Life After Death
This week I enjoyed a being the guest speaker on a motivational podcast where the host invited me to talk about what I learned from my near-death experience. I realized that I haven’t written much about it here, though it is one of the topmost and pivotal experiences of my life. Following is a summary and some key things I learned from the transition out of and back to this human life.
A couple weeks after my fifth round of chemotherapy treatments in 2013, my body stopped and I left this human-being-on-earth experience. For the weeks leading up to this, I had already felt out of body, as if I were floating inches away from my skin. Sometimes I would hug myself and try to pull myself back together. But mostly I was just lying on a couch, immobile and watching the blue sky and storms through the skylight above me. I felt like I couldn’t exist in my dying body with low blood pressure, greying skin, constant pain, and barely enough energy to talk or even think.
On my way to the hospital, I seizured and slumped over in the passenger seat. I remember that moment of talking with my friend and in less than the timespan of inhaling a breath, popping out of my body and instantly being enveloped in bright light.
This is a near-death experience story. This is my near-death experience story.
Here’s the shortcut to the lesson: We shouldn’t have to die to learn how to live.
To choose life is to give ourselves permission to live who we truly are and to bring our innate, unique gifts to the world. Let go of, walk away from, and stop listening to anyone who diminishes your being.
When I died, I left behind pain. I left behind all material things. All accomplishments and jobs. All conflict, struggle, and stress.
I transitioned home carrying one thing only — love. I returned to the source of my existence and had the most amazing experience full of love, understanding, and connection to every other being in existence.
I had an immediate infusion of knowledge and understanding about the universe, time, and the multiverse. About the interconnectivity of all things. And I touched and was infused with the power source that is the energy of all existence — love.
The host of the podcast, Sally, and I talked for nearly an hour, with a few stops for tears and regrouping. The final show is thirteen minutes long, so we focused primarily on the concept of slowing down, recalibrating and changing, then reemerging, which I wrote about in “Speed of Life.” This is illustrated with an image I made, showing bright light and a balance of dark lines as time moves along the linear spectrum.
The metamorphosis to live fully in our true selves is to learn how to shed shame, imperfection, and “productivity is worth” programming, the cultural norm that obfuscates our unique internal navigation toward living our soul’s missions.
But we are humans and we are difficult and fraught. For some reason we don’t always (or often or ever) act in our own best interests. I can attest to this form of self-denial and self-destruction a multitude of ways.
We talked in the live Q&A with the podcast audience about seeing and feeling signs that we are going against ourselves, and ignoring those waypoints that could be guiding us somewhere better and more fulfilling. We talked about numbing and how if we don’t allow ourselves to feel and we instead bury emotions and needs in busyness, career or social achievement, following unwritten rules, drinking or drugs or eating or whatever vice is at hand, then we lose touch with ourselves.
Let’s look at something simple — spreadsheets. I spent decades proving my worth to employers by saying yes to creating and managing digital spreadsheets, though just the thought of a spreadsheet makes me sick to my stomach. I imagine this is how people feel about public speaking, glossophobia, which is touted as affecting more than 75% of the population. I love public speaking, and even with the pre-talk jitters, it is in my sweet spot of skills. Spreadsheets are not my thing, my brain just doesn’t work that way.
So why did I spend years saying yes to jobs where this was a primary or critical function? Because I was paying attention to achievement goals and career climbing, not my own signs leading toward jobs that valued my gifts and abilities.
It seems that in many of our lives, we are given a multitude of opportunities to recalibrate and to put ourselves on track to realizing our full and true selves. I can look back now and see hundreds upon hundreds of signs, big and small. Following them would have, and did mean, disappointing my parents, my friends, my partners, and sometimes religious or societal norms. But never ever would it have meant disappointing myself.
It scared me to think about going out of the box. What if I just walked away from this safe job and went to Turkey to live with my friend near the beach and write novels… The excitement and potential to live in my real world of skills and gifts was palpable. In just contemplating this move, I felt the flow of being on my life path. And still I denied myself for a false sense of security and accomplishment.
When facing my demise in both an abusive relationship and when I was going through cancer treatments, I did come to peace with my life and choices; feeling that even with mistakes, in the end, I did my best.
How long was I gone when I died?
Five or ten minutes. A few lifetimes. Time was irrelevant in that existence. My friend pulled her car off the highway and parked to check my vitals, to decide what to do next. I had zero awareness of my body on earth in that car.
I did not encounter family members or pets, there was no reunion of friends whom had passed. I did have conversations with other beings among a council of peers, those who understood my purpose and journey. I was in the afterlife long enough to learn and understand information that I’ve since relayed in more than eight hours of recordings. I felt at home, blissfully happy, and at peace.
There was a moment where I was reminded that I had a choice to go back. Was there anything I wanted to do? Yes, yes, I said. And I received the clear message that I would be returning to a very broken body and a broken life. It would not be easy, but I was infused with a new paradigm about how to live and a fearlessness about death that comes from being in the soul’s original home.
There were two reasons to return and one request from my council, to tell the story.
Seven years ago I died in the middle of cancer treatments. I visited home for the refueling of unconditional, agape, original love. And every day since I have returned, I make a conscious effort to continue learning how to be the best, most authentic me. I do my best to take care of and shower my children with love. I, more often than not, make choices that are in alignment with my soul-self.
Ask yourself:
- What brings me joy?
- What makes me smile?
- What activities make my body and mind feel like a fine-tuned machine or at peace when I’m doing them?
Do those things! Even if for a few minutes a day. You are deserving of happiness and self-actualization. When you contribute your innate and unique skills to the world, you are giving others a gift, too. A gift of authenticity.
There are oodles of details to reveal about my NDE, and what led up to it, and what has come since. This place is one that will hold pieces of the full story, through words and photographs. I hope you’ll come back to read more and join me in the story.
Thank you for being.