My 19 year old niece Michelle was killed suddenly in a vehicle accident.  She was dear to my wife and I when she was younger, though we hadn't had much contact with her for several years... many years in fact.  She was the daughter of my wife's sister.

The morning of her death (she was killed overnight) I took the call at home and had to track down my wife as she had already left for work.  I'm sure I was in a state of shock. The day is a bit of a blur, but I do remember several times during that morning where I felt unsolicited contact from my niece in my mind.  I passed it off as imagination.  The day was also strange in that I played in a golf tournament despite her death.  I felt her telling me to go and play.  During that time driving to the course and in playing I felt her presence several times in ways that seemed beyond my imagination.  The rest of the day was spent in shock. 

Two days later, the day of her Catholic wake, at the evening session, I had a sudden and undeniable verbal communication from Michelle.  I was sitting with my wife in the second row at the funeral home before her casket.  She said in the voice of a four year old, "Here comes trouble" and communicated without words that I should go out to the parking lot to meet with a young man who had just arrived.  I could clearly see him distraught and teary-eyed with a small group of other young people her age in the parking lot though there was no window in the room.  Over and over she wanted me to go out to him and I refused with my rational mind.  There were no words at first other than "Here comes trouble" and "Go see him, Uncle Dave".  I just knew I should go and I clearly saw the scene in my mind, the same way I was hearing her words.  I sobbed heavily, overcome with a feeling of... awe?  emotion?  it's hard to say.  I was just hearing her voice so clearly and seeing what was going on in a place I couldn't physically see.  I just 'knew' what was happening, and where the boy was.  I didn't know who he was, only that she said "Here comes trouble".  I knew her boyfriend at the time, I had met him at the house.  He was in the room in the funeral home with us.  This was someone else.  I didn't know who he was, I just knew he was there and that she wanted me to go to him. 

After I delayed long enough (perhaps a few minutes?) there was no longer a need to go outside. The moment had passed and I felt it.  I could see him leaving some of the friends, and moving with others toward the door of the funeral home and eventually into the long hallway crowded with mourners of all ages.  It would be a while before he entered the room where I was with my wife and her family.  As a part of me followed his slow walk toward the room, I continued the communication with my niece Michelle.  She spoke so clearly, in a young voice I best remember. 

I asked her where she was and why she was talking to me.  She told me that she wasn't speaking to me directly, but that I alone had heard.  She said it was a matter of openness to the experience.  I asked her why her voice was that of a four year old.  She said there was no actual voice, that she and I were sharing thoughts - thought energies? - and that my mind was putting a voice onto what was being communicated.  She deliberately said in her young voice "I could sound like this", then in her 19 year old voice "Or like this", then in the voice of a 64 year old woman she would never be "Or like this".  Each time my mind heard the voice clearly and knew what I was hearing.  It was indeed my mind putting an audible voice on some other way of communicating.  I just 'knew' it.  It's so hard to put into words what I was experiencing. 

I asked again, or for the first time, where she was and I saw a blackness, a void, in which there was a spinning orb about ten feet tall to my perception.  The spinning orb was the earth and it was spinning very fast - many revolutions per second.  Two spiritual forms approached the spinning orb/earth.  The spiritual forms I mention were to my perception some sort of misty beings - ghostlike - with some semblance of humanoid scale and size, and yet they were formless.  They were human size only in reference to my point of reference, the reference in which the rapidly spinning earth was about ten feet in diameter.  As one being said some sort of farewell to the other, the other lifted up in a large puff and disappeared as a funnel shaped mist onto the surface of the planet.  In a matter of seconds it reappeared, this time as a small point of a funnel shaped mist lifting up and coming back to the same size and general shape it had before.  It walked / drifted away with the first being as they discussed what had happened during that lifetime.  I knew I had witnessed a human lifetime from another perspective, a spiritual form experiencing a single human lifetime and then coming back to review it with a friend/peer.  It's hard to explain but it was so clear to me.  

I also saw/felt/experienced total darkness that wasn't darkness, a void that wasn't a void but was everything and everywhere all at once.  No time, no space.  In that absence of anything I could be anywhere at anytime just by thinking about it.  All I had to do was to have a thought and I was there.  Everywhere all at once.  It was the most amazing, profound, deep experience I have ever had in this human lifetime.  (Later that day and for days after this whole experience I journaled the whole thing extensively.  I haven't re-read the journal but I have it in my possession to this day.) 

I believe she also shared the moment of her death during that time we were speaking.  She also communicated to me that I shouldn't share this experience with her immediate family as she came from a troubled family with a horribly abusive childhood.  They wouldn't understand at this time, nor should that abusive energy be part of the equation at that time.  I honored her wishes.

All this was going on while I sat next to my wife, likely clutching her hand, sobbing almost uncontrollably, and waiting for this young man to make his way into the room.  It may have taken a good twenty minutes or so.  It was as though my mind and spirit had left the room to journey with the spirit of my niece, and yet my body was still there in the seat. 

At the time the young man was going to round the corner into the viewing room, I turned around to see him.  At no time prior to this did I actually have visual access to the parking lot, to the front door, or to the long hallway down which he and every other mourner traveled.  There were no windows in the room.  The parking lot was fifty feet to my left beyond the wall, the hallway was behind me beyond a wall.  And yet I knew when the young man would enter.  I turned around to see him and saw a young man about 19 or 20, slightly tall and thin, red-eyed and with a reddish bump on his nose.  I had the thought that this might be the driver of the car in which she was killed.  I related the red bump on his nose with a possible bump off the steering wheel.  I didn't know the driver but I knew he wasn't seriously hurt.  Michelle had died of head injuries from either the window frame or the telephone pole that the small pickup truck had hit.  This likelihood matched up with her first words to me, "Here comes trouble".

I watched him move with the line toward the casket, not staring at him but glancing occasionally.  I became concerned that as he approached the front part of the line, Michelle's father would see him and there would be trouble - a fight. 

When he was about six to ten feet from the casket, maybe one or two people ahead of him, I saw a bluish-grey mist appear near him and just wrap around him completely.  It was Michelle and she was hugging him in the only way she could.  (sixteen years after the experience and I'm weeping as I type this - it was beautiful and so loving, so moving!  These words don't even come close to doing what I saw and felt justice).  She wrapped herself around him and I heard her say "Oh, Uncle Dave!  I love him so much !!!  I'll be with him forever. You have to tell him that I'll be with him forever and how much I love him."   There is nothing I have ever felt in my human existence that compares with the love I felt between them at that time.  He wasn't aware of it, at least I don't think so. But the love she was expressing was whole and complete and completely wrapped around him in ways no human touch could ever be.  I have come close - a mile away - years later in a spontaneous tantric experience with a woman I dated.  That relationship also involved after death contact with my partner's deceased sister and others.  But for as deep and powerful as those physical experiences were in my real life, they were still not like the love I saw happen in that funeral home.   And by the way, this wasn't Michelle's boyfriend.  I had met her boyfriend at her mom's house the day of Michelle's death.  This young man before me with Michelle wrapped around him was a stranger to me. 

By now he was at the casket and weeping.  There was no trouble, no fight.  Only love.  Love is all there is she has since said to me on many occasions.  After he had paid his respects at the (closed) casket, he walked away to my right and she turned her attention back to me telling me that I had to tell him what I had seen and that she loved him "SO MUCH" and that she would be with him forever.

(I'm still weeping.  This experience is profound in a way I've never experienced before or since.  It was visual, verbal, experiential, whole.  I've had many more experiences since but this one moved me more than any other.) 

As the young man walked further from the casket and from me I asked Michelle for his name.  My rational mind wanted some proof that what I had experienced was real.  She said very directly that this wouldn't be 'fair'.  That I had to do it on faith alone.  I had to trust that what I had seen, heard, and experienced was real and that the message of love had to be communicated to him directly without question. 

I followed him by glancing.  My wife by this time had asked me several times why I was sobbing so hard.  I couldn't tell her.  I couldn't get words out. I know I only nodded or motioned that I was okay and that I would speak later.  I tried to watch where he had gone, but I lost him in the crowded viewing room.  After maybe ten minutes of looking from my seat I decided to get up and look for him in the hallway or outside.  My awareness of anything outside my normal senses was now gone.  I was back to being all human again. 

I excused myself and told my wife that I had to get up and leave for a few minutes.  I went to the hallway and then to the door of the funeral home.  I couldn't see him anywhere.  I finally stepped outside and looked around the parking lot where there were many people gathered in small groups.  Still I couldn't see him.  Just off the front steps several of my brothers and cousins in law were gathered.  They got me involved in their conversation for a few minutes.  My mind was on finding the young man, but apparently he had left.

After a few minutes of talking with the in-laws I went back up the stairs and toward the front door.  It was there I saw the same young man sitting on the banister by the front door.  He was holding his head in his hands.  I reached for the door knob, 'chickening out' of what I was supposed to do.  I couldn't bring my rational mind to put full faith in the unusual experiences of the past hour or so.  Then I summoned up enough courage to let go of the knob and back up.  I heard the words in my head "We haven't met".  I turned and looked at the young man and said "Hi".  He looked at me quizzically and said "We haven't met".  That gave me a little shudder.  I said my name was Dave and that I was Michelle's uncle.  I said that we were pretty close when she was younger.  I asked if he was close with Michelle. 

The young man said to me that he and Michelle were very close.  He said that just a month ago they had gone to the shore (the beach, the ocean) together.  I said in the little bit of courage that I could muster that I had a feeling she was very close to him.  I said I didn't know why or something stupid like that, just that I had a 'feeling' she was close to him.  Then I excused myself and went back inside. 

I sat next to my wife and wept some more.  Sobbed deeply. 

Later that night, on the way home in the car, I told my wife briefly what had happened.  My young daughters were in the back seat listening and my eldest daughter said that she had heard Michelle speak to her while she was in school the day before.  There wasn't much more to the conversation.  I didn't go into a lot of depth.  There was so much going on for all of us emotionally.

During the night I had a dream or vision that I should just get it out and tell him the next time I saw him what had happened. 

The following day was the funeral.  I volunteered to be a pall bearer for my niece's casket and on the way out of the church we passed by that same young man near the doorway in the back of the church (the front door actually).  I passed directly in front of him and we stopped with the casket long enough for me to make eye contact with him and tell him that I needed to talk with him later.

At the cemetery I thought I might get the chance but I didn't.  I saw him, and even passed close by, but didn't get an opportunity to speak. 

A couple of hours later we were all at a post-burial dinner, all of us meaning family and close friends.  I didn't see the young man there and I thought I had missed all my chances.  I thought I had mishandled this spiritual request.  However, half an hour or so later I saw him enter the room and just got myself together and walked over.  Having made eye contact at the church made it easier to approach him now. 

Without much preparation I just told him that I had something I felt was important to tell him.  I said he might think I was nuts or something but that it didn't matter.  I just had to get it out.  And in brief, but without skimming over any details important to him I let him know what I had experienced.  I said that I knew when he arrived, I had somehow followed his movement in the hallway, and how I had seen her wrap around him just before he got to the casket.  I also told him how much she loved him - SO MUCH - and that she said she would be with him forever.  He looked at me open eyed but not visibly moved.  I had the feeling I was just nuts and that this didn't really apply to this young man.  I thanked him for letting me get it all out and tell this story to him as a stranger.  He told me he was called 'JB' and I said my name was Dave.  We shook hands then I walked back to the table where I had been sitting with my wife and sister-in-law (mother of the deceased) and sat down again. 

A few minutes later this young man came walking over to our table, locked eyes with me, and sat down across from me.  He was beaming !!  He said that I had no idea how much it meant to him that I had spoken to him and told him.  I may have said something about keeping it secret from the family because he didn't expound on it.  But I could tell that it was VERY significant to him.  His whole face and demeanor had changed.  Instead of being teary-eyed he now looked happy.  We shook hands again, more strongly, and he left the table a very happy young man.  I saw him speaking with others in the room afterward and he just looked so good.  My wife of course knew what had just happened, my sister in law did not. 

About a month later I had dropped my daughter off at a dance class and was leaving the parking lot to go home.  There was a favorite book store of mine in the complex where the dance studio was and I suddenly had a strong desire to go into the bookstore.  I didn't though, because I was already driving and leaving the lot to exit onto the highway.  The closer I got to leaving the parking lot the stronger the feeling got that I should go to the bookstore.  As I got to the traffic light at the parking lot exit I could no longer deny the feeling.  I backed my car up the ramp, turned around illegally, and drove over to the bookstore.  I went in thinking that maybe I should buy a certain book I had previously looked at.  On the way to the back of the store where my book was I could feel a pull to the left down a different aisle.  I went with the feeling and as I passed a certain bookshelf I reached down for a book that was calling to me though I couldn't see the title at first.  I pulled it out and saw that the book was called "Our Children Forever" and that it dealt with coping with the death of a child.  How curious !!!   On top of that, the book felt like it was six inches thick instead of its physical size of perhaps two inches thick.  It felt like it was the size and texture of a car-washing sponge!  Cool.  I knew this was the book I had come in to buy.  I thought that maybe my niece was communicating with me again to buy this book for my wife, who was struggling very much with the death of her beloved niece and godchild. 

I took the book up toward the counter to check out, then passed a shelf with some of the Celestine Prophecy series.  I had read the Celestine Prophecy and was interested in the related guide book.  As I stood looking over the Celestine Prophecy books I had a strong feeling that I should stop looking and just buy the book I had and leave.  Though I could no longer hear her voice directly, I spoke in my head to Michelle saying that I knew I should buy this book for Carol (my wife) but that I wanted to check out these others for myself while I was there.  They even dealt with the same type of subject, what could be wrong with that??  Still I had a strong urge to leave, and I resisted.  The longer I stayed the worse I felt and the smaller the book in my hand became.  What was once the size and texture of a car-washing sponge was now shrinking back toward the physical book it actually was.  Before long it actually was back to a normal paperback book about two inches thick with no special feeling, just a shine paper cover and a title dealing with the loss of a child.  I actually felt that I should now put the book back on its shelf and leave the store.

Though the 'magic' was gone I decided to buy the book anyway and I left the Celestine Prophecy rack alone.  I checked out and drove home with the book "Our Children Forever". 

As I approached the neighborhood where we lived, about five miles from the bookstore and dance class, I rounded a curve just before the entrance to our development.  In the other lane, apparently having just left our house, my sister in law - the mother of the deceased - waved to me as she drove home.  I had missed her by minutes !!  That's why the book shrunk !  She never, rarely actually, visited our home.  Her husband wouldn't allow it.  He was brutally and emotionally controlling over the whole household.  It was a rare event to get a visit from her.  I had blown it, again !   I didn't listen.  If I had left the bookstore when I was asked I'd have been home in time to give it to her.  The book wasn't for my wife Carol, it was for Michelle's mom. 

I drove home the last few minutes in tears for what I had failed to do.  I told my wife about it and she suggested I just drive down to her sister's house and give her the book there.  That felt right to me.  I got in my car and went.

When I arrived there I knocked on the door and she answered.  She seemed puzzled as to why I was there.  I went in for just a minute or two and handed her the book.  I said I had a strange gut feeling that it was important she had it.  I told her that the feeling to buy it had come over me when I dropped our daughter off for dance class.  She knew I was a little on the fringe so she wasn't all that surprised to hear me say that I was acting on gut feelings.  It was more than that but I couldn't say so. I didn't know if it was allowed.  I had to ask Michelle.  I just left after a couple of minutes and drove home. 

Within half an hour my sister in law was back at our house, to tell me that she was desperate for a sign from Michelle.  She said that's why she was at our house in the first place, she was feeling desperate for some sign that Michelle was alright.  She thought that maybe I would be open to talking with her about Michelle's death and the possibility of an afterlife.  She said she would take this book as a sign.  I had already asked Michelle in my mind about sharing more with her mother.  The whole book experience, while not verbal, was a direct contact experience nonetheless.  I 'knew' it in my soul. 

We sat at our kitchen table, a month or so after the funeral, and after sharing lots of happy thoughts about the meaning of me buying this book for her I started to ask my sister in law some questions.  She was obviously elated and that was enough for me for the moment.  I asked her how Michelle's friends were doing, I asked how her boyfriend was doing.  Michelle's mom told me that the boyfriend had sort of faded away, they hadn't dated very long.  I asked about her other friends by name, and then asked about the one called JB.  She told me that JB was Michelle's childhood sweetheart.  She said that had grown up together as friends since they were little, and that as they grew up they dated.  She said that Michelle had just broken up with JB less than a month before she died.  The one I had thought was her boyfriend was a latecomer.  JB was the one closest to her heart.  Everything I had felt was now real, to my mind as well as to my heart and soul.  There could be no doubt anymore.  I felt myself closing up, curling up this was a little too much to deal with all at once.  When something so powerful can be seen as imaginary, even just a little bit potentially imaginary, it leaves enough room for doubt.  Sixteen years later I'm still feeling it to my core.  At that moment in my kitchen it all became real, physically real and verifiable as well as known to my heart and soul.  My mind could no longer deny it. 

I actually dropped down onto the floor in a fetal position weeping.  My sister in law asked what was the matter.  My wife knew.  I lay there trying to get a grip and while I was there in that space between physical reality and soul awareness something happened again.  Michelle came through.  Not verbally, not in words, but lovingly.  She asked if she could use my body.  There's no way to say how these things happen.  There's no real progression of events.  It's just all there all at once.  Like that void, that place of nothingness where everything is all the time.  Just think about it and you're there.  Any time any place.  It's all one.  We're all one. 

It was in that state of being that I felt my niece asking me for permission to use my body to show her mom that she loved her too.  In real life there was none of this that I'm aware of.  It was all abuse, all emotional distance, all physical distance.  Michelle had moved away from her home to live with friends when she was just fifteen or so.  That's why we hadn't seen her.  She was no longer part of the family.  This is what my mind knew.  It may be only my perception, but this is the way I saw Michelle and her mom's physical reality in this lifetime.  And in that moment when I was laying curled up on the floor I knew Michelle wanted to borrow my physical body to enter in and to give her mom a hug.  I said okay. 

My body stood up.  I'd say I stood up but it wasn't fully like that.  My body stood up and I was there, but not in it.  Or I was partially in it but backing away.  Michelle was entering and I was watching from behind.  Not inside but attached in some way.  She was inside but she didn't quite fit.  It wasn't all normal/right for her.  It didn't fully match, neither did the feeling of being outside of my own shell.  But we all walked as one, almost one, and Michelle was inside and I was not though I was there.  I felt her use my hands to touch her mom's shoulders and arms.  I felt her use my eyes to look into her mom's eyes.  I felt her use my heart and my whole body to connect with her mother's.  I felt her hug her mom, I felt her look into her mom's face and then kiss her mom.  I saw the way her mom looked back wide eyed, mystified, searching, deeply moved and incredibly happy.  Her mom felt what Michelle was trying to convey.  I can't say that I remember disconnecting.  I just know that at some point it was over.  At that time it was also okay to talk a little, and so I did. 

I told Michelle's mom a lot more of the story.  I said that I wasn't supposed to say anything to her earlier, but I didn't say why.  Yet I didn't have to.   Even that secret was understood.  It was all okay now. 

This is the story of my first NDE encounter.  I think of it as an after death encounter. 

There have been more events, connections, contacts.  This was the most profound and I count it as my first real remembered experience.  In my conversations with Michelle she let me know that it wasn't truly the first.  Many times in the past I've imagined that I was talking with the deceased.  She said that many times those imaginary conversations weren't imaginary.  Some are, some aren't.  There's a fine line between the imaginary and the extraordinary.  A fine membrane if you will. 

Since that time I've used the skills learned in recognizing real perception and discerning it from imagination.  There is actually little difference and sometimes it's still difficult.  I guess it's supposed to be. 

I've developed a healing arts practice of my own that became a vocation.  Since retiring from my career as a postmaster, and even in the years before retiring, I've turned that vocation into a small business.  I practice as a vocation though, not as a business.  It's not about money.  The money comes all by itself when it's needed.  I've never had to worry.  Working with people, usually with spiritual and emotional blockages, had been my calling.  PTSD seems to be a common thread among my best clients. 

Eight years ago a small interaction with a client led me to a series of gut feelings and synchronicities that eventually led to the discovery of a large lithic archaeoastronomy site, similar in use to Stonehenge but in North America.  Through hard work and years of research it's now documented with archaeologists.  It is a new and previously undocumented site and its location is currently undisclosed pending safeguarding.  Without listening I'd never have found it, or should I say it would never have found me.  The spirits there continue to communicate and will eventually be brought into full recognition among anthropologists as a newly discovered culture on this continent. 

The world of NDEs and that space where we're all connected all the time is so real.  There is in fact nothing else beyond that, no place where we are in any way disconnected from one another.  Separation is the illusion.  Only love is real.

At the time of your experience was there an associated life-threatening event?   Uncertain  Not for me.  The sudden and unexpected death of an estranged and beloved niece brought about the opportunity for the first experience.

Was the experience difficult to express in words?  Yes    

At what time during the experience were you at your highest level of consciousness and alertness?    In different facets or capacities: 1) the sharing of LOVE between two beings.  2) the absolute KNOWING of a place where everything is everywhere all the time.

How did your highest level of consciousness and alertness during the experience compare to your normal everyday consciousness and alertness?      More consciousness and alertness than normal   It's in the text above, but to re-state: 

I also saw/felt/experienced total darkness that wasn't darkness, a void that wasn't a void but was everything and everywhere all at once.  No time, no space.  In that absence of anything I could be anywhere at anytime just by thinking about it.  All I had to do was to have a thought and I was there.  Everywhere all at once.  It was the most amazing, profound, deep experience I have ever had in this human lifetime.

Please compare your vision during the experience to your everyday vision that you had immediately prior to the time of the experience.   During the experience I could 'see' things that my physical body was not positioned to see; things that happened outside the room and outside the building I was in.

Please compare your hearing during the experience to your everyday hearing that you had immediately prior to the time of the experience.   My hearing wasn't physical 'hearing' but was a direct line of communication with a deceased person.  My mind put a 'voice' on the thoughts that flowed between us.  The other party, the deceased, changed her voice by getting me to realize that it was my mind assigning a voice to the communication.  The physical 'hearing' was only an outer shell.

Did you see or hear any earthly events that were occurring during a time that your consciousness / awareness was apart from your physical / earthly body?   Yes   The following clips from my narrative describe 'knowing' where a certain individual was at all times.  The person I 'saw' was a stranger to me, and yet he was the most significant person to the deceased.  There is no way I'd have known who he was, what he looked like, when he arrived at the funeral home, and when he would enter the Viewing Room at the funeral home. 

I had a sudden and undeniable verbal communication from Michelle.  I was sitting with my wife in the second row at the funeral home before her casket.  She said in the voice of a four year old, "Here comes trouble" and communicated without words that I should go out to the parking lot to meet with a young man who had just arrived.  I could clearly see him distraught and teary-eyed with a small group of other young people her age in the parking lot though there was no window in the room.  Over and over she wanted me to go out to him and I refused with my rational mind.  There were no words at first other than "Here comes trouble" and "Go see him, Uncle Dave".  I just knew I should go and I clearly saw the scene in my mind, the same way I was hearing her words.  I sobbed heavily, overcome with a feeling of... awe?  emotion?  it's hard to say.  I was just hearing her voice so clearly and seeing what was going on in a place I couldn't physically see.  I just 'knew' what was happening, and where the boy was.  I didn't know who he was, only that she said "Here comes trouble".  I knew her boyfriend at the time, I had met him at the house.  He was in the room in the funeral home with us.  This was someone else.  I didn't know who he was, I just knew he was there and that she wanted me to go to him....

At the time the young man was going to round the corner into the viewing room, I turned around to see him.  At no time prior to this did I actually have visual access to the parking lot, to the front door, or to the long hallway down which he and every other mourner traveled.  There were no windows in the room.  The parking lot was fifty feet to my left beyond the wall, the hallway was behind me beyond a wall.  And yet I knew when the young man would enter.  I turned around to see him and saw a young man about 19 or 20, slightly tall and thin, red-eyed and with a reddish bump on his nose.  I had the thought that this might be the driver of the car in which she was killed.

What emotions did you feel during the experience?   Intense and incredible LOVE above all other emotions.  The feeling of Love was and still is overwhelming.  

Did you pass into or through a tunnel?   No  

Did you see an unearthly light?   No  

Did you seem to encounter a mystical being or presence, or hear an unidentifiable voice?   I encountered a definite being, or a voice clearly of mystical or unearthly origin
I heard clearly the voice of my deceased niece: 

I asked her where she was and why she was talking to me.  She told me that she wasn't speaking to me directly, but that I alone had heard.  She said it was a matter of openness to the experience.  I asked her why her voice was that of a four year old.  She said there was no actual voice, that she and I were sharing thoughts - thought energies? - and that my mind was putting a voice onto what was being communicated.  She deliberately said in her young voice "I could sound like this", then in her 19 year old voice "Or like this", then in the voice of a 64 year old woman she would never be "Or like this".  Each time my mind heard the voice clearly and knew what I was hearing.  It was indeed my mind putting an audible voice on some other way of communicating.  I just 'knew' it.  It's so hard to put into words what I was experiencing.

Did you encounter or become aware of any beings who previously lived on earth who are described by name in religions (for example: Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, etc.)?   No  

Did you encounter or become aware of any deceased (or alive) beings?   Yes   I saw my deceased niece, though not in the form of a human being.  She appeared as a bluish gray mist, almost white, though so hard to describe.

I also saw two similar looking beings, one of which lived a lifetime on earth within a few seconds of my awareness of time.

Did you become aware of past events in your life during your experience?   No  

Did you seem to enter some other, unearthly world?   A clearly mystical or unearthly realm

I asked again, or for the first time, where she was and I saw a blackness, a void, in which there was a spinning orb about ten feet tall to my perception.  The spinning orb was the earth and it was spinning very fast - many revolutions per second.  Two spiritual forms approached the spinning orb/earth.  The spiritual forms I mention were to my perception some sort of misty beings - ghostlike - with some semblance of humanoid scale and size, and yet they were formless.  They were human size only in reference to my point of reference, the reference in which the rapidly spinning earth was about ten feet in diameter.  As one being said some sort of farewell to the other, the other lifted up in a large puff and disappeared as a funnel shaped mist onto the surface of the planet.  In a matter of seconds it reappeared, this time as a small point of a funnel shaped mist lifting up and coming back to the same size and general shape it had before.  It walked / drifted away with the first being as they discussed what had happened during that lifetime.  I knew I had witnessed a human lifetime from another perspective, a spiritual form experiencing a single human lifetime and then coming back to review it with a friend/peer.  It's hard to explain but it was so clear to me.

Did time seem to speed up or slow down?   Everything seemed to be happening at once; or time stopped or lost all meaning
There is no clear cut answer for this.  Overall, time seemed to flash by.  My attention was so focused on the experience that 'real life' seemed to just go by in a small series of moments.

During the experience of 'the Void' it felt as though I was in a place where everything was everywhere all the time.  There was no time or space as we know it.  Everything was just 'connected'.

Did you suddenly seem to understand everything?   Everything about the universe
See Above.  I felt as though everything is completely connected with everything else all the time.  There is no separation, there is only love.   Everything else, particularly separation, is an illusion.

This is only a fundamental concept.  I did not have the experience of complete knowledge of myself or others.  No 'right' way to do anything.  Just a sense of total connection.

Did you reach a boundary or limiting physical structure?   No

Did you come to a border or point of no return?   No

Did scenes from the future come to you?  No 

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness suggesting that there either is (or is not) continued existence after earthly life (life after death)?   Yes   direct communication with someone who is deceased, including information that I would not have known on my own. 

..It's late at night and I have to get up early tomorrow.  I'm not sure that I can quit this site and save all the information I've typed over the last several hours.  It's 2:17 a.m.  I have to be brief.

Please reference my above material for more detail or contact me by email or phone for more information.

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness that God or a supreme being either does (or does not) exist?   No  

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness that you either did (or did not) exist prior to this lifetime?   No  

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness that a mystical universal connection or unity/oneness either does (or does not) exist?   Yes  

I also saw/felt/experienced total darkness that wasn't darkness, a void that wasn't a void but was everything and everywhere all at once.  No time, no space.  In that absence of anything I could be anywhere at anytime just by thinking about it.  All I had to do was to have a thought and I was there.  Everywhere all at once.  It was the most amazing, profound, deep experience I have ever had in this human lifetime.  (Later that day and for days after this whole experience I journaled the whole thing extensively.  I haven't re-read the journal but I have it in my possession to this day.)

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness regarding earthly lifes meaning or purpose?   Yes  

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness regarding earthly lifes difficulties, challenges, or hardships?   No  

During your experience, did you encounter any specific information / awareness regarding love?   Yes   I physically or spiritually 'saw' the spiritual form of my deceased niece wrap around and envelop the physical body of her childhood sweetheart.  At the time of the experience I did not know who he was.  The sense of Love, the feeling of Love, was deeper than anything I've ever felt.  It still, sixteen years later, moves me to tears. 

I would like to write more about this because it is SO important!!  But at the time I am filling out this form it is very late (now 2:24 am) and I have to get up early to meet with a contractor.

During your experience, did you encounter any other specific information / awareness that you have not shared in other questions that is relevant to living our earthly lives?   No  

Did you have a sense of knowing special knowledge or purpose?   Yes   To pass on a message of love from the deceased to someone obviously very close to her.

What occurred during your experience included:   Content that was both consistent and not consistent with the beliefs you had at the time of your experience   mixed.   

It's very late right now and I can't complete all of this form in one sitting.

How accurately do you remember the experience in comparison to other life events that occurred around the time of the experience?   I remember the experience more accurately than other life events that occurred around the time of the experience   this experience is implanted into my consciousness like no other.

Discuss any changes that might have occurred in your life after your experience:  

Since that time I've used the skills learned in recognizing real perception and discerning it from imagination.  There is actually little difference and sometimes it's still difficult.  I guess it's supposed to be. 

I've developed a healing arts practice of my own that became a vocation.  Since retiring from my career as a postmaster, and even in the years before retiring, I've turned that vocation into a small business.  I practice as a vocation though, not as a business.  It's not about money.  The money comes all by itself when it's needed.  I've never had to worry.  Working with people, usually with spiritual and emotional blockages, had been my calling.  PTSD seems to be a common thread among my best clients. 

Eight years ago a small interaction with a client led me to a series of gut feelings and synchronicities that eventually led to the discovery of a large lithic archaeoastronomy site, similar in use to Stonehenge but in North America.  Through hard work and years of research it's now documented with archaeologists.  It is a new and previously undocumented site and its location is currently undisclosed pending safeguarding.  Without listening I'd never have found it, or should I say it would never have found me.  The spirits there continue to communicate and will eventually be brought into full recognition as a newly discovered culture on this continent.

My experience directly resulted in:   Large changes in my life

Did you have any changes in your values or beliefs after the experience that occurred as a result of the experience?   Yes  

The world of NDEs and that space where we're all connected all the time is so real.  There is in fact nothing else beyond that, no place where we are in any way disconnected from one another.  Separation is the illusion.  Only love is real.

Do you have any psychic, non-ordinary or other special gifts after your experience that you did not have before the experience?   Yes   Since the experience I've used the skills learned in recognizing real perception and discerning it from imagination.  There is actually little difference and sometimes it's still difficult.  I guess it's supposed to be.

I feel that I have an awareness for the fabric of life that exists beyond, below, or through ordinary life.  I'm aware of the energies that flow, that motivate people and all beings to behave and interact the way they do.

Are there one or several parts of your experience that are especially meaningful or significant to you?    

I asked again, or for the first time, where she was and I saw a blackness, a void, in which there was a spinning orb about ten feet tall to my perception.  The spinning orb was the earth and it was spinning very fast - many revolutions per second.  Two spiritual forms approached the spinning orb/earth.  The spiritual forms I mention were to my perception some sort of misty beings - ghostlike - with some semblance of humanoid scale and size, and yet they were formless.  They were human size only in reference to my point of reference, the reference in which the rapidly spinning earth was about ten feet in diameter.  As one being said some sort of farewell to the other, the other lifted up in a large puff and disappeared as a funnel shaped mist onto the surface of the planet.  In a matter of seconds it reappeared, this time as a small point of a funnel shaped mist lifting up and coming back to the same size and general shape it had before.  It walked / drifted away with the first being as they discussed what had happened during that lifetime.  I knew I had witnessed a human lifetime from another perspective, a spiritual form experiencing a single human lifetime and then coming back to review it with a friend/peer.  It's hard to explain but it was so clear to me.  

I also saw/felt/experienced total darkness that wasn't darkness, a void that wasn't a void but was everything and everywhere all at once.  No time, no space.  In that absence of anything I could be anywhere at anytime just by thinking about it.  All I had to do was to have a thought and I was there.  Everywhere all at once.  It was the most amazing, profound, deep experience I have ever had in this human lifetime.  (Later that day and for days after this whole experience I journaled the whole thing extensively.  I haven't re-read the journal but I have it in my possession to this day.) 

I actually dropped down onto the floor in a fetal position weeping.  My sister in law asked what was the matter.  My wife knew.  I lay there trying to get a grip and while I was there in that space between physical reality and soul awareness something happened again.  Michelle came through.  Not verbally, not in words, but lovingly.  She asked if she could use my body.  There's no way to say how these things happen.  There's no real progression of events.  It's just all there all at once.  Like that void, that place of nothingness where everything is all the time.  Just think about it and you're there.  Any time any place.  It's all one.  We're all one. 

It was in that state of being that I felt my niece asking me for permission to use my body to show her mom that she loved her too.  In real life there was none of this that I'm aware of.  It was all abuse, all emotional distance, all physical distance.  Michelle had moved away from her home to live with friends when she was just fifteen or so.  That's why we hadn't seen her.  She was no longer part of the family.  This is what my mind knew.  It may be only my perception, but this is the way I saw Michelle and her mom's physical reality in this lifetime.  And in that moment when I was laying curled up on the floor I knew Michelle wanted to borrow my physical body to enter in and to give her mom a hug.  I said okay. 

My body stood up.  I'd say I stood up but it wasn't fully like that.  My body stood up and I was there, but not in it.  Or I was partially in it but backing away.  Michelle was entering and I was watching from behind.  Not inside but attached in some way.  She was inside but she didn't quite fit.  It wasn't all normal/right for her.  It didn't fully match, neither did the feeling of being outside of my own shell.  But we all walked as one, almost one, and Michelle was inside and I was not though I was there.  I felt her use my hands to touch her mom's shoulders and arms.  I felt her use my eyes to look into her mom's eyes.  I felt her use my heart and my whole body to connect with her mother's.  I felt her hug her mom, I felt her look into her mom's face and then kiss her mom.  I saw the way her mom looked back wide eyed, mystified, searching, deeply moved and incredibly happy.  Her mom felt what Michelle was trying to convey.  I can't say that I remember disconnecting.  I just know that at some point it was over.  At that time it was also okay to talk a little, and so I did.

Have you ever shared this experience with others?   Yes  A few hours later I shared some aspects of the experience with my wife.  I remember being cautious to some extent as to how she might react.

In general I shared this experience with others many times.  At first it was hard to share without feeling that I might be judged as 'crazy'.

Now I can share and not feel 'crazy' at all.  There are times I don't share if I feel the sharing might be wasted on someone who is closed-minded.

Did you have any knowledge of near death experience (NDE) prior to your experience?   Yes   I'd heard of books on the subject and may have read some passages from some books.

I don't believe those books influenced my experience because the core of my experience involved people I didn't know and the knowledge of his physical location, etc without being able to see him.  Verifiable details made my experience real for me in every way.

What did you believe about the reality of your experience shortly (days to weeks) after it happened:   Experience was definitely real   1)The experience was unsolicited, very direct, and very clear audibly.

2)The emotion behind the experience was more powerful than any physical emotions I'd ever felt.

3) The experience and specific details were undeniably verified within one month.

What do you believe about the reality of your experience at the current time:   Experience was definitely real   More experiences have occurred since that first time.  The first was the most profound and unexpected.  More recent events happen quite often though not to the same depth.  Yet each one I've had has been verifiable and profound.  The most significant experience to date is finding a previously undiscovered archaoastronomy (Stonehenge-type) site in North America, dating to 4000 years old.  It was and is an ongoing series of spiritual experiences that have led me to discover this site.  My documentation and research has verified the site for what it is.  My future is quite bright, as is the likelihood of seeing this site in film, textbooks, and more.

Have your relationships changed specifically as a result of your experience?   Yes   To be able to connect with someone on a non-verbal level changes everything.  Once I'd had the experience of that communication with a deceased person, I knew that this was the primary mode of communicating our deepest emotions.

Have your religious beliefs/spiritual practices changed specifically as a result of your experience?   Yes   I'm more open to the existence of a Deity.  I have spent most of my life since that first experience learning, studying, and living a spiritually centered life.

At any time in your life, has anything ever reproduced any part of the experience?   Yes  

There have been more events, connections, contacts.  This was the most profound and I count it as my first real remembered experience.  In my conversations with Michelle she let me know that it wasn't truly the first.  Many times in the past I've imagined that I was talking with the deceased.  She said that many times those imaginary conversations weren't imaginary.  Some are, some aren't.  There's a fine line between the imaginary and the extraordinary.  A fine membrane if you will. 

Since that time I've used the skills learned in recognizing real perception and discerning it from imagination.  There is actually little difference and sometimes it's still difficult.  I guess it's supposed to be. 

I've developed a healing arts practice of my own that became a vocation.  Since retiring from my career as a postmaster, and even in the years before retiring, I've turned that vocation into a small business.  I practice as a vocation though, not as a business.  It's not about money.  The money comes all by itself when it's needed.  I've never had to worry.  Working with people, usually with spiritual and emotional blockages, had been my calling.  PTSD seems to be a common thread among my best clients. 

Eight years ago a small interaction with a client led me to a series of gut feelings and synchronicities that eventually led to the discovery of a large lithic archaeoastronomy site, similar in use to Stonehenge but in North America.  Through hard work and years of research it's now documented with archaeologists.  It is a new and previously undocumented site and its location is currently undisclosed pending safeguarding.  Without listening I'd never have found it, or should I say it would never have found me.  The spirits there continue to communicate and will eventually be brought into full recognition as a newly discovered culture on this continent. 

The world of NDEs and that space where we're all connected all the time is so real.  There is in fact nothing else beyond that, no place where we are in any way disconnected from one another.  Separation is the illusion.  Only love is real.

Is there anything else that you would like to add about your experience?   Not at this time.  It's WAY past my bedtime and I'm only completing this survey out of concern for losing all I've typed before.  I'd love to add more if available to me at some point in the future, the sooner the better.  Please write with instructions on how to do so.

Did the questions asked and information that you provided accurately and comprehensively describe your experience?   Uncertain   I wish I had more time to work on the form.  I wish I could have stopped mid-way and picked up on it again another day.  As it was I worked way beyond my normal bed time and could have done a better job in a better state of mind had I been able to stop and start fresh.