesitates to go because he knows there is no turning back. The brilliant light of God appears and a voice asks Cecil why he hesitated. Cecil answers he is too young to die and has a lot of questions. He asks what death is. The light shows him a car accident where some people are killed. Some do not leave their bodies because they do not believe in life after death. Cecil asks what hell is. The light shows him an old woman worrying about her children and everything. Cecil asks if there is a Satan and the light tells him no. Cecil asks how he can know right from wrong. The light replied, "Right is helping and being kind. Wrong is not only hurting someone, but not helping when you can." The light asks Cecil why he wants to return. Ultimately, Cecil discovers the real reason he wants to return is to "leave the earth a little better than he found it." (21) Linga Chokyi A curious phenomenon, little known in the West, but familiar to Tibetans, is the "delok". In Tibet, "delok" means "returned from death," and traditionally deloks are people who seemingly "die" as a result of an illness, and travel in the  bardo (one of many Tibetan Buddhist afterlife states). They visit the hell realms, where they witness the judgment of the dead and the suffering of hell, and sometimes they go to paradises and Buddha realms. The delok is sent back to their bodies with a message from the Lord of Death for the living, urging them to spiritual practice and a beneficial way of life. They spend the rest of their lives recounting their experiences to others in order to draw them toward the path of wisdom. During the sixteenth century, one of the most famous delok was named Lingza Chokyi. Dawa Drolma is the author of the book entitled Delog: Journey to Realms Beyond Death which is the source for the information about Linga Chokyi. She finds herself outside of her body but fails to realize she has died. She sees her corpse but thinks it is a dead pig lying on her bed and wearing her clothes. She frantically tries to talk to her family, but no one hears or sees her. Her weeping children cause her tremendous pain, but she feels joy when the death rituals are being performed on her behalf. After a while, she hears her deceased father calling her and begins to follow him. She arrives in the first afterlife level (bardo) and sees a bridge leading to the hell realms. Here, the Lord of Death counts the good and evil actions of the dead. She sees a great man (a yogin) enter the hell realms in order to liberate people. She is told there is an error concerning her name and family and it is not yet her time to die. She returns to her body. (22) Clara Another child of P.M.H. Atwater s study of childhood NDEs is a fifth grader named Clara. She became sick with extreme pain in her lower right side and was rushed to the hospital. It was there that she had her NDE. P.M.H. Atwater has also released a new book on childhood NDEs entitled The New Children and Near Death Experiences. Clara leaves her physical body and watches doctors working on it. Someone leads her through a tunnel where she hears a playground full of laughing children playing. Another person approaches telling them they are not yet ready for her. She is taken to a large building where others are working. She is led to meet Christ who tells her telepathically what she must do. Jesus has her look into a television-like device to see her future. What she sees makes her very happy. Jesus tells her she will forget what she witnessed in the device when she returns. It happens exactly as she was told. (23) Lynnclaire Dennis In 1987 while hot-air ballooning in the Swiss Alps, Lynnclaire died due to a lack of oxygen when her balloon reached too high of an altitude. During her NDE, she came into contact with what she calls "the Pattern", a mandala she describes as "primarily a matrix of personal and global healing." Seeing the Pattern, she knew she was looking at life itself. It was light; it was time and space. It was the energy of all matter, the heart of all that mattered. Her book, The Pattern, documents her experience. Lynnclaire finds herself in a beautiful valley. She wonders if she is in heaven. She sees her lifetime as it existed without the bounds of time. She hears beautiful music and begins to dance joyously. Her deceased grandmother appears and she realizes they are in a place of infinite love. They enter a meadow that becomes an amphitheater. On stage, every person greets her who played a part in her life and who has already died, including her miscarried baby. They all share a message of love. The last person who appears on the stage is unknown to her, yet this person is someone who speaks directly to her soul. This special person, whom she identifies as "the Presence," tells her she will be a catalyst for change and love. Everyone leaves the stage and she enters a sacred place before the light. She is embraced by "the Presence." She then finds herself climbing a mountain toward the light and realizes she is in the space between two worlds and is going home. A tunnel appears that takes her to the top of the mountain. At the end of the tunnel, she sees what she calls "the Pattern," which is God. As she prepares to take the next step to merge into the light, she is pulled back by her husband who is frantically giving her physical body CPR. (24) Jeanie Dicus In 1974, Jeanie's heart went into fibrillation and she died. Her resulting NDE is documented in one of P.M.H. Atwater's books, Beyond the Light. It affirms many concepts behind the NDE such as reincarnation, the mechanics of the life review and the why people cannot remember their life experiences before birth. Jeanie leaves her physical body and floats above it. She sees doctors operating frantically on her physical body. Jesus appears and asks if she wants to be reincarnated. She asks for some time to rest and think about it. She holds a conversation with Jesus telepathically. God appears as a tremendous light and gives her the choice to stay in the light or be revived and remain in a coma. She chooses to stay in the light. She feels ecstatic in the love and light of God. She is taken into a domed room where the walls are covered with television-like screens. On each screen, an event in her life is being played out. God asks her what she has done with her gift of life. She mentions the time and energy she spent on her daughter. Jeanie realizes she is judging herself, rather than God judging her, and that God is satisfied with her answer. She asks many questions of God and receives many answers. Afterward, she returns to her body. (25) Ned Dougherty As a most successful nightclub owner, Ned lived life in the fast lane. Despite his religious upbringing as a Roman Catholic, he had no interest in a spiritual life because he didn t believe in an afterlife. He was too busy searching for a good time to be bothered with such things. This all changed when he had an NDE resulting from a heart attack during a heated fistfight with a business associate. His NDE changed his life and gave him a conscious awareness of his mission in life. Later he served on the Board of Directors for the International Association for Near-Death Studies. His experience is documented in his book entitled Fast Lane to Heaven. Ned leaves his physical body and falls as if into a dark pit. He reaches the bottom and sees in the distance the light of God. He can see and hear the ambulance workers trying to revive his physical body. As the ambulance takes his body away, he finds himself hovering in mid air. Suddenly, all of his worldly possessions flash before his eyes. A tunnel forms and an old deceased friend appears. Together, they travel through the tunnel and come out into a universe of bright stars. The brilliant light of God appears and embraces them. Tremendous knowledge and revelations enter into him. He and his friend descend into an amphitheater filled with thousands of spirit beings who emanate all their love and attention to them. He is reunited in a kind of homecoming with deceased family and friends. The amphitheater grows quiet as a luminescent sphere envelops him and he experiences his life in review. Afterwards, he finds himself in a beautiful garden. A beautiful "lady of light" appears and takes him to the Hall of Records where he is shown images of the future. Afterward, he finds he is back in the garden again. A person resembling Jesus is seated next to him with children all around him. The lady of light shows him more scenes of the future. As the scenes end, the luminescent sphere dissolves and he is once again in the amphitheater standing next to his friend. The cheers of thousands of spirit beings communicate a tremendous amount of support for him. Then, he returns to life, escorted by his friend. (26) Betty Eadie Her book, Embraced by the Light, became a New York Times bestseller. Her NDE is considered to be one of the most detailed and most profound NDEs ever documented. The argument can be made that her NDE and book was responsible for causing other experiencers to come forward with their own NDEs, thereby proliferating the knowledge of the NDE to millions of readers. Betty leaves her body through her chest and floats above her bed. Three hooded monk-like beings she identifies as her guardian angels appear and tell her they have been with her for "eternities" and that she has died prematurely. Concerned about her family she left behind, she leaves and visits them at her home but discovers they cannot see her. She returns to her body and her guardian angels at the hospital. She is then sucked through a tunnel toward a very bright light. At the end of the tunnel, Jesus embraces her. Jesus tells her it is not yet time for her death. She begins to remember forgotten pre-birth memories while receiving an unlimited amount of knowledge. Two close friends appear whom she knew before she was born. They embrace and go on a tour of the spirit world. They enter a large room and see people creating heavenly garments using heavenly looms of some kind. In another room, she sees people working with a large computer-like machine. They enter another room similar to a library. It is a library of the mind. They go outdoors to a garden where beautiful mountains and rivers can be seen in the distance. It is a realm more beautiful than words can describe. Beside a waterfall, she observes a magnificent rose and becomes one with it briefly. A group of people gathers around her for a graduation party. Her guardian angels are there and they tell her she has died prematurely and must go back. Wanting to explore the universe, she is escorted by two light beings into the vastness of space. She travels to other worlds similar to earth having intelligent beings on them. She returns to the garden and is taken to a place where many spirits are preparing for life on Earth. Her guides show her a drunken man lying on the sidewalk. They ask her what she sees. She sees only a drunk wallowing in his own filth. Her guides show her who the man really is. They reveal to her the man is filled with light and love and who is greatly admired in the spirit world for being a reminder to people of the need to help others. She is shown the earth as it appears in space. She is shown how prayers shoot like beacon lights from the earth. She sees angels rushing around answering these prayers. She is observing all of this while in the garden. She is led from the garden and into a large building before a "Council of Elders," consisting of twelve men and Jesus. Here, she is again told her death was premature and she must return to earth. Jesus shows her life in review in the form of well-defined holograms. Jesus comforts her when she sees the negative aspects of her life and begins to judge herself too harshly. After her life review, she is told her mission in life is not complete and she must return. She steadfastly refuses. Jesus decides to reveal her mission in life with one condition. If she decides to return to earth, the memory of her mission will be removed. She agrees to this and is shown her mission. Immediately, she agrees to go back. Suddenly, thousands of angels appear to sing her farewell. She finds herself back in the hospital where it all began. Her mission in life was completely removed from her memory. (27) Dr. Richard Eby As a professor and obstetrician with a successful practice, Richard fell off a balcony in 1972 and hit his head causing an NDE. When her revived, he closed his medical practice in order to follow his calling into a full-time ministry. He is now proclaiming the gospel wherever TV, radio, or audiences request his unusual testimony. His NDE helped to shape his ministry and message. His NDE is published in his book entitled Caught up into Paradise. Richard finds himself out of his body and hears Jesus tell him, "Dick, you're dead!" He asks Jesus many questions to which he replies, "Didn't you read my book?" The answers are given to him corresponding to what is written in the Bible. He explores the paradise Jesus prepared for him. He begins to get lonesome for his wife and tries to find her. He returns to earth after his grieving wife prays for his return. (28) Black Elk The Native American medicine man Black Elk, of the Lakota Sioux nation, lived between 1863 and 1950, surviving the collision of two eras, when the ancient primal world of his people was shattered by the violent invasion of the new industrial culture. This remarkable medicine man did not even speak English when he told his visionary experience to the author John Neihardt, who wrote about it in his book entitled Black Elk Speaks. In this classic of Native American literature, Black Elk's NDE glows through his perceptions of a sacred natural world. Black Elk is a dying boy when two men appear in the clouds to tell him his grandfather is calling him. He is raised up into the clouds and feels sorry to leave his parents. He sees a vision of a classic Native American mandala consisting of a circular hoop and the center of the world on an axis stretching from the sky to the earth. Numerous horses prance around surrounded by lightning and thunder. He is told to follow the bay horse. The horse leads him to a rainbow door. Inside sit six grandfathers who are as old as the stars. The oldest grandfather welcomes him and says, "Your grandfathers all over the world are having a council, and they have called you here to teach you." He becomes frightened because he knows these are not old men, but the Powers of the world. Each grandfather gives him a special power. The first grandfather gives him the power to heal. The second grandfather gives him the power of cleansing. The third grandfather gives him the power of awakening and peace. The fourth grandfather gives him the power of growth. The fifth grandfather, the Spirit of the Sky, gives him the power of transcendent vision. The sixth grandfather transforms into a young Black Elk and back to an old man. The grandfather tells him his people will have great troubles. The boy hears a voice telling him, "Behold the circle of the nation's hoop, for it is holy, being endless, and thus all powers shall be one power in the people without end." He stands on the highest mountain and watches this hoop of the world. He says, "I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being." He receives his powers from the grandfathers and is sent back to his body. Many years after his NDE, he tells his story to a medicine man. He helps him reenact the vision as a ritual. Black Elk becomes a powerful medicine man and heals many people. (29) Angie Fenimore A wife and mother haunted by abuse in childhood and overwhelmed by despair, Angie was in a desperate state of mind. In 1991, she committed suicide in the hope to escape her sense of emptiness and suffering. But the resulting NDE led into a realm of darkness instead of light. Her book, Beyond the Darkness, describes the hell she experienced which is far more horrific and personal than the old fire-and-brimstone metaphors. It is a world of terrifying visions and profound psychic disconnection. Angie commits suicide and passes into a warm tunnel and re-experiences her own birth. She notices a large screen in front of her and is drawn into a three dimensional slide show of her entire life. She instantaneously relives her entire life from everyone's point of view, including that of herself. She sees her childhood from an adult point of view. After her life review, she finds herself in vast darkness. Looking to her right, she sees she is shoulder to shoulder with some teenagers who have also committed suicide. She is sucked further into the darkness to a plane she is told is purgatory. There are thousands of people there. Everyone there was too self-absorbed in their misery to communicate with others. She hears their thoughts and gets terrified at the solitude there. She realizes this is a place where there is no hope. Suddenly, a great voice emanates from a pinpoint of light she identifies as God the Father. Filled with power, anger and love, God asks her, "Is this what you really want? Don't you know that this is the worst thing you could have done?" She replies, "But my life is so hard." God replies to her, "You think that was hard. It is nothing compared to what awaits you if you take your life. Life's supposed to be hard. You can't skip over parts. We have all done it. You must earn what you receive." Jesus appears and says, "Don't you understand? I have done this for you?" Angie becomes one with Christ and understands perfectly about the sacrifice of Christ. Jesus pleads her case to God. God tells her, "I told you how to get through this," referring to the scriptures. She is shown the future, as it would be if her suicide succeeded. She realizes nobody else in purgatory can see God talking to her. This is because they lack the will to seek God as she does. She realizes beings of light have been all around her all along. As she gains more light, she is lifted from the plane of darkness and finds herself back in her physical body. (30) David Goines When David was thirteen years old, he was riding his bike to school and was hit by a concrete mixing truck. The resulting NDE revealed to him many of the secrets of the afterlife. Many questions concerning "Why are we here?" or "What is the meaning of life?" were answered. At the end of his experience, he was given a choice - a choice that is offered to us all. It is a choice we all must make when we die. David leaves his physical body and observes people working on it in the emergency room of a hospital. One nurse tells another, "Well, it certainly makes you wonder if it's worth saving this mess." Frightened by these words, he steps through the wall of the hospital and finds himself in a dark void. Taking another step, he finds himself in a beautiful garden. He sits on a bench and a kind and old gentleman appears sitting with him. David asks if he has died. The old man replies that he is not dead, but his body is in a lot of trouble. The old man explains why David can be two places at the same time, in the hospital and in the garden. The old man tells him he is there with David to remind him his true home is with God. David begins to remember forgotten knowledge concerning life before his birth. The old man disappears. David sees a path and begins to walk down it. Jesus appears and asks, "Will you come unto me?" David steps forward and pauses, remembering he has a whole life to learn and experience. He tells Jesus, "No, I still have many things which I must do." He then finds himself back in his body, wondering why he said  no to Jesus. (31) Rev. Kenneth Hagin Being raised a Southern Baptist, Kenneth thought he had done all that was necessary to get a place in heaven. He made a commitment to Christ, was baptized with water, and was a lifelong member of the church. He was a believer and follower of Jesus Christ and he knew this assured him a place in heaven. It came as a real shock to him when he found out it didn t. At the age of 15, Kenneth had an NDE resulting from a malformed heart  a condition he was born with. His NDE is described in his book entitled I Believe In Visions. Kenneth leaps out of his body and descends into a pit. The pit gets hotter the further down he descends. He discovers the very gates of hell and is drawn like a magnet to it. An unknown creature appears at his side and takes his arm to escort him through the gates. He realizes once he goes through the gates, he cannot return. As he is escorted toward the gates of hell, an unknown voice speaks causing everything to shake. The creature unhands him. He is then pulled away and returns to his physical body. This whole experience happens again two more times in succession exactly in the way it did the first time. (32) Helen In Jean Ritchie s book, Death s Door, she documented the suicide attempts and subsequent NDEs of a woman named Helen. Her NDEs demolished the myth held by many religious people that suicide and homosexuality are one-way tickets to hell. Although Helen is now very comfortable with her homosexuality, coping with it has not always been easy. When she was seventeen, she drank heavily and experimented with drugs. Her problems greatly escalated and led her to decide to take her own life. After taking an overdose of pills and drink, Helen s heart stopped four times according to medical staff. This led her to have an NDE. Helen commits suicide and floats out of her physical body. She feels a tremendous sense of peace. She floats into a supermarket-like place where she sees her deceased relatives beckoning to her. Outside, through the windows, she sees the family and friends she left behind beckoning to her. She decides to return to her physical body in the hospital. In a later NDE resulting from another suicide attempt, she travels to a beautiful realm through a tunnel toward a bright light. She feels tremendous peace and warmth there. She has a sense it is her decision to either stay or return. She awakens in the hospital. (33) Jake In 1996, Arvin Gibson, a retired nuclear engineer and a prominent NDE researcher, interviewed a firefighter named Jake who had a most unusual NDE while working with other firefighters in a forest. What makes his NDE unusual is that it happened at the same time as several of his co-workers were also having an NDE. Jake's experience was sufficiently interesting that Gibson's local chapter of IANDS invited Jake to tell his story at one of their meetings. Arvin Gibson's book, Fingerprints of God, documents the NDE. Jake and a crew of firefighters succumb to a fire they were battling. He leaves his physical body and sees the rest of his crew outside of their bodies as well. In the glorious peace that ensues, a brilliant light appears in which he sees his deceased great-grandfather. He tells Jake it is his choice to stay or return to life. Jake was told neither he, nor any of his crew who chose to return, would suffer ill effects from the fire. Jake and his crew return to their bodies and all are well as promised. (34) Valvita Jones At the time of her NDE, Valvita was a woman of Christian faith, a wife, and a proud mother. She entered the hospital due to a serious infection after having a cesarean section. Her NDE is documented in Rita Bennett s book, To Heaven and Back. Valvita leaves her physical body and observes doctors trying to revive it. She then passes through "three heavens." In the first heaven, she meets Christ and his great love. They travel through two more "sky-like heavens" until she comes into the presence of the light of God on an invisible throne extending all the way to earth. Falling prostrate, she hears God speak to her about her and her life, while she has a life review. After her life is reviewed, Jesus touches her hand and she is given the strength to stand up. Jesus leads her to some kind of arena, steps away from her and walks toward the light of God. Jesus then stops, turns sideways and stretches out his arms as a bridge between her and God. Everything she knew from scripture flashes into her mind. God and Jesus begin discussing her case. Jesus says, "My blood is sufficient. She's mine." This removed all her doubts and feelings of unworthiness. She becomes ecstatic and starts rejoicing. Jesus returns to her and rejoices with her. A look in Jesus' eyes tells her she had to return. Jesus tells her she has work for her to do. She then returns to life. (35) Carl Jung, M.D. Carl Jung was the world-renowned psychiatrist who founded analytical psychology. He had an NDE after having a heart attack. As he reflected on life after death, Jung recalled the meditating Hindu from his NDE and read it as a parable of the archetypal Higher Self, the God-image within. Jung centered on the archetypes of the collective unconscious in his autobiography entitled Memories, Dreams, Reflections, which describes his NDE. Carl finds himself in outer space viewing the earth from about a thousand miles above. He sees the beautiful blue aura surrounding the earth and it is the most beautiful sight he has ever seen. He turns around to see a temple floating in space with him. At the temple's entrance, a Hindu sits waiting for him. As Carl approaches, his earthly consciousness is stripped away. He begins to carry with him everything he had ever experienced. He knows inside the temple would be all the people to whom he really belongs. He knows inside he will find the answers to everything. This scene is suddenly interrupted by an image of his doctor protesting Carl's death. Carl becomes disappointed because he knows he will not be allowed to enter the temple. Instead, he returns to his physical body. For three weeks after his NDE, he is depressed for having to return to this "box system" on earth. He now sees this physical world as a place where people must live and work in box-like rooms. He becomes very angry with his doctor for bringing him back. Because of his experience, he realizes his doctor will soon die. This later turns out to be true. (36) Dr. Gerard Landry As an anesthesiologist who worked twenty-seven years in medicine, Gerard had a very good life as a Christian, husband and father. Then in 1979, he had a heart attack that resulted in an NDE. It is documented in Rita Bennett s book, To Heaven and Back. Gerard finds himself in heaven with a great number of other people all dressed in white robes and each person holding a crown in their hand. Someone tells him, "We were waiting for you." Suddenly, Jesus appears on the cross and glances at him with a look of great love and compassion. Everything Gerard read in the Bible becomes more real to him there. Jesus says to him, "Gerry, my peace be with you. You are healed. You will feel no pain. You will have no anxiety. You will have no fears or guilt from the past. In one week you will be home from the hospital." Jesus then tells him to tell his family that all their prayers are answered and are being answered. Jesus also tells him to read the Gospel and other books of John. When he asks why he must do this, Jesus replies, "John is my friend. He knows all about my love." His experience ends here. (37) Laura Another child of P.M.H. Atwater s study of childhood NDEs, is a three-year old named Laura, whose father, in a blind drunken rage, raped, sodomized, and beat her to death. At the most extreme outpost of pain, she cried out to God and in that moment was torn from life. Laura is carried into the sky by brightly colored angels. She is taken before the feet of a beautiful female angel who asks to hear about her life. The infinite light of God is there which heals her. Then a struggle between the angels in heaven and the doctors on earth occur in a literal tug-of-war to bring her back from death. The doctors win the struggle and she returns to physical life. (38) Lynn Another child of P.M.H. Atwater s study of childhood NDEs, is a thirteen-year old named Lynn who underwent open-heart surgery to correct a condition she had since birth. She had her NDE after a complication occurred during surgery. Lynn floats out of her physical body and around the ceiling. She observes doctors working on her body. She observes her grieving parents in the waiting room. She travels through a tunnel toward a brilliant light. From the light, two of her deceased dogs run to greet her. The light tells her it is not yet her time to die. She reaches up and touches the face of God. Her deceased relatives greet her and one of them shares with her an important piece of information to give to someone when she returns to physical life. Jesus appears and tells her the reason for her heart condition she was born with. Jesus tells her it was given to her as a challenge to help her grow and stay compassionate. Jesus tells her about her future. As she enters the tunnel to return, she notices some disoriented people hiding in the tunnel afraid to come into the light. She is told not to worry about them because a guide is coming along to help them. After her NDE, the important piece of information she was given to share with someone was verified to be true. (39) Laurelynn Martin At the height of her promising tennis career, Laurelynn had a routine surgical procedure that caused her to have an NDE. In her book, Searching for Home, she describes her NDE. It is an NDE that Dr. Kenneth Ring said,  can change your life and is  surpassingly rich in the spiritual insights it offers. Laurelynn leaves her physical body and watches doctors try to revive it. She floats through a dark void that is warm and loving. In the distance, she sees a brilliant light and she travels toward it. Once in the light, she has a feeling of being home. She greets others including her deceased brother-in-law. She is then led through her life review. When it is over, her brother-in-law tells her she is not ready must return to her body which she does. (40) Mebruke According to the tenets of the Muslim faith, death is the complete end of physical life and the beginning of a period of rest until the day of resurrection when Allah judges the living and the dead. Many Muslims believe that the righteous can see visions of God after death and the wicked see visions of hell. Except for these possible visions of heaven or hell, Muslims believe the soul remains in a kind of "soul sleep" until the Day of Judgment. In his book entitled Parting Visions, Dr. Melvin Morse described a Muslim NDE by a thirty-year old Saudi Arabian named Mebruke. She was swimming in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Italy when she drowned and had an NDE. Mebruke sees a very beautiful white light that has a peaceful effect on her. While underwater, she hears a voice tell her, "You are not to die like this." Suddenly, a powerful force of energy shoots through her physical body sending her to the surface. Shortly after this, she is rescued and taken aboard a boat. (41) Dr. Dianne Morrissey When she was twenty-eight years old, Dianne was electrocuted while working on her fish tank resulting in a very profound NDE. Her experience transformed her entire life in a very big way. Today, she is a certified hypnotherapist and has taught 25,000 people to see and feel God's presence during the dream state. Her book, You Can See the Light, trains people to do this very thing for themselves. Dianne leaves her body and observes her dog pawing at it. She discovers her spirit body is transparent and has the ability to walk through walls. She tries to communicate with a living person outside her house, but she walks through the person and is unnoticed by him. She sees a silver cord connecting her spirit body to her physical body. A tunnel appears and she travels through it. She emerges from the tunnel and a radiant angelic being appears. This being shows her an instantaneous three-dimensional display of her entire life. Afterward, she returns through the tunnel and emerges into another dimension. She sees a duplicate of herself lying on a bed. She then realizes the absurdity of being at three places at the same time. As she moves closer to the bed and reclines on it, her duplicate disappears. As she lies in the bed, she raptures with great feelings of love and peace. A pinpoint of light appears which gets closer and closer until she finds herself in the very presence of God. She is given the choice to either stay with God or return to her physical body. The light of God touches her and she is transformed, becoming one with God. Suddenly, she is sucked through the tunnel again and emerges before her angelic being. The angelic being begins asking her questions such as, "What do you want to do?" Diane replies, "I want to go into the light, and I want to touch things." She is sucked through the tunnel once again and emerges before her lifeless physical body. Realizing she wants the light, she is sucked back into the tunnel and back to the angelic being. Dianne is torn between staying in the light or returning to the physical world where she can actually "touch things." She goes back and forth through the tunnel several times more. She realizes she has done little while in the physical world - how few lives she touched. She is pulled through the tunnel and reenters her physical body. Afterwards, she wonders how she could have possibly decided to come back. (42) Dr. Don Morse As a scientist who believed in the absolute finality of death, Don went through life with an increasing anxiety about his eventual fate. Then an NDE led him on a quest to uncover what science knows about the nature of death. His subsequent spiritual journey led him through the entire realm of science and religious beliefs until he came to an inescapable conclusion: Some form of an afterlife must exist. In his book, Searching for Eternity, he summarizes the vast research and data leading to this conclusion. Don feels himself spinning around and around in ever widening circles. Out of the pitch darkness comes an incredibly bright, white light. He is shown his life in review. He flies above the clouds and travels to the cemetery where his body is going to be buried. He sees a newspaper with his own obituary in it. He returns to his body and is back in the hospital. (43) Vasudev Pandey Dr. Satwant Pasricha and Dr. Ian Stevenson documented sixteen cases of NDEs in India. Indian experiencers frequently report being taken to the after-death realm by functionaries who then discover that a mistake has been made and send the person back, whereupon he or she revives. One of their subjects was Vasudev Pandey who nearly died of "paratyphoid disease" when he was about ten years old. He had been considered dead and his body had actually been taken to the cremation ground. However, some indications of life aroused attention and he was revived. Two beings take hold of Vasudev and take him away. After some distance, he feels tired and the two beings drag him. He is taken before a black Hindu with no clothes who says to the two beings in a rage, "I had asked you to bring Vasudev the gardener. Our garden is drying up. You have brought Vasudev the student." He regains consciousness with the gardener standing in front of him. The next day, the gardener is dead. (44) Apostle Paul Many of books of the Bible were written by Paul, a Hebrew Pharisee who converted to Christianity after receiving a vision of Christ. In 1945, an ancient Gnostic book entitled the Apocalypse of Paul (45) was discovered in Egypt. Together with a number of other manuscripts, this book outlines the early Gnostic Christian idea of what happens after death when the soul is judged. According to Paul's Apocalypse, each soul has to rise as best it can through a hierarchy of heavens and face the increasingly difficult challenges posed by the guardian angels of each heaven. In the Apocalypse of Paul, Paul first meets the Holy Spirit in the form of a child. The child leads him to the third heaven. The child warns him they are about to enter a realm of archangels and demons. They pass by the place where souls go to be reincarnated. The child leads him to the fourth heaven where they see a soul having his life reviewed. The soul is subsequently reincarnated because of misdeeds. The child leads him to the fifth heaven were he meets his fellow apostles. Here they see angels scourging souls in order to drive them on to judgment. In the sixth heaven, he sees a strong light shine down on him. In the seventh heaven, he sees an old man bearing a striking resemblance to Jehovah as described by the prophet Ezekiel. The old man asks Paul where he is going. Paul gives him a password which is the Gnostic sign necessary for one to know to move into higher realms. (46) In the eighth heaven, Paul embraces the twelve disciples and they all rise to the ninth heaven. When he reaches the tenth heaven, he is transformed. (47) Rev. Howard Pittman In 1979, Howard was a Baptist minister of 35 years when he died while on the operating table during surgery. During his NDE, he traveled through a number of afterlife realms until he was taken before the throne of God. In his booklet entitled Placebo, he describes his NDE and the message he was told to share with the world. Howard leaves his physical body and angels lift him to the second heaven where he sees demonic spirits among the living on earth. He becomes nauseous at this sight. An angel tells him he is feeling this way because there is no love in this world. He is escorted to the third heaven through a tunnel he describes as the passageway from earth to the third heaven. He is taken to the very gates of heaven, but instead of entering, he is instructed to watch others enter one at a time. An angel forbids him to enter because he would not be able to return. Howard realizes if he could not return to his physical body, his physical body would die. This troubles him because he is very concerned about the physical body he left behind. He is told to stand by one side of the gate and present his case to God. He is assured God would hear and answer him. Howard begins talking of his good works. He asks God for an extension of his physical life. In anger, God rebukes him by telling him he lived a life only for himself. Dejected by this show of God's anger, he is escorted back to his body. Then he realizes God did not actually answer his question. Howard pleads with the angels to take him back so God can answer his question. He is escorted back to the gate before God and he pleads his case again. He promises God he will do better next time. God reminds him he has promised this before. He is shown all the promises he made to God that he didn't keep. Suddenly, he becomes filled with light causing him to see God in a whole new way. Instead of a God of wrath, which he saw previously, he sees God as a God of love. He becomes sorrowful for the promises he broke to God. God expresses sympathy for him. Howard realizes his physical body is not important after all. God tells him why he was taken to heaven in the first place. The reason is because God has an important message for him to tell others. The message has to do with the Second Coming of Christ, which he is told is soon to happen, and the fact the Christian church has fallen away from the faith. (48) Plato The oldest surviving report of an NDE in Western literature is Plato's story of Er, a soldier who awoke on his funeral pyre after sojourning in the afterlife. Plato integrated at least three elements of Er s NDE into his philosophy. These included the departure of the soul from the cave of shadows to see the light of truth, the flight of the soul to a vision of pure celestial being and its subsequent recollection of the vision of light, the very purpose of philosophy. In his book, Republic, he concludes his discussion of the immortal soul and ultimate justice with the story of Er. Traditional Greek culture had no strong faith in ultimate justice. The dead lingered in a dark, miserable underworld Hades, regardless of their behavior in this life, with no reward or punishment. But Plato drew on the idea of an otherworldly reward or punishment to motivate virtuous behavior in this life. The first point of Er's story is to report on this cosmic justice. Twelve days after Er is slain in battle, his body does not decay and is lain on a funeral pyre for burial. He revives from death and tells others his experience: He leaves his body and journeys with other souls to a mysterious region where there are two tunnels side by side in the earth and two tunnels side by side in the heavens. Judges sit between heaven and earth to judge the souls. Souls judged as righteous enter to the right, upward tunnel leading to the heavens. The souls judged as unjust enter the left, downward tunnel leading to the earth. As he draws near to be judged, he is told he must be a messenger to inform humanity of this other world. From the upper left tunnel from heaven, he sees souls arrive in preparation to be reincarnated to earth. These souls are happy and talk of how beautiful the world is from which they came. From the lower left tunnel from the earth come souls who are lamenting over how great the suffering was they endured in the world from which they just came. Journeying on, he sees a bright pure rainbow light resembling a "cosmic axis" holding together eight spheres revolving around the earth (the solar system?). Each sphere (planet?) is guided by its Fate. Before the groups of reincarnating souls, one of the Fates displays a number of earthly destinies from which the souls may choose. For example, the destiny of a tyrant or an animal or an artist can be selected. Before returning to earth, each soul drinks from the "River of Forgetfulness" to forget all pre-birth memories. Er, however, is not required to drink and forget. (49) Jan Price A nearly fatal heart attack caused Jan to undergo an NDE. While many experiencers are greeted by a being of light during their NDEs, Jan was greeted by her deceased dog. Their new relationship while in heaven is quite interesting and amazing. Her NDE reveals what happens to beloved pets when they cross over to the other side. In her book, The Other Side of Death, Jan describes her NDE and her adventures with her dog in the afterlife. Jan leaves her physical body and sees angels helping her rise higher. A beautiful light pours through her. Her beloved deceased dog appears and she communicates with it telepathically. Her dog gives her a guided tour of the afterlife. First, they go to the home her dog created with its mind and where her dog currently dwells. Next, they go to a cliff where they can observe what is happening in the physical world. Next, they enter a "Temple of Knowledge" resembling a Greek temple. Here, people are engaged in various artistic endeavors. Moving further inward, they see wise ones who are stationed at intervals waiting to assist people who choose to approach them. She approaches one of them and is given much knowledge. Her wise one shows her a city of light consisting of three simultaneous dimensions. In the first dimension, everyone and everything is dingy, with much darkness and evil. The second dimension is brighter and much more colorful and appears very much like the physical world. The third dimension is similar in description to the holy city in the Book of Revelation with pure gold and crystal glass. The people there live in harmony, great joy and peace. The wise one instructs her to go further into the Temple and she does. Once there, she experiences infinite knowledge and realizes her oneness with the light of God. In the light, a beautiful woman appears and asks her to gaze into her eyes. Jan realizes she is seeing into the eyes of her very own soul. She comes face to face with the glory she had from the beginning of time. As she descends back into her physical body, she is told to hold on to as much information as she can. She is sucked through a tunnel and finds herself back in her physical body. (50) Pam Reynolds Dr. Michael Sabom is a cardiologist whose latest book, Light and Death, includes a detailed medical and scientific analysis of the amazing NDE of a patient named Pam Reynolds. She underwent a highly unusual operation for a giant aneurysm in her brain. She had been referred to a doctor who had pioneered a daring surgical procedure known as hypothermic cardiac arrest, which would allow Pam's aneurysm to be removed with a reasonable chance of success. This operation, nicknamed "standstill" by the doctors who perform it, requires her body temperature be lowered to 60 degrees, her heartbeat and breathing stopped, her brain waves flattened, and the blood drained from her head. In everyday terms she is dead. As the operation was being performed, Pam's NDE began to unfold. She relates the story with remarkable detail and her observations of the surgery were later verified to be true. Pam undergoes a surgical procedure known as a "standstill" to remove a brain aneurysm. Her body temperature is lowered to 60 degrees. Her heartbeat and breathing are stopped. Her brain waves are flattened. All the blood is drained from her head and she literally becomes brain dead. The doctors then perform the operation. While this is happening, she leaves her body through the top of her head and floats above her physical body while the doctors operate on it. She notices only half of her head has been shaved off for the surgery. She watches as a doctor cuts open her head with an electric toothbrush-like device. She is pulled through a tunnel and into a place of incredibly bright light. She meets deceased loved ones who prevent her from traveling all the way into the light. She realizes she has to return to her body. Her deceased relatives sprinkle her with "sparkles" to gives her strength. Afterwards, her uncle leads her back to the tunnel to return to her physical body. She is reluctant to reenter her physical body because it looks repulsive from the surgery. She is told reentering her body would be like jumping into a swimming pool. She is reluctant to do so. She falls back into her body after being given a helping push from her uncle. (51) Dr. George Ritchie In 1943, George was training to be a doctor while in the Army. During this time, he became ill and died of pneumonia. Nine minutes later, he returned to life to tell of an amazing NDE. His NDE so profoundly moved Dr. Raymond Moody, the so-called  father of the NDE, that he was inspired to begin to seriously investigate the NDE. George s NDE is described in his book, Return From Tomorrow. George leaves his body and sees it lying in his bed. He is not aware the dead body in his bed is his. Wanting eagerly to travel to Richmond, Virginia to start college, he finds himself flying in the air toward a city. He is not sure how he acquired these strange powers of flight and transparency. He arrives at a city and discovers he has lost his solidness. He flies back to the hospital and sees his lifeless body in the morgue and realizes he has died. Suddenly, Jesus appears emitting a tremendous light and love. George's entire life appears before him. Jesus asks, "What have you done with your life?" He realizes Jesus is not judging him, but he is judging himself. Jesus gives him a tour of four different dimensions in the afterlife. They both fly toward a large city on earth where they notice a group of assembly-line workers at work. He witnesses the spirit of a woman trying desperately to obtain a cigarette from the workers who are oblivious to her presence. This woman died severely addicted to cigarettes. In a house, Jesus shows him the spirit of a boy following a living teenage girl and begging for forgiveness while the girl is completely unaware of the boy's presence. Jesus tells George that the boy committed suicide and is "chained to every consequence of his act." Jesus shows George a bar filled with sailors who are heavily drinking. Spirits try desperately and in vain to get a drink or to control the sailors' alcoholic behavior. These spirits are from humans who die severely alcoholic. He is horrified as he observes a drunken sailor pass out and an alcoholic spirit jump into the body of the sailor. Jesus takes him to a new dimension away from earth and shows him a kind of "receiving station" where spirits would arrive in a deep hypnotic sleep because of their beliefs. These are spirits who believe they must sleep after death until Jesus returns. Jesus shows him a dimension where angry spirits are locked in hand-to-hand combat, trying in vain to hurt each other. He hears verbal abuse going on. He observes some trying in vain to get sexual gratification from each other. He also sees spirits arguing over some religious or political point and trying to kill the ones who did not agree with them. Here, he realizes he is seeing hell. These are spirits who are locked into some earthly desire that went beyond the physical and which cannot be satisfied in the spirit. He is then taken to a different dimension appearing like an enormous university. Here he observes people dressed as monks engaged in some form of artistic behavior or research. He is taken into an enormous library where all the important books of the universe are assembled. He asks Jesus if this is heaven. He replies that these are the people who grew beyond selfish desires while on earth. George realizes these people cannot see Jesus, just as the others could not see him in hell. Jesus takes him into outer space toward a distant city made of brilliant light of a similar description to the city in the Book of Revelation. He speculates this is the place where people go who have become Christ-like while on earth. Here, love was the dominant focus of life. He realizes he is seeing heaven, but he is not allowed to go in. Jesus then shows him the future of the earth. He then returns to his physical body. (52) Virginia Rivers In 1986, Virginia had a near-fatal bout of pneumonia that caused her to have an NDE. At this time, she was extremely weak with a high fever, felt intense pressure in her ears, and had difficulty breathing. She remembers crying out inwardly, "Please, where is everybody? I must be dying." At that point, she lost consciousness, and her journey to the center of the universe and to the Source of All began. Her NDE is described in Dr. Kenneth Ring's book, Lessons from the Light. Virginia finds herself at peace in a black void. She travels very quickly through the stars, which creates a tunnel effect. The farther she travels, the more knowledge she gains. This includes knowledge she had forgotten long ago. As she travels, her consciousness expands tremendously. Love from all the corners of the universe pours into her. A light at the end of the tunnel gets brighter and brighter as she gets closer. At the end of the tunnel is God. All the light, love and knowledge of the universe is there. She realizes she is "home." She hovers next to God on the ledge of a huge mountain where she sees a golden altar shining in from of her. God tells her many things she cannot remember later. She is told she has to return because there was something she had yet to accomplish. At the moment, she knew what this something was, but finds she cannot remember it upon her return. She pleads for God to allow her to stay, but she knows she has something yet to accomplish on earth. She returns to her body in order to accomplish whatever it is she is to accomplish. (53) Dr. George Rodonaia George holds an M.D. and a Ph.D. in neuropathology, and a Ph.D. in the psychology of religion. Before immigrating to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1989, he worked as a research psychiatrist at the University of Moscow. George was pronounced death immediately after being hit by a car in 1976 and was left for three days in a morgue. He did not return to life until a doctor began to make an incision in his abdomen as part of an autopsy procedure. When he revived, he was able to describe a very profound NDE. Prior to his NDE, he was also an avowed atheist. After his experience, he devoted himself exclusively to the study of spirituality, taking a second doctorate in the psychology of religion. He became an ordained priest in the Eastern Orthodox Church and serves as a pastor at St. Paul United Methodist Church in Baytown, Texas. His NDE is described in Phillip Berman s book The Journey Home. George leaves his body and enters total darkness. He wonders how he could still be alive after his death. He realizes he must think positive thoughts to escape the darkness and enter into the light. As soon as he does, a bright light appears and he sees the universal form of life and nature. Afterward, he sees a holographic drama of his entire life in review. In the light, he becomes ecstatic as he becomes filled with knowledge. He travels back into time and lives in the minds of Jesus and his disciples. He does the same for other historical figures throughout history. Suddenly, he feels himself back in his physical body and is painfully aware his body is being cut open. He has returned to life after being dead for three days in the morgue. He revives to the utter shock and horror of the doctors performing his autopsy. (54) Sandra Rogers In 1976, Sandra put a gun to her heart and shot herself. Instead of the nothingness she sought from suicide, she had an NDE. Her NDE gives some insight into the process of reincarnation and reveals the choices those who commit suicide may be given. On April 28, 2000, Sandra died from complications resulting from her suicide attempt. In her book, Lessons from the Light, she describes her NDE. Sandra commits suicide and a being of light appears. Instantaneously, her entire life is presented to her for review. She is given access to unlimited knowledge. Christ gives her two choices. The first choice is to remain in the light with the condition she must reincarnate at a future time to re-experience and overcome all that caused her to commit suicide in the first place. The second choice is to be revived and live out the rest of her life overcoming her problems. She chooses the second choice and is revived. (55) Daniel Rosenblit As an atheist, Daniel made fun of those who believed in an afterlife. Then in 1978, after weeks of failing health, Daniel succumbed and had an NDE. It changed his life forever. For over ten years, he has been carrying on a ministry as a street preacher. He wrote a book about his experience entitled Transformed by the Light. Daniel finds himself before the light of God. He is overcome with grief and regret because of his life of self-indulgence, atheism and persecution of religious people. The light of God crushes all his egocentric illusions. He is shown his entire life in review including every thought, word and deed. He sees he lived his whole life mostly for himself. He is in sheer agony. God pours an incredible amount of love into him that greatly comforts him. He is forgiven and in a state of ecstasy. He feels as though God has given him a second chance as he returns to physical life. (56) Thomas Sawyer Thomas was an avowed agnostic when his pickup truck fell on him, crushing his chest flat. He was clinically dead for fifteen minutes and had an NDE. He was sent back to tell people about death and the unconditional love of God. He shared his NDE on such television shows as Phil Donahue, Oprah Winfrey, Unsolved Mysteries, and Good Morning America. His book, What Tom Sawyer Learned from Dying, gives a detailed account of his profound NDE. Thomas discovers he is in total blackness taking the form of a tunnel. He travels through this tunnel toward a very brilliant light. He realizes that within the light is everything in the universe, including himself. The light is God, the light of Christ, emitting tremendous love. The light communicates with him telepathically and answers all of his questions. Afterward, he is given a choice to either return to physical life or become part of the light. He is told the instant he considers it, it will be done. In order to make his choice intelligently, he is given a life review. He decides to stay in the light and become part of it. Nevertheless, he returns to his body, not knowing how or why. (57) Peter Sellers As the comic genius of a generation of actors, Peter brought brilliant characterizations to numerous films, including "The Mouse That Roared" (1959), "Dr. Strangelove" (1964), "The Pink Panther" (1964), and "Being There" (1979). He was known for his enthusiastic way of totally absorbing himself in his characters, even carrying roles offstage. He believed he drew on these characters from past lives that he had. Then in 1964, during the first of a rapid series of heart attacks, his heart stopped and he became clinically dead which led to an NDE. Peter confided in the famous actress Shirley MacLaine while shooting his last film. MacLaine writes about Peter s experience in her book, Out on a Limb. She writes how Peter was astonished she did not consider him "bonkers." Peter leaves his physical body and watches as it is taken to the hospital where a doctor massages his heart. He sees an incredibly beautiful, bright, loving white light and wants to go to the light more than anything in his life. A tremendous amount of love from the light fills him. He knows this light is God. He observes a hand emerging from the light towards him. He tries to grab the hand, but his heart begins beating again. The light tells him it is not yet his time to die. As the hand recedes, he feels himself floating back down to his body. He wakes up bitterly disappointed. (58) Kimberly Clark Sharp After her heart suddenly stopped, Kimberly lay on the sidewalk not breathing and without a pulse. This resulted in an NDE that changed her life profoundly. After her NDE, she became the cofounder and president of the Seattle International Association for Near-Death Studies (IANDS). Her NDE is described in her book, After the Light. Kimberly leaves her physical body and discovers she is in a dense, dark gray fog. In this fog, the past, present and future exist simultaneously. Suddenly, an explosion of light surrounds her and fills her with love and knowledge. She learns she must return to her physical body. Against her best wishes, she does so. (59) Jayne Smith Thirty-five years ago, Jayne was in the hospital and in labor with her second baby. In the process, she experienced clinical death and had an NDE. Her video entitled A Moment of Truth describes in detail her profound NDE. Jayne leaves her body through the top of her head and enters a kind of gray mist. She is ecstatic to still be alive after death. A brilliant light appears and she is cradled in rapturous love and unlimited knowledge. The rapture and ecstasy build to a point where she begins to worry she will shatter. At this point, the light recedes along with the rapture. She discovers she is in a beautiful meadow where the colors are like nothing she has ever seen. She sees a group of people dressed in robes standing on a hill nearby. As soon as she expresses to herself she wants to join them, she is there with them on the hill. Over the horizon, she notices a city of light representing a whole world. A man in a purple robe tells her telepathically that it isn't time for her to be there. All her questions are answered. She is prompted to look within her herself into her heart. When she does, she has a life review. She realizes the core of her being is perfect love and knows this is true for everyone. She receives knowledge long ago forgotten. She cannot understand how such important knowledge could have been forgotten. She is told that when she returns to physical life, she will not be able to remember some of the knowledge she has just learned. She hears a strange clicking sound and finds herself back in her body. (60) John Star One day, without any warning, John found himself face to face with the fact that life in this world is terminal. He was swimming in Lake Michigan about half a mile offshore when he got in trouble. He was swimming free style, like he had done at swimming competitions, when he turned his head to breathe and inhaled an oncoming wave. His lungs were full of water when he wondered if he could swim half a mile at top speed without breathing. He tried, but what resulted was an extraordinary NDE and a miraculous return to life. His NDE testimony was sent to me by email. John drowns and leaves his physical body. His physical body continues to swim as he observes this from above. A tremendous light appears filling him with joy. He has a life review and discovers he is beyond the barrier of space and time. He feels as if he is waking up from a dream. Friends appear in the light to greet him. From deep within himself, a voice tells him he must return and he does. (61) Rev. Howard Storm Before his NDE, Howard was a Professor of Art at Northern Kentucky University and not a very pleasant man by his own admission. He was an avowed atheist who was hostile to every form of religion and those who practiced it. He often would use rage to control everyone around him and he didn t find joy in anything. Anything that couldn t be seen, touched or felt, he had no faith in. He knew with certainty that the material world was the full extent of everything that was. He considered all belief systems associated with religion to be fantasies for people to deceive themselves with. Beyond what science said, there was nothing else. Then in 1985, Howard Storm had an NDE resulting from a perforation of the stomach. His life was so immensely changed by it, he resigned as a professor and devoted his time attending the United Theological Seminary and became a United Church of Christ minister. His NDE is documented in his book, My Descent into Death. Howard leaves his physical body and is surprised he still exists. Strange people lead him into a dark fog until he refuses to go any further. The strange people physically and verbally abuse him. They take great delight in abusing him for their amusement. A voice deep within him tells him to pray. As he does, the strange beings scream at him and back away. He continues to pray until he finds himself alone in the darkness. He pleads to Jesus for help and immediately Jesus appears in a tremendous light that heals. Together, they leave the darkness and travel into outer space toward a great concentration of light similar to a galaxy. He feels God is at the center of this "galaxy" and feels unworthy to continue. He asks Jesus to allow him to go back. Jesus tells him he belongs there. Other light beings join them and they review his life. He sees how self-centered he was throughout his entire life. After his life review, he asks Jesus many questions and they are answered. He learns he must return to life because of his spiritual underdevelopment. He pleads to stay but, nevertheless, returns to his body. His experience so changes him, he becomes a United Church of Christ minister. (62) Lorraine Tutmarc In 1928, Lorraine became ill with blood poisoning. Because there were no antibiotics in those days, doctors sent her home and told her there was nothing more they could do for her. Her bout with blood poisoning resulted in an NDE. Her NDE appears in the book, To Heaven and Back, by Rita Bennett. Lorraine leaves her body and floats to the upper corner of the room. She floats through the wall and finds herself up to her neck in a black river. She asks, "Where am I?" A loud, loving voice she identifies as God replies, "This is eternity. You are lost!" She asks, "What is this?" God replies, "This is the River of Death." She realizes God is revealing to her lost spiritual condition to her. A whirlpool drags her to the bottom of the river where Christ appears to her in a brilliant light. Christ appears to be sad and has a big blotch of red on the ivory robe he is wearing. Jesus tells her, "This is the blood that I shed on the cross for your sins." Jesus tells her, "Follow me." The moment she says, "I will," the River of Death disappears and she is healed. They both float toward a transparent, golden wall, but she cannot see all the way through it. Beyond the wall, she hears beautiful things, such as birds, choirs and musical instruments. She searches the wall to find the entrance but realizes it isn't time for her to enter yet. She turns around and discovers Jesus is not there. She then finds herself back in her body. (63) Emmanuel Tuwagirairmana Emmanuel lived as a Christian in Rwanda, Africa. During the Rwanda genocide of 1994, he was seriously injured and together with ten other people hid in a school. The wounds on his body grew worse until one morning his friends realized he had died. They could not bury him because it was very dangerous to move out of the school. They hid in the school and wrapped his body in a bed cover. By now his body was beginning to decay. This situation lasted for seven days. Then he revived and, with maggots feeding on him, told his friends about an amazing NDE. His NDE testimony was emailed to me and later he sent corroborating photographs. Emmanuel is taken to heaven where he meets an angel by the gates. The angel takes him to a beautiful garden where he meets Jesus. Jesus shows him his dead body. He is taken to a beautiful city where he sees some of his deceased friends. Across from a beautiful lake, he sees a brilliant light. Jesus tells him he cannot approach the throne of God because it is not yet time. He is shown hell where people work as slaves. Jesus gives something to him to eat. He eats it and discovers it tastes like chocolate. He is told he just ate the whole Bible and that upon return to earth he will have the entire Bible memorized. He returns to his maggot-infested body. He has spent several days being dead. (64) Vicki Umipeg As a forty-five year old blind woman, Vicki was one of the more than thirty people Dr. Kenneth Ring and Sharon Cooper interviewed at length during a two-year study concerning NDEs of the blind. Their study appears in their book entitled Mindsight. Vicki was born blind. Her optic nerve was completely destroyed at birth because of an excess of oxygen she received in the incubator. Yet, she is able to see for the first time in her life during her NDE. Vicki leaves her physical body and for the first time in her entire life, she can see. She observes a male doctor and a female nurse working on a body. She notices rings on the fingers of the body. She knows the body must be hers due to the unusual nature of her rings. She floats through the ceiling of the hospital to experience a panoramic view outside. Then, she is sucked through a tunnel and out into a beautiful meadow. Here, she meets two of her deceased former schoolmates who were also blind. They appear beautiful, healthy, and no longer children. She also meets deceased family members and friends. She is overcome with a sense of complete and total knowledge. Jesus appears and he tells her it is not her time to die yet. She is very reluctant to return until she is told she will have children to bear in the future. She is told she will and, later, she does. Jesus shows her entire life in review. Afterwards, she finds herself in her physical body again. She is blind again. (65) RaNelle Wallace In 1985, RaNelle and her husband tried to fly their single-engine airplane through a snowstorm in central Utah. They became disoriented and crashed against the side of a mountain, turning their small craft into a raging inferno. She suffered severe burns and died six hours later in an ambulance. Her NDE is described in her book, The Burning Within. RaNelle leaves her physical body and is sucked through a tunnel. At this time, she instantaneously relives every second of her life. At the end of the tunnel, she emerges into a brilliant light that heals her. Her deceased grandmother appears and RaNelle realizes for the first time she has died. She asks about a friend who died in an accident months earlier. This friend appears, but her grandmother forbids her to embrace him because of the life he lived. He was a drug dealer in life and had caused people to suffer. The grandmother explains that not being able to embrace him was a part of his punishment. Her grandmother leads her to a garden of astounding beauty where she is taught lessons about God's love. They fly around the landscape as knowledge pours into her. Suddenly, she has to stop because she can't handle all of the knowledge. Her grandmother reassures her and they continue on. She reunites with more deceased loved ones. Her grandmother then takes her to a place to "teach her humility." She shows her a place where a beautiful woman is lying on her side on an altar surrounded with gold and jewels. The woman was once a queen in life and now in the spirit, she is deluded into believing there are multitudes surrounding her, bowing and worshiping her. But there is no one there. Here, she learns the full extent of what vanity can do. RaNelle and her grandmother travel to another place where millions of people who have died are waiting for those on earth to finish their part of the work. Finally, she is shown her badly burned body and is told her mission in life is not complete. She must return, but she refuses. In an attempt to change her mind, her grandmother introduces her to a young man named Nathaniel, who is RaNelle's future son, not yet born. Nathaniel is crying and wondering why she is there. Nathaniel tells her if she doesn't return, his mission in life would be greatly hindered. This succeeds in changing her mind and she chooses to return to life. Seven years after her NDE, she gives birth to a son and names him Nathaniel. She believes her son is the young man she saw in her NDE. (66) Arthur Yensen In 1932, Arthur was a geologist who was involved in an automobile accident that resulted in an NDE. After seeing the afterlife, he later learned that telling others about it often brought criticism, especially from the church. But there were those who would listen and as time wore on, more and more people would ask him about it. Then in 1955, he published his NDE after public interest. His booklet,  I Saw Heaven, describes his NDE and gives many answers to questions he has been asked over the years. His NDE testimony also appears in P.M.H. Atwater s book Beyond The Light. Arthur leaves his body through the top of his head. He discovers he is in a beautiful mountain paradise. A group of people appears singing, dancing and laughing. Four of them run over to meet him. As they converse, he realizes he is finally home as he remembers having been here before. His questions are answered and he is filled with knowledge, love and ecstasy. One of them resembles a Greek god and tells him he must return to earth. He is told he has important work to do on earth. When it is done, he can come back and stay. With this, he returns to his body. (67) Research Conclusions  You would know the secret of death. But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heart of life. -- Kahlil Gibran The following research conclusions are the most profound insights I have found from the sixty-two NDEs profiled in this book. These conclusions have been grouped into thirteen categories: Life Before Birth, Life, Humanity, Religion, Spirituality, Future, Science, Death, Life After Death, God, Heaven, Hell and Reincarnation. If the NDE is a real afterlife experience suggested, these insights may be the most important truths ever documented. 1. Life Before Birth During an NDE, many people receive memories of a life in heaven before they were born into this world. Some have even seen their own children who have yet to be born. The reason the rest of us cannot remember these memories is probably because these memories reside in a very deep level of our consciousness. Very likely, remembering pre-birth memories is similar to trying to remember a dream you had during your deepest period of REM sleep. Many NDE memories cannot be remembered at a conscious level either. Metaphysical teachings, such as those from Edgar Cayce, reveal that these kinds of memories, of dreams and pre-birth, are stored in our subconscious (soul) and superconscious (spirit) minds. Hypnosis, meditation and dreaming are methods by which we can access our deeper consciousness and access these memories. The following are insights from many NDEs regarding this pre-birth information. Everyone has a mission to complete - a purpose for life and a reason for living. We are made to forget our missions before we are born so we will not dwell on them. Our missions in life will be fulfilled when it is time. We bond with family and friends to help us complete our missions we chose before we were born. A  veil of forgetfulness purposely blocks all our pre-birth memories. The reason we are made to forget any pre-birth memories is to fully experience the physical things, be physically challenged, make choices out of free will -- so we can make mistakes and so we can learn from them in ways only a physical life can impart. If we retained these pre-birth memories, we might not bother to experience physical life for its fulfillment. We might decide to skip the pain and thus miss the pleasure. The reason we cannot retain the incredible amount of knowledge existing in the afterlife is because if we could, we would appear abnormal to the rest of society. Mentally retarded people appear abnormal because they know much more than they can express. When coming to earth, we must forget our knowledge of the afterlife, because if we did not, we would never be able to thrive on earth. If we were allowed to remember, we would probably focus only on that. Before we were born, we took an oath before God that we would pretend time and space are real, that way we could come to earth to advance our souls. Before being born, we raised our right arm and made a sacred oath with God that we would do all in our power to accomplish our missions on earth. We vowed to become partners with God in bringing goodness to the earth. The people who stood with us in this pledge were the people who would eventually play an integral part in our lives on earth. If one were to fail in their mission, all would be hurt in some way. If one succeeded, all would benefit. We promised God before coming here we would make the most of this opportunity for God and ourselves. We will return to God with the knowledge and experience we have gained. God is enhanced by our experiences. Most of us have selected the illnesses we would suffer. Some of us have selected the illness that will end our lives. Our deaths are often calculated to help us and others grow spiritually. We come to earth to learn and share with others using gifts we have accumulated over several lifetimes. We choose our own parents based on our own free will. Prior to birth, we choose the body we will enter. We are merely visitors on earth. Our true home is in heaven. We came into this world to have trouble and to learn from it. Unfortunately, many people don't realize this and complain about their bad luck and spend their lives chasing pleasure, fame and money. Then they die without making any spiritual progress -- thus wasting an entire lifetime, a rare privilege. We are born into this world as mature spiritual beings rather than immature spiritual beings. The soul can choose to enter the mother's body at any stage during her pregnancy. Miscarried births or babies who survive only a short time are fulfilling a purpose. Such souls do not need the development that a long life would bring. Their deaths provide challenges that help their parents grow. Miscarried babies are able to appear as babies in the afterlife. By miscarrying, these souls have fulfilled their purpose to absolute perfection. They do not remain as babies, however, and they will grow to maturity immediately upon entering the afterlife. We have all volunteered for our positions in life, and each of us is receiving more help than we are aware of. 2. Life The NDE reveals our universe to be merely one dimension out of many. The universe is a part of a vast university of discovery where we come to learn important lessons for soul growth. Experiencers learn from their experience this profound fact: life is God. Everything of which life consists is God. To know that life is God, is to know how very special life is. We must be very careful how we treat things in life because how we treat things in life is how we treat God. Do we destroy life or do we respect it? Do we nurture life or do we abuse it? Do we value life or do we take it for granted? The following are insights from many NDEs concerning life and our relation to it. Life, love and light are God. In other words, all things are God. The earth is a divine living entity complete with its own aura. Its purpose is for humans to live on forever to play, learn and grow. The planets are alive and conscious. Life tries out different shapes and then returns from where it came. Beings (non-human) of a higher vibration also live on earth and are caretakers of the earth. They are actually part of the earth itself. Everything has a divine purpose: every grain of sand, every rock and plant. Everything on earth fits into a pattern that will, in the end, work out for justice and good. Difficulties are nature's way of teaching lessons that won't be learned otherwise. Everything in the entire universe fits together like a jigsaw puzzle. This earth is only a temporary place for our schooling. Our true permanent home is the spiritual universe. Life on earth is "rigged." No matter how much we try, we can never fully satisfy our selfish earthly desires. The universe runs according to a perfect plan. This plan is working itself out in the universe in perfection. There are no "accidents" in the universe. Nothing in life or death is an accident. The universe is upheld by love. We live in a moral universe. There is a reason and a purpose for everything happening in the universe, no matter how bad it appears. That purpose is already known to our higher self. Nothing can happen in the universe before its time. Everything is not only connected together; everything is also one. Everything in the universe is intimately connected. For example, the beating of a single butterfly's wings in China affects the weather in America in some way. Other worlds with intelligent life, similar to our own, exist in the universe. Souls inhabit the planets of our solar system. Our solar system is united by a transparent net or web, and each thread shines with great radiance in the spirit realm. The universe is filled with life living on other planets. There are many universes and God has authority over them all. Everything is really "veiled" spirit. Physical reality is like a "land of shadows." Spiritual reality is the true reality of which physical reality is only a shadow. Heavenly beings are always with us but we can't see them or hear them. You can only "see" them with your heart. They whisper things to us to help us do what is right. They do this because of their great love for us. We are to leave the earth a little better than we found it. All the physical rules for human life are nothing when compared to the one reality of living in the light. In comparison to life after death, life on earth is like a passing fantasy or a brief dream. 3. Humanity Many people who have an NDE are given a new sense of who we are as human beings. They no longer believe we are merely physical beings seeking spiritual things. They believe we are spirit beings temporarily inhabiting a physical body, learning important lessons only a physical universe can teach. As a part of life, human beings are a part of God. Jesus once said human beings are gods (John 10:34). Many religious traditions teach of the divine within. People who have NDEs often realize this first-hand. The following are insights from many NDEs regarding humanity. We are immortal and indestructible. We always have been and always will be. We can never be lost. We are eternal spiritual beings who have always been alive. The core of our being is perfect love. We have always been a part of God, but, while lost in selfishness, we have forgotten who we really are. We already know everything. We have just simply chosen to forget most of it in order to come to earth. We are an inseparable part of the light. As creations of God, we are perfect love. All humans are connected to form a single being. We are different aspects of the same being. We are all interconnected. We should treat all people as if they are a part of our soul because they are. We are intricately connected to all that exists throughout eternity. We are not becoming God as much as God is becoming us. We have a physical body, a mental body and a spiritual body. We are all collectively bonded to each other while on earth, united in one supreme purpose: to learn to love one another. Humans were not meant to die on earth. "Death" is a man-made term meaning very little in the afterlife. In order for us to appreciate, benefit and learn all we can from physical life, we seemingly have to rediscover what we knew before (only in physical ways) and discover how to return to God. The reason humans die physically is because they have fallen away from nature and violated its laws. To survive, humans must relearn the harmonic balance with nature. This is the next goal for humanity. All souls are equal at the spirit level. The spirit doesn't evolve; the personality of the soul does. Humans have a group soul, but have also evolved to have an individual conscious. Animals have only a group soul and reincarnate in groups. The races of humanity are actually personality clusters. Nations and cities also form their own clusters. Families have group souls. We are beings of light encased in physical bodies. All thoughts and experiences are recorded in our subconscious minds and in every cell of our body. Our children are not really ours, but God's. They are placed in our care to help them live the life they choose. Our planet has evolved to a point where we are all globally linked and could become one people. 4. Religion Many NDEs reveal the religions of this world to be merely external paths whose ideals are to lead people inward toward true spirituality. Religion is often confused with spirituality. People who have NDEs often return less religious, but more spiritual. As an example, one experiencer, Ken Martin, was a minister at the time of his NDE. Upon his return, he discovered that everything he had previously known, including his ministry and his calling, was insignificant in comparison to what he experienced during his NDE.(68) Religion has its function mostly as a cultural institution in this world, but religion has little application in the world of the NDE. It is our inward spirituality that matters most, not the outward rituals of religion we perform. The following are insights from many NDEs regarding religion. Deeds, not creeds, are what is most important. Jesus is a human manifestation of God. We are also manifestations of God of one degree or another. Jesus appears sometimes in NDEs to help people not be frightened before facing God. In the afterlife, love is manifest as light. The reason Jesus can be seen emanating such tremendous light is because of the tremendous love emanating from within him. Jesus has a great sense of humor as many experiencers have testified. The mission of Jesus in this world was to teach love. Jesus experienced all the suffering that has or ever will take place in the life of any human born on this earth. Jesus came to the earth to show humanity the God that the Father created us to be. Jesus went to the cross to show humanity it must die to its egotistical, self-centered and materialistic desires in order to allow the spirituality within us to manifest. Jesus' purpose was not limited to teach us how to reach heaven, but also how to create heaven on earth. Of all the knowledge humans have, there is nothing more important than knowing God. The reason why there are so many religions is because each of us is at a different level of soul development and understanding. The various religions are necessary because there are people who need what these religions teach. Religion is a stepping-stone to further knowledge. Religions are cultural institutions only. Love is universal because love is God. So-called "evil" does not really exist, at least, not in the way it is thought of on earth. What passes for evil is really ignorance (i.e. darkness). Light is knowledge of higher spiritual realities and darkness is ignorance of higher spiritual realities. Our ignorance causes us to make mistakes from which we must learn. In the end, those who make the most mistakes will learn the most. The true definition of "sin" means believing you are separate from others and God, then acting accordingly. God does not care about a person's religious affiliation, only his or her heart. Doctrine, creed and race mean nothing. No matter what we believe we are all children of God and the only rule is God's true law - do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Our religious affiliation is unimportant to God. What is important is how we show our love for God by the way we treat others. God created different religions because of the different lessons different people need to learn. There are really only two religions: the religion of love and the religion of fear. The gods of one faith are the angels, saints or supernatural beings of other faiths. There is only one God who is worshipped through many different teachings of many different religions. The most important thing is to really live what our religion teaches. We must put it into practice. Whatever we practice becomes a part of us, whether good or bad. Those religions claiming some singular relationship with God, claim superiority over other religions or exclude people for various reasons, go against God's law of loving one another as we love ourselves. The only purpose of our existence is to dedicate our lives to be faithful to God in all things. If we are not really trying to reform ourselves, becoming all good like God is, and not living God's teachings, then we are on the road to a much more painful afterlife. The key is striving to live the Golden Rule: do unto others as we would have them do unto us. The Bible is true, but it has to be read spiritually in order to understand it. If we read it prayerfully, it talks to us and it reveals itself to us. The best religion is the religion that brings us closest to God. There is no such thing as sin. The only thing having any meaning in the hereafter is what we think and what is in our heart. Insincere prayers of repetition have little light if any at all. These, having no power, are not heard. There is no prayer greater than a mother praying for her children. A high majority of Christians are living a deceived lie, believing they are worthy of heaven because they go to church. But they do not live a true Christian life. A true Christian lives his or her faith 24 hours a day every day - not just at church. 5. Spirituality The NDE often reveals the difference between being religious and being spiritual. The more unconditional love one has and practices toward others, the greater the spirituality attained. Many experiencers report that until they had their experience, they did not know such a love was even possible until they felt the tremendous love of the light. Unfortunately, such a love is rarely found in this world, but is abundant after death. The following are insights from many NDEs concerning spirituality. The totality of our actions, good and bad, determines our destiny. When we do bad things to others, bad things will eventually happen to us. When we do good things to others, good things will eventually happen to us. If we do only good things, we will eventually run out of bad things due us. Then only good things will happen to us, and vice versa. This spiritual law forces us to learn life's lessons, whether we want to or not. The more knowledge of the spirit we acquire while on earth, the further and faster we will progress in the spirit after death. Life is significant. It determines how far we can go into the light after death. Life is not about pursuits, but about people. Life is a precious gift: to love, to care, to share. Each moment is filled with great opportunities. We are not to waste our time while here on earth. We are to spread love and understanding. The best thing to do while on earth, to make it better for us after death, is to develop unselfish love. The way to heaven is to love so unselfishly that our soul vibrations will rise high enough to fit into heaven. By doing good to others, by improving our minds, by learning to cope with physical life, we earn our right of safe passage back to God. In doing this, we magnify and honor God. Our earth lives are gifts from God, a rare privilege, given for us to learn to give and receive love. Life is a road full of lessons, teaching love. When love is learned, you will have an eternal paradise within you. We are here to learn. The purpose of our life is to learn love. Heaven is our true home. Here on earth, we are in school. It is love - not religious dogma or ritual - that creates spiritual growth and saves us from a hell of our own making. The highest purpose of our earthly connections is love. There is only one truly significant work to do in life, and that is to love: to love nature, to love people, to love animals, to love creation itself, just because it is. We all play an important role in the development of other personalities around us. Love is supreme. Anything we do to show love is worthwhile: a smile, a word of encouragement, a small act of sacrifice. We grow by these actions. All events in our lives are significant. Even the events we consider insignificant will bring us to places of great awareness and love. By giving love, we receive and experience a tremendous love from the universe. Above and beyond anything else, we must first learn to love ourselves non-judgmentally and unconditionally. Then we will actually love all people and all things the same way. We can help others to change by changing our own lives. There are only two things we can take with us at death: love and knowledge. This is why it is best to learn about both as much as possible. The only good thing we can take with us from this life is the good we have done to others. All of our good deeds and kind words come back to us and bless us a hundred-fold after this life. Our strength will be found in love. Our destiny is determined by our conscience, our ability or willingness to absorb the light of God. We have the ability to grow forever unless we choose to accept a finite level of darkness. All it takes to change the world is to change one person (ourselves) which, in turn, will cause a chain reaction of change from one person to another. The positive, as well as the negative, impact of one decision has the capacity to be felt throughout the world. In order to become one with God, work must be done to remember and find the truth. The truth is this: our true self is a spirit and our spirit is one with God. In the search for truth, all paths lead to love, which is the Spirit of God. Love is the power of life. All creation springs from God's love and all creation has the capacity to love in return. Love is too immense and profound to ever be fully understood or experienced in this physical world. Love is God. Love for God is the greatest love there is. Then we must love ourselves because we cannot truly love others unless we first love ourselves. Love is the only thing that matters. Love is joy. We must learn to love others, to have compassion and to forgive them. Only love is truly real. Remembering love makes everything else appear real. The most important thing we can do in life is to love others as ourselves. Loving ourselves is very important. To know these things is not enough. We must express that knowledge by actually living them. Our lives are a golden opportunity to live a spiritual life in a world of darkness. Imagination is the key to reality. We create our own surroundings by the thoughts we think. Thoughts are deeds. If we learn to use what we have, we will receive more. This is a spiritual law. We will be given all that we are prepared to receive. Mistakes are an acceptable part of being human. We are to make all the mistakes we want. Mistakes are how we learn. The key is to try and not make the same mistakes again. God loves us the way we are - mistakes and all. When we make mistakes we should seek forgiveness, learn from the mistake, let go of guilt, and try not to repeat it. There is not necessarily only one right choice. There is a spectrum of right possibilities from which we can choose. In the spiritual universe, "sin" is not seen in the same way as it is here. In the spirit world, all things are learning experiences. We are here in this world to make mistakes, to learn and grow from them. Judgment, blame and shame distort or destroy one's sense of self. We don't have any right or knowledge to judge anyone else, in terms of that person's heart relationship to God. Only God truly knows what's in a person's heart. Because we lack complete knowledge here on earth, we are in no position to judge another human being. Forgiveness of self is where all forgiveness starts. If we cannot forgive ourselves, it is impossible to forgive others. Life's goal is happiness. Otherwise there would be no point in living. But if we look for happiness, it will elude us. The hardest and most important lessons we have to learn is that cheerfulness is our greatest virtue, and the happiest we will ever be is when we are helping someone else. If we look after others, God will look after us. God will do a lot better job of it than we can. Worry is the most foolish thing anyone can do because it builds undesirable images and acts like a prayer for things you don't want to happen. For example, worrying about cancer is like praying for cancer, and worrying about accidents is like praying for them to happen. Seeing is not believing. Believing is seeing. Life on earth changes us. It strips away a naivet, an innocence, infusing our eternal selves with maturity and wisdom. Be thankful each day for this gift of life. Many people go through life never really appreciating it. The purpose of life is joy. Self-awareness is the prayer of the heart, and to pray without ceasing is to play. Play with the joyful abandon of the child, absorbed in the light of each moment. Live for the pure joy of being. Happiness is holy. Know yourself as such. Right is helping and being kind. Wrong is not only hurting someone but also not helping when you can. Suffering exists, not as a "cross" God gives us to carry as Christ did, but comes from ourselves as a challenge to help us grow and stay compassionate. The only meaningful existence is to serve God's creation with a warm and loving hand of generosity and compassion. No one can truly fathom the great truths of life until they finally unite with eternity after death. Our earthly selves are constantly in opposition to our spirits. We grow spiritually by overcoming our earthly nature and by serving others. Our most severe challenges will one day reveal themselves to be our greatest teacher. We need negative experiences as well as positive experiences on earth. Before we can really know joy, we must know sorrow. Fear is the opposite of love. We cannot truly love God or others if we fear them. The physical body can be a limitation during our spiritual development on earth. God never gives more challenges in life than can be handled. Rather than jeopardize someone's spiritual progression or cause more suffering than can be endured, God will bring that soul home, where they can continue progressing. Suicide can harm the web of connections of people on earth, possibly drastically altering the lives of millions. All of us are inseparably linked, and the negative impact of one decision has the capacity to be felt throughout the world - even the universe. Not all suicides result in negative NDEs. Many NDEs resulting from a suicide attempt are heavenly. The general rule of thumb is this: hellish life, hellish afterlife - heavenly life, heavenly afterlife. Death will not change a hellish life into a heavenly afterlife, nor does it change a heavenly life into a hellish afterlife. 6. Future Many people are shown the future during an NDE. One woman, Karen Schaeffer, was shown her children's future, as it would happen if she decided not to return to life. Because she chose to return, that particular future did not happen. Such experiences are a clear demonstration of how the future is not fixed, but is based on probabilities as they currently exist. Sometimes the future shown to people during an NDE is one more global in perspective. Many have reported seeing tremendous upheavals and disasters that are soon to happen. The NDE reveals this coming period of tribulation will ultimately lead to the dawning of a new age of enlightenment. It is safe to assume that this too is based on current probabilities and is not fixed in stone. However, if current trends continue, many NDEs are warning us, we are headed for a disaster. The following are insights from many NDEs dealing with the future. The fate of humanity rests on our ability, individually and collectively, to change the direction of humankind in accordance with God's plan. The way to understand and work with God's plan is through prayer and meditation, through prayer to call to God, and through meditation to receive God's message. Acts of war and aggression are not part of God's plan. The future is not fixed but is based on events happening right now. The world can be saved, but not by its leaders, but by prayer groups throughout the world. The prayers of a group of twenty could save a nation from war. No future catastrophe would have to take place if humanity would begin to recognize and work with God's plan. Soon humanity will mature enough to assume a higher place in the universal scheme of things, but until then we must learn acceptance, tolerance and love for each other. A new age is coming when people will not be able to endure seeing others homeless or hungry. Then we will realize that only by helping each other could we truly help ourselves. It is time to live according to your beliefs, whatever they may be - to put your house in order - for the end times are upon us. (More on NDE prophecies can be found in the Question and Answer section of this ebook) 7. Science The scientific method deals with empirical facts concerning things measured by the senses. For those scientists who limit truth to what can be measured, the NDE is a fantasy at best and a delusion at worst. However, scientists such as Albert Einstein believe all knowledge of reality starts from experience and ends with it. Such scientists believe experience to be source of true science. This is the kind of science the NDE belongs to. The following are insights from many NDEs concerning science. Spirituality and science are one and the same. Many of our important inventions are first created in the spiritual universe by spirit prodigies. Then individuals on earth receive the inspiration to create these inventions here. Science and technology are gifts from God bestowed through inspiration. People on earth have literally been led to these discoveries, many of which later became perverted by humanity to use for its own destruction. The mushroom cloud of the atomic bomb is one of the holiest archetypes created by human beings. It, more than any religion or philosophy on earth, brought humanity together all of a sudden to a new level of consciousness. The power behind the atom is the power of God - the Force holding all things together. Space and time are illusions holding us to this earth plane. Time travel is possible in the afterlife. There is no beginning, middle or end to time. Time is not linear. Time is the eternal now. Television-like devices exist in the afterlife where people can view the future. In the spiritual universe, our earth time is meaningless. Past, present and future become one in the spirit realm. There we can travel forward or backward into time to experience any historical event. 8. Death Experiencers unanimously lose their fear of death upon return. Many actually look forward to their own deaths, when they can return to the beautiful realm they experienced. The NDE changes people's ideas of death forever. This is true even for those who merely read about the NDE. Those who experience death are often not even aware they have died. This fact demonstrates how insignificant death is. The NDE reveals death to be a very brief transition from the physical to the spiritual. It has been described by some to be similar to the process of waking up from a dream - the dream being the physical world. The following are insights from many NDEs dealing with the subject of death. From the light, we have come to earth and to the light we all shall return. There is no death - at least, not as we think of it. Death is not oblivion. Death is like falling asleep or like waking up. We leave one state of consciousness and enter another. Death means dying to the physical world. It also means being born into the spirit world. When we are born into this physical world, we fall asleep and forget who we really are. When we are born into the spirit world, we awaken and remember who we really are. The only thing we take with us at death is the love we have given away while on earth. Death is one of the most important lessons learned by those who are affected by it. Consciousness continues on after our brain is dead and not functioning. The state of "limbo" is the state of being in a coma. Death really means not believing life continues when physical life ends. Death is a process similar to waking up from a dream. Death means breaking through the barrier of space and time. At death, the spirit leaves the body. In traumatic deaths, the spirit may leave the body even before death occurs. When we leave our body, our spiritual awareness becomes more acute. On earth, our brains act as a filter to suppress this acute spiritual awareness. At death, we lose our physical body. Nothing else is lost. Our senses and our sense of awareness are tremendously greater when we are outside of our physical body. Birth is a sleep and a forgetting. Death is awakening and remembering. Death is actually a "rebirth" into a greater life of understanding and knowledge stretching forward and backward in time. Time stops when we die. Past, present and future become the eternal now. Our life on earth can be thought of as one channel on a radio. At death, it is as if someone spins the dial on the radio to a different channel. The previous channel is still there, but we are now experiencing a different channel. That is all death is - a change to another channel. We go to that particular channel where our speed of vibration fits a particular channel on the radio dial. During our death experience, the prayers of our loved ones can cause us to return unwillingly from the paradise of the afterlife. The dark void appearing in many NDEs lacks love. Those who get stuck in this dark void might not recognize this fact. To escape this void, one must be convinced their body is dead and one must think of love. Traveling through the tunnel in the NDE is traveling through the various afterlife dimensions. The tunnel itself winds around on a wheel like the Rotarians use. In the tunnel connecting this world with the next, humans as well as animals travel through the tunnel. The tunnel experience after death may create the recollection of birth. The tunnel in the NDE is the pathway to God. The tunnel is a porthole to the place where all souls go if they choose. The tunnel is the result of traveling at a high rate of speed past the stars in the universe. If one exits the tunnel and experiences the tremendous love and knowledge there, they will never forget the experience. At death, when we leave our physical body and face God, we become pure Mind. Our minds become "naked" in that our thoughts are there for all to understand perfectly. Death makes us more alive. We are more dead now while alive on earth than we are when we are physically dead. We have been on display our whole lives. Our entire life is one huge examination. After death, we are graded on everything. We grade ourselves. God does not judge us. The purpose of the life review is to make an informed choice of returning to life or becoming a part of the light of God. The purpose of the life review is to evaluate your life in terms of your intended mission in life. You are to review your life in a manner permitting you to focus on the areas of your life providing the most important experiences in terms of your spiritual growth and development. The life review is witnessed by all in the light. During the life review, aspects of a person's life may be found incompatible with eternity in the light. During the life review, we learn how to correct this. During our life review, we will see ourselves - our entire lives and past lives - completely from God's perspective. During our life review, we will instantaneously experience every thought and feeling of everyone we have ever known in our entire life. Some experiencers describe the life review as instantly "becoming" everyone we have ever known. During our life review, we see how our actions caused a chain reaction until they led back to ourselves. During our life review, we relive our entire life again literally from everyone's point of view in a single instant. We experience this while in the light of infinite knowledge and infinite love. During our life review, we will discover every aspect of our life from all perspectives. For example, if a person chose to, it would be possible to count the number of mosquitoes in his yard as a child. Our life review is more of a reliving of our entire life. There is no judgment except what comes from our own conscience. During our life review, we become the universe and re-experience our entire lifetime in an instant. During our life review, the major focus is how we have interacted with other people. Throughout our life review, we are given the spiritual strength to soberly review our lives. The message from the life review is this: love. The life review is an evaluation of our soul's development based on our soul's history. During our life review, our thoughts and actions of love brings great joy to God and us. Our thoughts and actions of selfishness and anger bring remorse to God and us. We are the judges of our own life. God is not. During our life review, God asks us, "What have you done with the precious gift of life given you." During our life review, the question, "What have you done with your life?" is answered. After death, some people are not instantly exposed to God because it would be too unbearable for them. People are shown what they need to see after death. Some people need a heavenly meadow and they will get it. Some need to see relatives and they will come. Some need to see jewels and they are shown jewels. We see what is necessary for our introduction into the spirit world. We are gradually educated as spirit beings and brought into heaven. Worldly desires melt away as well as the base animal nature we have been fighting much of our lives. We become who we really are - part of the divine. After death, God reveals to us our true spiritual condition. The "being of light" can be called Jesus, Buddha, Yahweh, the Great Spirit, our Higher Self, etc. The name does not matter. Only the recognition of absolute love and truth is important. After death, there exists a "point of no return" where once this barrier is crossed, returning to our body is impossible. Getting back into our body from an NDE is like jumping into a swimming pool. People born blind have NDEs no different than sighted people. However, people born blind see for the first time in their lives during their NDE. People born blind and who see for the first time during their NDE do not regain their sight when they return to their bodies. All physical and mental handicaps are corrected immediately after death. In the light of God, there are no opinions, conclusions or beliefs - only being. Being in a state of total harmonic perfection. Immediately after death, the connection to our humanity begins to wear off and an experience of being light as air, extremely happy and in love begins to happen. When children die, they are not children after death. They appear to be as they would in the "prime of their life." Childhood NDEs are identical to adult NDEs. Women who die as a result from having an abortion do not necessarily have bad death experiences. There are so many different descriptions of the NDE because there are so many different afterlife levels, perceptions and experiences. There is nothing worth worrying about - not even death. The memory of an NDE is more real than the memory of what one did yesterday. 9. Life After Death If you want to know what life after death is like, pay close attention to your dreams. The realm of your dreams is the realm of the NDE; that is, it is the realm of the mind. In the realm of the mind, all things are possible. Life after death means freeing oneself from all physical limitations and fully inhabiting the realm of the mind. In the realms of the afterlife, it is what one thinks that is most important. This is because thoughts are deeds in the afterlife. Here, in the physical world, we are what we do. But in the world of the NDE, we are what we think. The following are insights from many NDEs dealing with life after death. Once our transition after death is complete, we can choose to go to other afterlife levels when we are ready. When we die, we are given the choice to remain on this earth until our bodies are buried or to move on to the level to which our spirits had grown while on earth. After death, if our ties to earth are not let go, we can become a "restless spirit" and we would be permitted to return to earth. When we die, we will find many levels of development. We will always go to that level where we are most comfortable. In the afterlife, our thoughts are no longer private, but become known to all around us. People of the same kind of thoughts are drawn to each other because it is too threatening to be with others with whom we disagree when they know it. Communication in the spirit world is by thought: a direct mind-to-mind transfer of thought. In the spirit realm, our thoughts and feelings cannot be hidden from others. This reality can be heaven for some and hell for others, depending on their thoughts and feelings. In the afterlife, people with very negative thoughts go to a plane of lower vibration where their kind of thoughts can live. If they entered the higher realms, the "Master-Vibration" of God would annihilate these thoughts. This Master-Vibration is often referred to as "the Holy Spirit." After death, people gravitate into homogeneous groups according to the rate of their soul's vibrations. If the percentage of discord in a person is small, it can be eliminated by the Master-Vibration of God; the remaining good can then live there. However, if there is more discord within a soul's vibrations than good, this cannot be done and the person must gravitate to a lower afterlife level and live with people of their kind. In the afterlife, each person lives in the kind of a heaven or hell they prepared for themselves while on earth. Nobody sends us anywhere. We are sorted by the vibration of our soul. Everyone goes where they fit in. There are no negative thoughts in the higher spirit realms, only positive affirmations. In the afterlife, no one is made to feel uncomfortable by being forced to do or accept things which they are not prepared for. At death, the dimension of the afterlife we travel to is determined by the level of spiritual development we have attained while on earth. When we die, our ability to accept truth and live by it governs our progress in the spirit. It determines the degree of light we possess. Nobody forces light and truth upon us, and nobody takes it away unless we let them. People are self-governed and self-judged in the spirit realm. People have total free will. In the afterlife, everyone is free to experience the various afterlife dimensions and nothing is restricted. The only governor is the state of the conscious mind. Deeply held beliefs come into visible expression there. Not everyone has the same experience because everyone creates his or her own experience. Subtle energies slowly open restrictive, closed minds in order to accept greater understanding. Every soul shines the light of love in various degrees. The lights of souls who love very little are dim. On earth we have an inner nature (our subconscious) and an outer nature (our personality). At death, our outer nature dies and our inner nature becomes our new outer nature in the afterlife. Our higher self (our superconscious) remains one with God. However, this level of consciousness must be "reawakened" while on earth. In the afterlife, no one is ever lost or left behind. Everyone is of equal importance and each can never cease to exist. Our earth experience determines our afterlife destiny, but no one is locked there, and each can progress to higher and higher levels of being. Things change little in the afterlife. If a person has the fixed belief that they will sleep until the resurrection of the body, they may sleep for a very long time. If a person keeps an open mind, they will be free to adapt to the new surroundings and fit in where they belong with no unusual difficulty. This is why having fixed beliefs limit an open mind. Time passes over there the same as here, that is, one event follows another. But looking at it another way, time doesn't pass at all because there is not enough change to make the passage of time evident. From another viewpoint, time in the afterlife stands still because it is always now. The past and future are of equal length because there never was a beginning and never can be an end. In the earthly rat race, events follow each other so rapidly it gives us the illusion of time flying. On the other hand, in prison with absolutely no change, the days would stretch into seeming eternities. How does a person get ahead of others in the afterlife? They don't. There is no place in heaven for discontent or personal ambition. Some people may not be able to change at all after they arrive in the afterlife. On earth, we can change ourselves quite easily and should use this life to make ourselves into the kind of people we want to be in the afterlife. In the afterlife, we do not stop learning or progressing in knowledge. Death is merely the doorway to the next level of soul growth and evolution. In the afterlife, death on earth is considered a graduation. Only those who believe they can leave their bodies and progress further after death actually do. "Libraries" exist in the afterlife. In these libraries, when one reflects on a topic, all the knowledge on that topic enters the mind. In the afterlife, one can create things with the powers of the mind. In the afterlife, as we adjust and understand how to work with our mind, we will automatically know what is needed as the desire arises. In the afterlife, auras are what we use to evaluate a person's spiritual condition. The lighter and more brilliant the color, the more advanced the person is. The aura is also useful to determine how much a person needs to work on spiritual development. In the afterlife, the eyes of the spirit see in more dimensions than the eyes of the body. In the afterlife, we have 360-degree vision. The experience is like having eyes all around your head. In the afterlife, we see things from every angle like a cubist painting by Picasso. In the afterlife, our soul is our consciousness and our spirit is our transparent, glowing body. In the afterlife, we see others as they see themselves. Others can appear the way they do because they perceive we need them to appear that way. Much communication in the afterlife is silent, although sound is sometimes used in communication because it is pleasant. To travel from one point to another in the afterlife, all one has to do is think about it. In the afterlife, we can remember and feel different times and events in our lives as if they were happening right now. In the afterlife, we can observe what is happening on earth whenever we choose to do so. The tremendous love experienced in the afterlife is like having the love of every mother in the universe pour into us for all eternity. Deceased loved ones appear in the afterlife as they looked like at their best during their lives. In the afterlife, people wear what they want to wear. They wear what they are most comfortable in. A spiritual "receiving station" exists to receive people after death who arrive in a hypnotic sleep due to their faulty belief they must sleep until Jesus comes. Here, others try to arouse them from their sleep. There is an invisible dimension in the clouds above the earth where animals and human spirits go to become replenished for further evolution on earth. Since there is no need for reproduction in the afterlife, sex plays a different role. Without physical bodies to act as buffers, the sexes can get immeasurably closer to each other and become more intimate. Without inhibitions to frustrate them, they can receive and express love more freely and completely. 10. God Not all experiencers see the light of God. Some have very brief experiences excluding an encounter with God. Some have negative experiences where God is nowhere to be found. Those experiencers who actually see the brilliant light and experience the ecstatic love know they have seen God. Those who experience God in an NDE never want to leave the presence of God again. Nevertheless, they return having this experience of God seared into their very hearts and minds. They carry this experience back with them to share with the rest of us. As one experiencer was told, the time is now for humanity to know for certain there is life after death. This knowledge includes the knowledge of God. Heavenly NDEs reveal that God, in the NDE, is analogous to air in this physical world. What air is to the physical world, God is to the spirit world. One of the universal aspects of the NDE is that everyone returns with the belief in a higher power of some sort. I suppose it corresponds to the old adage of there being no atheists in foxholes. There are no atheists coming back from NDEs. The following are insights from many NDEs having to do with God. God is the pattern for all life. God is life, light, time and space. God is the energy of all matter. God is the heart of all that matters. God is the very essence of all being. God is the source behind every sun. God is the source of all light and love. God is the core of all things. God is the single point of infinite light and absolute love. God is the life force of the universe. God can be thought of as an all-pervading "Master-Vibrational energy." This energy is often referred to as the "Holy Spirit." Thoughts in heaven are controlled by this Master-Vibration. This Vibration neutralizes all negative thoughts and lets those in the higher dimensions think only good thoughts of love and happiness. The Master-Vibrational energy of God controls the universe and seems to regulate everything except the ignorance within the minds of people on earth. God is love. Love is light. Light is life. God is the light of life that loves. The only reality is God and God is love. God loves without limit. God is everything. God is everywhere because nothing exists outside of God. God is neither a man nor a woman nor a thing. Life itself is God. God is the creative energy of the universe, expressed everything there is. Wherever we are, God is. Like God, we are constantly expressing ourselves in some way. All creation is God exploring God's very being through every way imaginable, through every one of us. The Biblical name for God, "I AM," really has a question mark behind it. "I AM? WHAT AM I?" Our search to know more and more about God will take an eternity. Within the light of God, we realize everyone and everything is connected to God. In the light is the cure for all diseases, the knowledge within every universe. The light is wisdom and love beyond all comprehension. The closer one gets to God, the closer one comes to all the light, love and knowledge in the universe. Being one with God is like suddenly knowing every grain of sand in the universe and knowing why God put it there. God is more than light. God is also the darkness. God is everything. The small inner voice in your thoughts is the voice of God. The little voice inside us prompting us to do good things comes from God. It is the light of love inside each of us. God doesn't force anyone to heaven, hell, or anywhere. We are free to choose and build our destiny. All paths lead back to God. In the light of God, it is impossible to lie to yourself or to others or to God. There is no place for secrets to hide. God does not judge us when we die. In the clear light and love of God, some may judge, condemn and punish only themselves. There is no judgment except the judgment one levels at oneself. God has promised not to intervene in our lives unless we ask. It is God's love that sends us on our journey and it is our love for God that allows us to return. God feels our pain when we hurt. God's standard is pure love. Our lives will be compared to this standard in the light of God. Pure love is serving God and others without having self-centered motives. God's overriding desire is to purify the darkness of our souls, irrespective of the suffering it puts us through to achieve that end. If we learn to accept our situations in life, instead of fighting it, then our suffering is greatly minimized. The joy of being in the light of God can be so intense, we may think we are going to shatter. But God will not let us shatter. We are not permitted to take in more of this bliss and joy than we are able to handle at a time. God does not care about theology. God cares mostly about your heart. Your beliefs shape the kind of feedback you get from God. It doesn't matter what you call God. The different religions have different ways of explaining the same God. God is not concerned about a person's sexual orientation, whether gay or straight. 11. Heaven Where is heaven? Is it up in the sky somewhere? Jesus is recorded as saying that heaven is within us (Luke 17:20-21). This would agree with what experiencers are telling us. We can experience the realm of the spirit by focusing within ourselves through meditating, dreaming, praying, and even quiet reflection. It appears from the NDE there are actually many heavens, all taking up the same space as this physical universe, much like boxes within boxes. Indeed, it might be more correct to say we are already in heaven (or hell, depending upon the condition of your heart). We attain the highest level of heaven by having unconditional love for everyone. Such love is truly and absolutely heaven. The following are insights from many NDEs concerning heaven. What people call "heaven" is really our true home and destination. It is where we go for "recess" or to be rewarded by assessing our progress as a soul, evaluating our lives and to remember all truths including our real identity. We stay there for however long best serves our development. Heaven is not a place of rest because no one there gets tired. It's more like a new lease on life. Heaven is a place of imagination. Heaven is exactly what our imagination needs it to be. In heaven, where all people really love each other, there are no inhibitions or need for them. Everyone does exactly as they please. Which works out well because only the best in each person survives, and good is all anyone ever wants to do. This allows a freedom and happiness that people on earth can't imagine. People don't go to heaven because of their good deeds, or because they believe this or that, but because they fit in and belong. It's what you are that counts. Each soul has a "job" to do - a position to fill in the greater scheme of things. All souls evolve. Souls can choose to remain in heaven and operate on a particular level for eternity if they desire. Things in heaven don't age, don't get dirty, don't wear out and don't get tired. God keeps everything pure. Our deceased pets appear in heaven the way we remember them, only younger and more vital. We can communicate with them telepathically. They also have dwelling places of their own. 12. Hell Like heaven, there are many different hell realms witnessed by experiencers. Many of the levels of heaven and hell are manifested right here on earth. Some people are rotting in prison while others are enjoying a tropical paradise. Some people are addicts trapped on skid row while others are luxuriously living in the splendor of a mansion. Some people are suffering in mental institutions while others are studying at college. This does not mean a person in prison cannot find heaven within them. Nor does it mean a person in a tropical paradise always has heaven within them. Heaven and hell are spiritual conditions manifesting themselves as actual realms in the afterlife. The following are insights from many NDEs dealing with hell. What people call "hell" is really a spiritual "time-out" condition where souls reflect and work out the things blocking them from the power of their own light. They stay there for however long best serves their development. The hellish plane of darkness is literally a "time-out," a condition where one is supposed to grasp the gravity of their offenses and to pay the price. This spiritual time-out could last a moment or eons of time, as humans know it, depending upon when one reaches the point of willingness to see the light. Hell is a state of mind. When we die, we are bound by what we think. People are in hell before they die. At death, we are gathered together with those who think as we do. We create our own hell (as well as heaven) within us right here on earth and we bring it with us after death. Hell is a spiritual condition we create by being away from God until we choose to return to God. Hell is a condition totally devoid of love. Hell is a lack of wisdom and not moving forward to progress. Hell is not a place. Hell is not literal flames. Hell is a temporary spiritual condition of total separation from love, joy, God, light, peace, sanity, etc. People put themselves in this state until they no longer refuse to love others and themselves. Those with negative thought patterns may flee the light of God at death because they are too ashamed or too afraid to have their inner thoughts and negative natures revealed to everyone. God does not condemn anyone to hell. People create their own hell by their own physical desires. Some people flee the light of God after death for fear their hidden desires and thoughts will be revealed. Physical desires can be carried over into the afterlife but physical desires cannot be satisfied there. This can create a hellish condition for those who have them. One level of hell exists right here on earth where an earthly desire is craved but cannot be satisfied. Some people linger around the living after death, usually to try to satisfy a physical desire. These beings are called "earth-bound discarnates." By focusing on the love within them, people on earth are protected from earth-bound discarnates and any harm they may try to do. The devil does not exist, at least not as people on earth believe. There is no being who can be everywhere at once, who has powers to torment and tempt everyone at the same time. God would not permit such a being to exist. There is no devil to blame our own transgressions on. The hell of hells is knowing we were our own devil. The devil is really a person's own egocentric nature. However, there are earth-bound human souls with low vibrations, whom we may regard as "devils" because they can annoy us at times through telepathy. These earth-bound souls tune in on us through our low vibrations of hate, fear and greed. They can be tuned out with unselfish love or, if necessary, be chased away by a stronger soul, such as Christ. God will allow people to be dragged into darkness with like-minded creatures. It is a way to purge and redeem them by putting them through this kind of experience. However, God does not allow people to be pulled into darkness because of their loving nature. People with a loving nature are attracted upward toward the light. An extreme neglect of spiritual matters on earth can result in an earth-bound condition. This is the condition people often associate with ghosts. The living have auras of light surrounding their bodies. If the aura becomes distorted through alcohol or drugs, an earth-bound discarnate can temporarily possess the body. If an addiction isn't conquered before death, it could keep your soul earth-bound. Earth-bound souls stay around the earth until they learn to accept the greater power around them and let go of the earth and its desires. In the hellish realms, souls are convinced God doesn't exist. When a soul in hell does turn to God through prayer, the light of God surrounds them and they disappear from there and appear in a higher afterlife realm. To souls in hell, the sight of someone disappearing appears as if they were exterminated. This may explain the great fear of prayer in hell. Souls in the hellish realms do not have the same powers to progress and achieve joy that others with more light in the higher afterlife realms have. Their progress is limited - a result of divine justice. However, these souls can choose to grow if they wish. The way out of these hellish realms is to have a willingness to see the light and seek love for others and God. To escape the darkness, one must think p