I know that thing about feeling different so well. I have been married for 29 years and my wife is only just now acknowledging my NDEs. For the most part she has taken the position of “How do you know it was not Satan” and “So you belong to a special club”. She recently told me that she understands what a huge impact my NDEs have had on me. I told her that there is no way she can “understand” something like an NDE…I can barely comprehend them myself.Yes, I have had two NDEs. My first was a schoolyard accident when I was 10 years old and the second was a drug overdose when I was 16 years old. The second one was by far the most profound. In my second, God took me on a “tour” of the universe — the whole time explaining how everything works together and showing me how powerful we really are as human beings. It turns out that we create and shape every little thing about our lives. I even understood how the “bad stuff” takes shape and the profound meaning behind our every action.
Then God told me “Now I want to show you who you really are” and allowed me to become one with Him. He took me and folded his being around me and I became One with God…yet I was still Ray, with the same sense of humor and the same hang ups I have always had. God let His Love permeate my being and I was finally Home. I cannot describe this at all…it was so huge and meaningful. What we call Love is so small next to what God calls Love.
Another thing….He told me that I must go back, that it was not my time yet. But He told me that I could return anytime I wanted.
Now, what in the world does that mean?
So when the Bible tells us that we are made in God’s image I understand…we are like “Little Gods” and far, far more powerful than we know.
You were created you, and will never be anything or anyone but you. You were created whole, perfect, and with everything you will ever need given to you.
The physical life wrapped you into a body, and your parents, teachers, friends, loved ones, and peers taught you who you believe you are at this moment. Your beliefs, your thoughts, your emotions, are a result of not who you are, but what you have come to believe you are. It is not bad, nor good that you have become a physical person, believing in physical concepts and teachings, it is for the purpose of learning about yourself. In your physical interactions with others you are really interacting with yourself, for you are a part of everyone and everything, and everyone and everything is a part of you. We live in a Oneness of consciousness. How you treat others is exactly how you treat yourself. Physical life is a journey of self-discovery. By discovering the warmth, goodness, and love in others you discovery it within yourself. You will learn to honor, and respect all life for it is a part of you, an eternal part, as you are eternal. The path to enlightenment is the path to self-discovery, self-love, self-confidence, and the realization of the greater good is your good. The greater picture is your picture.
By Dimitri Vassilaros
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, May 23, 2008
Fred Tregaskes saw the light at the end of the tunnel in Vietnam after his body was tagged and bagged and placed in refrigerated storage.”I won’t wear a jacket to this day,” says the retired master sergeant, now 71. “I can’t stand the sound of a zipper.”
The tunnel went on forever, Tregaskes says. “I saw people I had known and served with, all dead. The light was brighter than the sun but pure white. You could not turn away but it did not hurt your eyes. It kept coming, kept coming. It was drawing you in.”
The career soldier — a paratrooper who led squads and platoons through very unfriendly fire — didn’t realize it at the time, but he was marked for life with a band of brothers who had a similar experience.
“I made a conscious decision to come back,” he says. His wife and their six children in 1967 were his motivation while U.S. military doctors, in what was then South Vietnam, were desperately trying to keep him alive after enemy fire blew him apart and eventually put him in a wheelchair.
Tregaskes and his wife Frieda (the childhood sweethearts have been married 51 years) live in Armstrong County. And he has a place in the Hall of Valor at Soldiers & Sailors Military Museum and Memorial in Oakland. Tregaskes also heads the Keystone Paralyzed Veterans of America.
He was awarded the Silver and Bronze stars and Purple Heart with Oak Leaf Cluster. None were for his biggest battle against the most ruthless of friendly fire.
The wounds were so bad that his wife, a registered nurse, could still see his internal organs through them months after the doctors saved his life. But they kept trying to tell him that it would not be much of a life. He was warned that he might be better off than a vegetable — but not much.
Seven rounds of enemy fire went clear through the hip and took off part of the spine. Right hip? Gone. A kidney gone, too, and a lot more of his insides. In a coma for six months. “They really messed me up,” he says.
And no feeling in his legs.
The shrinks tried to convince him to accept the fact — the fact — that he never would walk again.
So when did Tregaskes finally realize that?
“I have not accepted it yet,” he says. “I refused to accept it. I really believe that some day I will be able to walk.”
And he did, sort of, with braces and crutches — braced with a iron will. He “waddled” like a duck, he calls it, and leaned a lot, for all but the last two years.
Tregaskes claims he spots others who had similar near-death experiences by that aura or glow he sees around them.
And he claims, they, about 15 people so far who also “crossed over,” have spotted the same around him.
“How are you, my brother?” a stranger asked when both were shopping for tractors. “I told him, ‘I’m fine,’ and then I asked, ‘When did you have your experience?’ ”
Mrs. T. calls them his “visitors.”
And as for a Memorial Day thought for the Trib’s readers, Tregaskes says: “Do not give up. Keep on trying. As long as you can get one foot forward, the other will follow. Maintain your faith.
“And never forget your fellow soldier, your fellow man on your right and your left. You watch out for him and he will watch out for you.”
Dimitri Vassilaros is a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review editorial page columnist. His column appears Fridays. He can be reached at dvassilaros@tribweb.com or 412-380-5637.
(Posted with the gracious permission of the author.)
When I was 41 years old and a mother of 4 small children, I was in liver and kidney failure and had been a patient for 2 months in Presbyterian Hospital, Pittsburgh Pa. I had a sudden lethal gastric hemorrhage requiring 12 units of blood . This happened in a small bathroom beside my bed and the other patient in my room (near the window) immediately used her call light.
As the nurses helped me into my bed, I suddenly experienced a penetrating blinding white light in my eyesight and I asked someone to “turn off the light” — (please) — or to “close the windows.” I had undescribable pain through out my entire body — it seemed unbearable and I was moaning and shivering.
Next I remember feeling “heavy medical equipment” on my body and the activity of many people around me. I heard someone say “60?” “30?” and immediately I felt that I was becoming “numb” and “cool.” I pressed my fingers against the side of my leg under the covers — and “yes” — I had no feeling!!
The next moment I felt that I was traveling feet first, at a very high rate of speed, down a never ending hallway. I raised my head a few times and it seemed that the floors had a “converging checkerboard” look…it was an unending tunnel. Next, I realized that I felt no pain and that I had wondrous mobility and intelligence and peace. I looked downward and I saw a hospital bed? and I wondered as I looked at the figure in the bed — if it was me? It didn`t look like me…it looked so very small! and I saw the room was full of doctors and nurses. I felt pity and sorrow for them — as my sense of well being was overwhelming!
I saw my husband entering the front entrance to the hospital, and I saw him talking to a man at the elevator entrance in the lobby. I seemed to be moving “further away” and it seemed that I had some sense of direction. I was surrounded by the warmth of the most wonderful love I can ever describe and I felt that I was not alone. I felt that I was “speaking” without words. I felt exhausted.
I knew that I was going on to a new life or some new assignment. It seemed that I was “moving to the right” and traveling further and further toward my “new assignment”. I was so intensely happy and secure basking in this sense of well being and intense love. The atmosphere of where I was did not seem new to me at all…I had no intention of ever leaving…and in a split second, I felt a “heaviness” and then excruciating pain through out my body.
I was aware that “I was back” and I also realized that I was indeed going to recover! I wanted to tell the persons working around my bed….I tried and tried…but I was too weak or unable to speak.
Immediately following this episode…I could hear them talking in ICU…and they told me that all my liver and urine reports were coming back normal. Previous to my collapse, my body was ridden with toxins and my urinary output had been only 1cc. per day. I finally returned home to my family after a total of 3 months hospitalization.
I was frail and weak…89 lbs. I was laying on a bed in our upstairs bedroom. I always needed help to get out of bed, but this day I was alone. I was laying on my back, so I tried to sit up forward, bracing myself on one arm. As I did, I looked over my shoulder to my pillow and realized that I had seemed to separate from my body…I was sitting forward…but I saw my body and head still resting on the pillow!! I immediately dropped backward onto my pillow!!! And, of course, stayed there until I could call out for help!!??
For many years I could not talk to anyone about my experiences…and when I tried I became very emotional and would begin to cry. But I am happy that now people have become more open with the NDE subject.
I am a RN, went back to work part time after a 1 year recovery and worked often in ICU or the ER and it seemed to me that patients in my care seemed to rest and generally do so much better when I was present for the shift.
I am a totally changed person since my NDE. I see life in a very spiritual way…and recognize that we are all indeed living spirits in the divine master plan of the universe. We are all living moving parts in the riddle of life!!!
I was in Phoenix, AZ on March 15, 1997. I thought I got food poisoning so I decided that I wanted to go home to Denver, Colorado. I left Phoenix early in the morning of March 15th and I went directly, 12 hours by car, to Denver. I was able to drive, but I did not eat or stop for rest breaks, just refueling. On March 16th, I was truly exhausted. I felt so sick. I made a doctor’s appointment for that day. My doctor examined me and stated that I had the flu and I would get over it.
I rested for several days, but I had not improved. I returned on a Monday to be examined again. The doctor was amazed to see that I had a very low oxygen level. I returned home with an oxygen tank and endured seven hours before I returned through the emergency room. My heart rate was racing at 190. The emergency room quickly began to work on me. I remember asking if I was “out of the woods”. The nurse told me I was not.
I was taken to the intensive care unit. I proceeded to go into a coma. On the first day I went into liver failure. The second day I went into kidney failure and on the third day I hemorrhaged with internal bleeding. On the fourth day, I had by the professional’s opinion, a positive day of health improvement.
At this time family and friends were sitting in the waiting room and being informed that my survival was doubtful. On that day I started having my out of body experiences and communicating with the other side. I have no recollection of this, but friends in the room became very fascinated with my one sided discussion on my left. I answered many questions and asked questions in my usual business manner. I was able to turn to my right and answer questions posed to me by the people who were physically in the room. Later my friends told me they heard a one sided phone-like conversation and they could not find out who the questioner was on my left.
Saturday, March 31st 1997 was the big fun day. My dear friend Dorothy came into the room and I immediately went into heart failure at 12:30 P.M. The doctor in the care unit climbed in bed and straddled by chest and began beating it. I decided so to speak, “I am out of here”. I rose up to the ceiling and watched as nine hospital medical personnel worked on me. I was fascinated with how each one had a specific job and that they came from all parts of the building. I then left the room and went to the waiting room where my friends were sitting. I have never seen this room in the physical realm. I was able to identify each one in the small room and who was sitting in what colored chair, but more importantly I was very specific to what each wore. There were five people and they all have agreed with my assessment of their arrangement in the room and their clothing. One lady said that it would have been impossible for me to identify her clothing because it was the first time she had worn that new blouse. Everything that I saw was in indescribable colors. I have never seen such colors since.
I then left the waiting room and went to where I grew up on a farm in northeast Colorado. I was floating above it and once again the colors were beyond description. I then took a quick turn and went into the light. The beautiful heavenly light and the warmth and serenity was now my certain destiny. I started my journey down the tunnel of bliss and two people were there waiting to greet me. I wanted to reach them, but I got zapped. The paddles came down on my chest and I was back in the physical presence. I was very, but very angry. I also remember the excruciating pain in my chest. It was awful. I was then in the present place in the intensive care unit. I watched as the medical personnel filed out and my nurse was arranging my body and washing the blood from my mouth. I fell asleep.
At 4:30 P.M. my friend Dorothy entered my room and I immediately left again. Once again the hospital medical personnel were filing in. The crash cart with paddles were right by the bed. I left immediately and went for the light. I was entering the tunnel. I knew how to get there fast from my previous experience and I remember saying I did not want to be stopped this time. Zap again! I was back in my pain filled body. This time I was really furious and I told them so. That moment forward to this day I have been in this physical plane. Dorothy held my hand as the technicians once again left the room. She had such comforting words. She told me that everyone was praying for me in the waiting room. She stated they all wished I would stay, but that she would understand if I choose to leave. She further stated that if I stayed I would make so many people happy. She then posed a question to me, “what are you thinking about”? I very angrily told her I was trying to decide if I would stay or not. She broke out into laughter. My friend, Dorothy is a nun, she understood all my indecision’s and has been a wonderful support since that time.
Unbeknown to me in the intensive care unit I had five broken ribs from the resuscitation. The days, weeks and months to follow would be excruciating. I became very angry that I survived. I ordered from my doctor who had done the resuscitation a form for a medallion that I wear around my neck stating no CPR will be performed on me. I want to live a happy and healthy physical life here, but I am anxious to make the transition as soon as I am called back.
My life has changed. I worry not. I work as a consultant when I so desire in the petroleum industry. I counsel people in health crisis and in their days of transition to the next plane. I am somewhat at a loss today as to what my real purpose for surviving has been, but I have resigned myself to accept each moment, day and time and move forward. I have basic spiritual beliefs, but I can not specify a deep devotion to any one religion. I have disappointed some friends by stating that your beliefs one way or the other will not change your outcome, so be you Muslim, Jewish, Christian or undecided, the outcome is the same. I truly believe this. I am so blessed to have had this glorious experience of near death. I am just an average person with no grand accomplishments, but I am very content, happy and secure with the future.
Presently, I am hoping to meet other people who have had a NDE, just to have a sense of belonging with other individuals who can relate to my experience. To date I have not come into contact with anyone in the Denver metropolitan area who can understand my desire for recognition of my NDE.
D.O.
I was a 20-year-old female security guard, working around some of the worst areas of Sydney, Australia. On the 10th of June, 1999, I was assaulted and left unconscious for 10 minutes before my partner found me. Someone had come up from behind and grabbed the back of my neck and my jacket and pushed me face first into a brick wall. I didn’t think much of it. Some people have a lot of animosity against people in uniform.
Then early on the morning of 26th of June, 1999, I received a call on my cellular phone from the guy who had assaulted me. Apologizing for smashing my head into a concrete wall, then telling me to behave myself and I will be fine.
I continued working as a security guard in the same area, but being a little more cautious of who was watching me closely. Then on the 23rd of July, 1999, I was subjected to another call from this person stating that “I’m going to get YOU! WATCH OUT GIRL!”
After my boss had heard about this last phone call she moved me from that area to a mobile patrol in the eastern suburbs of Sydney. It was a better pay, and alot easier on the mind. I received no more further phone calls from this stalker.
Then on Friday the 13th of August, I was getting ready for work, about ten minutes before I had to leave for work I decided to go out and get the mail from the letter box by the street. I walked back into my house when I was knocked out from behind. During this time I suspect the stalker wrote up a message on my computer (of which I have no knowledge of what it says. The police are keeping their mouths shut to everyone.), then I suspect I might have been starting to regain consciousness when he started to leave and saw his chance.
He drew my gun from the holster on my still unconscious body. BANG! I heard the noise but I still did not register consciousness. Seconds later I sat up and screamed. No one heard me. Blood was pulsing from my left shoulder, it quickly covered my whole shirt. I ran through the house looking for a phone. I saw a phone but in my delirious state I could not orientate myself around the furniture to it. Blood still pulsed from my shoulder. I ran back the way I had come. I knew there was three phones in my room. I tripped. I lay there for what seemed like minutes saying “Oh God, Help Me! Help Me Please!!” I managed to drag myself to the room at the end of the hallway in which it first started. I couldn’t reach the phones which were upon a desk. Thankfully a cloth was draped over the desk, I pulled it off until I saw my cellular phone reaching over the edge of the desk. I dialed 000 (being the emergency number). The guy at the other end said “Police, fire, ambulance?” I panted “Police!” The guy replied “State?” I guess I still hadn’t lost my sense of humour when I replied with “Dying!” The guy then said “In which state do you live?” I replied “New South Wales.” He asked “Suburb?” I replied “Baulkham Hills” He said “Connecting you now.” The phone rang again. Another guy answered, asking me, “State the problem?” “I’ve been shot!” I panted. He asked “What address?” I panted into the phone my full address. He then hung up.
I needed to talk to someone, I didn’t want to be alone. I rang work. “Help me!!” My boss “Jenny? Jenny? What’s wrong?!” “I’ve been shot!” My boss frantically replied “How?! You didn’t shoot yourself?” “No! The stalker. He shot me!” My boss answered “Oh God, is an ambulance on the way?!” I replied “Police are.” I hadn’t even thought about an ambulance, I was still losing alot of blood. The phone dropped out. I continued repeating “Help me, Help me!!” Then I heard “Hello?” I said as loud as I could “Help Me!” I heard “Secure that weapon!” Then a policeman was at my side, he saw my uniform and thought I was a cop, “F*^k! It’s a copper!!”
Within the next five minutes 16 cop cars had pulled up in my street along with two ambulances. The ambulance officers rushed to my side and covered me up and put me on a stretcher. I was in the ambulance, some female cop was calling my name over and over. “Jennifer? Jennifer?” I was in too much pain to reply. “Jennifer? You have a severe chest injury. You could die.” I screamed. “I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die!” She said I need information? Description? Anything? I started spouting names of people who would know the story up to today. I heard several cops asking the ambulance officers if they needed a police escort.
I woke in emergency. There were doctors and nurses and police everywhere. They cut my clothes off. I remember hearing snip, snip, tear as they tore them off.
Then I remember seeing myself on the operating table from above. I was covered in blood. I moved on and started going into the past. It wasn’t so much as recognising the past through seeing it, it was more like having the feelings of the event all over again. I went through thousands of events of my life. I finally saw a light. Everything around it was black like a tunnel. I started drifting closer and closer. I felt safe. I approached the light. Someone was standing next to the entrance.
As I went to enter the light, this person moved in front of the light and said “It’s not your time.” I was starting to drift away, I tried to stay there, but I couldn’t control my movement. I next remember waking up in hospital.
After 9 hours of surgery, they mended an artery, a nerve, and replaced 5 and a half litres of blood. My left arm is slowly recovering, but it will be a long term process. I was reading though my medical reports and stated that upon entry into hospital I was revived and resuscitated by CPR.
- Nil response
- Nil blood pressure
- Nil pulse
- Temp at 32.6 degrees celcius
* Time taken/response was 46 seconds.
I still live in fear of this stalker as they have not caught him. But my recovery is more important to me.
I have never told the whole story to anyone I know, and I don’t know why I broadcast it across the net.
One night a couple of months ago I went to bed normally and woke up in an ambulance. Observing the surprised look on my face, the guy holding the oxygen mask informed me that I had had a grand mal seizure.According to my wife: about 4:00 a.m. I made a loud wheezing sound and then started thrashing around violently. Then I turned purple, fell over sideways and stopped breathing. She began CPR and kept it up for several minutes until I started sputtering and coughing up slime, then she called an ambulance.
My assumption was that my breathing was there but hard to detect, that she had been doing CPR on a living speciman, and that I was lucky to be alive after something like that. However, ever since I woke up in the meat-wagon I’ve had this bizarre, nagging feeling that I have been dead. I don’t remember anything that would suggest something like that, but the feeling is rather, ahhh, substantial, and it doesn’t seem to be going away.
Ever since that night my life has been a whole new ball of wax, and a sometimes disturbing one at that. I am having to learn how to live all over again; but, now I have to live in two worlds at once and I can only talk to people about one of them: the one THEY are aware of.
Here’s the part that means I’ve gone completely insane: I am aware now of an “other world”. This other world is dark and empty by default, but I now have access to this “thing” that radiates love (this sounds REALLY stupid). The thing that radiates love seems like it has the mentality of a child. It is curious and non-judgemental, and it seems to have become something of a silent partner. Why? Because without it I am subjected to this “darkness” that robs me of meaning. I am FORCED to let this “love” flow through me so I can keep going and try to straighten out this incredible mess. This is mind boggling. I actually sit around feeling LOVE for people I don’t even know. I can’t even get mad any more.
Your site is very valuable to people who have had this kind of thing happen and I appreciate it immensely. Once I figure out how to help people use this situation I’ll put up a section about it on my site (with a link to your site).
Sorry to be so long winded. I had to get this off my chest and people who will understand are few and far between.
I was a young, ‘tough guy’ years ago. Another life, it seems. I was in Northern Ontario, looking for work in the mines when I happened to get into a ’scuffle’ with another young tough guy. I fell and hit my head (the temple) on the corner of a metal waste container on my way to the floor. I was on my hands and knees, looking at the blood streaming from my skull into a pool on the tiles.I looked up and saw that I was no longer in the room I had been in, but, I was outside in a beautiful setting…rolling hills, trees, birds singing in the sky. I was surrounded by a large group of beings. They were in a circle around me, observing me as I kneeled before them.
There appeared to be order to their positions. The younger looking ones were in the front, closest to me. The older behind, peering over the heads and shoulders of the ones in front of them. All of them wore white robes and were hairless.(Bald). They were communicating with each other with their minds and I could ‘hear’ their thoughts in my mind, very, very clearly. The younger ones were asking of the older ones, ‘Is he ready? Is he Coming? Should we help him? Is he ready? Is he Coming? Should we help him?’ The older ones simply stated, ‘Wait, be patient, wait.’
(Keep in mind, at this time in my life I was not spiritually involved or religious in any way. I was a tough guy and I felt — and was proud — that I walked alone.) I shook my head and found myself back in the room, bleeding profusely from the cut. My ‘opponent’ helped me to my feet and took me to get stitched up.
This vision was a profound and powerful event in my life, as you can imagine. It was some time ago (over 30 years) and there was not much talk those days about near death experiences, so I kept quiet about it, pondered it, absorbed it, and eventually found myself renewed by it. (I was not on drugs, either, so it was not a drug-induced hallucination.) This event occurred. It was real and I have no doubt of it’s authenticity. I have been given a gift in this seeing and can tell you all with complete confidence.. You are not alone..EVER! And, there IS NO DEATH! Rejoice, be well, love!
L.L
I call this NDE experience GRANTED for a very special reason.My NDE, and to tell you the very honest truth about it, I am not really sure if this is what you would call this. I will make this very short and to the point.
I figure that I was a young teenager, around 15 to 16 years of age. I was sleeping one night and I felt this tremendous pull out of my body. My room was naturally dark, so I did not look down and view my body or go through a tunnel of darkness and see a great white light at the end of this tunnel.
Instead, I seen something much, much better. I seen Jesus Himself. I felt a pull up in the corner of my room and seen Jesus! He had long brown hair, he had on a white robe with a deep red scarlet sash covering His shoulders and hanging to His waist. His arms were stretched out to me. I felt a tremendous pull directly to Him. I resisted and he kept pulling me. As I was approaching Him I felt so much love and acceptance. I felt like crying with relief for this overwhelming sense of comfort and unconditional love that I was then experiencing from Him. He then said to me, not through his words but in the form of mental communication, “Come, you have had so much pain.” I wanted to naturally go to Him but knew at the time my mother was still alive and was going through a very difficult period and needed me to be with her. I did not want her to come into my room and find that I had passed on during the night. I then said to Jesus mentally, “I want to come with you but my mother will be in so much pain and will take this very hard. If it is your will I will gladly come with you, but please let me go back to be with her.” I remember kneeling and for a few moments Jesus did not answer. I sensed that Jesus was ready to take me then and He knew that it was my choice to stay. Then with a one word command and in a voice so sweet, full of compassion and loving, but with a command of authority like no other He said the word, “GRANTED” and I was once again in my body.
I live today knowing that He will be there on the other side waiting to personally take me home with HIM when it is trully my time to pass. My mother just recently passed away, so I await His coming for me! I do not mean to sound as if I am hanging around waiting to die. I am still grieving over her loss and I have my good and bad moments. However, I know in my heart that this is not the end. His very words, “Behold, in My Father’s house there are many mansions. I will go and prepare a place for you.”
Thank you for taking the time to read this and please pray for me and my brothers and sisters for strength and guidance over this difficult period of our lives.
When I was about 4 yrs old I died. I accidentally hung myself and was not discovered until I was blue and not breathing. Since that time I have had many Spiritual Experiences, here is one such experience: In 1975 I went to a spiritual retreat in northern California. On a Saturday I attended a class called “Healing Outside of Time.” During the class I closed my eyes and meditated, All at once I was lifted out of my body, above this dimension and into another one. I was standing in a misty place and there were 3 beings there. They “gave” or passed something to me. I was not sure what but the next thing I knew I heard the class instructor say we would have an intermission and I was in my body in my seat again. I opened my eyes and walked outside the room.
As I looked at the ocean, I could “feel” myself in the ocean and the ocean in me, I could feel myself in the trees and the trees in me. What was really strange was that I could also feel the automobiles, electric wires, asphalt, buildings all of this universe inside of me. I was at One with it All. I looked around at other peoples faces and it was imposible to tell where they left off and I began. I could feel their face on mine and my face on theirs. Words do not explain this Wonderful feeling of Oneness with all Life.
There is much more to this but I cannot put it in words. However, the experience lasted for 3 days. Since that time there have been many such experiences. These days I am given things in meditation that I feel compelled to write down. I will leave you with one such message I received about Silence:
Silence
What is silence? Is silence an absence of sound? No, for I have felt the Silence while walking on a noisy, crowded avenue. Is silence an absence of thought? No, for Silence has come upon me in the middle of a movie theater even while focused on the action of the movie. What then is silence?
On a warm and lazy day, while lying in the grass and looking up at the sky; the clouds come and then move out of sight, yet the sky remains. An airplane appears and then is gone, a bird flies by and still behind all this the sky remains.
Turning the gaze inward, a thought comes and then disappears, a feeling floats by and then is gone, yet behind all this the Silence remains.
My child, you have learned to still your thoughts in order to become aware of the Silence within. Yet, I would not have you cling to the practice which led you to your inner Silence, but rather, rest in the inner Silence to which you were led. It is Silence from which you sprung forth and Silence to which you shall return, but in truth, you have always existed as the Silence. A lifetime appears and then passes away, and another, and another, yet, Silence is undisturbed.
Infinite, Eternal, the Silence of your Being, even now, beckons you home. It is the Silence of your Being that is the real “hidden manna” and now know this: I have given you a white stone, upon which is written a “new name”; Silence is that name. And no one knows saving him that receiveth it. Your real name is Silence. You are the Silence from which all Life flows. You are the Infinite Silence Itself.
At all times, in all places that appear to you, learn to rest back in the Silence of your Being; commune with that Silence, feel that Silence, know that only the Silence is Real.
Oh dear one, have I been so long a time with you and thou hast not known me? Know Me now, the Silence of your Being. Trust Me, I will never leave you nor forsake you, for in truth, I Am you.
Peace, My Peace, I give unto you. Rest now, in the Silence of Being.
It was the summer of 1963 and we wanted to go camping at Scott Lake near Sisters, Oregon. The lake there was always warm and the mountains all around us. My brother Brian and I were walking up the back way of the hill to the rock quarry when we spotted a large squirrel that was screaming at us, wanting us to leave the area. We went to see what it was guarding and it ran to the edge. We thought that we had it trapped and proceeded to capture it. As I went forward the squirrel lept off the ledge and streched out it’s arms and flew all the way down to the other side, which was at least 75 feet high.I stepped out on the rock that the squirrel had just lept from and was looking down at the large rocks below when the rock I was standing on shifted. As I spun around to try and grab the ground that came up to meet my face it went into slow motion. I remember Brian’s look on his face was pure terror as my weight slowly pulled me over the ledge. I grabbed frantically at the rocks and soil for a hold, then I got both hands on a protruding rock that held my weight while my legs swung slowly in on the little bit of overhang. I could not get my feet to get a foot hold.
As I hung there names were being called out from all over the campground. People were watching a small kid hanging off a cliff and calling out their kids’ names. I looked out and up at Brian for some help, but all he could do in shock was to scream. Then the rock that was holding me let loose a little and I knew then I wouldn’t be able to hold until someone could come and get me. On the next swing of my legs the rock pulled out of the side of the cliff and I was looking at it when that happened, it came down with force right into my forehead.
I just relaxed and felt like I was spinning in slow motion. Just before I hit I saw two teenagers streched out like they were going to catch me, but they couldn’t reach me due to the large rocks. I landed on my back, but just before impact my spirit stopped and when my body hit it felt like a mattress, I bounced up and hit the second time and bounced again. I know that I was thinking that I bounced like a basketball as I drifted out of consciousness.
The names never stopped, every name you can think of was still being called out. Then a voice that I knew, but still not sure if it was my great grandfather, asked if there was anything I wished to do before we left and I replied I wanted to go home. I liked where I was, it was protected and I thought that I’d just look one more time before leaving.
The next second I was in our living room at home, I’m not standing, but up on the ceiling looking around. It was then that I saw an old toy train my mom had as a kid, and when I saw it, a heavy sorrow came over me. Then I heard my mom’s screams and I told them I wanted to go home with mom. I was told that I would have pain and I remember saying I didn’t care I wanted to go to mom. With that, I came to on a picnic table where the two teenagers had brought me. A grandmotherly woman putting something in my eyes, she had decided to clean the blood off my face so that the parents could ID the body.
As I sat up the old woman fainted and mom was screaming as she came to me, I passed out and came to at the hospital after three days in a coma. To this day I have not had any problems with the headaches the doctors said that I’d have.
I’ve had more life problems that I also have survived including Cancer. One month ago had a rollover and flipped at the top of Mt Hood in a Fourrunner. It crushed the roof flat with my wife and daughter and grandson and not a scratch on any of us. Thank God.
On December 9-11, 2007, the biggest, meanest ice storm in the history of Tulsa, Oklahoma left 234,000 homes and businesses without electric power. Freezing rain coated the power lines, poles, and trees with layer after layer of ice until the weight of the ice was too great for the trees and the wood fell. The trees dropped their ice-laden branches on power lines causing the power lines to break and hit the ground. Houses and cars were not spared either. It was a frightening sound, the poping and cracking of broken limbs descending to earth. Then as quickly as it came, the ice melted leaving our city in the dark.
The aftermath was mind-blowing, streets filled with downed trees, dark and cold. The first job was to clear the streets and make them open for traffic. Many people needed a warm place to stay and a hot meal. Here the churches responded by setting up shelters to provide these things. Next came the convoys of out-of-state linemen and tree workers, 8000 of them from 14 different states made their way into the city. It was a welcome sight to see the trucks moving through the city in groups of five to fifteen guided by a local city worker. A truly massive effort was underway. It was common to see as many as 35 trucks in staging areas across the city. The army of workers were housed in the old IPE building on the fair grounds, a huge building about the size of seven football fields. They are still here working hard, but now most of the city has electricity. We can’t thank them enough. I took some photos and posted them HERE.
Dear Leroy, please include my name plus my email address with this NDE account. Then people can contact me if they want to.
Life can be very, very hard for some of us. The pain of life can become unbearable and at such times it seems that the only way out is to kill oneself. I know this feeling because I have killed myself. My suicide was not a cry for help. I made sure that nobody was going to find me before I died. Mine was a genuine and sincere attempt to kill myself. I was finished, I could continue no more and I followed the only course of action that I thought was right. I took a massive overdose.
Before you die there is the possibility that things could improve, one way or another. Once you’ve killed yourself though, you can’t turn back. Not unless a miracle happens. Such a miracle did happen to me when I made my suicide attempt. Because while I did certainly succeed in dying and leaving this world, I was assured by people in the next world that I’d made a big mistake and was sent back into my body, which only by a miracle of God, revived itself without any medical assistance.
My suicide was back in 1976. I was very lonely and depressed and quite simply did not want to continue living nor did I see any purpose in my living. My life seemed a futile and empty existance. I felt it was time to say goodbye to this world. Late in the evening I took a massive overdose, put the Pink Floyd, “Wish You Were Here” album on and settled down to die quietly.
Three days later I found myself lying on the living room floor. I couldn’t stand up and was so weak I could only crawl. But I was alive. I remembered having left my body and spending quite some time, (I don’t know how long but it seemed like a long time) in a place somewhere, sitting and listening to some people talking to me. I felt relaxed in this place and with these people, They were very nice and understanding people and they were telling me that this was not the way it had to be, that I did not have to kill myself and that I could go back and live again. They totally reassured me that I was supposed to be alive and there was a purpose for it. There was no judgement there from these people, only love and compassion. These people seemed to know me and I got the distinct impression that they were aware of my life and all of the problems I had been going through. They knew with utter certainty that my life was worth living and that I should go back into my body again. They spoke about my life with confidence. I was something special to these people and in their eyes, I was worthy of having my life back. They treated me with the utmost respect and kindness.
So when I found myself back in my body, alive and lying on my living room floor, I was very grateful and happy to be back here again. I had been given a second chance. Later that day I was taken to the hospital and when I told a doctor how many tablets I’d taken he exclaimed, “You should be dead!”
After this suicide NDE I realised that I was not alone. Those people in the spiritual dimension were aware of my life and my every struggle through it. Imagine that while you are in pain and turmoil, that there are people who are watching you and begging you to carry on, not to give up. These people cannot contact you directly because you have to overcome these terrible problems without their help. For they are the people in the spirit world who are invisible to us. And yet these people are hoping and praying that you find the strength to carry on. They don’t want you to give up because they know that if you just carry on a while longer, you will overcome some of these terrible problems and find some respite. They know that you will gain more by simply hanging in there, rather than giving up and taking your own life.
It may seem impossible at times, it may seem pointless to carry on but believe me, I’ve been there and tried suicide. Thankfully I was shown by those people in the spirit world, that suicide is not the answer and does not solve anything. I was lucky because I was sent back to continue my life. The problems I had been suffering from prior to my suicide did not all disappear overnight. However, the realisation that my life was worth living, enabled me to tackle my problems and not just give up.
Finally, I would be happy to correspond with anyone who wants to drop me an email. I am not a saint or a do-gooder but since I have done the final deed, survived and seen the folly of it, I may be able to relate to how you are feeling. Hang in there…
Just wanted to relate a suicide story. I know that this world is especially tough on our young people right now, and that there are those young people who consider suicide as a way out, I know, I was one. After you read this story I hope you will realize how foolish and self centered it is.
This story is about a 17-year-old high school youth named Tom. He lived across the street with his family from my best friend in the mid-1980’s. He had been doing some PCP (a popular, and very dangerous drug) and it really messed him up psychologically. He was being treated for some months with anti-depressants.
On the first day that he stopped taking them he went into his parent’s bedroom (where there was a cabinet of his step-father’s guns, him being a cop) and shot himself. Apparently he was very resentful of his mother re-marrying and was always acting out, not able to just accept it. His mother had already gone to work for the day so he thought that he was alone at the time. His 8-year-old sister was late going to school and heard the shot and discovered him.
She called her mother at work and the mother came home to find him, dying. Two days later I went over with my friend with some food to visit with her. I notice while we were sitting with her (I was sitting across from her) that there was this flash that streaked toward her on her right side. I thought that this was odd and began thinking about what this could mean later after we had left.
When I really looked at that light what I saw was her son, Tom, racing toward her repeatedly, desperate to get her attention. He was in such agony, because he needed to tell his mother how sorry he was. He thought that by killing himself that he could just be out of pain and that all his problems would be solved. Now he was in his own private hell of his own making and there was no way to stop it.
I can still to this day feel his agony and shock that he was not able to communicate with his mother when he was right there, she couldn’t notice him. He was so very terrified, he didn’t know what else to do. When you die, even by your own hand, you are still conscious, you still know what is going on but are helpless to do anything about it so it makes your problems even worse.
Just do what you have to do to get help. When you are young, you feel like your problems are so permanent that there is nothing that you can do. Don’t believe it, there is always something that you can do. There is always a way out, don’t give up, your life is worth everything. May God Bless the young people of this world, you have value or you wouldn’t be in this world!
The following is based on a true story about a real person. The names and locations have been changed to insure privacy. I wrote this for those who are considering suicide and/or those who feel their situation is hopeless. Deke thought he was hopeless, too.
Deke grew up in the slums of L.A. He never knew his father, and his mother was an alcoholic. Welfare checks provided money for her habit, and Deke was just a liability. From a very early age, he roamed the streets; stealing, and begging for money. He was always hungry and never trusted anyone. As he got older he became interested in drugs — both using and selling. There was a lot of money in dealing, but it was dangerous. He had to beat people up, and finally, to kill them.Deke ran into law trouble at age 11, and was in and out of juvenile lockups until adulthood caught up with him. Prison gates slammed behind Deke forever, on his 24 birthday. The conviction was murder one, and the sentence: life.
Now Deke didn’t like prison at all, and the longer he stayed, the meaner he got. He started fights in the cafeteria and on the yard. He was big, mean and brutal. Six foot six and 247 pounds of muscle and anger. He beat up other inmates for the fun of it, and killed a cell mate over an argument about a cigarette. He choked him to death before the guards arrived. He was put in solitary confinement, didn’t help, then was transfered to a maximum security prison for incorrigibles. Deke was considered hopeless by penal system authorities.
His behaviour was so bad at the maximum lockup he had to be kept in solitary. He would attack anything that moved. He could not be allowed outside his cell without four guards in attendance, so he stayed in his cell nearly all the time. At night, he would rage against the bars, hitting them and shouting obscenities at the guards, pleading for them to kill him. This would continue for hours before Deke became exhausted and fell asleep.
The warden petitioned the state to place Deke in an institution for the criminally insane, but was turned down. The mental health people refused to take Deke due to his history of violence. So Deke soon held the record for days in solitary, his food pushed under the bars, and his cell hosed down weekly to keep it somewhat sanitary. More animal than human, this was Deke’s lifestyle.
On the nights Deke wasn’t raging at the bars, he would sit on his cot and watch the rats scurring around his cell looking for food. He tried to hit or kick them, but was seldom fast enough. They came in the evening, when the sun went down, to clean up bits of food Deke spilled from the flimsy paper plates the guards brought him.
One night when the rats came, Deke noticed one of them was different. Moving slow and lighter in color than the rest. This rat was lean and small, pulling itself across the floor with two front legs. Deke noticed the rat had been injured, one back leg was totally useless, and the other just kicking at the floor, more like a rudder than a propeller of its tiny body. Deke’s first thought was to smash this small varment to put it out of its misery. As he waited for the injured rat to get closer, he noticed how the other rats nipped, pushed and took food away from it; thinking only of themselves; not caring if the injured rat had anything to eat. When Deke started to kill the rat, something deep inside him, long forgotten, buried under a thousand fears — stirred. Just for a fleeting moment Deke saw himself as that injured rat. He thought: “that’s me, I am just a crippled rat that no one cares about.” Holding this thought, Deke allowed the small rodent safe passage from his cell that night.
When they brought food the next day, Deke stuffed some bread in his pockets, hoping the crippled rat would return in the evening. He had thought about the rat all day and chose the name Eeke for it. That’s what women would scream when they saw a rat and it rhymed with Deke. “Deke and Eeke;” he thought; “two cripples living in a world where nobody cares if they live or die.”
Sure enough, Eeke showed up at dusk, dragging his pale, thin body across the floor with his two front feet. Deke quickly removed the bread from his pocket and placed it in the corner of his cell, between the bunk and the back wall. Several of the healthy rats started to make for the food, but Deke met them with hands and feet flailing about, kicking and swatting, chasing them away from the small pile of bread. Eeke started for the bread also, however, the injured Eeke seemed to sense what was happening and made for the back wall of the tiny cell and eased down to the corner, making it easier for Deke to allow him to pass while keeping the others at bay. For the first time in days, Eeke ate a good meal, undisturbed by the other rats.
This same scenario was repeated for several days. Each day Deke would find more things to barricade the corner. Cardboard, paper plates, and clothes, provided a wall between the food and the rats. A small space near the back wall was left open for Eeke to enter. In the corner “food fort” Deke provided water and a bed of clothes as well as food for Eeke. After a couple of weeks, Eeke stopped leaving the cell after he ate; content to sleep on the bed provided.
Deke still wanted to do more for his friend. He asked the guards if he could get a book from the prison library on the care of small animals. Now, the guards had noticed he hadn’t been raging at the bars for awhile, and even seemed a little pleasant when they brought his food, so they got him the book with a warning that if he destroyed it, he would get no more books. They knew why he wanted it, making pets of rats was nothing new in prison, they just didn’t know the rat was injured.
Deke had a hard time reading and understanding the book. He had missed a lot of school. So, he asked for a dictionary and some books to help him read better. He got these too. Because he seemed so different now, the guards asked him if he would like to have yard priviledges, but he declined, muttering something about defending an eek.
After a month or two, Deke read enough to know he couldn’t help his friend Eeke medically, so he sent the book back to the library asking for some regular reading material. The guards brought him some Biographies and books on History. Deke would set, and read these books all day. Often reading them out loud and discussing them with Eeke, who was usually asleep at this time. He reached the point where he was reading two or three books a week. During this time, the guards would often ask if he wanted to go to the yard for exercise, or to the cafeteria to eat, but Deke always declined, saying he needed his privacy. The guards came to respect him and were glad he had changed, so they didn’t push him to do those things.
Then one day, it happened. After many months of close friendship, Eeke died. Deke found him early in the morning, on his little bed, he had died during the night. After Deke had determined that his friend, (the only friend he had ever known), was really dead. He did something that he had never done before in his entire life — he cried. He cried for hours, his tears washing 35 years of pain out of his system along with the grief of losing Eeke. He had never loved anyone or anything before Eeke.
Early the next morning, Deke called to the guard, and asked to be taken to the yard for exercise. The guard was aware of what was happening, but said nothing. He even noticed the small bundle of clothes Deke carried with him, but said nothing. As soon as Deke was in the yard, he quickly walked to the corner of the prison wall and stooped to dig a small hole in the ground. He used a metal spoon stolen from the cafeteria years earlier. Swiftly, he put the small bundle of clothes and the spoon in the hole, closing it, patting down and smoothing the dirt with his hands. Turning to the guard, Deke asked to go back to his cell, the guard complied, saying nothing.
Deke asked for books on death and dying, emotions, love, self-help and God. Before long, he was granted library priviledges and spent hours there, just looking and reading. He also ate in the cafeteria and walked in the yard every day. Deke made pets out of other rats, but it was not the same as Eeke. He would never forget Eeke. It was Eeke, he came to understand, that saved his life. The more he read and understood about himself, the more he noticed the pain in the faces of other inmates. He saw it in the yard, the cafeteria and especially at night in the cells.
When Deke went out into the yard, he would talk to other inmates about their feelings. Try to help them control their anger and fear. A small group of men would form around him to listen, as Deke talked about himself, and how he had changed because of Eeke. He gave them hope for the future, how to stay out of prison, once they served their time. Deke was respected in the yard, and looked up to by the guards, who noticed that those listening to him were becoming model prisoners.
The warden of the prison heard about Deke’s recovery and called him in to talk. Deke and the warden talked a long time, most of the morning. When Deke left the warden’s office, he had a new task at the prison. Deke agreed to teach a class on a regular basis, telling about himself, and trying to help other inmates in the way he helped himself. This was the beginning of a new career for Deke, one that would last the rest of his life.
Deke’s class went from a handful of people once a week to crowded classrooms three times a week, in less than a year. Deke was like them, he knew their language, what they were afraid of, and how to help them. Wardens in other prisons soon heard about Deke and wanted to set up similar programs, so Deke was escorted to four other prisons to talk, hold classes, and help set up those programs with inmates, who like himself, had learned to love.
While Deke had learned to love through the help of an injured rat named Eeke, he never lost his roughness completely. On one occasion he picked up a heckler, chair and all, and through him out the door of the classroom so hard that he hit the wall on the other side of the hall and was knocked unconscious. Everyone knew that you didn’t mess around with Deke. (The heckler, a con named “Red,” asked to come back to Deke’s class after he recovered, and eventually became one of Deke’s best students.)
It was Deke’s habit to get to the room early, and as the inmates arrived he would greet them and ask a couple of questions. He asked: “Do you think you are street smart,” and “Do you believe you know what life is all about.” Nearly everyone answered these questions with a big “Yes.” After the class was seated, Deke would stand in front of them with a big scowl on his face and say something like this: “I asked you men a couple of questions, and you said you were smart and knew what life was all about.” “Well, if you’re so goddamned smart, why are you living in a six by eight foot cell, eating slop for food, and doing what someone else wants you to do all day.” “While only two miles south from here, there are people swimming in their own pools, eating steak, coming and going as they please and doing what they want.” “You don’t look very damned smart to me.” That got their attention, and the class would begin.
Deke was very effective. Those who attended his classes regularly almost never returned to prison after their time was up. Deke helped hundreds get out of prison, and stay out. The program continues today, even though Deke died many years ago. They had to hold two memorial services for Deke, one inside the prison, in the yard, hundreds came. And one at a local stadium, thousands came to honor this man who taught them to love.
Now the moral of this story is: it doesn’t matter how many people love you or don’t love you. What matters is THAT YOU LOVE. Learning to love is not that hard. There are lots of “Eeks” around. You see them every day, people that need your help, things that need to be done. You learn to love yourself by loving others. I have written a help page. Look for the “A Method” head about half way down the page. A ten minute a day method to improve your life. I originally wrote it for those contemplating suicide, but it will work for anyone who uses it. There is no such thing as hopeless.
The following is a list of Personal Growth Affirmations. I have found this list most helpful in building confidence and trust. I offer it here as a guide for the reader. Affirmations are powerful life changers when used daily over a long period of time. They work best when read (or written) twice a day while trying to visualize each affirmation vividly in your mind.
Please feel free to copy or print the affirmations for your personal use.
If you want better to put on the wall, and/or frame go to my picture gallery.
If you want to hear the affirmations and some other self-help audio.
I am a good person. I am loved. I am love.
I am worthy of prosperity. I am worthy of abundance.
I am worthy of joy. I am worthy of happiness.
I am perfect health. I am perfect order.
I am always successful. I am mentally clear.
I am responsible for my life.
I am responsible for my life only.
I am free to choose the direction of my life.
I am choosing the direction of my life.
I am in control of my life. I am in control of my life only.
I am blessing everyone and everything in my life.
I am safe and secure. I am completely safe and secure.
I am forgiven. I am forgiving all others.
I am at peace with myself. I am at peace with the world.
I am open to all knowledge.
I am letting the knowledge reveal truth.
I am open to all truth. I am open only to truth.
I am living in truth. I am truth.
I am in my perfect career now. I am being myself.
I am open to my perfect loving partner now.
I am open to let my life’s purpose reveal itself to me now.
I am ready to receive my good.
I am courage. I am whole. I am eternal.
I am living in eternity now. I am living in the present now.
