JustNDEs

Just NDEs Episode 3: Sarah’s Near Death Experience Source: nderf.org Set and Setting: August, 1989 Event Description: In August of 1989, I was bicycling home from a volunteer position around 10 p.m. As I was coming up on a light, I was hit from behind by a pickup truck traveling at approximately 50 mph. The bike and I were slammed against the truck. As the driver slammed on the brakes, I was catapulted 60 feet through the air to land on the shoulder of the road. My lungs collapsed, most of my internal organs ruptured, and I broke my pelvis and several ribs. I was pretty close to roadkill. Fortunately, a police officer was nearby and able to radio for an ambulance quickly. I, as I know myself, have no memory of the preceding events. This is what I remember: One moment I was riding my bike and the next, I was in a place of complete darkness. I had no sense of direction or perspective, but I did have an awareness of my body, that is, I still had one. Off in the "distance," I began to notice a hum and a pinprick of light. The sound began to grow louder, and the light seemed to be coming toward me. As the object drew closer, I noticed that it was a fantastic demonic creature surrounded by flames with huge eyes and teeth dancing toward me, slavering and growling. There was menace in its gaze as it smashed its teeth and stuck out a long, slobbering orange tongue at me. I was riveted to the "spot" in the dark where I stood. There seemed to be nowhere to go to avoid the thing as the creature was advancing at an increasing speed determined to intercept me. I stood my "ground" and closed my eyes, expecting to be engulfed in flames or devoured or both. Instead, I had an awareness of the creature slowly passing painlessly through my body, and I turned an inward eye to it only to discover that the creature was laughing with glee as it melted through me. It exited with a pop behind me, and suddenly I was flying forward very fast through the dark. As I flew, two more of the demon creatures came toward me displaying different colors but still fearsome. Armed with my knowledge of the first one, I allowed these beings to approach and pass through me. Soon I came to the entrance of a tunnel in the black. The tunnel seemed to be constructed of gray cloudlike material and wound far away and up to the right. Then it branched, and I couldn't see where it led. From the branching on the right extended a yellow-white light that helped to softly illuminate the tunnel. I glanced down at myself and noticed that my body was gone. It had been replaced by a blue-white light, sort of equi-limbed cross/star that pulsed. This "seemed" natural and pleasant to me at the time. It was very freeing to no longer be attached to a weighty form. Looking back into the tunnel, I noticed there were doorways on both sides of the structure. A few other cross/stars were wandering about in the tunnel, some blue like myself, some amber-colored. Two other blue cross/stars appeared beside me and gently propelled me into the tunnel. I floated along and up, observing that some "doorways" were open while others seemed to have been shut. The first doorway I peered into resembled a classic Hell. There was the sound of shrieking and agonizing screams. Naked human beings were strewn about a blasted landscape with pools of bubbling excrement and jagged boulders. Devils and other animals were torturing people in all imaginable ways, and people were also torturing each other. As I neared the doorway to this sinister scene, I felt a sucking sensation drawing me in like a whirlpool, and I found myself "flying" above the miserable landscape. The smell was putrid, and the heat was almost unbearable, but a part of me was fascinated by the seemingly infinite varieties of pain and anguish that were being inflicted on the inhabitants of this realm. Most of me wanted to leave, so I had no difficulty, and my feeling was that anyone could leave if they wished. I felt that no one or nothing had put those people in captivity except their belief in the agony they continued to suffer. I "flew" back to the doorway, which was clearly visible from everywhere in the "Hell." I left with nothing but joy, but I still had a sense of myself as apart from that joy. The next doorway in the tunnel wasn't much better. As far as the eye could see, people walked on barren yellow ground with their heads down, completely engrossed in their own depressed self-pitying thoughts, unaware that anyone else was around them. A great feeling of loneliness and isolation emanated from the scene, and I shied away from getting too close, although no sucking sensation was felt near this opening in the cloud tunnel. I flew along further up the tunnel and glanced in other doorways, but the next one that made a lasting impression on me was a world of almost indescribable beauty. I looked upon a beautiful wooded garden with fountains and waterfalls and streams and bridges that glowed and sparkled with iridescent colors. A close depiction of the beauty of this world has been captured by the artist Gilbert Williams, whose work I discovered several years after my NDE. A feeling of peace and harmony flowed from this scene, and I moved toward the doorway with a great desire to enter. As I began to go through the opening, my "nose" encountered what felt like plastic wrap webbing. I pushed forward but was gently rebuffed, and a voice said, "You do not have the information to enter this world." At the time, I remember feeling disappointed but not judged as unworthy, just uninformed. I then turned my attention to the light that was glowing around the fork to the right. I entered into the light and was transformed by a feeling of utter absolute joy. There was nothing but joy. I said to the light "I'm here," and the light said "Great" in a voice that rang with happiness and bliss. I gave myself up to the bliss and learned many things that sound corny when described but are truths for me that resonate through me now and forever. I learned that I am eternal and though I may experience many forms of death, I will always know who I am. I have nothing to fear, only more to experience, and I am the one that ultimately chooses what I experience. It sounds hokey, but believe me, it feels really, really good to know these things inside yourself. Eventually, I became disenchanted with eternal bliss and decided to leave. I said to the light "I'm leaving," and the light said "Great," continuing its utter joyous and blissful existence unaltered in any way by my presence. I floated back down the tunnel, glancing about me in continued wonder, eventually settling on the threshold of a doorway that looked into outer space. Pieces of rock floated by, and in the distance, planets and galaxies spun and whirled. A rather conflicting feeling of both serenity and adventure surrounded me as I gazed upon the silent scene. The entrance to the tunnel was nearby, and I could hear voices shouting "Don't go Sarah! What about Zane?" (My son who was five at the time of this incident). I grew annoyed at these voices because I wasn't intending to "go" anywhere, and of course, I was going to be there to watch Zane grow up. Another being appeared beside me, and we "talked" about my options. We heard a voice say, "If you pass through this door, you can't come back." My next conscious memory was of lying in a hospital bed with uncountable tubes sticking into me and a respirator tube in my mouth. I was full of joy and humming with power, although I was unable to move any part of my body of my own volition. I was also full of pain, and that sensation quickly oriented me to my physical self again. I have had to face many trials and challenges since my NDE, including complete loss of identity, disability, poverty, loss of friends due to their inability to understand how the experience changed me, and chronic pain. But the knowledge of the eternity of my spirit and the freedom from the fear of death have created in me a foundation of peace that no temporary physical condition can shake. I have a great wish, that everyone could experience the wonders I have without having to suffer the trauma I did, for it would transform the world. -- Just NDEs has utilized AI to remove typos and grammatical errors from the above transcript, but the narrative is otherwise true to the original. Feel free to donate by clicking the donate URL or visit our website at www.justndes.com. May you know peace and joy. https://www.patreon.com/JustNDEs

Just NDEs Episode 2: When Time Stood Still Source: nderf.org Set and Setting: May 3, 1969 B Company, 2nd Battalion, 47th Mechanized Infantry, 9th Infantry Division Event Description: It was toward the end of the dry season, and my platoon was pulling out. Our mission was simple: drive down the road, show the flag, and make sure that we still had the right-of-way. The two slowly moving tracks (armored personnel carriers) in front of mine were already kicking up the pulverized dirt road into little clouds of dust. Lady, the platoon mascot, trotted alongside, wagging her tail. She no longer went with us ever since a mine had blown up the track that she had been riding on. I exchanged my cloth hat for a helmet, put on my wire-rimmed sunglasses, and half-cocked the .50 caliber machine gun as we passed through the base camp gate and picked up speed. Lady stopped a few feet beyond the gate and watched us go. Our four tracks soon achieved a monotonous but comfortable 40 mph, which created a welcome breeze. To either side of the road for mile after mile lay a gridwork of rice-paddy dikes dividing the land into tidy rectangles of various sizes. The pale yellow stubble of last season's crop failed to hide the earth in the fields. Separated by cracks an inch wide, the clay soil of the paddies had dried into flagstone-sized blocks. Although the land was flat, the fields did not extend far into the distance but rather ended abruptly at the ubiquitous wood line. This woods was composed of thick, lush, green nipa-palm and stood from twenty to thirty feet tall. From no place in the Mekong River Delta could one escape from being completely surrounded by it. Sometimes it might be a couple of miles away, and at others, only a few hundred feet. It grew where the delta distributaries were, and they, like a root system, were everywhere. "We" controlled the larger towns and villages, the roads, the skies, the major waterways, and the rice paddies. The wood line belonged to "Charlie." With diesel engines roaring and trailing a huge, mile-long cloud of dust, the column began to approach one of the spots where the dreaded jungle wall squeezed in on the road from both sides. Instinctively, I began to watch the wood line more closely. All of a sudden, a very large anti-tank mine was command-detonated eight feet directly beneath my lil' ol' lily-white ss. I immediately knew what was happening (because my track had been blown up before just three weeks prior to this), and thought to myself, "Oh sht, here we go again." I was catapulted upwards along with everyone and everything else. People, dust, weapons, ammunition, helmets, and C-ration boxes formed an expanding inverted cone with myself in the middle. On the journey upward, external time decelerated. The rates of the rotations of all of the objects surrounding me rapidly decreased—in an apparent violation of the law of conservation of angular momentum. I was fascinated by the unnatural ever-slowing gyrations of the bodies of my comrades and wondered, "Is this the end? Are we all dead?" At the apex of my trajectory, time stopped completely and an inexplicable calm descended. The state of consciousness that then prevailed was as to the normal waking state as the normal waking state is to a dream. Whatever It was, It was peaceful, omnipresent (temporally and spatially), omniscient, and absorbed everything into an indivisible Whole. The entire universe past, present, and future collapsed down to a single Center upon which everything depends for its existence. It is That which does not change. It is the "Light" of Pure Consciousness which illuminates all things. It is the ultimate meaning of the enigmatic Biblical passage, "The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light" (Matt. 6:22). It is the great Nothing—for it includes all things, and therefore, is Itself not a thing. That's how It gets to be the All-in-All. Furthermore, there was (and still is) absolutely no doubt as to Its authenticity any more than one would doubt upon awakening from a dream that the waking state is "real" and that the dream was "just a dream." In short, God Himself took over my reins in the sense that "I" no longer existed as a distinct entity—only He exists. There was an overwhelming feeling of bliss, love, compassion, and strangely enough, a foudroyant sense of déjà vu. The knowledge obtained that the True Home and the True Self of all things had been miraculously revealed. The events of my life up to that point were unhurriedly and nonjudgmentally reviewed in great detail—not in chronological order, but somehow all at once—although some events were emphasized more intensely than others. Subsequently, "I" was allowed to exist again (there was no choice in the matter—it simply happened) and was given the opportunity to be aware of anything that I wanted to be aware of with the understanding that time was not a factor; indeed, there was "all the time in the world." I proceeded to focus on this or that aspect of my life and concluded that there wasn't too much to be ashamed of. Actually, I made extremely poor use of this gift, but then, I was just a naive 22-year-old with a somewhat skewed concept of relative importance. I could "see" a 360-degree panorama of the road, the wood lines on either side, and the other three tracks of my platoon (two in front and one behind us). The entire episode seemed to be housed in my head, but I was uncertain whether or not my head was still attached to the rest of my body—although, under the circumstances, this point did not seem important one way or the other. In other words, I really didn't care if my life was to be snuffed out or not within the next few seconds. I was then gently (but unequivocally) "informed" that I would survive the explosion without serious injury and even that I would make it out of Vietnam in one piece. So, selfishly, I turned my attention to the immediate situation and very calmly and deliberately concluded that I should: 1) stay conscious so as not to drown in two inches of rice-paddy water, 2) stay loose so as to break as few bones as possible, and 3) roll away from the track so that it wouldn't crush me to death if it tipped over. Only after my mind had run out of things to decide on did time start to rush back in. The transcendental state of consciousness terminated and I reverted back to the normal waking state. I could see the ground about 20 feet below me and began to fall toward it. -- Just NDEs has utilized AI to remove typos and grammatical errors from the above transcript, but the narrative is otherwise true to the original. Feel free to donate by clicking the donate URL or visit our website at www.justndes.com. May you know peace and joy. https://www.patreon.com/JustNDEs

Just NDEs Episode 1: Wendy Z’s Shared Death Experience Source: nderf.org Set and Setting: August 20, 2007 Event Description: My maternal grandfather was fighting in WWII. He was hit by a train and sustained a head injury. His doctors claimed this injury is what caused his brain tumor some 60 years later. It was an inoperable brain tumor, so he started radiation therapy. My grandfather was always working on or repairing something in the workshop or shed. I was one of his seven grandchildren and one of two of his female grandchildren. There was at least one or more grandson helping him. Being a girl, I didn't really care to be working on dirty machinery. So, we didn't spend a lot of time together and were not particularly close. But family, in general, was very important to him. His radiation therapy appointments became a little taxing on our family. My grandmother never drove and his children and grandchildren worked during the day. All except me. I was a stay-at-home mom at the time, with my children in school for the better part of the day. I volunteered to help get him back and forth to his doctor appointments. It was during these trips that he and I got to know each other a little better. He would tell me jokes during the car rides. This went on for months. At some point, we were made aware that the radiation wasn't helping shrink the brain tumor. There were more aggressive, experimental treatments available but my grandfather was done. He declined the treatment and settled on hospice care. Early on in hospice care, there were still emergency room visits to help maintain his condition and keep him as comfortable as possible. During one of these visits, my aunt mentioned his care becoming 'too much' and she wanted to look into a hospice facility instead of hospice at-home care. My cousin and I adamantly rejected this suggestion; and we both volunteered to take over his daily care. I believe this is why I was included in his death experience. Another aunt and I ended up providing most of his care at my aunt and uncle's house. I live 30 minutes away from her. I was there every day for weeks. His death was clearly coming as all the signs the hospice nurses talk about were present. I decided I was going to spend the night. I phoned my husband to make arrangements for our children so I could stay. That evening the rest of the family headed home. I was standing on the front porch waving goodbye to my mother when I noticed the full moon and one single cloud in the night sky. I don't know why this caught my attention, but while standing there I heard a very strong voice come from inside of me telling me to go home for the night. I argued with the voice, with my reasons for wanting to stay. More firmly, the voice told me to go home. So I do. I explain to my aunt that I've changed my mind and I'm going home. She seemed confused, but hugged me goodbye. It was already late when I decided to leave. As soon as I got home, I showered and got ready for bed. It was a long, taxing day and I was exhausted. I fell asleep fast. The next thing I know, I'm back at my aunt and uncle's house, standing on the front porch and staring at the single cloud in the night sky. My grandfather is next to me. I can't see him, as much as I feel him. I feel both of us get sucked into a tunnel along with my grandfather's guide in front of us. I sense him as male, although I see him as light. I can see 360 degrees around me. I can even 'look down' at me and grandfather. In the blink of an eye, we are moving at what I can only guess is the speed of light. The guide first, with my grandfather and I, side by side right behind him. We are moving incredibly fast and the tunnel is long and winding. You can liken the tunnel to being on a super-fast, winding rollercoaster. The tunnel is very, very long. At each turn, I think we will be at our destination, but we keep going. I remember feeling like a small child thinking, 'Are we there yet?' I can see the universe outside the tunnel walls and the stars look like streaks. It looked very much like warp speed is shown on 'Star Wars.' As I watch, I know what I'm seeing and that seems completely normal to me. I did not feel like I was somewhere I shouldn't be. I didn't think I had died. Everything that was happening and seeing was completely normal to me. But I was curious what was next. After what felt like a long ride in a short amount of time, we came to an abrupt stop. We are still in the tunnel and I realize that I can no longer join them. I can't cross this point. I don't see a door, but I feel the tunnel ahead of us opens. My grandfather goes first, his guide goes next, and I feel the tunnel close. I'm suddenly very aware of how lonely and cold I am. I hadn't noticed the warm, comfortable light coming from my grandfather's guide until it was gone. A ringing phone draws me back into my body as I wake up feeling a buzzing sensation. I answer the phone, it's my mother calling me to let me know that grandfather had passed. I said, 'I know.' I've always had premonitions in real life and in dreams, so this experience didn't seem strange to me. Although, I wasn't sure why I had it. I didn't know it was a shared death experience. Several months after this experience on a Sunday morning, that same voice told me to make dinner and take it over to my parents' house that evening. Again, I tried to argue with the voice. It insisted that I must make dinner and take it to my parents' house with my husband and children. I called my mother to confirm the plans. I did as I was told and took dinner and a cake to my parents' house. We all had a nice dinner and visit. We left around 9:00 p.m. and went home to put our children to bed. I received a phone call around two in the morning that my step-dad had been taken to the hospital for chest pain. I needed to meet my mom, aunt, and uncle at the hospital. It was a small-town hospital, and the paramedics decided en route to take him to a heart hospital over an hour away. When my step-dad was lifted into the ambulance, he was awake and talking. This change of plans was confusing to us. On the drive to the heart hospital, I had a vision of my step-dad lying in a casket. I knew he had died. He had actually died en route. -- Just NDEs has utilized AI to remove typos and grammatical errors from the above transcript, but the narrative is otherwise true to the original. Feel free to donate by clicking the donate URL or visit our website at www.justndes.com. May you know peace and joy. https://www.patreon.com/JustNDEs Just NDEs Episode number X: Wendy Z’s Near Death Experience Source: nderf.org Set and Setting: 08202007 Event Description: My maternal grandfather was fighting in WWII. He was hit by a train and sustained a head injury. His doctors claimed this injury is what caused his brain tumor some 60 years later. It was an inoperable brain tumor, so he started radiation therapy. My grandfather was always working on or repairing something in the workshop or shed. I was one of his seven grandchildren and one of two of his female grandchildren. There was at least one or more grandson helping him. Being a girl, I didn't really care to be working on dirty machinery. So, we didn't spend a lot of time together and were not particularly close. But family, in general, was very important to him. His radiation therapy appointments became a little taxing on our family. My grandmother never drove and his children and grandchildren worked during the day. All except me. I was a stay-at-home mom at the time, with my children in school for the better part of the day. I volunteered to help get him back and forth to his doctor appointments. It was during these trips that he and I got to know each other a little better. He would tell me jokes during the car rides. This went on for months. At some point, we were made aware that the radiation wasn't helping shrink the brain tumor. There were more aggressive, experimental treatments available but my grandfather was done. He declined the treatment and settled on hospice care. Early on in hospice care, there were still emergency room visits to help maintain his condition and keep him as comfortable as possible. During one of these visits, my aunt mentioned his care becoming 'too much' and she wanted to look into a hospice facility instead of hospice at-home care. My cousin and I adamantly rejected this suggestion; and we both volunteered to take over his daily care. I believe this is why I was included in his death experience. Another aunt and I ended up providing most of his care at my aunt and uncle's house. I live 30 minutes away from her. I was there every day for weeks. His death was clearly coming as all the signs the hospice nurses talk about were present. I decided I was going to spend the night. I phoned my husband to make arrangements for our children so I could stay. That evening the rest of the family headed home. I was standing on the front porch waving goodbye to my mother when I noticed the full moon and one single cloud in the night sky. I don't know why this caught my attention, but while standing there I heard a very strong voice come from inside of me telling me to go home for the night. I argued with the voice, with my reasons for wanting to stay. More firmly, the voice told me to go home. So I do. I explain to my aunt that I've changed my mind and I'm going home. She seemed confused, but hugged me goodbye. It was already late when I decided to leave. As soon as I got home, I showered and got ready for bed. It was a long, taxing day and I was exhausted. I fell asleep fast. The next thing I know, I'm back at my aunt and uncle's house, standing on the front porch and staring at the single cloud in the night sky. My grandfather is next to me. I can't see him, as much as I feel him. I feel both of us get sucked into a tunnel along with my grandfather's guide in front of us. I sense him as male, although I see him as light. I can see 360 degrees around me. I can even 'look down' at me and grandfather. In the blink of an eye, we are moving at what I can only guess is the speed of light. The guide first, with my grandfather and I, side by side right behind him. We are moving incredibly fast and the tunnel is long and winding. You can liken the tunnel to being on a super-fast, winding rollercoaster. The tunnel is very, very long. At each turn, I think we will be at our destination, but we keep going. I remember feeling like a small child thinking, 'Are we there yet?' I can see the universe outside the tunnel walls and the stars look like streaks. It looked very much like warp speed is shown on 'Star Wars.' As I watch, I know what I'm seeing and that seems completely normal to me. I did not feel like I was somewhere I shouldn't be. I didn't think I had died. Everything that was happening and seeing was completely normal to me. But I was curious what was next. After what felt like a long ride in a short amount of time, we came to an abrupt stop. We are still in the tunnel and I realize that I can no longer join them. I can't cross this point. I don't see a door, but I feel the tunnel ahead of us opens. My grandfather goes first, his guide goes next, and I feel the tunnel close. I'm suddenly very aware of how lonely and cold I am. I hadn't noticed the warm, comfortable light coming from my grandfather's guide until it was gone. A ringing phone draws me back into my body as I wake up feeling a buzzing sensation. I answer the phone, it's my mother calling me to let me know that grandfather had passed. I said, 'I know.' I've always had premonitions in real life and in dreams, so this experience didn't seem strange to me. Although, I wasn't sure why I had it. I didn't know it was a shared death experience. Several months after this experience on a Sunday morning, that same voice told me to make dinner and take it over to my parents' house that evening. Again, I tried to argue with the voice. It insisted that I must make dinner and take it to my parents' house with my husband and children. I called my mother to confirm the plans. I did as I was told and took dinner and a cake to my parents' house. We all had a nice dinner and visit. We left around 9:00 p.m. and went home to put our children to bed. I received a phone call around two in the morning that my step-dad had been taken to the hospital for chest pain. I needed to meet my mom, aunt, and uncle at the hospital. It was a small-town hospital, and the paramedics decided en route to take him to a heart hospital over an hour away. When my step-dad was lifted into the ambulance, he was awake and talking. This change of plans was confusing to us. On the drive to the heart hospital, I had a vision of my step-dad lying in a casket. I knew he had died. He had actually died en route. -- Just NDEs has utilized AI to remove typos and grammatical errors from the above transcript, but the narrative is otherwise true to the original. Feel free to donate by clicking the donate URL or visit our website at www.justndes.com. May you know peace and joy. https://www.patreon.com/JustNDEs