Out-of Body Experiences and the Near-Death
Experience
Imagine
you are a patient in a hospital and surgery is
being performed on you. You are sound asleep. You were
sound asleep long before they wheeled into the operating
room. But while you are asleep something very strange
happens. During the operation, you are suddenly awakened
to find yourself floating near the ceiling! Down below
are the doctors working on your body (as in the cartoon
on the left). You see a strange sign hanging from the
ceiling which says "Popsicles are in bloom." You watch
as the doctor puts the electric paddles on your chest.
You have a wonderful peaceful feeling which you have
never had before. The doctors give your body a shock
and you are back in your body sound asleep again. Later, you awaken
in your hospital room and tell the doctor about your out-of-body
experience and the weird "Popsicles are in
bloom" sign. The
doctor smiles and tells you, "Your heart stopped
during surgery and we had to revive you." The doctor
then explains to you, "You are part of a near-death
study and you just had a near-death experience. You
are the first patient who has ever read that sign. That
sign can only be read by someone reading it from the
vantage point of the ceiling. And because you were able
to read this sign and tell us about it, you have proven
scientifically that the mind can function outside of
the brain and body. A great scientific discovery has just occurred.
Congratulations. You
have proven scientifically that consciousness transcends
our physical body and death. Your validated
out-of-body perception during your near-death
experience (NDE) has won you the Nobel Prize. As you
will read below, there are many NDEs which come very
close to providing such evidence. Indeed, it is only
a matter of time.
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Table
of Contents |
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1.
How NDEs will prove the survival of consciousness after
death |
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Someday, someone is going to have a near-death experience
and observe a scientifically controlled test object,
such as a sign like "You are dead" which can
only be seen if the observer is actually outside of
their body. However , this is only the first step. Researchers
must also do the following:
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a. |
Prove that consciousness
can transcend the body by perceiving verifiable
events while out of the body.
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b. |
The next step is the same
as the first step except it occurs while the
body is verifiably "dead" (i.e., clinical
and brain death).
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c. |
Once the above can be proven,
all the skeptics will have to admit that consciousness
survives death.
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It may surprise some people to know
that these kind of studies are going on right at this
moment. Indeed, it is only a matter of time when someone
tells a doctor they saw the "You are dead"
sign. For test purposes, however, the sign will probably
say something more cryptic to insure the uniqueness
of such an event.
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2.
Examples of out-of-body visual perception |
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A large number of near-death experiencers have witnessed
verifiable events occurring outside of their body. Unfortunately,
such evidence does not constitute "scientific evidence."
The reason is because scientific evidence involves replication
of the experience and the existence of strict controls
over the events being witnessed. However, the example
I gave at the beginning of this page is the kind of
test environment which can provide such scientific evidence.
Many examples of anecdotal evidence of verifiable perception
are provided on this web page.
The following are three of the most
interesting out-of-body testimonies from three NDEs
which I have on my website. They are from the near-death
experiences of
Dr. Dianne Morrissey,
Dr. George Ritchie, and
Reinee Pasarow. They are exceptional because they
are NDEs involving an extended out-of-body phase, when
the experiencer observed events happening around their
body.
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a.
Dr. Dianne Morrissey's NDE and out-of-body perception |
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"I bent over to pick
up the plastic tubing. As I began to straighten
up, I accidentally bumped the tubing on the
edge of the tank. The water suddenly squirted
across my face - the pain was so sharp, it felt
as if a knife where slitting my cheek! I screamed
from the shock and pain, then felt a moment
of temporary relief as the water crossed over
my molars. My reprieve was short-lived, however,
as the electrified water rushed into my mouth.
"As my body bent over
in shock, I had the most uncanny knowledge that
death was ahead of me. I began to mourn the
loss of everything I'd known: the earth,
my home, my friends - all that I'd been
aware of, all that I loved. Everything I'd
believed to be true and lasting was slipping
away from me. I was face to face with death,
face to face with the unknown.
"My body was thrown
backwards and to one side by the current. My
body crashed to the floor, thrown with such
force that my head went right through the drywall,
about a foot above the floor. I never felt the
injuries, however, because I was no longer in
my body. I was actually watching my electrocution
from above! How could I be out of my body and
still be alive? I wondered, astonished.
"Suddenly, I was aware
that I was inside a vast, seemingly infinite
blackness. I wasn't sure where this blackness
was in relationship to the earth, but for some
reason I was unafraid. My blackout period was
brief, for I now found myself back in my home,
but in a new form. I was transparent, yet I
still looked like me.
"How elated I felt!
Now, out of my body, I had no worries, no cares.
Never had I felt like this when I was "alive".
My entire spirit body was transparent, and I
was inside a glowing white light that extended
about three feet around me. At that moment,
an awareness overtook me - I am not my physical
body! This realization made me feel so free,
so wonderful! My spirit was glowing with a white
light that illuminated the entire room.
"Then, I was up near
the ceiling again. Everything still looked the
same - the furnishings, the walls - but there
was a new awareness about the dimension to the
scene - it had become transparent. I could see
everything more clearly than ever before, and
like a scientist, I found myself looking at
life through a microscope, discovering minuscule
particles of matter normally invisible.
"I was now aware of
the absence of physical sensations, yet I was
feeling a heightened sense of awareness such
as I'd never felt while alive. I knew I
was different from the "Dianne" I
had been, but I also knew I was "me".
It was similar to looking at your reflection
in a mirror; you know you're not the reflection,
but it does appear to be you.
"Now, I saw that everything
was shrouded by a mist. Despite a lack of gravity,
I could easily control my direction, and when
I moved into the living room, I noticed that
I had just walked through the glass coffee table.
Wow! How did I do that? I marveled.
"Tuffy (her dog) suddenly
entered the den and began nipping at my face
and pawing at my arm, trying to get my body
to wake up. I knew that his relentless attempts
to awaken my physical body wouldn't work,
yet I was proud of him for trying, and even
hoped his efforts might work. I wondered where
his chum, Penny, was, and suddenly I was next
to her in the backyard. I opened my mouth to
talk to her and felt my tongue moving, but no
sounds came out. I could distinctly hear my
voice, and then realized it was coming from
my mind. I tried several times to get Penny's
attention, yelling, "Penny, can you see
me? Penny, can you hear me?" Apparently
she didn't, because there was no response.
"Next, I walked around
my backyard. As I looked through the walls of
my house toward the front sidewalk, I noticed
a man walking down the street. Eagerly, I flew
to him, right through the walls, and tried to
get his attention. Staring deeply into his eyes,
I said forcefully, "Can you help me? I
need help." Then I tried to shake his shoulders,
but he still didn't notice me. Frustrated,
I tried to touch his shoulder to get him to
look at me, and my hand went through his upper
right shoulder blade and out his back. This
startled me.
"What am I to do? I
wondered, becoming upset when I realized that
the man could neither see nor hear me. Instantly,
I was back in my yard again, Penny beside me.
I noticed that whenever I felt any apprehension,
I was instantly moved to a place of greater
comfort.
"On the way back to
the den, I stopped right in the middle of the
wall between rooms. I sensed that I was to look
down at something fantastic, and as I gazed
downward, I saw a long silver cord coming out
of my spirit body, right through the cheesecloth-like
fabric I was wearing. The cord extended down
and out in front of me, and as I turned around,
I saw that the silver cord draped around and
behind me, like an umbilical cord. I followed
it through the two hallway walls and into my
den, where I saw it attached to the back of
the head of my physical body. The cord was about
an inch wide and sparkled like Christmas tree
tinsel.
"As soon as I saw that
the silver cord was attached to my physical
body, my spirit body was thrust into a dark
tunnel. I moved through it with great speed,
traveling faster than I could have imagined
possible. Although the tunnel was filled with
an all consuming darkness, I felt peaceful and
unafraid." (Dr.
Dianne Morrissey)
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b.
Dr. George Ritchie's NDE and out-of-body perception |
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"The men let
go of my arms ... I heard a click and a whirr.
The whirr went on and on. It was getting louder.
The whirr was inside my head and my knees were
made of rubber. They were bending and I was
falling and all the time the whirr grew louder.
I sat up with a start. What time was it? I looked
at the bedside table but they'd taken the
clock away. In fact, where was any of my stuff?
"I jumped out of bed
in alarm, looking for my clothes. My uniform
wasn't on the chair. I turned around, then
froze. Someone was lying in that bed. I took
a step closer. He was quite a young man, with
short brown hair, lying very still. But, the
thing was impossible! I myself had just gotten
out of that bed! For a moment I wrestled with
the mystery of it. It was too strange to think
about - and anyway I didn't have the time.
"I went back past the
offices and stepped out into the corridor. A
sergeant was coming along it carrying an instrument
tray covered with a cloth. Probably he didn't
know anything, but I was so glad to find someone
awake that I started toward him.
"'Excuse me, Sergeant,'
I said. 'You haven't seen the ward boy
for this unit, have you?'
"He didn't answer.
Didn't even glance at me. He just kept coming,
straight at me, not slowing down.
"'Look out!'
I yelled, jumping out of his way.
"The next minute he
was past me, walking away down the corridor
as if he had never seen me, though how we had
kept from colliding I didn't know. And then
I saw something that gave me a new idea. Farther
down the corridor was one of the heavy metal
doors that led to the outside. I hurried toward
it. Even if I had missed that train, I'd
find some way of getting to Richmond!
"Almost without knowing
it I found myself outside, racing swiftly along,
traveling faster in fact than I'd ever moved
in my life. Looking down I was astonished to
see not the ground, but the tops of mesquite
bushes beneath me. Already Camp Barkeley seemed
to be far behind me as I sped over the dark
frozen desert. My mind kept telling me that
what I was doing was impossible, and yet ...
it was happening. I was going to Richmond; somehow
I had known that from the moment I burst through
that hospital door. Going to Richmond a hundred
times faster than any train on earth could take
me.
"Almost immediately
I noticed myself slowing down. Just below me
now, where two streets came together, I caught
a flickering blue glow. It came from a neon
sign over the door of a red-roofed one-story
building with a Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer sign
propped in the front window. Cafe, the jittering
letters over the door read, and from the windows
light streamed onto the pavement. Staring down
at it, I realized I had stopped moving altogether.
Finding myself somehow suspended fifty feet
in the air was an even stranger feeling than
the whirlwind flight had been. But I had no
time to puzzle over it, for down the sidewalk
toward the all-night cafe a man came briskly
walking. At least, I thought, I could find out
from him what town this was and in what direction
I was heading. Even as the idea occurred to
me - as though thought and motion had become
the same thing - I found myself down on the
sidewalk, hurrying along at the stranger's
side. He was a civilian, maybe forty or forty-five,
wearing a topcoat but no hat. He was obviously
thinking hard about something because he never
glanced my way as I fell into step beside him.
"'Can you tell me
please,' I said, 'What city this is?'
"He kept right on walking.
"'Please sir!'
I said, speaking louder, 'I'm a stranger
here and I'd appreciate it if ...'
"We reached the cafe
and he turned, reaching for the door handle.
Was the fellow deaf? I put out my left hand
to tap his shoulder. There was nothing there.
"I stood there in front
of the door, gaping after him as he opened it
and disappeared inside. It had been like touching
thin air. Like no one had been there at all.
And yet I had distinctly seen him, even to the
beginnings of a black stubble on his chin where
he needed a shave.
"I backed away from
the mystery of the substance-less man and leaned
up against the guy wire of a telephone pole
to think things through. My body went through
that guy wire as though it too had not been
there.
"There on the sidewalk
of that unknown city, I did some incredulous
thinking. The strangest, most difficult thinking
I had ever done. The man in the cafe, this telephone
pole ... suppose they were perfectly normal.
Suppose I was the one who was - changed, somehow.
What if in some impossible, unimaginable way,
I lost my ... hardness. My ability to grasp
things, to make contact with the world. Even
to be seen! The fellow just now. It was obvious
he never saw or heard me.
"And suddenly I remembered
the young man I had seen in the bed in that
little hospital room. What if that had been
... me? Or anyhow, the material, concrete part
of myself that in some unexplainable way I'd
gotten separated from. What if the form which
I had left lying in the hospital room in Texas
was my own?
"And if it were, how
could I get back to it again? Why had I ever
rushed off so unthinkingly?
"I was moving again,
speeding away from the city. Below me was the
broad river. I appeared to be going back, back
in the direction I had come from, and it seemed
to me I was flashing across space even faster
than before. Hills, lakes, farms slipped away
beneath me as I sped in an unswerving straight
line over the dark nighttime land. I was standing
in front of the base hospital.
"And so began one of
the strangest searches that can ever have taken
place: the search for myself. From one ward
to another of that enormous complex I rushed,
pausing in each small room, stooping over the
occupant of the bed, hurrying on.
"I backed toward the
doorway. The man in that bed was dead! I felt
the same reluctance I had the previous time
at being in a room with a dead person. But ...
if that was my ring, then - then it was me,
the separated part of me, lying under that sheet.
Did that mean that I was ...
"It was the first time
in this entire experience that the word death
occurred to me in connection with what was happening.
"But I wasn't dead!
How could I be dead and still be awake? Thinking.
Experiencing. Death was different. Death was
... I didn't know. Blanking out. Nothingness.
I was me, wide awake, only without a physical
body to function in.
"Frantically I clawed
at the sheet, trying to draw it back, trying
to uncover the figure on the bed. All my efforts
did not even stir a breeze in the silent little
room.
"Suddenly I was aware
that it was brighter, a lot brighter, than it
had been. I stared in astonishment as the brightness
increased, coming from nowhere, seeming to shine
everywhere at once. All the light bulbs in the
ward couldn't give off that much light.
All the bulbs in the world couldn't! It
was impossibly bright. It was like a million
welders' lamps all blazing at once.
"'I'm glad I
don't have physical eyes at this moment,'
I thought. 'This light would destroy the
retina in a tenth of a second.'
"'No, I corrected
myself, not the light. He. He would be too bright
to look at.'
"For now I saw that
it was not light but a man who had entered the
room, or rather, a man made out of light, though
this seemed no more possible to my mind than
the incredible intensity of the brightness that
made up his form." (Dr.
George Ritchie)
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c.
Reinee Pasarow's NDE and out-of-body perception |
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Reinee Pasarow was as a teenager when she
had an NDE after she became unconscious following
an allergic food reaction. While outside of
her body, she could sense every sound, every
action and even every thought of the persons
people around her. She observed two firemen’s
frantic efforts to revive her. All the events
she witnessed while out of her body - the conversations,
the actions of the persons involved, the hospital
scene - happened exactly as she remembered them.
Furthermore, aspects of her OBE have been reported
by other people who have had OBEs which is remarkable
because this type of information was something
she did not know about at the time and would
read about later.
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"Then, just like
that (clapping her hands), I became a ball of
light or energy in the midst of this crowd that
was circling a body. I became massively aware,
unlike any awareness I had had during physical
existence. I was not really aware of myself.
I was aware of everyone around me. I was aware
of my mother and my neighbors, and my friends
and the firemen and what they were thinking
and what they were feeling and what they were
hoping and what they were praying. This was
such a pummeling input of emotion and information
that I was all at once overwhelmed and confused,
and rather disoriented.
"I followed
their attention to something on the sidewalk
and I looked at a body on the sidewalk. I looked
at the curve of the wrist bone and I recognized
it. I remember looking at it and thinking, "That
looks so much like my wrist bone." And
then I became aware that the thing on the sidewalk,
that thing that suddenly became a piece of meat
to me, was what I had identified as myself before,
but had no connection with it other than that
I had been with it for a very long time. But
it had nothing to do with me because suddenly,
I was more of a person than I had ever been
before. I was more conscious than I could ever
be. I was free of the limitations of being a
physical being.
"I looked at my
body and I was repulsed with the grief and the
tumult around it and with the very idea that
I had ever considered something physical to
be my reality, to be a human reality.
"And with that (taps the table) again
like this, I was bumped way up, up above some
light wires. From that point I could watch everyone
beneath me, but I was not as closely associated
with them, [but] I was completely feeling everything
they were feeling.
"I watched my
mother and a boy come out of the house and up
the hill which I could not have seen physically.
I was very sad for my mother. I was very sad
for my friend who kept calling me. And I was
very sad for the child who had come out of the
house. I was very sad that he would think I
was dead. So my concern was for them. I spent
my time observing them and calling to them -
calling to them that everything was as it should
be, that everything was fine, that I was free,
that it was wonderful, that I loved them and
that they loved me and that the bond, unlike
physical bonds, would never be destroyed. I
tried to communicate this to them over and over
again and I realized that I had no mouth. I
had no body. They could not hear what I was
saying to them. I would have to leave them in
the same hands I had left myself in the process
of dying. With that I turned away, just sort
of like a ball, just turned away.
"My
attention turned away lovingly but knowing that
there was nothing I could do. I turned away
from them and began to pull up. I became aware
(it was as if I were a camera on a space ship
or something) of our place, my particular little
street and then my particular little town. I
kept pulling up and up and up to a point where
I could observe the whole earth. This was wonderful!
(After Reinee's
visit to heaven, she returns to where her body
is located.)
"With
a terribly hard crash, I became aware of the
scene I had left earlier - the fire trucks,
and now an ambulance. There were men who were
picking up my body and loading it into the ambulance.
I was in a state of complete grief. I felt that
I had become Eve and was cast out of the garden
of Eden.
"As I was descending down
this tunnel, my heart was already attached to
my home beyond. I was begging not to leave.
I crashed down into this realm of existence
and was suddenly confused by time and space.
It was as if I had never existed physically.
I was suddenly disoriented. My concern was for
my mother, because she was by herself and she
was losing a sixteen year old daughter. She
knew that this was happening because the ambulance
attendant looked at the driver in front and
said, "DOA. DOA," which means of course
dead on arrival. The driver turned off the siren
and slowed down the ambulance. Before, he had
been driving in a very reckless manner.
"We were coming out of the mountains.
As we did that, my concern was for the pain
of my mother. I simple wanted to comfort her
and to wrap my soul around her. To assuage the
loss of a daughter, the loss of a child, I found
myself simply praying for her.
"I
followed the ambulance to the hospital and I
watched as my body was unloaded. My mother followed
the gurney into the emergency room. I watched
as the first doctor went to work on me. I wasn't
particularly interested in the first doctor
because the first doctor had, that day, been
through motorcycle accidents coming out of the
mountains. He had been through a very long day
and he was not concerned with someone who had
been brought in dead on arrival. He had no connection
with me. He didn't care and had no affection.
So I had no interest in watching what he did
because my interest was based on affection and
love.
"I then left the emergency
room and was above my mother and some friends
who had followed her into the other room. I
again tried to communicate with them. I tried
to let them know that, "This is a very
joyous occasion. I am dead on arrival. Hopefully
all would go well. They are never going to be
able to revive me. I was going to be dead now.
Death had become life to me. Death was not something
to be frightened of, but something to look forward
to."
"What happened then was
the first doctor pronounced me dead and was
sending my body off to the morgue. My own personal
physician, who was a country doctor and a very
gruff man, stormed into the emergency room in
a tuxedo with his black bag. He looked at the
nurse on the phone who was calling the morgue,
and looked at the doctor who was washing his
hands, and looked at my [covered] body and said, "What
the hell happened here? Where is the patient?"
They said, "She was dead on arrival."
He said, "The hell she was." He proceeded
to scream at the other nurse who was sort of
standing off in the corner, "I want injections
of adrenaline. Bring them to me immediately
and come over here and assist me." He began
to go to work on my body. He began to beat on
the chest and began to shock. I was simply terrified
by this turn of events and disgusted that they
would treat a body so brutally.
"All
of a sudden I sort of became protective towards
my body, even though I wanted nothing to do
with it. I began to be protective. They could
at least be nice about it. But they were beating
on my chest and shocking my body, but I was
up in the corner of the emergency room accompanied
by other essences who were keeping me contained
in that emergency room."
(Reinee
Pasarow)
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Reinee then described how
she finally returned to her body as a result of her
doctor's last effort to revive her. The medical
professionals she talked to did not know how to deal
with her experience.
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3.
Verified out-of-body perception In NDEs |
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The "holy grail" of
NDE research is finding an undeniable answer to the
question of whether consciousness can survive bodily
death. But before this can be answered, researchers
must first determine whether consciousness can transcend
the brain and function outside of it. One way is to
discover this is to examine those NDEs which are "veridical"
(i.e., verified). Veridical NDEs occur when the experiencer
acquires verifiable information which they could not
have obtained by any normal means. Often, near-death
experiencers report witnessing events that happen at
some distant location away from their body, such as
another room of the hospital. If the events witnessed
by the experiencer at the distant location can be verified
to have occurred, then veridical perception would be
said to have taken place. It would provide very compelling
evidence that NDEs are experiences outside of the physical
body. NDE research is coming very close to providing
such undeniable evidence. What follows are some examples.
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a.
Pam Reynolds's verified out-of-body perception |
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In
Dr. Michael Sabom's
book,
Light and Death,
he includes the NDE account of a woman named
Pam Reynolds
who underwent a rare operation to remove a giant
basilar artery aneurysm
in her brain that seriously threatened her life.
The surgical procedure used to remove the aneurysm
is known as "hypothermic
cardiac arrest"
or "standstill." Pam's body temperature
was lowered to 60 degrees, her heartbeat and
breathing were stopped, her brain waves were
flattened, and all the blood was drained from
her head. For all practical purposes, she was
put to death. After removing the aneurysm, she
was restored to life. But, during the time that
Pam was in standstill, she experienced a profound
NDE. Her remarkably detailed veridical out-of-body
observations of her surgery were later verified
to be very accurate. Pam's case is considered
to be one of the strongest cases of veridical
perception evidence in NDE research because
of her ability to describe the unique surgical
instruments and procedures used and her ability
to describe in detail these events while she
was clinically and brain dead. The following
is the out-of-body aspect of her NDE in her
own words:
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"The
next thing I recall was the sound: It was a
Natural "D." As I listened to the
sound, I felt it was pulling me out of the top
of my head. The further out of my body I got,
the more clear the tone became. I had the impression
it was like a road, a frequency that you go
on ... I remember seeing several things in the
operating room when I was looking down. It was
the most aware that I think that I have ever
been in my entire life ...I was metaphorically
sitting on [the doctor's] shoulder. It was
not like normal vision. It was brighter and
more focused and clearer than normal vision
... There was so much in the operating room
that I didn't recognize, and so many people.
"I thought the way they
had my head shaved was very peculiar. I expected
them to take all of the hair, but they did not
...
"The saw-thing that
I hated the sound of looked like an electric
toothbrush and it had a dent in it, a groove
at the top where the saw appeared to go into
the handle, but it didn't ... And the saw
had interchangeable blades, too, but these blades
were in what looked like a socket wrench case
... I heard the saw crank up. I didn't see
them use it on my head, but I think I heard
it being used on something. It was humming at
a relatively high pitch and then all of a sudden
it went Brrrrrrrrr! like that.
"Someone said something
about my veins and arteries being very small.
I believe it was a female voice and that it
was Dr. Murray, but I'm not sure. She was
the cardiologist. I remember thinking that I
should have told her about that ... I remember
the heart-lung machine. I didn't like the
respirator ... I remember a lot of tools and
instruments that I did not readily recognize.
"There was a sensation
like being pulled, but not against your will.
I was going on my own accord because I wanted
to go. I have different metaphors to try to
explain this. It was like the Wizard of Oz -
being taken up in a tornado vortex, only you're
not spinning around like you've got vertigo.
You're very focused and you have a place
to go. The feeling was like going up in an elevator
real fast. And there was a sensation, but it
wasn't a bodily, physical sensation. It
was like a tunnel but it wasn't a tunnel."
(Pam meets her deceased
relatives and then must return to her body.)
"But
then I got to the end of it and saw the thing,
my body. I didn't want to get into it ...
It looked terrible, like a train wreck. It looked
like what it was: dead. I believe it was covered.
It scared me and I didn't want to look at
it. It was communicated to me that it was like
jumping into a swimming pool. No problem, just
jump right into the swimming pool. I didn't
want to, but I guess I was late or something
because he [the uncle] pushed me. I felt a definite
repelling and at the same time a pulling from
the body. The body was pulling and the tunnel
was pushing ... It was like diving into a pool
of ice water ... It hurt! When I came back,
they were playing Hotel California and the line
was "You can check out anytime you like,
but you can never leave." I mentioned [later]
to Dr. Brown that that was incredibly insensitive
and he told me that I needed to sleep more."
(Pam
Reynolds)
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b. Dr.
Charles Tart's case of verified out-of-body perception |
|

Dr. Charles T. Tart,
www.issc-taste.org
and
www.paradigm-sys.com,
is a transpersonal
psychologist and parapsychologist known for his psychological
work on the nature of consciousness (particularly altered
states of consciousness), as one of the founders of
the field of
transpersonal psychology,
and for his research in scientific parapsychology. He
served as an instructor in psychiatry in the
School of Medicine of the University of Virginia,
and as a consultant on government funded parapsychological
research at the
Stanford
Research Institute. Dr. Tart, the author of
The End of Materialism, is known for his experimental
work in autoscopic out-of-body and near-death experiences.
He is currently a professor of psychology at the
University of California at Davis. Dr. Tart published
an article in the
Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research
which documents the OBE of a young woman who was one
of his research subjects. What makes this particular
OBE remarkable is that she was able to leave her physical
body and read a 5-digit number from a significant distance
and correctly give it to him upon return. This is one
of best examples of a veridical OBE occurring under
laboratory conditions.
Read the article here.
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c.
Reverend George Rodonaia's NDE and verified out-of-body
perception |
|
 
The book entitled,
The Self Does Not Die: Verified
Paranormal Phenomena from Near-Death Experiences,
by
Titus Rivas,
Anny Dirven, Rudolf H. Smit,
Robert Mays,
and
Janice Holden,
documents P.M.H. Atwater's research into
George Rodonaia's extraordinary case of veridical
out-of-body telepathic perception of an injured infant
and George's wife during his NDE from Atwater's book
Beyond The Light. The following is an excerpt:
"When
Rodonaia thought of his body, he saw it lying in the
morgue. He remembered everything that had happened.
He was also able to 'see' the thoughts and emotions
of his wife, Nino, and of the people who had been involved
in the accident. It was as if they had their thoughts
'inside of him.' He then wanted to find out the 'truth'
of those thoughts and emotions. By expressing a longing
for greater knowledge, he was confronted by mental images
of existence and thus became acquainted with thousands
of years of history.
"When
he returned to his body in the morgue, he was drawn
to a nearby hospital, where the wife of a friend had
just had a baby. The newborn was constantly crying.
He examined the baby, a girl. His 'eyes' were like X-rays
that could look right through the little body. This
ability enabled him to draw the conclusion that the
baby had broken its hip during delivery. He spoke to
her, 'Don’t cry. Nobody understands you.' The baby was
so astonished by his presence that she immediately stopped
crying. According to Rodonaia, children are able to
see and hear transmaterial apparitions. The child reacted
to him, he believes, because he was 'a physical reality'
to her.
"After three days, when the autopsy of Rodonaia’s body
was just getting under way, he succeeded in opening
his eyes. At first, the doctors thought it was a reflex,
but Rodonaia appeared to have actually come back from
the dead, even though his death and his frigid condition
had both been confirmed. He was in poor condition physically,
but after three days, the first words he spoke were
about the baby that urgently needed help. X-rays of
the baby confirmed that he was right.
"At one point, Atwater interviewed Rodonaia’s wife,
Nino, who stated that during his NDE, Rodonaia had actually
witnessed what she had seen. According to Nino, he had
actually had telepathic contact with her. In an email
dated July 28, 2015, Atwater wrote Rivas the following
about this aspect of the case:
|
"George
told me that as part of his near-death experience,
among the many things he could do was to be
able to enter the minds of all his friends and
find out whether or not they were really friends.
During this entry process, he also entered the
mind of this wife, Nino. When he did, he both
saw and heard his wife picking out his gravesite.
As she stood there looking at the gravesite,
in her head, she pictured several men she would
consider being her next husband. She made a
list for herself of their various qualities,
pro and con, to decide which one would be the
most suitable.
"After George revived
and his tongue shrunk back to its normal size
so George could talk (this took three days),
George greeted his wife. He told her about the
gravesite scenario. He described everything
she saw there. Then he told her everything she
thought about while there, the specific men
she was considering to be her next husband and
[the] list she was making in her mind about
their various pros and cons. He was correct
in every detail. This so freaked her out that
she refused to have much to do with him for
a year. I had no sense that this was telepathic,
but real, physically real, as if George’s mind
was physically inside his wife’s mind. He saw
what she saw. He also saw what she thought.
"When I met Nino and both children, I asked
Nino if I could talk to her about that incident
at the gravesite and her list of qualities of
the men she was considering marrying. She described
the incident for me and that all of this was
done in the privacy of her own mind. She only
thought about the men and their various qualities.
The list was her own. When her suddenly, newly
alive, formerly dead husband talked about that
personal moment at the gravesite, named the
men she thought about, and then went on to 'read'
the list back to her that she made for each
man, she was utterly shocked at his accuracy
and how he could even do this. This shock was
felt as if an affront against her right to privacy,
the intimate privacy of her own mind. I asked
if it was true that she would have little or
nothing to do with him for a year. She said,
yes, it was true. She could not sleep in the
same room with him. When I asked why, her answer
was: 'I no longer had the privacy of my own
mind. This was very hard to take.'" (The
Self Does Not Die, p.130-132)
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Nino also confirmed what happened
at the hospital, the first words he said after his tongue
swelling went down, of his friend’s wife having just
given birth to a daughter, he told the doctors to get
right up to the maternity ward and X-ray that baby’s
hip, that it had been broken by the attending nurse
who had dropped the baby. George was a doctor himself
and he described the hip break in detail. The doctors
rushed up to the maternity ward, had the baby X-rayed
and found the break exactly as described by George.
They then confronted the nurse with what they found
and she admitted to dropping the baby. She was immediately
fired.
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d.
Dr. Pim van Lommel's case of verified out-of-body
perception |
|

In
January of 2001, near-death experiences and near-death
research earned greater scientific respect and credibility
when the findings of a particular NDE study were published.
The distinguished British medical journal
The Lancet published
an article by Dr. Pim van Lommel of the Rijnstate
Hospital in the Netherlands on the first large-scale
study of NDEs which he conducted.
His study began in 1988 and lasted
13 years. It included 344 survivors of cardiac arrest
from 10 Dutch hospitals. Of these 344 survivors, 18
percent experienced an NDE. And because Lommel and his
staff conducted follow-up interviews with these patients
over many years, they were able to rule out such factors
as anoxia, seizures, medication, etc. Lommel's findings
confirmed prior research findings conducted by other
near-death researchers. It confirmed that NDEs are real
and they cannot be explained by physiological or psychological
causes alone. Lommel also accepted the implication that
consciousness survives death and that consciousness
is not completely dependent upon the brain.
Lommel noted that only 10 seconds
after the heart stops beating, the electroencephalogram
goes dead. At this point, there is no activity in the
brain cortex and the brain cannot manufacture visions.
Within 10 minutes, brain stem activity ceases and irreparable
brain damage can occur. However, Lommel notes that some
patients still reported being conscious at this point.
One particular example cited by Lommel is a man who
came into the hospital already blue from a lack of oxygen.
The hospital staff spent 90 minutes trying to resuscitate
him, using artificial respiration, heart massage and
defibrillation, before they could move him to intensive
care where he was remained in a coma for a week with
brain damage. But when the patient regained consciousness,
he was able to describe events that occurred around
him while he was brain damaged and out of his body.
This veridical evidence comes from a coronary-care-unit
nurse who reported the veridical out-of-body experience
of the comatose patient:
|
"During a night
shift an ambulance brings in a 44-year-old
cyanotic, comatose man into the coronary
care unit. He had been found about an hour
before in a meadow by passers-by. After
admission, he receives artificial respiration
without intubation, while heart massage
and defibrillation are also applied. When
we wanted to intubate the patient, he turns
out to have dentures in his mouth. I remove
these upper dentures and put them onto the
crash car. Meanwhile, we continue extensive
CPR. After about an hour and a half the
patient has sufficient heart rhythm and
blood pressure, but he is still ventilated
and intubated, and he is still comatose.
He is transferred to the intensive care
unit to continue the necessary artificial
respiration. Only after more than a week
do I meet again with the patient, who is
by now back on the cardiac ward. I distribute
his medication. The moment he sees me he
says:
"Oh, that
nurse knows where my dentures are."
|
"I am very surprised.
Then he elucidates:
"Yes, you
were there when I was brought into hospital
and you took my dentures out of my mouth
and put them onto that car, it had all
these bottles on it and there was this
sliding drawer underneath and there
you put my teeth."
|
"I was especially
amazed because I remembered this happening
while the man was in deep coma and in the
process of CPR. When I asked further, it
appeared the man had seen himself lying
in bed, that he had perceived from above
how nurses and doctors had been busy with
CPR. He was also able to describe correctly
and in detail the small room in which he
had been resuscitated as well as the appearance
of those present like myself. At the time
that he observed the situation he had been
very much afraid that we would stop CPR
and that he would die. And it is true that
we had been very negative about the patient's
prognosis due to his very poor medical condition
when admitted. The patient tells me that
he desperately and unsuccessfully tried
to make it clear to us that he was still
alive and that we should continue CPR. He
is deeply impressed by his experience and
says he is no longer afraid of death. Four
weeks later he left hospital as a healthy
man." (Dr.
Pim Van Lommel)
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4.
Miscellaneous NDE testimonies on out-of-body perception |
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Jane
Seymour:
The famous movie actress who starred
in the television series "Dr. Quinn,
Medicine Woman," describes the
following out-of-body experience during
her NDE:
|
"I literally
left my body. I had this feeling that
I could see myself on the bed, with
people grouped around me. I remember
them all trying to resuscitate me. I
was above them, in the corner of the
room looking down. I saw people putting
needles in me, trying to hold me down,
doing things." (Jane
Seymour)
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Vicki Umipeg:
In
Dr. Kenneth
Ring's
book,
Mindsight,
he documents his research concerning
NDEs in people born blind. One of his
subjects, Vicki Umipeg, told Dr. Ring
that she found herself floating above
her body in the emergency room of a
hospital following an automobile accident
and saw for the first time in her life.
She was aware of being up near the ceiling
watching a male doctor and a female
nurse working on her body, which she
viewed from her elevated position. Vicki
has a clear recollection of how she
came to the realization that this was
her own body below her:
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"I knew
it was me ... I was pretty thin then.
I was quite tall and thin at that point.
And I recognized at first that it was
a body, but I didn't even know that
it was mine initially. Then I perceived
that I was up on the ceiling, and I
thought, 'Well, that's kind
of weird. What am I doing up here?'
I thought, 'Well, this must be me.
Am I dead? ...' I just briefly saw
this body, and ... I knew that it was
mine because I wasn't in mine."
In addition, she was able to note certain
further identifying features indicating
that the body she was observing was
certainly her own:
"I think
I was wearing the plain gold band on
my right ring finger and my father's
wedding ring next to it. But my wedding
ring I definitely saw ... That was the
one I noticed the most because it's
most unusual. It has orange blossoms
on the corners of it." (Vicki
Umipeg)
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Brad Steiger:
The author of the NDE book
One with the
Light
experienced the following event during
his NDE:
|
On an August day
in 1947, 11-year-old Brad Steiger nearly
died of multiple skull fractures after
being caught in the metallic blades
of a piece of machinery on his family's
Iowa farm. He felt his "essential
self" drift away from his body.
He watched his sister run for help and
realized he was simultaneously in his
father's arms being carried from
the field, and above himself, observing.
(Brad
Steiger)
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Dannion Brinkley:
In his book,
Saved by the Light, Dannion Brinkley
describes the following:
|
"I began
to look around, to roll over in midair.
Below me was my own body, thrown across
the bed. My shoes were smoking and the
telephone was melted in my hand. I could
see Sandy run into the room. She stood
over the bed and looked at me with a
dazed expression, the kind you might
find on the parent of a child found
floating facedown in a swimming pool."
(Dannion
Brinkley)
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 |
Kimberly
Clark Sharp:
In a paper published in the
Journal of Near-Death Studies concerning
veridical NDE evidence,
Dr. Ken Ring included perhaps the
most famous case of veridical observation
in NDE research at that time.
Kimberly Clark Sharp first documented
the NDE of a woman named Maria in her
book,
After The
Light.
|
"Maria was
a migrant worker who, while visiting
friends in Seattle, had a severe heart
attack. She was rushed to Harborview
Hospital and placed in the coronary
care unit. A few days later, she had
a cardiac arrest and an unusual out-of-body
experience. At one point in this experience,
she found herself outside the hospital
and spotted a single tennis shoe on
the ledge of the north side of the third
floor of the building. Maria not only
was able to indicate the whereabouts
of this oddly situated object, but was
able to provide precise details concerning
its appearance, such as that its little
toe area was worn and one of its laces
was stuck underneath its heel. Upon
hearing Maria's story, Clark, with
some considerable degree of skepticism
and metaphysical misgiving, went to
the location described to see whether
any such shoe could be found. Indeed
it was, just where and precisely as
Maria had described it, except that
from the window through which Clark
was able to see it, the details of its
appearance that Maria had specified
could not be discerned. Clark concluded, "The
only way she could have had such a perspective
was if she had been floating right outside
and at very close range to the tennis
shoe. I retrieved the shoe and brought
it back to Maria; it was very concrete
evidence for me." (Clark,
1984, p. 243).
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Dr. Kenneth
Ring:
A study on veridical perception in NDEs
was conducted by
Dr. Kenneth Ring and Madeline Lawrence.
It included the 1985 account of
Kathy Milne who was working as a
nurse at Hartford Hospital. Milne had
already been interested in NDEs, and
one day found herself talking to a woman
who had been resuscitated and who had
an NDE. Following a telephone interview
with Kenneth Ring on August 24, 1992,
she described the following account
in a letter:
|
"She told
me how she floated up over her body,
viewed the resuscitation effort for
a short time and then felt herself being
pulled up through several floors of
the hospital. She then found herself
above the roof and realized she was
looking at the skyline of Hartford.
She marveled at how interesting this
view was and out of the corner of her
eye she saw a red object. It turned
out to be a shoe ... [S]he thought about
the shoe... and suddenly, she felt "sucked
up" a blackened hole. The rest
of her NDE account was fairly typical,
as I remember. "I was relating
this to a [skeptical] resident who in
a mocking manner left. Apparently, he
got a janitor to get him onto the roof.
When I saw him later than day, he had
a red shoe and he became a believer,
too."" (K.
Milne, personal communication, October
19,1992))
|
After Dr. Ring's
initial interview with Milne, he made
a point of inquiring whether she had
ever heard of the case of Maria's shoe
[as described in the introduction above].
Not only was she unfamiliar with it,
but she was utterly amazed to hear of
another story so similar to the one
she had just recounted to Dr. Ring.
It remains an unanswered question as
to how these isolated shoes arrived
at their unlikely perches for later
viewing by astonished NDErs and their
baffled investigators.
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Dr.
Joyce Harmon:
In the summer of 1982,
Dr. Joyce Harmon, a surgical intensive
care unit (ICU) nurse at Hartford Hospital,
returned to work after a vacation. On
that vacation she had purchased a new
pair of plaid shoelaces, which she happened
to be wearing on her first day back
at the hospital. That day, she was involved
in resuscitating a patient, a woman
she didn't know, by giving her medicine.
The resuscitation was successful and
the next day Harmon chanced to see the
patient, whereupon they had a conversation,
the gist of which (not necessarily a
verbatim account) is as follows:
|
"The patient,
upon seeing Harmon, volunteered, 'Oh,
you're the one with the plaid shoelaces!'
"'What?'
Harmon replied, astonished. She says
she distinctly remembers feeling the
hair on her neck rise.'
"'I
saw them,' the woman continued. 'I
was watching what was happening yesterday
when I died. I was up above.'"
(J. Harmon, personal
communication, August 28, 1992)
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P.M.H. Atwater:
The following is one of
P.M.H. Atwater's case studies
from her book
Beyond the Light which is not only
veridical, it is highly suggestive of
the survival of consciousness after
death. Atwater has stated that this
testimonial has been verified by relatives
of the experiencer involved. Here is
the excerpt:
|
"I spoke
of Margaret Fields Kean who nearly died
in 1978 after being hospitalized for
about three weeks with severe phlebitis.
A blood clot had passed to her heart
and lungs and she became deathly ill.
Then she was given injections for nausea
that, due to the blood thinners she
had previously received, caused internal
hemorrhaging. Pandemonium reigned as
she slipped away. While absent from
her body, she witnessed the scene below
her, then heard and saw people in the
waiting room down the hall - right through
the walls - as well as nurses at their
station. She also knew their thoughts.
Margaret went on to have a transcendent
near-death experience in which she instantly
knew and understood many things; her
future, and that she would become a
healer. This completely contradicted
her vision of herself at that moment
in her life, for she was content being
a super-mom farm wife who rode horses,
taught Bible classes, led 4-H and Girl
Scout groups, gardened, canned, and
baked bread. A healer? Ridiculous! Yet,
when Margaret revived, she immediately
began to heal other patients in the
room around her by 'reaching out'
to them. Then, she 'projected'
into the isolation room of a white boy
charred black by severe burns. She 'sat'
next to him on the bed, introduced herself,
and proceeded to counsel him about his
purpose in life. She told him it was
okay if he chose to die as God was loving
and he had nothing to fear.
Months later,
while continuing her recovery and still
in great pain, Margaret was attending
a horse show when a couple, hearing
the loudspeaker announce her daughter's
name as a winner, sought her out. They
were parents of the severely burned
boy. Before he died, he had told them
about meeting Margaret and relayed all
the wonderful truths she had told him
about God and about life. The parents
were thrilled to have finally located
her so they could say thanks for what
she had done for their son. The dying
boy had identified her by name - even
though the two had never physically
seen each other or verbally spoken in
any manner, nor had any nurse known
that the two had ever communicated,
nor had it been possible that Margaret
ever could have known if the isolation
room was even occupied much less who
might be there." (P.M.H.
Atwater)
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Dr. Kenneth
Ring:
Dr. Ring reported in a scholarly paper
one of the most interesting case of
verified out-of-body perception. In
the late 1970s,
Sue Saunders was working at Hartford
Hospital as a respiratory therapist
and had the following experience resuscitating
a patient:
|
"One day she
was helping to resuscitate a 60-ish
man in the emergency room whose electrocardiogram
had gone flat. Medics were shocking
him repeatedly with no results. Saunders
was trying to give him oxygen. In the
middle of the resuscitation, someone
else took over for her and she left.
A couple of days later, she encountered
this patient in the ICU. He spontaneously
commented, 'You looked so much better
in your yellow top.' She, like Harmon,
was so shocked at this remark that she
got goose-bumps, for she had been wearing
a yellow smock the previous day. 'Yeah,'
the man continued, I saw you. You had
something over your face and you were
pushing air into me. And I saw your
yellow smock..""
(S. Saunders,
personal communication, August 28, 1992))
|
Saunders confirmed
that she had had something over her
face - a mask - and that she had worn
the yellow smock while trying to give
him oxygen, while he was unconscious
and without a heartbeat. Saunders confirmed
that she had had something over her
face - a mask - and that she had worn
the yellow smock while trying to give
him oxygen, while he was unconscious
and without a heartbeat. According to
Dr. Ring, this case attests to these
three important observations:
|
a.
Patients
who claim to have out-of-body
experiences while near-death
sometimes describe unusual objects
that they could not have known
about by normal means. |
b.
These
objects can later be shown to
have existed in the form and
location indicated by the patients'
testimony. |
c.
Hearing
this testimony has a strong
emotional and cognitive effect
on the caregivers involved,
either strengthening their pre-existing
belief in the authenticity of
NDE accounts or occasioning
a kind of on-the-spot conversion. |
|
Source:
Ring, Kenneth, Ph.D. & Lawrence,
Madeline, R.N., Ph.D. "Further
evidence for veridical perception during
near-death experiences",
Journal of Near-Death Studies, 1993
11 (4)223-229.
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Robert Pastorelli: "I
was in excruciating pain. Then, in the next
second, there was no pain. Suddenly I realized
I was out of my body. I was floating above myself,
looking down at my unconscious body lying in
the hospital emergency room with my eyes closed.
I could see tubes down my nose and throat. I
knew I was dying and I thought, 'Well, this
must be death.' I even saw a priest giving
me the last rites. But it was the most peaceful
feeling in the world. Then I saw my father starting
to faint out of grief. Two nurses grabbed him
and sat him down in a chair across the room.
When
I looked down and saw my father's pain it
had an effect on me. I firmly believe that at
that moment I made a decision to live, not die.
The next thing I knew I was waking up back in
my body. Later, in the recovery room, when I
was fully conscious, I told my father what had
happened, his fainting and all. He was astounded."
(Robert
Pastorelli)
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 |
In
P.M.H. Atwater's book,
Children of
the New Millennium,
an interesting case of verified out-of-body
perception is documented about a woman
named Lynn whose observations during
her near-death experience were later
proven to be true, including the black
and Asian doctors on the operating team.
|
"The next
thing I knew I was floating around the
ceiling looking down on my body. My
chest was open wide and I could see
my internal organs. I remember thinking
how odd it was that my organs were a
beautiful pearl gray, not at all like
the bright red chucks in the horror
flicks I loved to watch. I also noticed
there was a black doctor and an Oriental
one on the operating team. The reason
this stuck in my mind is that I was
brought up in a very white middle-class
neighborhood, and I had seen black schoolteachers
but never a black doctor. I'd met
the operating team the day before, but
they were all white.
Suddenly, I had to move on, so I floated
into the waiting room, where my parents
were. My father had his head buried
in my mother's lap. He was kneeling
at her feet, his arms wrapped around
her waist, and he was sobbing. My mother
was stroking his head, whispering to
him. This scene shocked me, as my father
was not prone to showing emotions. Once
I realize they would be fine, I felt
myself pulled into a horizontal tunnel."
(Lynn)
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David
Goines: "I
remember the fear of impact (getting hit), however,
I have no recollection of the impact or having
my body become totally integrated with the bicycle,
nor hurtling over sixty feet through the air
and landing in the canal. My next memory was
quite a scene in the hospital emergency room.
It was the most unique experience of my earthly
life. Unique, because I was observing my own
body in the emergency room and all the activity
going on, except that I was not in my body.
I was above it all - looking down. I was feeling
no pain.
Everyone was very
busy. I knew by their activity that I was in
serious trouble. There was much discussion about
how to extract me from the tangled wreckage
of my bike and/or whether they would need to
leave me in it until I was stabilized enough
to try. I could see and hear everything. It
was gruesome. It was frightening. They finally
decided they had me stable enough to get rid
of the bike and they called for a welding specialist
to bring a torch to help cut me out of the bike.
Thank God my body seemed to be unconscious.
All of this would have been quite enough for
my young mind to endure - until one nurse, whom
I knew, said to another, 'Well - it certainly
makes you wonder if it is worth saving this
mess.' She nearly scared me to death! At
that moment, it was more than I could stand
above and watch. I wanted to run away from this
scene. I needed to escape. Quickly, I turned,
took one step through the wall so to speak and
found myself in total darkness." (David
Goines)
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 |
David Oakford: "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."
(David
Oakford)
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Kimberly Clark Sharp: "I
was going back. I knew it. I was already on
the way. I was on a trajectory headed straight
for my body. That's when I saw my body for
the first time, and when I realized I was no
longer a part of it. Until this moment, I'd
only seen myself straight on, as we usually
do, in mirrors and photographs. Now I was jolted
by the strange sight of me in profile from four
feet away. I looked at my body, the body I knew
so well, and was surprised by my detachment.
I felt the same sort of gratitude toward my
body that I had for my old winter coat when
I put it away in the spring. It had served me
well, but I no longer needed it. I had absolutely
no attachment to it. Whatever constituted the
self I knew as me was no longer there. My essence,
my consciousness, my memories, my personality
were outside, not in, that prison of flesh."
(Kimberly
Clark Sharp)
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Dr.
Liz Dale's research subject: "Immediately
after the impact from falling forward onto the
metal grating, I felt myself floating up, out
of my body, and hovering above my body and all
the people who were watching it, and who seemed
paralyzed by shock and horror at what had happened.
I think they pretty much assumed that I was
dead. I remember looking down and seeing my
body three-dimensionally for the first time.
And it was such a shock, because we never see
ourselves except in a one-dimensional mirror
reflection, or a photograph. But I felt no pain
at all; I felt completely whole and free, and
I thought, 'This is who I really am.'
I saw my physical body, all crumpled
and bloody and lifeless; and this enormous wave
of compassion washed over me and I wanted to
tell all of the bystanders that everything was
going to be OK and not to be sad or alarmed.
Then suddenly I felt myself being pulled, literally
at the speed of light, farther from the physical
earth, and I saw all of the people on the planet
simultaneously in that one moment. I saw people
in China and Sweden and Uruguay; I saw people
sleeping and dreaming; I saw people preparing
food in their homes and in restaurants; people
traveling in all manner of transportation, to
and from work and school and appointments; I
saw children playing together, and bankers and
teachers and factory workers at their jobs.
I saw mothers giving birth to children, which
was especially beautiful and moving to me."
(Dr.
Liz Dale)
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Rev.
Howard Storm: "For
a time there was a sense of being unconscious
or asleep. I'm not sure how long it lasted,
but I felt really strange, and I opened my eyes.
To my surprise I was standing up next to the
bed, and I was looking at my body laying in
the bed. My first
reaction was, 'This is crazy! I can't
be standing here looking down at myself. That's
not possible.' This wasn't what I expected,
this wasn't right. Why was I still alive?
I wanted oblivion. Yet I was looking at a thing
that was my body, and it just didn't have
that much meaning to me. Now knowing what was
happening, I became upset. I started yelling
and screaming at my wife, and she just sat there
like a stone. She didn't look at me, she
didn't move and I kept screaming profanities
to get her to pay attention. Being confused,
upset, and angry, I tried to get the attention
of my room-mate, with the same result. He didn't
react. I wanted
this to be a dream, and I kept saying to myself, 'This
has got to be a dream.' But I knew that
it wasn't a dream. I became aware that strangely
I felt more alert, more aware, more alive than
I had ever felt in my entire life. All my senses
were extremely acute. Everything felt tingly
and alive. The floor was cool and my bare feet
felt moist and clammy. This had to be real."
(Rev.
Howard Storm)
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P.M.H.
Atwater: "The
pain ebbed by as I rose steadily upward, again
stopping at the light fixture, only this time
in the living room. I looked down, recognizing
the body on the floor as mine. There was no
confusion this time. My situation was clearly
defined. Good God, I'm dead! Time and space
ended for me after gazing for what seemed endless
minutes at my body. It made no movement. There
was no breathing. No response. When I was satisfied
that it was dead, there came a joyous euphoria,
like a prisoner being released from a long jail
sentence. I danced and danced around the light
bulb, singing like a child. It was finally over.
I was free." (P.M.H.
Atwater)
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Grace Bubulka: "I
was then looking down from above the left foot
area of my bed. The distance from my bed was
as though I was against the ceiling corner.
I could see the backs of the staff to the left
of my bed and the faces of my doctors and the
Filipino nurse. I was exasperated with them
and with my futile attempt to connect with them.
I had no strong feelings about my body lying
on the bed. It was almost unfamiliar to me."
(Grace
Bubulka)
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Laurelynn Martin: "I
awakened and found myself floating above my
body, off to the right side, looking down, watching
the attempts of the medical team trying to revive
the lifeless form below. I viewed the scene
with detachment. The surgical team was frantic.
The color red was everywhere, splattered on
their gowns, splattered on the floor, and a
bright pool of a flowing red substance, in the
now wide open abdominal cavity. At that moment,
I didn't make the connection that the body
being worked on was my own! It didn't matter
anyway. I was in a state of floating freedom,
experiencing no pain and having a great time.
I wanted to shout to the distressed people below, "Hey,
I'm okay. It's fantastic up here,"
but they were so intent on their work, I didn't
want to interrupt their efforts. I had traveled
to another realm of total and absolute peace.
With no physical body my movement was unencumbered.
Thought was the avenue for travel. I floated
up through blackness where there was no fear,
no pain, no misunderstandings, but instead a
sense of well-being. I was enveloped by total
bliss in an atmosphere of unconditional love
and acceptance." (Laurelynn
Martin)
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Josiane Antonette: "Am
I outside myself observing? I see my body and
its pain. I look at my feet; they are pale and
lifeless. My legs cannot move. My face is white
and drawn ... Now I'm on the hospital room
ceiling gazing down! Everything appears so small:
I see my bed; my body looks small and colorless;
the people around the bed are tiny. Overwhelming
grief and sorrow fill the room, and yet I feel
completely disconnected from the scene below
me. I hover nearer and look at the strange form
lying on the bed. I feel compassion beyond words.
I understand everything, but I have no feeling
of attachment to anyone. I look at each person
standing at the bedside and feel tremendous
love. I want to say to them, 'I'm all
right. You don't have to worry. I'm
all right. Look at me! I'm fine!'"
(Josiane
Antonette)
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Rev. Kenneth Hagin: "My
heart stopped beating. This numbness spread
to my feet, my ankles, my knees, my hips, my
stomach, my heart and I leaped out of my body.
I did not lose consciousness; I leaped out of
my body like a diver would leap off a diving
board into a swimming pool. I knew I was outside
my body. I could see my family in the room,
but I couldn't contact them. I began to
descend down, down, into a pit, like you'd
go down into a well, cavern or cave ...
Then, like a suction from above, I floated
up, head first, through the darkness. Before
I got to the top, I could see the light. I've
been down in a well: it was like you were way
down in a well and could see the light up above.
I came up on the porch of my grandpa's house.
Then I went through the wall not through the
door, and not through the window through the
wall, and seemed to leap inside my body like
a man would slip his foot inside his boot in
the morning time. Before I leaped inside my
body, I could see my grandmother sitting on
the edge of the bed holding me in her arms.
When I got inside my body, I could communicate
with her.
'I felt myself slipping,'
I said, 'Granny, I'm going again. You've
been a second mother to me when Momma was ill.'
My heart stopped for a second time. I leaped
out of my body and began to descend: down, down,
down ... And then I was pulled up, head first.
I could see the lights of the earth above me
before I came up out of the pit. The only difference
this time was that I came up at the foot of
the bed. For a second time I stood there. I
could see my body lying there on the bed. I
could see Grandma as she sat there holding me
in her arms." [Here
Hagin says goodbye to his family] "I
left a word for each one of them, and my heart
stopped the third time. I could feel the circulation
as it cut off. Suddenly my toes went numb. Faster
than you can snap your fingers, my toes, feet,
ankles, knees, hips, stomach and heart went
dead and I leaped out of my body and began to
descend ..."" [Hagin
then enters his body again and recovers from
his illness.] (Rev.
Kenneth Hagin)
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Ricky Randolph: "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 upwards through
the atmosphere." (Ricky
Randolph)
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Rexella Van Impe:
The wife of television evangelist Dr. Jack Van
Impe,
Rexella, was injured in a car accident in
Brussels in 1982. She discovered herself outside
of her body watching her husband crying as he
held her in his arms. The experience was told
in their video, "Heaven: An Out-of-Body
Adventure?" [This
videotape, produced in 1992, is available through
JVI Ministries,
POB 7004, Troy, MI, USA 48007.]
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Chris
Taylor: "On
September 1993, I was at Papworth Hospital having
my aortic valve replaced. I left my body and
watched the surgeon operating on me. He was
a bit of a maverick and had a red and white
check head cover. He was listening to Meat Loaf's 'Bat
out of hell' and invisible drumming to it.
He splashed some blood on one of the nurses.
She got angry. I asked him about this
and he confirmed it by stating that I could
not have seen this due to the screen around
my face. On November 2001, I rushed back to
Papworth with a dissecting aorta which is usually
fatal. My son had seen me have the attack and
my profound pain. He was scared and had tears
streaming down his face. He made me promise
that I would not die. I promised him. I underwent
10 hours of emergency surgery at the end of
which my heart failed to spontaneously restart.
The surgeon manually manipulated my heart for
26 minutes. At some stage in the procedure I
left my body with a whooshing sound. I then
was floating toward a bright light. All around
me was a gray cloud-type thick fog. It had texture.
The closer I approached the light I became aware
of a fundamental sense of purity. I could feel
my pain falling away. I became aware of PURE
LOVE, peace, tranquility. I could hear voices
that were welcoming me without speaking specific
words; but, I understood that this was natural
and normal. I also knew that I was leaving the
two people I love the most - my wife and son.
I was then aware of my son to my left sitting
on a chair and sobbing into his hands. My wife
walked up to him to comfort him. He said he
was scared and my wife assured him I was strong
and would live. He calmly said, 'I'm
not scared of Dad dying. I know he will not
die. He promised me and DAD ALWAYS KEEPS HIS
PROMISES. I then painfully zipped back into
my body. Imagine being cold and wet, longing
for a warm shower. Imagine taking off those
cold wet clothes and getting into the shower.
Now imagine getting back into the clothes. Got
the message? When I came to, 28 hours later,
my wife was told I was in a coma and brain dead.
I was so angry for days. I was angry I had lived.
That may sound weird but that is, in brief,
my story.
Two things: This experience has left me feeling
over powered spiritually. Secondly, I am a Police
Inspector and not prone to flights of fancy."
(Chris
Taylor)
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Nadia McCaffrey: "I
was out of my body. I floated there for awhile,
and looked down at lifeless body on the gurney.
However, the real me had become a comfortable
glowing shape. For a while, I watched on as
the nurses and doctors worked quickly to revive
me. Then, I lost interest and my attention turned
towards a long dark tunnel." (Nadia
McCaffrey)
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Beverly Brodsky: "I
found myself floating on the ceiling over the
bed looking down at my unconscious body. I barely
had time to realize the glorious strangeness
of the situation - that I was me but not in
my body - when I was joined by a radiant being
bathed in a shimmering white glow." (Beverly
Brodsky)
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Jan
Price: "I
remember being surprised as I observed the full
heart arrest taking place. I suppose we never
really think of ourselves as dying, but obviously
I had died because I wasn't in my body anymore.
(Jan
Price)
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Norman Paulsen: "There
is my body lying at the foot of the telephone
pole, covered with blankets. Without sensation,
I enter it again. My eyes open to see concerned
faces looking down upon me." (Norman
Paulsen)
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Valvita
Jones: "Feeling
so peaceful and free, I started moving upward.
I realized my body was below me, and I vaguely
remember observing efforts by the medical team
to revive it. My main interest was that I was
above the room. I was not even in the room but
in the first sky. I say first sky in the heavens,
because it seemed as though there were three
heavens that I passed through." (Valvita
Jones)
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Laura: "After
this infinite moment had passed, there began
a battle for my life between the angels in heaven
and the doctors on earth. Every time the doctors
pounded on my chest, my spirit was sucked into
my body for a split second, only to be pulled
back again by the angels. They held me by my
feet, struggling to keep me from coming back.
Finally, the doctors pounded one last time.
I heard an angel say, "They're stronger
than we are," and I was sucked back into
my body, sat up, screamed, and passed out."
(Laura)
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Caroline
Sharp: "It
is now almost 34 years ago, but with amazing
clarity, I can remember the emotions I went
through as I hovered above my body. It was a
total euphoric happiness. Feeling totally unconcerned
and faintly amused, I watched the two nurses
and doctor working to resuscitate my lifeless
body. I could relate with extreme clarity the
actions they took in this procedure." (Caroline
Sharp)
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Mrs.
Walters: "When
I had my first child I had the experience of
being out of my body and hovering above it attached
to a thick cord. I could see myself on the bed
and the doctor who was in a panic. I could also
see the nurse and the instruments on a trolley
in the corner of the room. The only way I could
have seen the instrument was from the angle
I was in. I would not have been able to see
them from the bed. I remember thinking it was
wonderful to be free of that cumbersome body
and not really caring what happened to it."
(Mrs.
Walters)
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Randy
Gehling: "I
didn't really know what had hit me. I just
seemed to go flying through the air. And then
a really funny thing happened. A part of me
- I guess my soul - just kept flying, and I
saw my body smash into the ground. I knew it
had to hurt to land that hard, so I was happy
that I was where I was - wherever that was.
When I got a little higher, I saw that it had
been Kurt's car that had hit me. I always
told him that he drove too fast in the neighborhood."
(Randy
Gehling)
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Jeanie
Dicus: "I
was floating above my body. I saw green shower
caps. The people in the room all wore those
stupid caps. There were five or six caps and
they were panicky. Their fear was so thick I
could feel it. I kept thinking, "Hey, I'm
okay, don't worry," but they didn't
get my message. This was a little frustrating.
I found myself in the right-hand corner of the
room. I lifted my arm and stretched. I had been
immobile for so long. It felt like I had taken
off a body girdle, and it was so delicious to
get out of that cramped body." (Jeanie
Dicus)
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Peter
Sellers: "Well,
I felt myself leave my body. I just floated
out of my physical form and I saw them cart
my body away to the hospital. I went with it.
(Peter
Sellers)
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Elaine
Durham: "When
I got to the hospital, it was not as if I was
on the gurney look up, but I was moving, not
necessarily walking, but I was at eye level
along the right side of the gurney. And there
was my body on it, but I did not have any relationship
at all to that body." (Elaine
Durham)
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An
accountant: "The
next thing I remember was looking down on my
body in the intensive care unit. I don't
know how I got in there, but they were working
on me. There was this young doctor in a white
coat and two nurses and a black fellow in a
white uniform and he was doing most of the work
on me. This black fellow was shoving down on
my chest and someone else was breathing for
me and they were yelling to get this and that!'
I learned later that this black fellow was a
male nurse on the ward. I had never seen him
before. I even remember the black bow tie he
was wearing. Next thing I remember was going
through this dark passage." (An
accountant)
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Helen: "I
remember clearly floating up above myself, and
looking down on my body. It was connected to
numerous machines. I could see the drip and
the oxygen mask. I could see the doctors working
to restart my heart with electronic pads. I
could see that my parents were there. It felt
very peaceful, much better than where I had
been before. I was bathed in warmth and light,
and the calm was almost tangible. I felt it
was up to me to decide where I wanted to be,
up there or back in my body, but the peace was
so overwhelming that I knew I wanted to stay."
(Helen)
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Carter Mills:
A massive load of compressed cardboard Carter
Mills was loading, slipped out of control, slamming
him against a steel pole. He remembers a sharp
pain, collapsing, being in a black void, then
finding himself floating in a prone position
twelve feet above his crumpled body. He saw
and heard people running around, yelling for
an ambulance and saying, "Don't touch
him, give him air." His body went from
white to blue; there was no breath. The sight
filled him with awe. "I'm here, my
body is there. How did this happen?" Not
understanding how he could suddenly be airborne,
Carter attempted to reenter his body. Crawling
downward in swim-like strokes, he had almost
reached his goal when a gentle but firm hand
tugged his right arm. When he looked up, there
were two angels replete with robes, wings, bare
feet, and streaming hair - no color but opaque
white - and no particular gender. (Carter
Mills)
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John
Star: "Suddenly
the world was calm and clear. I could see the
shoreline, still in the distance and noticed
the sun shining overhead. It seemed brighter
than usual. When I looked down I got the surprise
of my life. There was my body, still swimming
toward shore, moving as straight and smooth
as a motor boat. I watched for a while, indifferent
to the plight of my body. I was far more concerned
with trying to figure out where I was."
(John
Star)
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Michael: "And
then something exited my chest. Its hard to
describe exactly what it was or what it felt
like but it was a real presence, a definite
feeling. Perhaps terms like "life force"
or "energy" come closest to trying
to describe what it was, but it seemed to contain
my personality as well. Again, its extremely
difficult to describe except that it was a real
sensation of something immaterial leaving my
physical body. This "force", for lack
of a better word, then positioned itself in
the corner of the bathroom ceiling (the bathroom
was in darkness) and I stared down on my own
motionless body, skinny and frail and apparently
lifeless. This force which seemed to contain
something of me certainly an awareness that "I"
was no longer in my body, then moved at an amazing
speed through somewhere black, like space in
its vastness." (Michael)
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Ida
Acosta: "I
was drifting in and out of my body, from darkness
into light, simultaneously. There were sounds
demanding that I leave my wonderful bliss to
come back to life. Doctors calling my name.
I looked upon it all with a strange indifference.
And I could see myself. I could hear a machine
beeping. People were slapping me, shaking me,
tossing me around, sticking things into me,
and I just didn't care. I was in bliss and
I really just wanted to die, because at that
moment I realized there was no death. It was
exactly like drifting into the best sleep ever."
(Ida
Acosta)
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Rose
A.: "On
this one day I found that part of me had separated
from my physical body and had risen above my
body to the ceiling. From above, I saw myself
lying face down on the carpeting. Everything
was so clear mentally and there was no pain;
I sensed that the physical body was that which
felt pain, that which would also hamper one's
clarity of thinking. This other part of me,
a spiritual me or a soul me, was so much more
at peace being outside of the physical me. I
knew that if my mother had entered the bedroom
at that point, she would not have gotten a response
from my physical body, but I would want her
to know that everything was all right with me."
(Rose
A.)
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Karen
Floyd: "At
this time, I had floated out of my body. I was
floating just below the ceiling of the car looking
down at myself on the seat of the car. I remember
thinking how strange it was that I was up here
when my body was still on the car seat! I could
see my friend driving and looking back and talking
to me. I also noticed that I didn't feel
bad anymore." (Karen
Floyd)
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Sharon: "Sometime
during the night I 'woke up' to find
myself against the ceiling. I was literally
floating and I could see myself from the chest
up. I remember feeling no discomfort, such as
heat or cold, just a nice peaceful feeling.
While I was wondering why I was able to float
against the ceiling, I looked down and saw myself
sleeping on my back. This was strange enough,
but the strangest part was how I thought of
myself on the bed. I thought of myself in the
third-person. I remember distinctly thinking, 'She
is running out of air' and 'There is
no oxygen in this room.' I did not think
this in a state of panic, more like a peaceful
concern for the body. The next thing I knew,
I was hurling toward my body." (Sharon)
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Jerriann Massey: "Three
times she fought her way through the murky water
and surfaced to suck air, she said. "The
third time back under, I was out of my body.
It was like when you are wearing pants way too
tight and you take them off. Now, you can relax
and breathe. That's what it felt like."
(Jerriann
Massey)
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Alise: "At
the height of the pain I left my body. I saw
my body on the bed and tried to communicate
to those tending to it but finally gave up and
left out the roof of the hospital. I felt like
a traitor as they were working very hard on
my body but I did not want it any more. I did
not want to go back. So I left very quickly
and what was foremost in my mind was that I
knew exactly where to go. There was no tunnel
or light or anything, I just knew where to go
and went. Like going 'home'.
Getting 'out'
of my body was like going through a magnetic
field. Each magnet was attracted to the other
and then to another and another until the first
was attracted to the last and then I was free.
I knew I had just gone through the elements
of the earth that made up my physical body.
This registered in my brain as pain but it wasn't
pain exactly but the process of going through
the elements and overcoming gravity." (Alise)
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Martha
A. St. Claire:
As she began to drown, Martha remembers entering
into a kind of dream-like state she feels was
the beginning of her near-death experience.
She states, "All of a sudden, I was out
of my body watching myself being pulled along
and thinking, 'This is really incredible.
This is really quite amazing.'" (Martha
A. St. Claire)
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Mr.
Thermal: "Before
we got into the cars we had there, the lightening
bolt came through a board in the side of the
barn and got me. I felt myself falling but it
didn't hurt. Then I noticed I was above
myself looking down at me. My body was actually
smoking. I watched one guy jump from the wagon
he was on, to the ground. On his way over to
me, it seemed like it took him 10 minutes to
land. Everyone was moving so slow. I was speaking
out loud. I could hear myself, but it seemed
the others couldn't. I saw them gathering
around me trying to wake me up, but I was awake.
I was above them. I tried to look at my hands
but couldn't see them. I knew they were
there. I could feel them move. And I could feel
my feet too, but again, my body was on the ground
right beneath me." (Mister Thermal)
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Elizabeth: "His
smile was wide and bright, as he took hold of
my left arm, and we began to drift downward.
It was comforting and safe to be with him, as
we passed by stars in the night sky, drifting
through clouds. I eventually could see my town
and the top of my house. We drifted through
the roof, entering my bedroom. At the ceiling,
I noticed my daughter, still sleeping soundly.
But then I noticed something else; I noticed
another body next to hers. When we reach the
floor, I realized it was my own. I was completely
confused. He gently lifted me, placing me back
into my body. I immediately jumped out of bed
reaching for him. But by now, his light was
escaping through the window, until finally completely
gone. I sat on the edge of my bed, still engulfed
with such joy. I took hold of my head, saying
over and over again in my mind, I will not forget,
I will not forget." (Elizabeth)
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John
Powell: "He
then brought me again to this earth. When I
saw my body lying on the bed I did not want
to enter it again for I felt so happy out of
it that I could not bear the thought of entering
it again, but he said, 'Enter,' and
I had to obey." (John
Powell)
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Sherry
Gideon: "The
last thing that happened was when I watched
my spirit descend back into my body. I could
suddenly see myself lying on my bed. I could
feel a light coming through the window that
was so powerful beyond words. As I watched my
spirit return to this body on the bed. I could
hear the last words spoken to me: "You
must help the world to understand that they
must give of themselves freely without expecting
and love is all there is!" (Sherry
Gideon)
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Bruce
Budden: "I
could see my body lying on the lawn and a few
cars and people around the scene ... The next
thing I recall is almost like energizing over
top of my physical body. I moved closer and
was hovering a foot or so over my body. I then
slowly turned over and then started sinking
down into my body. The electrical energy of
my spirit started flowing back into my physical
body. As I was doing this, this almost sense
of transformation, the feeling of being in the
pure spirit form started changing to the feelings
of the earthly realm. There was a great sense
of heaviness, I felt the physical emotions starting
to return, along with the emotions of the human
animal. The next thing I recall is opening my
eyes and seeing the lights of the cars around
me and I looked around to find the light I was
just in front of but I couldn't find it.
Then it hit me, damn, I'm back. At that
point I passed out." (Bruce
Budden)
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Vicki
Moyer: "During
my experience, I was standing in a beautiful
garden and saw Jesus. He was sitting on a stone
bench. We both were dressed in biblical gown
and wore sandals. Jesus let me see through a
dimension to where my body being operated on
in surgery. I could see it. I remember how I
felt. I felt like my body was only a shell and
that it was not the true me. I felt like this
was me, my soul. I remember him letting me hear
my friends and love ones pray for me."
(Vicki
Moyer)
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Dr. Habermas and
Moreland's research:
Dr. Gary Habermas and J.P. Moreland documented
two cases of veridical perception in their book,
Immortality, The Other
Side of Death.
The first case was a young girl named Katie
who nearly drowned in a pool. After being resuscitated
in the emergency room, a CAT scan showed she
had massive brain swelling. She was attached
to an artificial lung to keep her breathing
and given a ten percent chance of survival.
Three days later, she completely recovered and
told a remarkable story. Though she had been
profoundly comatose, with her eyes closed throughout
her entire treatment, she gave exact details
regarding the physical features of her doctors,
the hospital rooms in which she had been treated,
and the medical procedures her doctors employed
to save her. Amazingly, she was also able to
describe, in minute detail, what her family
was doing at home, awaiting news of her status,
while she lie in the hospital! Then, Katie said
she met Jesus and the heavenly Father. Their
second case involves a five-year-old boy named
Rick who suffered from meningitis. As Rick was
rushed to the hospital in an ambulance, he decided
to stay behind. He later reported seeing his
father crying in the car while he drove the
family to the hospital. Rick then rushed to
the hospital arriving before the ambulance.
He saw hospital orderlies move a young girl
out of the room he would be occupying. Rick's
memories were corroborated by his family, and
were particularly amazing due to the fact that
he was comatose before he was taken in the ambulance
and for several days afterward. (Habermas
and Moreland)
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Guenter Wagner: "Suddenly
it dawned on me that I was out of my body. It
must have happened the moment this oozing stopped.
I saw a body lying on the floor, which could
only belong to me. I was shivering and I quickly
wanted to return to my body and its warmth when
I heard someone say, 'Stop! Before going
back, see what it is like outside!'
However,
I did not pay any attention to the voice. Although
I could not see any physical body but my own,
this voice was quite near. Then I heard it again,
this time it was begging me very earnestly, 'Please,
do not go back, I beseech you. Why do you not
want to discover your new faculties first? You
may still go back if you do not like them.'
I hesitated. After all, this voice was right.
Why shouldn't I give it a try? On that the
voice said quickly, 'Test your mind! If
you do you will discover that you can think
in a way you have never experienced before.'
The voice was right again. I could think very
lucidly indeed, and I was able to understand
very quickly with a directness that did not
leave a trace of doubt. Then I heard the voice
again, 'If you are willing to stay outside
of your body, you will make a wonderful journey
and you will see many interesting things. However,
you must decide quickly! So hurry up!' Eventually
I began to consider the whole situation. It
was really up to me whether I wanted to return
to my body and live the life on earth with all
its limitations and with all its joy or to stay
outside in this condition of clear thinking.
The voice again urged me to hurry up and to
tell him whether I had made up my mind. I gave
in. I decided to stay outside and I instantly
realized that my body had to die, meaning total
destruction by decay. I thought to myself, "How
sad for my mother!' As for me, I did not
feel any regrets, because my body was now only
a wrapper to me, a burden of which I freed myself
the moment I had decided to stay outside. Presently
I realized that I was able to move freely about
in a way I had never experienced before. I was
floating right through the walls of our house
(I saw my mother in front of the kitchen stove
cooking a meal) and up into the sky. In the
distance, I saw a great shining ball, which
was the sun. I felt irresistibly attracted to
it by its brightness and I wanted to go right
into it. No sooner had I thought this when I
hit something that catapulted me far out into
blackness. I tried once more, but it all happened
again. I quickly learned that there had to be
an invisible barrier that I could only approach
but not overcome.
Then the Being of Light was gone. One of the
other beings brought me back to earth. I do
not know how. I only heard, while being tucked
back into my body, a snapping sound like the
sound that can be heard when you put the lid
on top of a mess tin securing it with the catch."
(Guenter
Wagner)
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5.
The out-of-body phenomenon of consciousness expansion |
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Many NDE testimonies involve
the experiencer describing how their consciousness expanded
until it fills the entire universe - even beyond. This
phenomenon has been described as literally becoming
the universe by near-death experiencers. This concept
of a universal and transcendental consciousness agrees
with the metaphysical notion of how the universe exerts
an influence upon us astrologically.
I have found several NDEs
on my website that provide evidence of veridical consciousness
expansion. What is interesting is how this phenomenon
supports a current theory of consciousness held by a
prominent consciousness researcher which will be explained
after presenting these excerpts from NDE testimony of
how consciousness expands after death and allows for
veridical observation outside of the body to take place.
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a.
Near-death experiencers on consciousness expansion |
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"Suddenly I seemed to be rocketing
away from the planet on this stream of life.
I saw the earth fly away. The solar system,
in all its splendor, whizzed by and disappeared.
At faster than light speed, I flew through the
center of the galaxy, absorbing more knowledge
as I went. I learned that this galaxy, and all
of the Universe, is bursting with many different
varieties of LIFE. I saw many worlds. The good
news is that we are not alone in this Universe!
As I rode this stream of consciousness through
the center of the galaxy, the stream was expanding
in awesome fractal waves of energy. The super
clusters of galaxies with all their ancient
wisdom flew by. At first I thought I was going
somewhere; actually traveling. But then I realized
that, as the stream was expanding, my own consciousness
was also expanding to take in everything in
the Universe!" (Mellen-Thomas
Benedict)
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"The stars seemed to fly past me
so rapidly that they formed a tunnel around
me. I began to sense awareness, knowledge. The
farther forward I was propelled the more knowledge
I received. My mind felt like a sponge, growing
and expanding in size with each addition. The
knowledge came in single words and in whole
idea blocks. I just seemed to be able to understand
everything as it was being soaked up or absorbed.
I could feel my mind expanding and absorbing
and each new piece of information somehow seemed
to belong. It was as if I had known already
but forgotten or mislaid it, as if it were waiting
here for me to pick it up on my way by."
(Virginia
Rivers)
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"And in your life review
you'll be the universe and experience yourself
in what you call your lifetime and how it affects
the universe." (Thomas
Sawyer)
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"I was involved in this tremendous
pouring forth of gratitude and joy and as that
was going inside me, this white light began
to infiltrate my consciousness. It came into
me. It seemed I went out into it. I expanded
into it as it came into my field of consciousness."
(Jayne
Smith)
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"My presence fills the room. And
now I feel my presence in every room in the
hospital. Even the tiniest space in the hospital
is filled with this presence that is me. I sense
myself beyond the hospital, above the city,
even encompassing earth. I am melting into the
universe. I am everywhere at once." (Josiane
Antonette)
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"Stage by stage we expand into the
planetary spheres, like light that has been
contained within a darkened glass, when finally
uncovered and released goes out into the boundless
universe. The moral disposition we carry over
with us allows or prevents us from moving on
in a conscious manner. Seeing how we expand
toward the stars and planets after death, it's
no wonder we look at the night sky in awe with
feelings of reverence and maybe even memories."
(Rudolf
Steiner)
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"I felt caught up in all of this
to the very depths of my being. I felt myself
expanding and expanding until I thought, "I'm
going to burst!" The moment I thought, "I'm
going to burst!", I suddenly found myself
alone, back where this being had met me, and
he had gone." (Margaret
Tweddell)
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b.
NDE researchers on NDE consciousness expansion |
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Dr.
Stanislav Grof's research: "I
had my training as a psychiatrist, a physician
and then as a Freudian analyst. When I became
interested in non-ordinary states and started
serving powerful mystical experiences, also
having some myself, my first idea was that it
(consciousness) has to be hard-wired in the
brain. I spent quite a bit of time trying to
figure out how something like that is possible.
Today, I came to the conclusion that [consciousness]
is not coming from the brain. In that sense,
it supports what
Aldous Huxley
believed after he had some powerful psychedelic
experiences and was trying to link them to the
brain. He came to the conclusion that maybe
the brain acts as a kind of reducing valve that
actually protects us from too much cosmic input.
"So, I don't
see, for example, that experiences of archetypal
realms, heavens, paradises, experiences of archetypal
beings, such as deities, demons from different
cultures, that people typically have in these
states that they can be somehow explained as
something that comes from the brain. I don't
think you can locate the source of consciousness.
I am quite sure it is not in the brain not inside
of the skull. It actually, according to my experience,
would lie beyond time and space, so it is not
localizable. You actually come to the source
of consciousness when you dissolve any categories
that imply separation, individuality, time,
space and so on. You just experience it as a
presence. People who have these experiences
can either perceive that source or they can
actually become the source, completely dissolved
and experience that source. But such categories
as time and space, localization coordinates,
are not relevant for that experience. You actually
have a sense that the concepts of time and space
come from that place. They are generated by
that place; but, the cosmic source itself, the
cosmic consciousness cannot be located certainly
not in the material world." (Dr.
Stanislav Grof,
from the NDE video,
Life After Death,
Episode 8, Wellspring Media)
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Dr.
Peter
Fenwick's NDE research:
Fenwick is a neuropsychiatrist and the leading
authority in Britain on NDEs who has described
how the NDEs are unique to any other state of
consciousness. In the documentary, "Into
the Unknown: Strange But True," Dr. Fenwick
explains:
"In the NDE, you are
unconscious. One of the things we know about
brain function in unconsciousness, is that you
cannot create images and if you do, you cannot
remember them ... The brain isn't functioning.
It's not there. It's destroyed. It's
abnormal. But, yet, it can produce these very
clear experiences [NDEs] ... an unconscious
state is when the brain ceases to function.
For example, if you faint, you fall to the floor,
you don't know what's happening and
the brain isn't working. The memory systems
are particularly sensitive to unconsciousness.
So, you won't remember anything. But, yet,
after one of these experiences [NDEs], you come
out with clear, lucid memories ... This is a
real puzzle for science. I have not yet seen
any good scientific explanation which can explain
that fact." (Dr.
Peter Fenwick)
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Dr.
Timothy Leary's Psychedelic research: "You
must be ready to accept the possibility that
there is a limitless range of awareness for
which we now have no words; that awareness can
expand beyond the range of your ego, your self,
your familiar identity, beyond everything you
have learned, beyond your notions of space and
time, beyond the differences which usually separate
people from each other and from the world around
them." (Dr.
Timothy Leary)
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Dr. Susan
Blackmore:
After hovering around New York, Susan Blackmore
floated back to her room in Oxford where she
became very small and entered her body's
toes. Then she grew very big, as big as a planet
at first, and then she filled the solar system
and finally she became as large as the universe.
Susan Blackmore believes that consciousness
and NDEs are only secretions of the brain -
much like a hallucination. If she is correct,
then NDEs are nothing more than a mass hallucinations.
The problem with this idea is that
unconscious brains
do not hallucinate.
And even if unconscious brains could hallucinate,
they would not be able to retain unconscious
memories. (Dr.
Susan Blackmore)
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