Out-of-Body Experiences and the Near-Death Experience
Out-of Body Experiences and the
Near-Death Experience&
that you are a patient in a hospital and surgery
is being performed on you. You are sound asleep.
You were sound asleep long before they wheeled into
the operating room. But while you are asleep something
very strange happens. During the operation, you
are suddenly awakened to find yourself floating
near the ceiling! Down below are the doctors working
on your body (as in the cartoon on the left). You
see a strange sign hanging from the ceiling which
says &You are dead.& You watch as the
doctor puts the electric paddles on your chest.
You have a wonderful peaceful feeling which you
have never had before. The doctors give your body
a shock and you are back in your body sound asleep
again. Hours later, you awaken and tell the doctor
about your out-of-body experience and the &You
are dead& sign. The doctor smiles and tells
you, &Your heart stopped during surgery and
we had to revive you." The doctor then explains
to you, "You are part of a near-death
study and you just had a near-death experience. You are
the first patient who has ever read that sign. That
sign can only be read by someone reading it from
the vantage point of the ceiling. And because you
were able to read this sign and tell us about it,
you have proven scientifically that the mind can
function outside of the body. A great scientific
discovery has just occurred. Congratulations.
You have proven scientifically
that consciousness transcends our physical body
and possibly death.&&
of Contents
NDEs will prove the survival of consciousness after
Someday, someone is going
to have a near-death experience and observe a scientifically
controlled test object, such as a sign like &You
are dead& which can only be seen if the observer
is actually outside of their body. However , this
is only the first step. Researchers must also do
the following:
Prove that consciousness
can transcend the body by perceiving verifiable
events while out of the body.
The next step is the
same as the first step except it occurs
while the body is verifiably &dead&
(i.e., clinical and brain death).
Once the above can be
proven, all the skeptics will have to admit
that consciousness survives death.
It may surprise some people
to know that these kind of studies are going on
right at this moment. Indeed, it is only a matter
of time when someone tells a doctor they saw the &You
are dead& sign. For test purposes, however,
the sign will probably say something more cryptic
to insure the uniqueness of such an event.
&2. Examples
of out-of-body visual perception
A large number of near-death
experiencers have witnessed verifiable events occurring
outside of their body. Unfortunately, such evidence
does not constitute &scientific evidence.&
The reason is because scientific evidence involves
replication of the experience and the existence
of strict controls over the events being witnessed.
However, the example I gave at the beginning of
this page is the kind of test environment which
can provide such scientific evidence. Many examples
of anecdotal evidence of verifiable perception are
provided on this web page.
following are three of the most interesting out-of-body
testimonies from three NDEs which I have on my website.
They are from the near-death experiences of
. They are exceptional because
they are NDEs involving an extended out-of-body
phase, when the experiencer observed events happening
around their body.
Dianne Morrissey's NDE and out-of-body perception
is the author
of the books
She describes her beautiful NDE in detail
in her video entitled
It is one of the best videos I have ever
seen. When Dianne was twenty-eight years
old, she was electrocuted and had a very
profound NDE. The following is the out-of-body
aspect of her NDE reprinted by permission
from her book
&I bent over to
pick up the plastic tubing. As I began to
straighten up, I accidentally bumped the
tubing on the edge of the tank. The water
suddenly squirted across my face - the pain
was so sharp, it felt as if a knife where
slitting my cheek! I screamed from the shock
and pain, then felt a moment of temporary
relief as the water crossed over my molars.
My reprieve was short-lived, however, as
the electrified water rushed into my mouth.
&As my body bent
over in shock, I had the most uncanny knowledge
that death was ahead of me. I began to mourn
the loss of everything I'd known: the
earth, my home, my friends - all that I'd
been aware of, all that I loved. Everything
I'd believed to be true and lasting
was slipping away from me. I was face to
face with death, face to face with the unknown.
&My body was thrown
backwards and to one side by the current.
My body crashed to the floor, thrown with
such force that my head went right through
the drywall, about a foot above the floor.
I never felt the injuries, however, because
I was no longer in my body. I was actually
watching my electrocution from above! How
could I be out of my body and still be alive?
I wondered, astonished.
&Suddenly, I was
aware that I was inside a vast, seemingly
infinite blackness. I wasn't sure where
this blackness was in relationship to the
earth, but for some reason I was unafraid.
My blackout period was brief, for I now
found myself back in my home, but in a new
form. I was transparent, yet I still looked
&How elated I felt!
Now, out of my body, I had no worries, no
cares. Never had I felt like this when I
was &alive&. My entire spirit
body was transparent, and I was inside a
glowing white light that extended about
three feet around me. At that moment, an
awareness overtook me - I am not my physical
body! This realization made me feel so free,
so wonderful! My spirit was glowing with
a white light that illuminated the entire
&Then, I was up
near the ceiling again. Everything still
looked the same - the furnishings, the walls
- but there was a new awareness about the
dimension to the scene - it had become transparent.
I could see everything more clearly than
ever before, and like a scientist, I found
myself looking at life through a microscope,
discovering minuscule particles of matter
normally invisible.
&I was now aware
of the absence of physical sensations, yet
I was feeling a heightened sense of awareness
such as I'd never felt while alive.
I knew I was different from the &Dianne&
I had been, but I also knew I was &me&.
It was similar to looking at your reflection
you know you're not the
reflection, but it does appear to be you.
&Now, I saw that
everything was shrouded by a mist. Despite
a lack of gravity, I could easily control
my direction, and when I moved into the
living room, I noticed that I had just walked
through the glass coffee table. Wow! How
did I do that? I marveled.
&Tuffy (her dog)
suddenly entered the den and began nipping
at my face and pawing at my arm, trying
to get my body to wake up. I knew that his
relentless attempts to awaken my physical
body wouldn't work, yet I was proud
of him for trying, and even hoped his efforts
might work. I wondered where his chum, Penny,
was, and suddenly I was next to her in the
backyard. I opened my mouth to talk to her
and felt my tongue moving, but no sounds
came out. I could distinctly hear my voice,
and then realized it was coming from my
mind. I tried several times to get Penny's
attention, yelling, &Penny, can you
see me? Penny, can you hear me?& Apparently
she didn't, because there was no response.
&Next, I walked
around my backyard. As I looked through
the walls of my house toward the front sidewalk,
I noticed a man walking down the street.
Eagerly, I flew to him, right through the
walls, and tried to get his attention. Staring
deeply into his eyes, I said forcefully, &Can
you help me? I need help.& Then I tried
to shake his shoulders, but he still didn't
notice me. Frustrated, I tried to touch
his shoulder to get him to look at me, and
my hand went through his upper right shoulder
blade and out his back. This startled me.
&What am I to do?
I wondered, becoming upset when I realized
that the man could neither see nor hear
me. Instantly, I was back in my yard again,
Penny beside me. I noticed that whenever
I felt any apprehension, I was instantly
moved to a place of greater comfort.
&On the way back
to the den, I stopped right in the middle
of the wall between rooms. I sensed that
I was to look down at something fantastic,
and as I gazed downward, I saw a long silver
cord coming out of my spirit body, right
through the cheesecloth-like fabric I was
wearing. The cord extended down and out
in front of me, and as I turned around,
I saw that the silver cord draped around
and behind me, like an umbilical cord. I
followed it through the two hallway walls
and into my den, where I saw it attached
to the back of the head of my physical body.
The cord was about an inch wide and sparkled
like Christmas tree tinsel.
&As soon as I saw
that the silver cord was attached to my
physical body, my spirit body was thrust
into a dark tunnel. I moved through it with
great speed, traveling faster than I could
have imagined possible. Although the tunnel
was filled with an all consuming darkness,
I felt peaceful and unafraid.&
George Ritchie's NDE and out-of-body perception
died of pneumonia
and nine minutes later returned to life
to tell about it. The following is the account
of the out-of-body aspect of his NDE excerpted
from his excellent book
His follow-up book is
let go of my arms ... I heard a click and
a whirr. The whirr went on and on. It was
getting louder. The whirr was inside my
head and my knees were made of rubber. They
were bending and I was falling and all the
time the whirr grew louder. I sat up with
a start. What time was it? I looked at the
bedside table but they'd taken the clock
away. In fact, where was any of my stuff?
&I jumped out of
bed in alarm, looking for my clothes. My
uniform wasn't on the chair. I turned
around, then froze. Someone was lying in
that bed. I took a step closer. He was quite
a young man, with short brown hair, lying
very still. But, the thing was impossible!
I myself had just gotten out of that bed!
For a moment I wrestled with the mystery
of it. It was too strange to think about
- and anyway I didn't have the time.
&I went back past
the offices and stepped out into the corridor.
A sergeant was coming along it carrying
an instrument tray covered with a cloth.
Probably he didn't know anything, but
I was so glad to find someone awake that
I started toward him.
&'Excuse me,
Sergeant,' I said. 'You haven't
seen the ward boy for this unit, have you?'
&He didn't answer.
Didn't even glance at me. He just kept
coming, straight at me, not slowing down.
&'Look out!'
I yelled, jumping out of his way.
&The next minute
he was past me, walking away down the corridor
as if he had never seen me, though how we
had kept from colliding I didn't know.
And then I saw something that gave me a
new idea. Farther down the corridor was
one of the heavy metal doors that led to
the outside. I hurried toward it. Even if
I had missed that train, I'd find some
way of getting to Richmond!
&Almost without
knowing it I found myself outside, racing
swiftly along, traveling faster in fact
than I'd ever moved in my life. Looking
down I was astonished to see not the ground,
but the tops of mesquite bushes beneath
me. Already Camp Barkeley seemed to be far
behind me as I sped over the dark frozen
desert. My mind kept telling me that what
I was doing was impossible, and yet ...
it was happening. I was going to R
somehow I had known that from the moment
I burst through that hospital door. Going
to Richmond a hundred times faster than
any train on earth could take me.
&Almost immediately
I noticed myself slowing down. Just below
me now, where two streets came together,
I caught a flickering blue glow. It came
from a neon sign over the door of a red-roofed
one-story building with a Pabst Blue Ribbon
Beer sign propped in the front window. Cafe,
the jittering letters over the door read,
and from the windows light streamed onto
the pavement. Staring down at it, I realized
I had stopped moving altogether. Finding
myself somehow suspended fifty feet in the
air was an even stranger feeling than the
whirlwind flight had been. But I had no
time to puzzle over it, for down the sidewalk
toward the all-night cafe a man came briskly
walking. At least, I thought, I could find
out from him what town this was and in what
direction I was heading. Even as the idea
occurred to me - as though thought and motion
had become the same thing - I found myself
down on the sidewalk, hurrying along at
the stranger's side. He was a civilian,
maybe forty or forty-five, wearing a topcoat
but no hat. He was obviously thinking hard
about something because he never glanced
my way as I fell into step beside him.
&'Can you tell
me please,' I said, 'What city this
&He kept right on
&'Please sir!'
I said, speaking louder, 'I'm a
stranger here and I'd appreciate it
if ...'
&We reached the
cafe and he turned, reaching for the door
handle. Was the fellow deaf? I put out my
left hand to tap his shoulder. There was
nothing there.
&I stood there in
front of the door, gaping after him as he
opened it and disappeared inside. It had
been like touching thin air. Like no one
had been there at all. And yet I had distinctly
seen him, even to the beginnings of a black
stubble on his chin where he needed a shave.
&I backed away from
the mystery of the substance-less man and
leaned up against the guy wire of a telephone
pole to think things through. My body went
through that guy wire as though it too had
not been there.
&There on the sidewalk
of that unknown city, I did some incredulous
thinking. The strangest, most difficult
thinking I had ever done. The man in the
cafe, this telephone pole ... suppose they
were perfectly normal. Suppose I was the
one who was - changed, somehow. What if
in some impossible, unimaginable way, I
lost my ... hardness. My ability to grasp
things, to make contact with the world.
Even to be seen! The fellow just now. It
was obvious he never saw or heard me.
&And suddenly I
remembered the young man I had seen in the
bed in that little hospital room. What if
that had been ... me? Or anyhow, the material,
concrete part of myself that in some unexplainable
way I'd gotten separated from. What
if the form which I had left lying in the
hospital room in Texas was my own?
&And if it were,
how could I get back to it again? Why had
I ever rushed off so unthinkingly?
&I was moving again,
speeding away from the city. Below me was
the broad river. I appeared to be going
back, back in the direction I had come from,
and it seemed to me I was flashing across
space even faster than before. Hills, lakes,
farms slipped away beneath me as I sped
in an unswerving straight line over the
dark nighttime land. I was standing in front
of the base hospital.
&And so began one
of the strangest searches that can ever
have taken place: the search for myself.
From one ward to another of that enormous
complex I rushed, pausing in each small
room, stooping over the occupant of the
bed, hurrying on.
&I backed toward
the doorway. The man in that bed was dead!
I felt the same reluctance I had the previous
time at being in a room with a dead person.
But ... if that was my ring, then - then
it was me, the separated part of me, lying
under that sheet. Did that mean that I was
&It was the first
time in this entire experience that the
word death occurred to me in connection
with what was happening.
&But I wasn't
dead! How could I be dead and still be awake?
Thinking. Experiencing. Death was different.
Death was ... I didn't know. Blanking
out. Nothingness. I was me, wide awake,
only without a physical body to function
&Frantically I clawed
at the sheet, trying to draw it back, trying
to uncover the figure on the bed. All my
efforts did not even stir a breeze in the
silent little room.
&Suddenly I was
aware that it was brighter, a lot brighter,
than it had been. I stared in astonishment
as the brightness increased, coming from
nowhere, seeming to shine everywhere at
once. All the light bulbs in the ward couldn't
give off that much light. All the bulbs
in the world couldn't! It was impossibly
bright. It was like a million welders'
lamps all blazing at once.
&'I'm glad
I don't have physical eyes at this moment,'
I thought. 'This light would destroy
the retina in a tenth of a second.'
&'No, I corrected
myself, not the light. He. He would be too
bright to look at.'
&For now I saw that
it was not light but a man who had entered
the room, or rather, a man made out of light,
though this seemed no more possible to my
mind than the incredible intensity of the
brightness that made up his form.&
&c. Reinee
Pasarow's NDE and out-of-body perception
was as a teenager when
she had an NDE after she became unconscious
following an allergic food reaction. While
outside of her body, she could sense every
sound, every action and even every thought
of the persons people around her. She observed
two firemen’s frantic efforts to revive
her. All the events she witnessed while
out of her body - the conversations, the
actions of the persons involved, the hospital
scene - happened exactly as she remembered
them. Furthermore, aspects of her OBE have
been reported by other people who have had
OBEs which is remarkable because this type
of information was something she did not
know about at the time and would read about
&Then, just
like that (clapping her hands), I became
a ball of light or energy in the midst of
this crowd that was circling a body. I became
massively aware, unlike any awareness I
had had during physical existence. I was
not really aware of myself. I was aware
of everyone around me. I was aware of my
mother and my neighbors, and my friends
and the firemen and what they were thinking
and what they were feeling and what they
were hoping and what they were praying.
This was such a pummeling input of emotion
and information that I was all at once overwhelmed
and confused, and rather disoriented.
&I followed their attention to
something on the sidewalk and I looked at
a body on the sidewalk. I looked at the
curve of the wrist bone and I recognized
it. I remember looking at it and thinking, &That
looks so much like my wrist bone.&
And then I became aware that the thing on
the sidewalk, that thing that suddenly became
a piece of meat to me, was what I had identified
as myself before, but had no connection
with it other than that I had been with
it for a very long time. But it had nothing
to do with me because suddenly, I was more
of a person than I had ever been before.
I was more conscious than I could ever be.
I was free of the limitations of being a
physical being.&I looked at
my body and I was repulsed with the grief
and the tumult around it and with the very
idea that I had ever considered something
physical to be my reality, to be a human
reality.&And with that (taps
the table) again like this, I was bumped
way up, up above some light wires. From
that point I could watch everyone beneath
me, but I was not as closely associated
with them, [but] I was completely feeling
everything they were feeling.&I
watched my mother and a boy come out of
the house and up the hill which I could
not have seen physically. I was very sad
for my mother. I was very sad for my friend
who kept calling me. And I was very sad
for the child who had come out of the house.
I was very sad that he would think I was
dead. So my concern was for them. I spent
my time observing them and calling to them
- calling to them that everything was as
it should be, that everything was fine,
that I was free, that it was wonderful,
that I loved them and that they loved me
and that the bond, unlike physical bonds,
would never be destroyed. I tried to communicate
this to them over and over again and I realized
that I had no mouth. I had no body. They
could not hear what I was saying to them.
I would have to leave them in the same hands
I had left myself in the process of dying.
With that I turned away, just sort of like
a ball, just turned away.&My
attention turned away lovingly but knowing
that there was nothing I could do. I turned
away from them and began to pull up. I became
aware (it was as if I were a camera on a
space ship or something) of our place, my
particular little street and then my particular
little town. I kept pulling up and up and
up to a point where I could observe the
whole earth. This was wonderful!
(After Reinee's
visit to heaven, she returns to where her
body is located.)
a terribly hard crash, I became aware of
the scene I had left earlier - the fire
trucks, and now an ambulance. There were
men who were picking up my body and loading
it into the ambulance. I was in a state
of complete grief. I felt that I had become
Eve and was cast out of the garden of Eden.
&As I was descending down this
tunnel, my heart was already attached to
my home beyond. I was begging not to leave.
I crashed down into this realm of existence
and was suddenly confused by time and space.
It was as if I had never existed physically.
I was suddenly disoriented. My concern was
for my mother, because she was by herself
and she was losing a sixteen year old daughter.
She knew that this was happening because
the ambulance attendant looked at the driver
in front and said, &DOA. DOA,&
which means of course dead on arrival. The
driver turned off the siren and slowed down
the ambulance. Before, he had been driving
in a very reckless manner.&We
were coming out of the mountains. As we
did that, my concern was for the pain of
my mother. I simple wanted to comfort her
and to wrap my soul around her. To assuage
the loss of a daughter, the loss of a child,
I found myself simply praying for her.
&I followed the ambulance to the
hospital and I watched as my body was unloaded.
My mother followed the gurney into the emergency
room. I watched as the first doctor went
to work on me. I wasn't particularly
interested in the first doctor because the
first doctor had, that day, been through
motorcycle accidents coming out of the mountains.
He had been through a very long day and
he was not concerned with someone who had
been brought in dead on arrival. He had
no connection with me. He didn't care
and had no affection. So I had no interest
in watching what he did because my interest
was based on affection and love.&I
then left the emergency room and was above
my mother and some friends who had followed
her into the other room. I again tried to
communicate with them. I tried to let them
know that, &This is a very joyous occasion.
I am dead on arrival. Hopefully all would
go well. They are never going to be able
to revive me. I was going to be dead now.
Death had become life to me. Death was not
something to be frightened of, but something
to look forward to.&&What
happened then was the first doctor pronounced
me dead and was sending my body off to the
morgue. My own personal physician, who was
a country doctor and a very gruff man, stormed
into the emergency room in a tuxedo with
his black bag. He looked at the nurse on
the phone who was calling the morgue, and
looked at the doctor who was washing his
hands, and looked at my [covered] body and
said, &What the hell happened here?
Where is the patient?& They said, &She
was dead on arrival.& He said, &The
hell she was.& He proceeded to scream
at the other nurse who was sort of standing
off in the corner, &I want injections
of adrenaline. Bring them to me immediately
and come over here and assist me.&
He began to go to work on my body. He began
to beat on the chest and began to shock.
I was simply terrified by this turn of events
and disgusted that they would treat a body
so brutally.&All of a sudden
I sort of became protective towards my body,
even though I wanted nothing to do with
it. I began to be protective. They could
at least be nice about it. But they were
beating on my chest and shocking my body,
but I was up in the corner of the emergency
room accompanied by other essences who were
keeping me contained in that emergency room.&
Reinee then described
how she finally returned to her body as a result
of her doctor's last effort to revive her. The
medical professionals she talked to did not know
how to deal with her experience.
&3. Verified
out-of-body perception In NDEs
The &holy grail&
of NDE research is finding an undeniable answer
to the question of whether consciousness can survive
bodily death. But before this can be answered, researchers
must first determine whether consciousness can transcend
the brain and function outside of it. One way is
to discover this is to examine those NDEs which
are &veridical& (i.e., verified). Veridical
NDEs occur when the experiencer acquires verifiable
information which they could not have obtained by
any normal means. Often, near-death experiencers
report witnessing events that happen at some distant
location away from their body, such as another room
of the hospital. If the events witnessed by the
experiencer at the distant location can be verified
to have occurred, then veridical perception would
be said to have taken place. It would provide very
compelling evidence that NDEs are experiences outside
of the physical body. NDE research is coming very
close to providing such undeniable evidence. What
follows are some examples.
Reynolds's verified out-of-body perception
he includes the NDE account of a woman named
who underwent a rare operation to remove
in her brain that seriously threatened her
life. The surgical procedure used to remove
the aneurysm is known as &&
or &standstill.& Pam's body
temperature was lowered to 60 degrees, her
heartbeat and breathing were stopped, her
brain waves were flattened, and all the
blood was drained from her head. For all
practical purposes, she was put to death.
After removing the aneurysm, she was restored
to life. But, during the time that Pam was
in standstill, she experienced a profound
NDE. Her remarkably detailed veridical out-of-body
observations of her surgery were later verified
to be very accurate. Pam's case is considered
to be one of the strongest cases of veridical
perception evidence in NDE research because
of her ability to describe the unique surgical
instruments and procedures used and her
ability to describe in detail these events
while she was clinically and brain dead.
The following is the out-of-body aspect
of her NDE in her own words:
next thing I recall was the sound: It was
a Natural &D.& As I listened to
the sound, I felt it was pulling me out
of the top of my head. The further out of
my body I got, the more clear the tone became.
I had the impression it was like a road,
a frequency that you go on ... I remember
seeing several things in the operating room
when I was looking down. It was the most
aware that I think that I have ever been
in my entire life ...I was metaphorically
sitting on [the doctor's] shoulder.
It was not like normal vision. It was brighter
and more focused and clearer than normal
vision ... There was so much in the operating
room that I didn't recognize, and so
many people.
&I thought the way
they had my head shaved was very peculiar.
I expected them to take all of the hair,
but they did not ...
&The saw-thing that
I hated the sound of looked like an electric
toothbrush and it had a dent in it, a groove
at the top where the saw appeared to go
into the handle, but it didn't ... And
the saw had interchangeable blades, too,
but these blades were in what looked like
a socket wrench case ... I heard the saw
crank up. I didn't see them use it on
my head, but I think I heard it being used
on something. It was humming at a relatively
high pitch and then all of a sudden it went
Brrrrrrrrr! like that.
&Someone said something
about my veins and arteries being very small.
I believe it was a female voice and that
it was Dr. Murray, but I'm not sure.
She was the cardiologist. I remember thinking
that I should have told her about that ...
I remember the heart-lung machine. I didn't
like the respirator ... I remember a lot
of tools and instruments that I did not
readily recognize.
&There was a sensation
like being pulled, but not against your
will. I was going on my own accord because
I wanted to go. I have different metaphors
to try to explain this. It was like the
Wizard of Oz - being taken up in a tornado
vortex, only you're not spinning around
like you've got vertigo. You're
very focused and you have a place to go.
The feeling was like going up in an elevator
real fast. And there was a sensation, but
it wasn't a bodily, physical sensation.
It was like a tunnel but it wasn't a
(Pam meets her deceased
relatives and then must return to her body.)
&But then I got
to the end of it and saw the thing, my body.
I didn't want to get into it ... It
looked terrible, like a train wreck. It
looked like what it was: dead. I believe
it was covered. It scared me and I didn't
want to look at it. It was communicated
to me that it was like jumping into a swimming
pool. No problem, just jump right into the
swimming pool. I didn't want to, but
I guess I was late or something because
he [the uncle] pushed me. I felt a definite
repelling and at the same time a pulling
from the body. The body was pulling and
the tunnel was pushing ... It was like diving
into a pool of ice water ... It hurt! When
I came back, they were playing Hotel California
and the line was &You can check out
anytime you like, but you can never leave.&
I mentioned [later] to Dr. Brown that that
was incredibly insensitive and he told me
that I needed to sleep more.& ()
Charles Tart's case of verified out-of-body
perception
Dr. Charles T. Tart,
is a transpersonal
psychologist and parapsychologist known for his
psychological work on the nature of consciousness
(particularly altered states of consciousness),
as one of the founders of the field of
and for his research in scientific parapsychology.
He served as an instructor in psychiatry in the
and as a consultant on government funded parapsychological
research at the
. Dr. Tart, the author of
, is known for his experimental
work in autoscopic out-of-body and near-death experiences.
He is currently a professor of psychology at the
. Dr. Tart
published an article in the
which documents the OBE of a young woman who was
one of his research subjects. What makes this particular
OBE remarkable is that she was able to leave her
physical body and read a 5-digit number from a significant
distance and correctly give it to him upon return.
This is one of best examples of a veridical OBE
occurring under laboratory conditions.
&c. Reverend
George Rodonaia's NDE and verified out-of-body perception
documentary
, he interviewed a Russian
scientist named
, who had a near-death
experience during which he observed an infant
crying in a nearby room. George observed
that no one could figure out why the infant
was crying so persistently. But George learned
while out of his body that the infant had
a broken arm. When George returned to life,
he told the infant's parents about the broken
arm. An x-ray revealed that the infant's
arm was indeed broken. This same incident
is documented in Dr. Melvin Morse's book
(along with Paul Perry) called
The following excerpt from &Transformed
by the Light& describes George's
observation of this infant while he was
out of his body. Note that in Dr. Morse's
book, he refers to George by his Russian
name &Yuri&.
[During his NDE
and while outside of his body],
Yuri could go visit his family. He saw his
grieving wife and their two sons, both too
small to understand that their father had
been killed. Then he visited his next-door
neighbor..
They had a new child,
born a couple of days before Yuri's
death. Yuri could tell that they were upset
by what happened to him. But they were especially
distressed by the fact that their child
would not stop crying..
No matter what they
did he continued to cry. When he slept it
was short and fitful and then he would awaken,
crying again. They had taken him back to
the doctors but they were stumped. All the
usual things such as colic were ruled out
and they sent them home hoping the baby
would eventually settle down..
While there in this
disembodied state, Yuri discovered something:&
"l could talk to the baby. It
was amazing. I could not talk
to the parents - my friends
- but I could talk to the little
boy who had just been born.
I asked him what was wrong.
No words were exchanged, but
I asked him maybe through telepathy
what was wrong. He told me that
his arm hurt. And when he told
me that, I was able to see that
the bone was twisted and broken."
Eventually the doctor
from Moscow came to perform the autopsy
on Yuri. When they moved his body from the
cabinet to a gurney, his eyes flickered.
The doctor became suspicious and examined
his eyes. When they responded to light,
he was immediately wheeled to emergency
surgery and saved.
Yuri told his
family about being &dead.& No
one believed him until he began to provide
details about what he saw during his travels
out of body. Then they became less skeptical.
His diagnosis on the baby next door did
the trick. He told of visiting them that
night and of their concern over their new
child. He told them that he had talked to
the baby and discovered that he had a greenstick
fracture of his arm. The parents took the
child to a doctor and he x-rayed the arm
only to discover that Yuri's very long-distance
diagnosis was right. ()
Pim van Lommel's&case of verified out-of-body
perception
January of 2001, near-death experiences and near-death
research earned greater scientific respect and credibility
when the findings of a particular NDE study were
published. The distinguished British medical journal
of the Rijnstate
Hospital in the Netherlands on the first large-scale
study of NDEs which he conducted.
His study began in 1988 and
lasted 13 years. It included 344 survivors of cardiac
arrest from 10 Dutch hospitals. Of these 344 survivors,
18 percent experienced an NDE. And because Lommel
and his staff conducted follow-up interviews with
these patients over many years, they were able to
rule out such factors as anoxia, seizures, medication,
etc. Lommel's findings confirmed prior research
findings conducted by other near-death researchers.
It confirmed that NDEs are real and they cannot
be explained by physiological or psychological causes
alone. Lommel also accepted the implication that
consciousness survives death and that consciousness
is not completely dependent upon the brain.
Lommel noted that only 10
seconds after the heart stops beating, the electroencephalogram
goes dead. At this point, there is no activity in
the brain cortex and the brain cannot manufacture
visions. Within 10 minutes, brain stem activity
ceases and irreparable brain damage can occur. However,
Lommel notes that some patients still reported being
conscious at this point. One particular example
cited by Lommel is a man who came into the hospital
already blue from a lack of oxygen. The hospital
staff spent 90 minutes trying to resuscitate him,
using artificial respiration, heart massage and
defibrillation, before they could move him to intensive
care where he was remained in a coma for a week
with brain damage. But when the patient regained
consciousness, he was able to describe events that
occurred around him while he was brain damaged and
out of his body. This veridical evidence comes from
a coronary-care-unit nurse who reported the veridical
out-of-body experience of the comatose patient:
a night shift an ambulance brings in
a 44-year-old cyanotic, comatose man
into the coronary care unit. He had
been found about an hour before in a
meadow by passers-by. After admission,
he receives artificial respiration without
intubation, while heart massage and
defibrillation are also applied. When
we wanted to intubate the patient, he
turns out to have dentures in his mouth.
I remove these upper dentures and put
them onto the crash car. Meanwhile,
we continue extensive CPR. After about
an hour and a half the patient has sufficient
heart rhythm and blood pressure, but
he is still ventilated and intubated,
and he is still comatose. He is transferred
to the intensive care unit to continue
the necessary artificial respiration.
Only after more than a week do I meet
again with the patient, who is by now
back on the cardiac ward. I distribute
his medication. The moment he sees me
that nurse knows where my dentures
&I am very
surprised. Then he elucidates:&
you were there when I was brought
into hospital and you took my dentures
out of my mouth and put them onto
that car, it had all these bottles
on it and there was this sliding
drawer underneath and there you
put my teeth.&
especially amazed because I remembered
this happening while the man was in
deep coma and in the process of CPR.
When I asked further, it appeared the
man had seen himself lying in bed, that
he had perceived from above how nurses
and doctors had been busy with CPR.
He was also able to describe correctly
and in detail the small room in which
he had been resuscitated as well as
the appearance of those present like
myself. At the time that he observed
the situation he had been very much
afraid that we would stop CPR and that
he would die. And it is true that we
had been very negative about the patient's
prognosis due to his very poor medical
condition when admitted. The patient
tells me that he desperately and unsuccessfully
tried to make it clear to us that he
was still alive and that we should continue
CPR. He is deeply impressed by his experience
and says he is no longer afraid of death.
Four weeks later he left hospital as
a healthy man.& ()
&4. Miscellaneous
NDE testimonies on out-of-body perception
&Jane Seymour:
The famous movie actress who starred
in the television series &Dr.
Quinn, Medicine Woman,& describes
the following out-of-body experience
during her NDE:
&I literally
left my body. I had this feeling
that I could see myself on the bed,
with people grouped around me. I
remember them all trying to resuscitate
me. I was above them, in the corner
of the room looking down. I saw
people putting needles in me, trying
to hold me down, doing things.&
he documents his research concerning
NDEs in people born blind. One of
his subjects, Vicki Umipeg, told
Dr. Ring that she found herself
floating above her body in the emergency
room of a hospital following an
automobile accident and saw for
the first time in her life. She
was aware of being up near the ceiling
watching a male doctor and a female
nurse working on her body, which
she viewed from her elevated position.
Vicki has a clear recollection of
how she came to the realization
that this was her own body below
it was me ... I was pretty thin
then. I was quite tall and thin
at that point. And I recognized
at first that it was a body, but
I didn't even know that it was
mine initially. Then I perceived
that I was up on the ceiling, and
I thought, 'Well, that's
kind of weird. What am I doing up
here?' I thought, 'Well,
this must be me. Am I dead? ...'
I just briefly saw this body, and
... I knew that it was mine because
I wasn't in mine.& In addition,
she was able to note certain further
identifying features indicating
that the body she was observing
was certainly her own:
think I was wearing the plain gold
band on my right ring finger and
my father's wedding ring next
to it. But my wedding ring I definitely
saw ... That was the one I noticed
the most because it's most unusual.
It has orange blossoms on the corners
of it.& ()
Brad Steiger:
The author of the NDE book
experienced the following event
during his NDE:
On an August
day in 1947, 11-year-old Brad Steiger
nearly died of multiple skull fractures
after being caught in the metallic
blades of a piece of machinery on
his family's Iowa farm. He felt
his &essential self& drift
away from his body. He watched his
sister run for help and realized
he was simultaneously in his father's
arms being carried from the field,
and above himself, observing. ()
Brinkley:&
In his book,
Brinkley describes the following:
to look around, to roll over in
midair. Below me was my own body,
thrown across the bed. My shoes
were smoking and the telephone was
melted in my hand. I could see Sandy
run into the room. She stood over
the bed and looked at me with a
dazed expression, the kind you might
find on the parent of a child found
floating facedown in a swimming
Clark Sharp:&
In a paper published in the
concerning veridical NDE evidence,
included perhaps
the most famous case of veridical
observation in NDE research at that
first documented
the NDE of a woman named Maria in
was a migrant worker who, while
visiting friends in Seattle, had
a severe heart attack. She was rushed
to Harborview Hospital and placed
in the coronary care unit. A few
days later, she had a cardiac arrest
and an unusual out-of-body experience.
At one point in this experience,
she found herself outside the hospital
and spotted a single tennis shoe
on the ledge of the north side of
the third floor of the building.
Maria not only was able to indicate
the whereabouts of this oddly situated
object, but was able to provide
precise details concerning its appearance,
such as that its little toe area
was worn and one of its laces was
stuck underneath its heel. Upon
hearing Maria's story, Clark,
with some considerable degree of
skepticism and metaphysical misgiving,
went to the location described to
see whether any such shoe could
be found. Indeed it was, just where
and precisely as Maria had described
it, except that from the window
through which Clark was able to
see it, the details of its appearance
that Maria had specified could not
be discerned. Clark concluded, &The
only way she could have had such
a perspective was if she had been
floating right outside and at very
close range to the tennis shoe.
I retrieved the shoe and brought
it back to M it was very concrete
evidence for me.& ().
Dr. Kenneth
A study on veridical perception
in NDEs was conducted by
and Madeline
Lawrence. It included the 1985 account
who was working
as a nurse at Hartford Hospital.
Milne had already been interested
in NDEs, and one day found herself
talking to a woman who had been
resuscitated and who had an NDE.
Following a telephone interview
with Kenneth Ring on August 24,
1992, she described the following
account in a letter:
told me how she floated up over
her body, viewed the resuscitation
effort for a short time and then
felt herself being pulled up through
several floors of the hospital.
She then found herself above the
roof and realized she was looking
at the skyline of Hartford. She
marveled at how interesting this
view was and out of the corner of
her eye she saw a red object. It
turned out to be a shoe ... [S]he
thought about the shoe... and suddenly,
she felt &sucked up& a
blackened hole. The rest of her
NDE account was fairly typical,
as I remember. &I was relating
this to a [skeptical] resident who
in a mocking manner left. Apparently,
he got a janitor to get him onto
the roof. When I saw him later than
day, he had a red shoe and he became
a believer, too.&"
(K. Milne,
personal communication, October
Dr. Ring's initial interview
with Milne, he made a point of
inquiring whether she had ever
heard of the case of Maria's
shoe [as described in the
introduction above]. Not only
was she unfamiliar with it, but
she was utterly amazed to hear
of another story so similar to
the one she had just recounted
to Dr. Ring. It remains an
unanswered question as to how
these isolated shoes arrived at
their unlikely perches for later
viewing by astonished NDErs and
their baffled investigators.
Joyce Harmon:&
In the summer of 1982,
, a surgical
intensive care unit (ICU) nurse
at Hartford Hospital, returned to
work after a vacation. On that vacation
she had purchased a new pair of
plaid shoelaces, which she happened
to be wearing on her first day back
at the hospital. That day, she was
involved in resuscitating a patient,
a woman she didn't know, by
giving her medicine. The resuscitation
was successful and the next day
Harmon chanced to see the patient,
whereupon they had a conversation,
the gist of which (not necessarily
a verbatim account) is as follows:
patient, upon seeing Harmon, volunteered, 'Oh,
you're the one with the plaid
shoelaces!'
&'What?'
Harmon replied, astonished. She
says she distinctly remembers feeling
the hair on her neck rise.'
saw them,' the woman continued. 'I
was watching what was happening
yesterday when I died. I was up
above.'&
(J. Harmon,
personal communication, August 28,
The following is one of
's case studies
from her book
which is not
only veridical, it is highly suggestive
of the survival of consciousness
after death. Atwater has stated
that this testimonial has been verified
by relatives of the experiencer
involved. Here is the excerpt:
spoke of Margaret Fields Kean who
nearly died in 1978 after being
hospitalized for about three weeks
with severe phlebitis. A blood clot
had passed to her heart and lungs
and she became deathly ill. Then
she was given injections for nausea
that, due to the blood thinners
she had previously received, caused
internal hemorrhaging. Pandemonium
reigned as she slipped away. While
absent from her body, she witnessed
the scene below her, then heard
and saw people in the waiting room
down the hall - right through the
walls - as well as nurses at their
station. She also knew their thoughts.
Margaret went on to have a transcendent
near-death experience in which she
instantly knew and understood many
her future, and that she
would become a healer. This completely
contradicted her vision of herself
at that moment in her life, for
she was content being a super-mom
farm wife who rode horses, taught
Bible classes, led 4-H and Girl
Scout groups, gardened, canned,
and baked bread. A healer? Ridiculous!
Yet, when Margaret revived, she
immediately began to heal other
patients in the room around her
by 'reaching out' to them.
Then, she 'projected' into
the isolation room of a white boy
charred black by severe burns. She 'sat'
next to him on the bed, introduced
herself, and proceeded to counsel
him about his purpose in life. She
told him it was okay if he chose
to die as God was loving and he
had nothing to fear.
later, while continuing her recovery
and still in great pain, Margaret
was attending a horse show when
a couple, hearing the loudspeaker
announce her daughter's name
as a winner, sought her out. They
were parents of the severely burned
boy. Before he died, he had told
them about meeting Margaret and
relayed all the wonderful truths
she had told him about God and about
life. The parents were thrilled
to have finally located her so they
could say thanks for what she had
done for their son. The dying boy
had identified her by name - even
though the two had never physically
seen each other or verbally spoken
in any manner, nor had any nurse
known that the two had ever communicated,
nor had it been possible that Margaret
ever could have known if the isolation
room was even occupied much less
who might be there.& ()
Dr. Kenneth Ring:&
Dr. Ring reported in a scholarly
paper one of the most interesting
case of verified out-of-body perception.
In the late 1970s,
was working at
Hartford Hospital as a respiratory
therapist and had the following
experience resuscitating a patient:
she was helping to resuscitate a
60-ish man in the emergency room
whose electrocardiogram had gone
flat. Medics were shocking him repeatedly
with no results. Saunders was trying
to give him oxygen. In the middle
of the resuscitation, someone else
took over for her and she left.
A couple of days later, she encountered
this patient in the ICU. He spontaneously
commented, 'You looked so much better
in your yellow top.' She, like Harmon,
was so shocked at this remark that
she got goose-bumps, for she had
been wearing a yellow smock the
previous day. 'Yeah,' the man continued,
I saw you. You had something over
your face and you were pushing air
into me. And I saw your yellow smock..&"
(S. Saunders,
personal communication, August 28,
confirmed that she had had something
over her face - a mask - and that
she had worn the yellow smock while
trying to give him oxygen, while
he was unconscious and without a
heartbeat. Saunders confirmed that
she had had something over her face
- a mask - and that she had worn
the yellow smock while trying to
give him oxygen, while he was unconscious
and without a heartbeat. According
to Dr. Ring, this case attests to
these three important observations:
who claim to have out-of-body
experiences while near-death
sometimes describe unusual
objects that they could
not have known about by
normal means.
objects can later be shown
to have existed in the form
and location indicated by
the patients' testimony.
this testimony has a strong
emotional and cognitive
effect on the caregivers
involved, either strengthening
their pre-existing belief
in the authenticity of NDE
accounts or occasioning
a kind of on-the-spot conversion.
Ring, Kenneth, Ph.D. & Lawrence,
Madeline, R.N., Ph.D. &&,
Journal of Near-Death Studies, 1993
11 (4)223-229.
Robert Pastorelli:& &I
was in excruciating pain. Then, in the next
second, there was no pain. Suddenly I realized
I was out of my body. I was floating above
myself, looking down at my unconscious body
lying in the hospital emergency room with
my eyes closed. I could see tubes down my
nose and throat. I knew I was dying and
I thought, 'Well, this must be death.'
I even saw a priest giving me the last rites.
But it was the most peaceful feeling in
the world. Then I saw my father starting
to faint out of grief. Two nurses grabbed
him and sat him down in a chair across the
When I looked
down and saw my father's pain it had
an effect on me. I firmly believe that at
that moment I made a decision to live, not
die. The next thing I knew I was waking
up back in my body. Later, in the recovery
room, when I was fully conscious, I told
my father what had happened, his fainting
and all. He was astounded.& ()
Atwater's book,
an interesting case of verified
out-of-body perception is documented
about a woman named Lynn whose observations
during her near-death experience
were later proven to be true, including
the black and Asian doctors on the
operating team.
next thing I knew I was floating
around the ceiling looking down
on my body. My chest was open wide
and I could see my internal organs.
I remember thinking how odd it was
that my organs were a beautiful
pearl gray, not at all like the
bright red chucks in the horror
flicks I loved to watch. I also
noticed there was a black doctor
and an Oriental one on the operating
team. The reason this stuck in my
mind is that I was brought up in
a very white middle-class neighborhood,
and I had seen black schoolteachers
but never a black doctor. I'd
met the operating team the day before,
but they were all white.
Suddenly, I had to move on, so I
floated into the waiting room, where
my parents were. My father had his
head buried in my mother's lap.
He was kneeling at her feet, his
arms wrapped around her waist, and
he was sobbing. My mother was stroking
his head, whispering to him. This
scene shocked me, as my father was
not prone to showing emotions. Once
I realize they would be fine, I
felt myself pulled into a horizontal
tunnel.& ()
David Goines: &I
remember the fear of impact (getting hit),
however, I have no recollection of the impact
or having my body become totally integrated
with the bicycle, nor hurtling over sixty
feet through the air and landing in the
canal. My next memory was quite a scene
in the hospital emergency room. It was the
most unique experience of my earthly life.
Unique, because I was observing my own body
in the emergency room and all the activity
going on, except that I was not in my body.
I was above it all - looking down. I was
feeling no pain.
Everyone was very
busy. I knew by their activity that I was
in serious trouble. There was much discussion
about how to extract me from the tangled
wreckage of my bike and/or whether they
would need to leave me in it until I was
stabilized enough to try. I could see and
hear everything. It was gruesome. It was
frightening. They finally decided they had
me stable enough to get rid of the bike
and they called for a welding specialist
to bring a torch to help cut me out of the
bike. Thank God my body seemed to be unconscious.
All of this would have been quite enough
for my young mind to endure - until one
nurse, whom I knew, said to another, 'Well
- it certainly makes you wonder if it is
worth saving this mess.' She nearly
scared me to death! At that moment, it was
more than I could stand above and watch.
I wanted to run away from this scene. I
needed to escape. Quickly, I turned, took
one step through the wall so to speak and
found myself in total darkness.& ()
Oakford: &I
called out to my friends and nobody came.
I tried to unplug the stereo but that did
not work either. Every time I tried to touch
the cord to unplug it I could not grasp
it. It just kept on playing &LA Woman&
and the sound rattled my very being. I ran
all over the house calling for my friends,
yelling repeatedly that the music was too
loud but I was not heard. I pleaded for
the music to be turned down. I tried to
go outside but I could not feel the doorknob.
I could see the daylight outside but could
not go outside. I ended up hiding in the
bathroom in an unsuccessful attempt to escape
the noise. I looked in the mirror and could
not see myself. That frightened me greatly.
I went back into the family room and saw
my body sitting in the chair. It looked
like I was sleeping. I wondered how I could
be looking at myself. I got a bit scared
then because I could see me from outside
of me, from all different angles except
from the inside angle I was used to seeing
myself. I was alone. I was confused and very
scared. I tried to get back into my body
but could not. I could not touch the ground
either. I was floating. I rose up into a
spot above my body and kind of just hung
there. I could no longer move. I called
out for help and nobody came. I tried to
go out the door but like the stereo I could
not touch the doorknob.& ()
Clark Sharp: &I
was going back. I knew it. I was already
on the way. I was on a trajectory headed
straight for my body. That's when I
saw my body for the first time, and when
I realized I was no longer a part of it.
Until this moment, I'd only seen myself
straight on, as we usually do, in mirrors
and photographs. Now I was jolted by the
strange sight of me in profile from four
feet away. I looked at my body, the body
I knew so well, and was surprised by my
detachment. I felt the same sort of gratitude
toward my body that I had for my old winter
coat when I put it away in the spring. It
had served me well, but I no longer needed
it. I had absolutely no attachment to it.
Whatever constituted the self I knew as
me was no longer there. My essence, my consciousness,
my memories, my personality were outside,
not in, that prison of flesh.& ()
Dr. Liz Dale's
research subject: &Immediately
after the impact from falling forward onto
the metal grating, I felt myself floating
up, out of my body, and hovering above my
body and all the people who were watching
it, and who seemed paralyzed by shock and
horror at what had happened. I think they
pretty much assumed that I was dead. I remember
looking down and seeing my body three-dimensionally
for the first time. And it was such a shock,
because we never see ourselves except in
a one-dimensional mirror reflection, or
a photograph. But I
I felt completely whole and free, and I
thought, 'This is who I really am.'
I saw my physical body, all crumpled
and and this enormous
wave of compassion washed over me and I
wanted to tell all of the bystanders that
everything was going to be OK and not to
be sad or alarmed.
Then suddenly I felt myself being pulled,
literally at the speed of light, farther
from the physical earth, and I saw all of
the people on the planet simultaneously
in that one moment. I saw people in China
and Sweden and U I saw people sleeping
I saw people preparing food
in their home people
traveling in all manner of transportation,
to and from work and sch
I saw children playing together, and bankers
and teachers and factory workers at their
jobs. I saw mothers giving birth to children,
which was especially beautiful and moving
to me.& ()
Rev. Howard Storm: &For
a time there was a sense of being unconscious
or asleep. I'm not sure how long it
lasted, but I felt really strange, and I
opened my eyes. To my surprise I was standing
up next to the bed, and I was looking at
my body laying in the bed.
My first reaction was, 'This
is crazy! I can't be standing here looking
down at myself. That's not possible.'
This wasn't what I expected, this wasn't
right. Why was I still alive? I wanted oblivion.
Yet I was looking at a thing that was my
body, and it just didn't have that much
meaning to me. Now knowing what was happening,
I became upset. I started yelling and screaming
at my wife, and she just sat there like
a stone. She didn't look at me, she
didn't move and I kept screaming profanities
to get her to pay attention. Being confused,
upset, and angry, I tried to get the attention
of my room-mate, with the same result. He
didn't react.
I wanted this to be a dream, and I kept
saying to myself, 'This has got to be
a dream.' But I knew that it wasn't
a dream. I became aware that strangely I
felt more alert, more aware, more alive
than I had ever felt in my entire life.
All my senses were extremely acute. Everything
felt tingly and alive. The floor was cool
and my bare feet felt moist and clammy.
This had to be real.& ()
P.M.H. Atwater: &The
pain ebbed by as I rose steadily upward,
again stopping at the light fixture, only
this time in the living room. I looked down,
recognizing the body on the floor as mine.
There was no confusion this time. My situation
was clearly defined. Good God, I'm dead!
Time and space ended for me after gazing
for what seemed endless minutes at my body.
It made no movement. There was no breathing.
No response. When I was satisfied that it
was dead, there came a joyous euphoria,
like a prisoner being released from a long
jail sentence. I danced and danced around
the light bulb, singing like a child. It
was finally over. I was free.& ()
Grace Bubulka: &I
was then looking down from above the left
foot area of my bed. The distance from my
bed was as though I was against the ceiling
corner. I could see the backs of the staff
to the left of my bed and the faces of my
doctors and the Filipino nurse. I was exasperated
with them and with my futile attempt to
connect with them. I had no strong feelings
about my body lying on the bed. It was almost
unfamiliar to me.& ()
Laurelynn Martin: &I
awakened and found myself floating above
my body, off to the right side, looking
down, watching the attempts of the medical
team trying to revive the lifeless form
below. I viewed the scene with detachment.
The surgical team was frantic. The color
red was everywhere, splattered on their
gowns, splattered on the floor, and a bright
pool of a flowing red substance, in the
now wide open abdominal cavity. At that
moment, I didn't make the connection
that the body being worked on was my own!
It didn't matter anyway. I was in a
state of floating freedom, experiencing
no pain and having a great time. I wanted
to shout to the distressed people below, &Hey,
I'm okay. It's fantastic up here,&
but they were so intent on their work, I
didn't want to interrupt their efforts.
I had traveled to another realm of total
and absolute peace. With no physical body
my movement was unencumbered. Thought was
the avenue for travel. I floated up through
blackness where there was no fear, no pain,
no misunderstandings, but instead a sense
of well-being. I was enveloped by total
bliss in an atmosphere of unconditional
love and acceptance.& ()
Josiane Antonette:& &Am
I outside myself observing? I see my body
and its pain. I they are
pale and lifeless. My legs cannot move.
My face is white and drawn ... Now I'm
on the hospital room ceiling gazing down!
Everything appears so small: I
my body looks the people
around the bed are tiny. Overwhelming grief
and sorrow fill the room, and yet I feel
completely disconnected from the scene below
me. I hover nearer and look at the strange
form lying on the bed. I feel compassion
beyond words. I understand everything, but
I have no feeling of attachment to anyone.
I look at each person standing at the bedside
and feel tremendous love. I want to say
to them, 'I'm all right. You don't
have to worry. I'm all right. Look at
me! I'm fine!'& ()
Rev. Kenneth
Hagin: &My
heart stopped beating. This numbness spread
to my feet, my ankles, my knees, my hips,
my stomach, my heart and I leaped out of
my body. I did no I
leaped out of my body like a diver would
leap off a diving board into a swimming
pool. I knew I was outside my body. I could
see my family in the room, but I couldn't
contact them. I began to descend down, down,
into a pit, like you'd go down into
a well, cavern or cave ...&
Then, like a suction from above, I floated
up, head first, through the darkness. Before
I got to the top, I could see the light.
I've been down in a well: it was like
you were way down in a well and could see
the light up above. I came up on the porch
of my grandpa's house. Then I went through
the wall not through the door, and not through
the window through the wall, and seemed
to leap inside my body like a man would
slip his foot inside his boot in the morning
time. Before I leaped inside my body, I
could see my grandmother sitting on the
edge of the bed holding me in her arms.
When I got inside my body, I could communicate
'I felt myself
slipping,' I said, 'Granny, I'm
going again. You've been a second mother
to me when Momma was ill.' My heart
stopped for a second time. I leaped out
of my body and began to descend: down, down,
down ... And then I was pulled up, head
first. I could see the lights of the
above me before I came up out of the pit.
The only difference this time was that I
came up at the foot of the bed. For a second
time I stood there. I could see my body
lying there on the bed. I could see Grandma
as she sat there holding me in her arms."
Hagin says goodbye to his family]
left a word for each one of them, and my
heart stopped the third time. I could feel
the circulation as it cut off. Suddenly
my toes went numb. Faster than you can snap
your fingers, my toes, feet, ankles, knees,
hips, stomach and heart went dead and I
leaped out of my body and began to descend
...&" [Hagin
then enters his body again and recovers
from his illness.] ()
Randolph:& &I
felt myself leaving my body. I was floating
a few feet in the air above the river. I
looked on my body with mixed feelings. I
was bleeding from my mouth, nose, ears,
and saw a trickle of blood underneath me
on the boulder. As I was reflecting on the
state of my body, I felt a pulling and began
to rise very fast. I was traveling at a
high rate of speed upwards through the atmosphere.&
Rexella Van Impe:&
The wife of television evangelist Dr. Jack
, was injured in a car accident
in Brussels in 1982. She discovered herself
outside of her body watching her husband
crying as he held her in his arms. The experience
was told in their video, &Heaven: An
Out-of-Body Adventure?&
[This videotape, produced
in 1992, is available through
POB 7004, Troy, MI, USA 48007.]
Chris Taylor: &On
September 1993, I was at Papworth Hospital
having my aortic valve replaced. I left
my body and watched the surgeon operating
on me. He was a bit of a maverick and had
a red and white check head cover. He was
listening to Meat Loaf's 'Bat out
of hell' and invisible drumming to it.
He splashed some blood on one of the nurses.
She got angry. I asked him about
this and he confirmed it by stating that
I could not have seen this due to the screen
around my face. On November 2001, I rushed
back to Papworth with a dissecting aorta
which is usually fatal. My son had seen
me have the attack and my profound pain.
He was scared and had tears streaming down
his face. He made me promise that I would
not die. I promised him. I underwent 10
hours of emergency surgery at the end of
which my heart failed to spontaneously restart.
The surgeon manually manipulated my heart
for 26 minutes. At some stage in the procedure
I left my body with a whooshing sound. I
then was floating toward a bright light.
All around me was a gray cloud-type thick
fog. It had texture. The closer I approached
the light I became aware of a fundamental
sense of purity. I could feel my pain falling
away. I became aware of PURE LOVE, peace,
tranquility. I could hear voices that were
welcoming me without spe
but, I understood that this was natural
and normal. I also knew that I was leaving
the two people I love the