Psience Quest

(* Sceptics look away)

My friend's dead mother appeared by his side (in his vehicle) and told him that he needed to get to hospital urgently. He didn't know where the hospital was, but she guided him down these back roads in an unfamiliar (to my friend) part of the USA.
He then managed to get inside (the hospital)l before dropping dead on the floor. He was brought back by the skill of a Mexican male nurse (who gave him lengthy CPR and multiple shocks) before spending three weeks in a coma.

The point here is... how did the 'spirit' of his dead mother know that he was about to die ? I've come across this many times and I now believe that the inhabitants of this other 'world' (whatever it is) know exactly what is going to happen in this world and sometimes intervene ?

 And that's all I feel I can say on the matter. Of course, such notions create great amusement amongst the guardians of rationality etc. Nevertheless, his story knits together perfectly and although he can't show me a picture of his dead mother sitting beside him, there is no way that this was invented. My friend was compelled by 'something' to change the direction of his journey (during the night) and go to hospital when he had no way of knowing that he was going to die and no way of knowing where the hospital was.

Janine Shepherd, a former Olympic athelete, describes the 'insight' she was given after a truly horrendous accident. Her subsequent NDE touches on the puzzling 'questions' mentioned in the posts above.

I could, at will, move between two dimensions. One moment, I was in my body in the physical plane, and the next, I was in the non-physical—sometimes in both places at the same time. The only distinction between the two was that one came with excruciating pain, while the other felt detached from worldly concerns, and pain-free.

I knew I was being guided and nurtured by those who had travelled such a journey long before mine. There were no spoken words between us, only thoughts, and even those thoughts are today difficult to recount. I was experiencing pure awareness.

I was offered a choice: To remain in this spiritual world or return to my physical body—one seemingly now broken beyond repair.

Those 10 days in death, alternating visits between physical and ethereal worlds, gave me a deep and profound understanding of who I truly am, and my purpose in life.
 
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/wha...8a33f62dc9

The famous Australian climber Lincoln Hall, is the only person to have survived a night at the top of Mount Everest at 29,000 feet, without any oxygen and only a minimum of clothing. He had been left for dead by the Sherpa assisstants who did not have the strength to carry his body down the mountain.

In this incredibly dire situation, Hall describes (in his book Dead Lucky) what he experienced as he literally lay right on the edge of death. How he felt himself 'wearing' what he describes as the 'cloak of death/darkness' but somehow choosing to take it off and live (stay on earth) 

In this interview with ABC (Australia) in 2011, Hall answers questions about his life and experience during this event.
Sadly Lincoln died prematurely in 2012 (from exposure to asbestos)

http://www.abc.net.au/compass/s3338159.htm

"My out of body experience came when I emerged from some kind of sleep or dream or something. I'd certainly passed out in some respect, but then something really strange happened, and that is that I didn't want to be there. But suddenly I wasn't there. I wasn't there on the rock. However I could see myself on the rock about 10 metres away, maybe a metre or two above.

Obviously I was from being 10 metres away it was a completely different angle and I could see the sherpas over here and I could see the sherpas there. And I didn't really think anything about it. And then I'm not quite sure what made the switch happen, but suddenly it was a switch back to where I was. And so it was a huge sort of jolt of adrenaline, of fear."

Some of the members have seen this NDE reported by Canadian artist, Jeremy Down. For those that haven't, the video offers a very picturesque description of the events that led to it and his subsequent thoughts and feelings on what it means.

"It just seemed to make complete sense like we all come to earth here and we forget who we are and why we came back to move forward. I dunno, it's hard to put into words but there's a definite purpose and it makes complete sense." 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQESgxwICoA

This woman had an NDE when her heart stopped during the removal of a brain tumour. She says she had never heard of such a thing (as an NDE) before. That would at least rule out expectation, presumably.

Ron Barnett :

"Her description of what she experienced during her 'death' sounds similar to what you may have heard before, although she says that at the time she hadn’t ever heard of such things happening to anyone. She said to her it seemed more real than sitting in the laundry room at the Towers talking with me" (The reporter RB)

"And I remember being outside of what seemed like a wall or a gate. And my two grandfathers who had passed before me and my godfather who had passed before came out, and they were these white beings. And there was like no real form to them. And we communicated, it must have been by thought."

"I had all the answers to everything. I mean I knew everything. And it was like phenomenal. I felt total bliss."

https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/o...416472002/

For those who are not familiar with John Geiger's excellent book, The Third Man factor, here is a nice sample of the content.

 Geiger spent five years tracking down the stories of people who've experienced the Third Man phenomenon. He opens his book with the story of Ron Di Francesco, a worker at the World Trade Centre on 9/11.

"There was still danger, so it led me to the stairwell, led me to break through, led me to run through the fire. . . . There was obviously somebody encouraging me. That's not where you go, you don't go toward the fire. . . ."

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor...=112746464

This is a rather curious report from a woman who attempted suicide by jumping out of a fourth floor window in East Germany in 1947. She reports some elements, such as being able to perceive the thoughts of people while out of her body and also claiming to know when someone was going to die, amongst other things.

She also alludes to a feeling of guilt drawing her back to her body which lay in the hospital morgue waiting to be dissected, apparently. It is a bit confusing and not just because the translation may not be quite accurate, I'm not sure.

With thanks to 
 
Empirische Jenseitsforschung

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Izh3lP4gZuw

In March 2009, Raymond O'Brien collapsed at home. He barely managed to summon help (999) through the intervention of his cat, which in licking Ray's nose, somehow roused him just enough to make the call for help on his mobile phone.

Inside the ambulance, Raymond died for the first time and was defibrillated. He woke up and asked the ambulance staff if they wanted to come back in the house for a cup of tea, as he felt fine now.

"No, Ray, this is very serious, you died! " ...and she pointed to a red clock on the ambulance wall which had been set to 12 midnight, the exact time his heart stopped. During his close brush with death, he was defibrillated no less than ten times and during this, he experienced leaving his physical body behind on several occasions and also visiting a place he describes as paradise.

Raymond very kindly allowed me to reproduce his experience here and he is currently finishing his training as a
PTSD (Post traumatic stress disorder) counsellor, such was the extreme pain and literally 'shocking' circumstances of his resuscitation. NB. It is very unusual for anyone to feel the pain from defibrillation (but it does occasionally happen, apparently)

In the ambulance when his heart stopped:

The "wind" was the first contact with my soul, I felt the incredible power of this sentient being as it welcomed me, as it passed through me from the right hand side. The first touch it made with me was my right upper shoulder, quickly followed by my waist and right leg, it went through me so quickly and yet slow enough to introduce itself. I was immediately aware of a sense of knowing this "wind." The way it passed through my soul was akin to the most wonderful blissful sensation, I am trying so much to give an understanding of what happened when we met.

I can only say it was on par with the most comfortable warm duvet, open fire warmth that one could have ever experienced... it was so soft on my soul. The two of us connected which brought a comfort and calmness to us, there seemed to be a slight edge of confusion from the "wind" in regards to me. All of this is happening even before I have raised my head to look around, I was still fixed on looking at my bare feet when I realized by the emptiness within that the "wind" had left my soul alone.

As I took in what was unfolding I recall having a thought that this time I am going take all of this moment in and the way I am going to do this is by being practical! I very briefly looked at the scenery to my right, there was a green pasture that led off to water, it could have been a lake (Ray mentioned here that he was surprised to then telepathically communicate with a swan who asked him where he had been)....

...but I was more fascinated with the feeling coming from my feet, I looked back down at them, the grass was protruding through my toes. I started to get excited at the realization of where I was.

The "other side" was reinforced with what I was seeing at my feet. The grass of course was not grass in the sense of grass in a park for instance. It resembled very warm soft straight fur about two inches or so in height. I scrunched my toes and could feel the smoothness of each green blade of it.

The fur grass was slippery smooth between my toes and I was impressed with this as it gave me another affirmation to my sense of being on the "other side."

It was then that I looked up again to see just up ahead on a very slight hill, there were two men, and three women standing almost parallel to each other. The two men, one elderly, the other younger, wore white togas. What impressed me about the older man was that he had this inner strength. I have never experienced such energy! He had so much power, it shone out between his neck and shoulders.

The younger man, say around forty years of age, had brown hair and a good tan. The elderly man was clearly healthy, but he had white hair and a white beard. Of the three women/ladies, one was taller than the other two and they also wore white togas with additional white head veils. The women and the man were in conversation with the elderly man, who had a tan coloured book in his left hand he seemed to be reading from.

There I stood and I was just waiting patiently for a very short while. The tallest woman, who was just stunning, had long dark brown hair and the most beautiful face! She stood opposite to the younger man, turned and looked directly at me, smiling.

I smiled back, then I watched her bend forward and say something to the younger man and as she did, the other two women turned their attention from the elderly man to looking past each other to see me standing there. I don't recall their faces just the angle they took to look past the tall woman.

The colour contrast between the bright white clothing, the green "fur" grass and the blue sky was mesmerizing to me! The beautiful smell of this place became implanted in me as I was to find out several years later!  Each passing second made me closer to staying here.

All of a sudden I found I was standing next to the younger man,  how this happened, I don't know; but I did see him turn and hear him say to the elderly man, "Rays here!"

I knew from the energy that was given off, the elderly man had the final say on what was going to happen to me. My eyes were fixed not on him but on the tan coloured book in his left hand and with the gentlest of gestures, without even looking up from his book, he waved his right hand and said at the same time, "He should not be here"

Ray then awakes in the ambulance and is transported to hospital. He then suffers a series of cardiac arrests (9 more) and is defibrillated with additional chest compressions many times.

Typical of one of these arrests is this out of body experience in the resuscitation room.

One bizarre moment I can recall  distinctly is being defibrillated and then immediately sitting up and raising my right arm, pointing with my finger at the crash team. They visibly recoiled from me and I heard myself say to them "Thanks, I needed that!"

Then I fell back again..my head hit the black cushioning on the trolley... I had a burning cold hot pain in my chest...then blackness... then a very violent  awakening from this blackness. I assume the violent awakening came from the defibrillator. A sense of suffocation, followed by a deep intake of breath and an immediate panic... and then the sensation of my nose being pressed up against the white ceiling tiles that they have in the hospitals.

 I was blown away by the realization that I am on the ceiling !  I could actually see the tiny fibre-board holes in the tiles, followed by bright white cold light coming from what appeared to be the fluorescent lights, I then had the feeling of falling down back in to my body.  I fought with the staff, I could hear them say "Its us, Ray its us!"

I was so angry at the pain that they were giving me that I shouted "What the hell do you think you are doing to me?"

The staff were holding me down as I was trying to get them off me... two members of staff per leg and the same for my arms. I came too, but I knew more was still to come it was just a clear sense of knowing. I spoke to some of the cardiac sisters just a month ago about this 'event.'  They know the crash team and they said to me "You must have really freaked them out, Ray!" 
 
His final out of body experience :

 (I recall that OBE very well in actual fact it still touches me at this very moment) The other day on my white board in the kitchen I wrote this.

 He doesn't know this is going to hurt me. 'He' is called B...., a member of the crash team that night... and as I sat on my haunches (out of my body), on my physical forehead knowing that I'm probably dead, I was shocked to understand how quickly it was all over with my life to a point where a sense of guilt came to mind because I had left my body and really did not give any thought or thanks to what we had been through together in life.

So I said, "Thank you, Ray" as I looked along the length of my physical body below me. The crash team were running out of idea's of what to do next, I could see it in their expressions and a slight lack of urgency of movements in comparison to the start of my resuscitation.

As they worked on me I could see the clock up on the wall and knew I had been here a while. What drew my eyes away from the clock was the 'slopping' movement of my body, side to side caused by the defibrillator.

I looked down at Ray (me), his tee-shirt cut open and I made a point of saying, "It doesn't matter what you do to me, it won't make the blindest bit of difference!" Wishful thinking, I suppose as I wanted to be where this journey had started (in paradise).

So here I am squatting on my forehead, this in itself felt completely natural, then B appeared with the defibrillator to my left hand side. B and my soul were very nearly at eye level to each other and as I looked at him, to my disbelief, he said to the crash team as he rubbed the paddles together, "If this doesn't bring him back, nothing will."  Then he applied the defibrillator to me and I came back. The staff had 'caught' me; I was back and knew it; I could feel it, the shock of coming back ....and it made me so angry. I knew then I was in big trouble.

Some of Ray's thoughts on this :

"He" (Ray >Me) also doesn't know this is going to hurt him...came from my soul. I felt empathy for my physical body, as I knew  that this 'event' had now taken a turn from the bliss of paradise to a dark and painful level.  I was coming back. 

The 'events' were still to be on-going, I was told this, in some form of telepathy between the bout's of dying. I was probably two thirds in, time wise, in this NDE/OBE and by this time it looked to me from my 'soul's' point of view that Ray (the physical Ray) is going through a very tough time... and now he knows it. And I did  know it, as each time I came back into my body, I would reassess and take stock of the situation.

I recall (as a soul) lying back down in my body after B (the nurse/tech) had shocked me. I find it most unusual now to be remembering the 'event' from two separate plains, the physical which was intertwined with the unknown. The word unknown was hugely significant to me.

It is full of the most intense panic, the fear of the awareness that 'I have to wait and lie here' for the next 'event' (arrest) and (possible shock from the defibrillator). I felt like the situation was comparable to the plight of Prometheus from Greek mythology. I'll never forget that thought. I understood that tale now and what the meaning meant to me.. and it meant sheer cold fear of the pain and knowing it was coming for me. 

I had accepted that I was going to die again. I could not take the information in quick enough to try and make sense of why ? I could see through the gaps of the staff to my right a shady grey shapeless fog had come for me again.

In response to a question about whether or not he had any conception of his non physical body :

I did see my feet. They were bare but slightly smaller. I was aware of the texture of my physical body's forehead and the strangeness of this situation but I was also comfortable with the 'rational.' I never spoke to B (from the crash team) about him defibrillating me, maybe I shall in the future. He left as quickly as he came, then a short while after this, the ambulance girl, R, who was the first person to resuscitate me in the ambulance, made an appearance. She came with another paramedic lady and I heard Rebecca say to her "Here he is, here's the man I was telling you about   Ray, you are so lucky!" 

Ray also described going sideways out of his physical body and ending up in a place somewhat less pleasant (but not hell)

Many thanks to Raymond O'Brien.

https://www.neardeathexperienceuk.com/community.html

Plant biologist and artist, Kevin Songer lives with Marfan Syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that has caused many problems and painful difficulties in his life. In 2011 he had to undergo a very serious operation for a dissected aorta.

The operation involves placing the patient on cardio-pulmonary by-pass and cooling them down to a temperature of less than 20 degrees C. The patient's head is packed in ice and the EEG is completely flat before the repair is undertaken. No experience at all should be possible in this state and yet he saw his chest wide open and the surgeons cutting and sewing in the graft that is used to fix this extremely serious problem.  

I contacted Kevin by email and he very kindly agreed to let me reproduce his near death experience, which he believes occurred during the operation, here. He has also kindly agreed to answer some additional questions which I intend to post here with his permission (of course).  

Kevin's experience occurred while he was having his first open heart surgery in the emergency room at Jacksonville's Memorial Hospital in Florida, where he lives.

"After driving myself to Memorial Hospital in Jacksonville (I know, I should have called 911 but I did not) and stumbling into the ER, the young surgeon on call determined my aorta was dissected root to foot.  He told me that he wanted to go in and replace the aortic valve and install a Dacron graft up to the aortic arch.

To do so I'd have to have my body cooled (hypothermia) and my heart put on bypass while they repaired the critically damaged cardiovascular system.

The entire  operation took about ten or so hours.  Recovery was difficult to say the least and I even had to go back through additional open heart surgery to mitigate subsequent heart infections.  Wearing the wound vac over my heart was tough, as was enduring the three months of 24/7 IV antibiotics and anti fungal medications.

While I was lying on the operating table during my aortic root and arch replacement my self awareness began to take a life of its own, separate from my body.

I can clearly remember what was happening, even to this day.  Unlike a dream that seems real at the time but fades from memory after a few short days, the NDE experience I had that day is as ever clear now as two and a half years ago.

I was so very aware of myself and knew exactly who I was.  My body however was on the operating table below with the doctors and nurses hovering over, cutting sewing and doing whatever thoracic surgeons and their teams do when installing mechanical heart valves and Dacron aorta grafts.

I was quite content, feeling safe and happy where I was, 'hovering' above the operating table.

Looking around I could see many people praying for me and sending me good thoughts.  This was interesting I thought, but I honestly was more interested in what I could see not in the operating room, but in another part of my self-awareness.  There was an amazing place of really cool colors and sound I was witnessing.  I could fly, soar and felt very, very at home.

After the entire experience I felt somewhat guilty at not worrying about those people left behind on the earth while I was "partying" in the afterlife.  I knew my wife and kids and family would be OK.  I did not worry about them what-so-ever in my NDE state.  

I did not even think of calling out to the doctors and nurses.  There was no doubt my body was on the operating table and I could see much of what was going on.
  
During my NDE I  was a self aware 'spirit', yet I had form too.  My form was not so much a preoccupying factor though as I 'hovered' in the air above the table.  I know my self awareness had form because I was bumping against the ceiling as I floated upwards.  When I'd bump the ceiling, my form would float back down towards the other side of the room.  The floating up, bumping the ceiling and floating back down repeated itself over and over until I began taking notice of this occurrence.

The whole bumping into the ceiling thing really pissed me off. Not because bumping hurt or anything, but because I was aware of an amazing array of new sounds and senses I was catching a glimpse of and I wanted to explore more.  There were so many beautiful colors I'd never seen before and sounds and scents and hues and textures and stuff I cannot even describe.  There was a new existence out there that I was tasting and I wanted more of it, a place where I felt immense love and acceptance and belonging.

So many were there with me too.  This place where my self awareness was, was a very good city or town or wherever- whatever it was.  I did not want to leave.  As soon as a beautiful new form would pass by and I felt drawn to it, the bumping would start again.  That damned ceiling!

The bumping meant I was not going to die.  I knew this as I continued to bump, and it disappointed me. I wanted to stay and explore this new place full of wonder and beauty.  As I floated up, bumped and floated back down I knew that if I were going to die, I'd float straight through the ceiling, out into this place of wonder.  The bumping meant I was going to stay.  My earthly body was keeping me in the room.

During my long recovery period I revisited this plane of self awareness several times.  Two and a half years later I do not see this land so much anymore, except for those once-in-a-while nights where deep sleep takes me there.

Having my heart disconnected from my body and being cooled to hypothermia levels gave me a chance to see different things.

I do believe I almost died.  I also believe I caught a glimpse of what happens beyond our present self-awareness.  I am really glad I am here today to see my teens raised and spend days with my wife, friends and family.  Looking forward to many more years here before I drop dead.

But get ready for a cool adventure when it is your time to go.  Been there, done that and it is amazing!

More to follow.

Kevin wrote this in addition to the post above.

As my heart and body were separated during bypass I woke up floating just below the operating room ceiling.  Before I'd only seen the operating room in a highly medicated state as I was being wheeled in on the gurney.

Now though, I could see every detail of me on the table with a team of doctors and nurses working on my body, talking, moving and doing whatever doctors and nurses do during a major surgery.  My heart was clearly visible inside my open chest.  I remember asking myself if I was dreaming.  I was lucid and everything was incredulously clear.

Off in the distance I could see throngs of people I knew and others did not know.  They were all sending me good thoughts and praying fervently.  I did not have any feelings of fear but rather a sensation of curiosity.  I knew my wife Judy was in the waiting room and I knew she was going to be OK no matter what.  There was no sense of panic or helplessness.  In fact I felt very much at peace, relaxed and filled or covered with a bright feeling of love.

Looking up I could see through the ceiling.  Beyond the roof lay another world, one filled with what I can only describe as an immense, thick essence of love.  Everything was real, very real.  There were many beings, all very, very happy to see me, all just as real as the doctors and nurses in the room below.

But then the bumping started.  I tried to move towards 'those others' but for some reason was stuck below the ceiling.  Every time I would literally float up I'd bump into the ceiling and bounce back down into the air above the operating table.  At first I was frustrated at being able to see and hear the others but not being able to join them.

A calm voice informed me I was not going to leave my body permanently yet, that it was not my time to die that night.  'OK' I thought, 'this is really amazing'.  Before the dissection I had always worried about dying and what happened afterwards.  But the actual experience was not one of dread, not one of missing my wife and children, not one of regret of having to leave, but instead was one of excitement and anticipation.  And I had other beings to be there with me through it all.

Bright lights, unbelievable landscapes, colors, senses I've never experienced or imagined before and a warm, all encompassing love clothed and lay before me even as I bounced back down from the operating room ceiling.

I am a scientist trained in formal, demonstrable proof and have always questioned near-death accounts like mine, that is until it happened to me. I also flatly reject any suggestion that experience was imagined and I really don't care if the reader believes it or not.  This is my experience, one no one can take from me.

After my surgeon woke me hours later and as I began a very long recovery path, the out of body event stayed in my memory with startling detail, and continues to do so even today.

Subsequently there had to be a second open heart operation to clear a thick mass of fungal growth around my heart from complications arising out of the first surgery.  Months later I was finally home.