In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife

It reveals the source of life. It brings a new way of knowing that lies beyond the reach of the five senses. It reveals the underlying intelligence that organizes and sustains creation (for the moment we won’t use the word “God,” for in many cultures a single creator is not part of dying or the afterlife).

Perhaps there are men raised in peace and lucidity, with no phantoms on their tails, who see nothing in a storm cloud but convection currents and water vapor. In any case I would not change places with one of them. What grandeur there is in my life blossoms out of my own mean beginnings. What times of peace I know are a thousand times more precious

I have no memory of ever having exhaled, or of being lowered onto the mattress and covered with a blanket. All at once I felt a tremendous rush of energy fill my head accompanied by a punishing roar. I managed, barely, to squeeze out the words I had prepared, “trust” and “surrender.” These words became my mantra, but they seemed utterly pathetic, w

To this very day, I consider the panoramic life review to be the pinnacle point of my time spent in Heaven. During this all-inclusive recapitulation of my entire history, every single thing I had ever thought, said, and done was displayed for me in holographic form. As the scenes played out (and often ended painfully), I was not only myself, but I