A couple of days ago a friend of my asked, in our afterlife Facebook group, what do you expect after you die? Everyone in that group is convinced we survive physical death. What comes next is a matter of a lot of discussion.
But, before we can be dead, we have to die. And dying is scary. It’s an unknown and the unknown creates fear. None of us has ever done it before, at least not that we can remember. Will it hurt? Will it be scary? Will we just blink out? Let’s take the worst case scenario first. How bad can it possibly be? If you believe there is nothing after death, then dying is the end. Does it hurt? It can’t hurt much or for long, the moment of death anyway. It’s a moment, it’s over and you’re gone. You’re not disappointed there is nothing after death because you have no consciousness to register any disappointment. You’re just gone. That doesn’t sound like anything to fear.
Of course, that’s not the way it works. So, what does actually happen? From Near Death Experience reports and from medium readings of people who have actually died, we can put together a pretty well educated guess. We can’t know for sure because while there are many very strong similarities between the reports, there are also significant differences. Let’s say you’re in an accident that takes your life, many people report that their spirit left their body even before the moment of physical death of their bodies. It’s as if they are spared that trauma by just leaving before the body is mangled. One account I heard was of a doctor who had a kayaking accident. She was pinned underwater in her kayak- drowning. The force of the water was breaking her legs. Being a doctor, she intellectually knew what was happening to her and was assessing her own injuries as they occurred. However, she felt no pain. So, it seems that we are often spared those last moments of pain and trauma that we would experience in the body. Separating from the body happens in different ways. Some people report “popping” out of their bodies. They might even hear a noise. Others report feeling their consciousness kind of contract, withdrawing from the extremities and concentrating in the chest or the top of the head before popping out of the body. Immediately after the moment of separation of consciousness from the body, many people report standing over their bodies or floating above their bodies. They look back them sometimes not even recognizing them at first. Some people look at their bodies with fondness, but often people report they look at them emotionally detached from them or maybe thinking of them as an old coat they had used enough and were ready to throw out.
Next people generally report that they feel better than they ever have in their entire lives. Vision is better, hearing is better, all the senses are heightened. People are often surprised to find they still have a body. It might appear slightly translucent, but it’s a real, solid body. Howard Storm, a NDE experiencer I met recently had a terrible hellish experience at the beginning of his NDE, but when he stepped out of his body, the first thing he felt was not only whole and free of pain, but seemed to be more alive there than he ever was hear. People report this world seems like a dream and that world seems real.
This next thing is the most bizarre to me. Almost everyone who has had an NDE has reported that they had no desire to return to Earth. They say it’s so blissful, there is so much love and there is such a feeling of being at “Home” that they just don’t want to come back. I could understand this in old, sick people, but young people report it. And, most amazing of all, mothers say they did not want to return to their children. There seems to be an almost immediate detachment from things of the Earth, including people. This doesn’t mean you no longer care about people here. It’s taken me a long time to come to some understanding. It’s a perspective shift. They know that everything here will be “all right” eventually. And the sense of time that we have here is either completely gone or vastly changed such that they feel they will see us again “very soon” Erica McKenzie reported that she saw a “bridge” between heaven and Earth that she could use to still be with her children, so she did not feel the need to come back to them. From the perspective on the other side, you will feel that you have never left your loved ones and you know that they will be with you again, the way they were, soon.
It seems very few people die alone. Often before the moment of death, up to a week, usually a few hours, deceased loved ones will begin gathering around the dying person. The dying person will often see through into the other dimension. Many people are greeted by loved ones they recognize. Some are greeted by angels. Shayna told us, through a medium, she was met by “angel ladies”. Advanced souls might actually just know the way and zip back Home without an escort.
You might or might not see a tunnel. One theory is the tunnel is a portal through lower realms and is a way of protecting your spirit as it passes through those realms. Not everyone who has an NDE has that experience though.
A life review of some sort is very common, but no one judges you. You might have others there to show you your life which you will relive in great detail actually feeling not only your own feelings again, but those of the people you impacted. You judge yourself You self-evaluate, which might sound like you’re getting off easy, but some say this can be a very difficult process as you come to grips with who you truly are.
A few people who have had NDEs have what are called LTP (less than positive) experiences. There are some tips on this. First, every LTP that I have ever heard of the person having it is rescued as soon as he asks for help. In the unlikely event you find yourself in a place you don’t want to be, don’t hesitate to ask for help.
I’ve been studying the afterlife for about 15 years now. The more I learn, the less I fear and the more I look forward to the return trip home. We celebrate births and we mourn deaths. It should be the other way around. Being born is hard. Living here is hard. Being born is the beginning of a wonderful chance to learn and experience, but it’s the start of a difficult journey. Dying is graduating. It’s finishing the course and returning Home. Dying is easy.
