Over the past twenty-five years a great many books have been published with personal testimonies of near-death experiences and the often intense changes that follow. The most systematic (retrospective) studies of such changes have been published by Kenneth Ring, Margot Grey, P. M. H. Atwater, Cherie Sutherland, Melvin Morse, Peter and Elisabeth Fenwick, Kenneth Ring with Evelyn Elsaesser-Valarino, and Anja Opdebeeck.2 These books show great similarities between the reported processes of change irrespective of age, cultural or religious background, or the medical cause of the NDE. However, the people who were interviewed for these (retrospective) studies were approached through advertisements, lectures, and the Internet, and thus they raise the aforementioned problem of selection. Who did or did not volunteer for an interview? Are we hearing only from people who struggle most to come to terms with the experience? Or those who struggle least? Unfortunately, we will never know.
The major failing of these interesting and edifying books filled with remarkable anecdotal evidence is that while they provide a clear picture of the various aspects of the process of change, they offer no reliable figures on the incidence of the changes and the exact times when they occur. Another limitation of these studies is that they fail to indicate the passage of time between the NDE and the interview. The sole exception here is Sutherland’s study.3 The passage of time between the NDE and the interview is significant in determining the degree to which the changes have been accepted and integrated. The longer this interval, the more positive changes are reported. In other words, the processes of change vary a lot depending on whether people are interviewed one year or twenty-five years after their NDE, and this complicates the interpretation of the data in these studies. Not all the changes listed in them occur, and the changes that do occur do not always occur at the same rate.
Cherie Sutherland carried out a somewhat more systematic study by examining changes in religious beliefs, spiritual interests, and aspects of heightened intuition before and after the NDE and comparing these data with the general population. Her study included fifty people with an average (young) age of 31 (7–76), and an average (long) interval between the NDE and interview of 19 years (2–52). There are only a few other retrospective studies in which post-NDE changes have been compared with a control group of people who suffered a serious medical crisis without an NDE. Such comparison plays an important role in ascertaining whether the reported changes are caused by the NDE or by the serious medical crisis. In his study Ring also interviewed friends and family in order to put the reported changes into perspective.4The Dutch study that my colleagues and I conducted (see chapter 7) is the only prospective, longitudinal study of post-NDE processes of change. It drew on a control group of cardiac arrest survivors without NDE who matched the patients with an NDE in terms of age and gender. Our research, featuring interviews with NDErs and a control group at two- and eight-year intervals, has the longest follow-up published to date. Wherever possible, the interviews included patients’ partners, which enabled us to put the processes of change into perspective. (We will discuss the effect of time on processes of change later in this chapter.)
Factors That Influence the Process of Change
The transformations reported by people with a near-death experience differ widely both in terms of content and in terms of the rate of acceptance and integration.5 Factors that play no role are age (except in very young children), gender, and level of education. But personality traits of the person prior to the NDE, such as an extroverted or introverted character or a positive or somber disposition, are important factors in this process. If dealing with unexpected situations was always a challenge, coming to terms with an NDE is that much harder. And people with a strict religious upbringing cope with the experience differently than people who reject any form of religion, as for example in the former East Germany.6Cultural factors play a role too: in countries such as India, where spirituality, meditation, and reincarnation are widely accepted, the content of the NDE and its resulting changes appear to be more easily integrated than in the West. Within Western culture the experience is completely at odds with conventional wisdom. And it is no surprise that people who were raised with material values find it harder to accept the new insight that money and power are no longer essential to happiness. It is not so much the content that makes the NDE so difficult to come to terms with but the fact that Western culture and science do not really accommodate this kind of spiritual experience.
As mentioned, the depth of the NDE is not the only important factor in the process of change. Significant too are the medical circumstances under which the NDE occurred, such as a car accident with prolonged rehabilitation, a heart attack with feelings of restriction and anxiety, or a brain hemorrhage with permanent paralysis. Patients must come to terms with the NDE itself but also accept and deal with the consequences of the serious medical crisis that precipitated it, which sometimes involves extensive rehabilitation, wheelchair use, and other lingering symptoms.
Alongside the personal acceptance and integration of the NDE, the social support of family and friends is equally crucial.7 An NDE can put a severe strain on relationships (more on this later). Integration also depends on the response of health care practitioners, on whether they can lend a respectful ear and the support needed for processes of change. The skeptical response of most health workers is a source of extreme frustration to NDErs. The integration process can be accelerated if the person affected learns that he or she is not the only one who has had such an overwhelming experience and that there is a name for it (NDE). Contact with other NDErs and reading books on NDE and its consequences for later life can be equally helpful. This form of affirmation helps people recognize their experience, reduce anxiety, and facilitate better and faster integration.
Integrating the Experience
Acceptance of the experience and the changed insights often depends on the response of the partner and family, friends, acquaintances, doctors, nurses and other health care practitioners, particularly during the first few months and years after the NDE. Yet many people with an NDE discover that others are incapable of listening without prejudice and criticism. Retreating into years of silence may be the only way to cope with the experience. People feel transformed while those around them remain the same. The process of accepting and integrating the NDE cannot begin until people feel capable of sharing their thoughts and feelings.8With immense perseverance, often aided by positive reactions from those around them, people learn to live according to their newfound insights into what matters in life.
The integration process lasts at least seven years or more because the effort provokes a lot of resistance in both NDErs and those around them. I have come across people who were unable to talk about their NDE and its consequences until more than fifty years after the event. For fear of rejection, they kept their NDE a lifelong secret. These people had found it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to live their lives according to their newfound insights. Despite its largely positive content, the NDE is traumatic in these cases because the process of coming to terms with the experience is so difficult and painful.9
Positive and Negative Aspects of Processes of Change
In the first few years after the NDE especially, people are prone to depressions, feelings of nostalgia, and loneliness. As a rule, the positive aspects come to the fore only once people are capable of accepting and integrating their NDE. But the process of integration cannot get under way properly until the experience can be shared. When someone first tries to disclose the NDE, the other person’s reaction is absolutely crucial. If this initial reaction is negative or skeptical, the process of accepting and integrating the NDE typically presents far greater problems than if this initial reaction is positive, sympathetic, or neutral. Evidence has shown that positive responses facilitate and accelerate the integration process. In fact, without the possibility of communication, the process of coming to terms with the NDE often fails to get under way at all. Most NDErs feel an urgent need to talk about their experience. This need stems not only from a desire for affirmation, but above all from a desire for support. That said, of course there will always be some people who prefer to come to terms with their NDE in silence.
An Overview of the Various Changes
What follows is an overview of the various aspects of the post-NDE process of change. Many of the potential changes described here are not common to everybody. Similarly, many elements of the transformation are not experienced until many years after the NDE. This overview is based on the findings of a number of articles, the aforementioned eight books, and my conversations with the hundreds of people who shared their NDE and its consequences with me.10
Self-Acceptance and a Changed Self-Image
The experience of transpersonal aspects during the NDE changes people’s sense of who they really are. Transpersonal refers to those aspects of someone’s consciousness that transcend the personal or the ego. This experience can be accompanied by a heightened sense of self-worth. Thanks to their changed self-image, people become less dependent on the approval of others, better at dealing with stress, and more adventurous, and they also take greater risks. It changes people’s attitude toward their body and alerts them to new ways of thinking. They are more likely to look at the bigger picture and are capable of forming more objective opinions, even at the risk of seeming aloof. And because they are more easily engrossed in things, they are less aware of their surroundings. Increased levels of curiosity coupled with a hunger for knowledge spark a particular interest in theological issues, philosophy, psychology, and natural sciences (especially quantum physics), although their education often fails to satisfy this need for deeper knowledge. They also develop a noticeably greater interest in physical and psychological processes and the possibility of (self-) healing.
Compassion for Others
After the NDE, relationships with others change noticeably, and people are now capable of greater compassion.
It’s so clear to me now that my NDE has transformed my emotions toward life and my emotional life. Everything I do now is aimed at reliving and spreading this feeling of Love.
People are more forgiving, more tolerant, and less critical of others. They are also more emotional. Appreciation of relationships increases; people spend more time with family, friends, and relatives, and they are more willing and able to share emotions with others. They are more compassionate and caring and set greater store by unconditional love. Yet relationships are also more likely to run into problems. Sometimes there is more, sometimes less interest in sexual intercourse. Some people have trouble communicating with others because they struggle to find the right words. A greater sense of justice is coupled with the urge to tell the truth and say what is on one’s mind. Any trace of past aggression is usually gone. It is replaced by the need to help and support others, which usually leads to a career change in favor of the care professions, such as nursing, care of terminal patients, or voluntary work with elderly people or low-income families. NDErs are also more likely to donate to charities or to dedicate themselves to a social cause.
Appreciating Life
The near-death experience brings about remarkable changes in what people see as the true purpose in life.
Apparently, I still have a task to fulfill in this life.
People who have a near-death experience seem positive of a new goal or new mission in life. They also appreciate the little things in life, pay more attention to the here and now, and enjoy the moment. They are less likely, however, to allow themselves to be restricted by social convention. People are more confident of their ability to handle problems, more open to change, and less preoccupied with time and schedules. But even though they struggle with the concept of time, they do tend to honor appointments. They are better at putting things into perspective, they take an unbiased view of life, and they are quick to smile while at the same time more serious. Their increased respect for life also reveals itself in the greater appreciation of and interest in nature. They are now much more aware of seasonal change and like doors and windows to be open to admit fresh air. They also take more pleasure in classical or soothing music and are less tolerant of noise. NDErs attach less importance to status, money, and material possessions and distance themselves from the competitive elements in contemporary society.
No More Fear of Death and a Belief in Life After Death
The experience of feeling utterly unchanged as a person after temporarily leaving the sick or lifeless body teaches people that death is something entirely different than they previously thought.
Dead turned out to be not dead.
In most cases this realization greatly reduces the fear of death and bolsters people’s belief in life after death.
I’m no longer afraid of death. I see the experience as a gift. Now I know there’s more after death. I’m grateful. I feel that I have to talk about it to help others, to reassure them if they’re afraid of death. I feel privileged.
For figures on the reduced fear of death and the increased belief in an afterlife, see the table “A Different View of Death After an NDE.” The table lists people’s attitudes prior to their NDE alongside the changes that occurred at least twenty years after the NDE. Those who believed in life after death before their NDE have become absolutely certain after their experience.
A Different View of Death After an NDE
No fear of death: Sutherland11Before NDE (percent): 16
After NDE (percent): 98
No fear of death: Grey12
Before NDE (percent): 37
After NDE (percent): 100
No fear of death: Opdebeeck13
Before NDE (percent): 55
After NDE (percent): 100
No fear of death: Belief in life after death Sutherland
Before NDE (percent): 38
After NDE (percent): 100
No fear of death: Grey
Before NDE (percent): 24
After NDE (percent): 76
No fear of death: Ring14Before NDE (percent): (number?)
After NDE (percent): 86
No fear of death: Opdebeeck
Before NDE (percent): 25
After NDE (percent): 96
No fear of death: Musgrave15
Before NDE (percent): 22
After NDE (percent): 92
The fear of death decreases even further over the years after the NDE (see the table “Life Changes After a Cardiac Arrest” on Chapter Three). The loss of the fear of death also changes people’s outlook on life; some aspects of life become important while others become completely irrelevant. After an NDE, people only want to spend time and energy on things of lasting value. Almost all ephemeral and material things, such as a lot of money, a big house, or an expensive car, become less important. People also identify much less with their own body, believing it to be “merely” the physical, material aspect of somebody’s personality. “I can live without my body, but apparently my body cannot live without me.”
The effect of the loss of the fear of death can be illustrated with the story of an eighty-two-year-old patient with serious heart failure who had been admitted to the cardiac ward where I worked as a cardiologist. This man was terminally ill, as his shortness of breath no longer responded to medication. Normally doctors and nurses give a wide berth to a dying patient’s room; having finished treatment, they can do nothing more. But this was a completely different story. More than ten years earlier, this patient had suffered a massive myocardial infarction with cardiac arrest for which he had been successfully resuscitated. During his cardiac arrest he had experienced an extremely deep NDE and had lost his fear of death. The man knew he was dying. Yet there he was in bed, looking radiant despite his difficult breathing. Beautiful classical music could be heard at all times, and from morning till night his room was filled with nursing staff, family, and fellow patients, all of whom he tried to help. He was attentive and in good spirits, and it was a real joy to be in his presence. And this is exactly how he went: good-natured, cheerful, and supportive of those around him. After he died he lay in bed with a big smile on his face, and people kept coming into his room to pay their last respects.
A Decline in Religious Affiliation Coupled with Greater Religious Sentiment
A near-death experience can sometimes engender profound religious feelings and give people the impression of a personal bond with God.
I now have a much, much stronger bond with God. I see and feel him as the greatest force in my life. He entered my life unbidden, but I welcomed him.
But an NDE leads some people to believe that they are one of God’s chosen. This sense of salvation can make them feel relatively invulnerable and extremely important and may result in a strong urge to spread word of the NDE as a deeply religious experience. Such proselytizing is often seen as intrusive and stirs a great deal of resistance. But generally speaking, people’s religious sentiment increases after an NDE while their interest in organized religion declines sharply (see table “Changes in Religious Affiliation After an NDE”).
I have strong religious feelings now. I no longer “believe” in God; I’m absolutely certain. But it has nothing whatsoever to do with the church.
Changes in Religious Affiliation After an NDE
No religion
Before NDE (percent): 46
After NDE (percent): 84
General Population (percent): 16
Church of England
Before NDE (percent): 24
After NDE (percent): 4
General Population (percent): 28.3
Roman Catholic
Before NDE (percent): 12
After NDE (percent): 8
General Population (percent): 25.6
Methodist
Before NDE (percent): 4
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): 4.3
Presbyterian
Before NDE (percent): 2
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): 7.2
Jewish
Before NDE (percent): 2
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): 0.4
Baptist
Before NDE (percent): 2
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): 2.1
Lutheran
Before NDE (percent): 2
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): 1.3
Calvinist
Before NDE (percent): 2
After NDE (percent): 0
General Population (percent): NA
Brethren
Before NDE (percent): 4
After NDE (percent): 2
General Population (percent): NA
Buddhist
Before NDE (percent): 0
After NDE (percent): 2
General Population (percent): 0.2
Average interval between NDE and interview: 19 years (Sutherland16)
The table shows Australian data from 1990. Because of major international variation in church attendance, the percentage of nondenominational people referred to in studies depends largely on both year and country of research.
It is important to bear in mind that, irrespective of NDEs, the percentage of nondenominational people in the Netherlands increased sharply in the twentieth century. In 1900 only 2 percent of the Dutch people were not affiliated with any church, by 1960 their number had risen to 18 percent, and by 1999 it was up to 63 percent. More and more people believe that religiosity has nothing to do with church attendance. Figures from 2002 also show that 37 percent of nondenominational people in the Netherlands believe in life after death, 25 percent believe in heaven, 19 percent believe in the sense of praying, and 31 percent believe in religious miracles. In other words, religious beliefs can exist independently of religious affiliation.17There is no comparable decline in religious affiliation in the United States: 78 percent of Americans today are still Christian, of which the majority (55 percent) are Protestant, and only 16.1 percent have no religion. In the United States 28 percent of people never attend any religious service, and 40 percent attend at least once a week. In the United Kingdom there is similarly a high percentage of people with a religious affiliation: 71.6 percent are Christian and 2.7 percent Muslim, but only 14 percent attend church at least once a week (statistic from 2005). From 1964 to 2005 religion combined with church attendance decreased in the United Kingdom from 74 to 31 percent while at the same time the percentage of nondenominational people increased from 3 to 38 percent.18Greater Spirituality
Happiness does not depend on outward things, but on the way we see them.
—TOLSTOY
A near-death experience can evoke the sense that the old self has died and that a new person has been born. The NDE and its subsequent changes are thus experienced as a spiritual death and rebirth. If religious affiliation declines, people also report an increase in religiosity and a greater interest in spirituality, meditation, prayer, and surrender. With their precious life restored, people view themselves as having a unique mission, and they are fueled by a heightened sense of spiritual purpose. They feel part of a meaningful universe and adopt a more philosophical attitude to life.
By contrast, cardiac arrest survivors without an NDE display a marked decline in interest in spirituality (see the table “Life Changes After a Cardiac Arrest” on Chapter Three).
Physical Changes
People not only experience psychological transformations, they also report important physical changes. The NDE can precipitate hypersensitivity (hyperesthesia) to bright lights, in particular, sunlight. In fact, the experience can trigger a heightened sensitivity to all sensory impressions, such as sound, taste, touch, and smell. Some people can no longer stand the physical proximity of their partner. There are also frequent reports of synesthesia, a phenomenon in which sensory impressions influence one another. In these cases, areas of the brain that play a role in processing data from the various faculties are more closely connected than usual and exchange information. In other words, they sort of get their wires crossed. People affected in this way talk of seeing smells and hearing or smelling colors (for example, “smelling red”). The NDE can also result in a greater sensitivity to loud noises, a desire for silence, and a newfound preference for soothing music.
Changes in Post-NDE Religiosity
Value of organized religion
Before NDE (percent): 36
After NDE (percent): 20
General population (percent): 56
Church attendance
Before NDE (percent): 38
After NDE (percent): 20
General population (percent): 34
Prayer
Before NDE (percent): 48
After NDE (percent): 74
General population (percent): 56
Meditation
Before NDE (percent): 12
After NDE (percent): 60
General population (percent): NA
Quest for spiritual values
Before NDE (percent): 20
After NDE (percent): 88
General population (percent): NA
Guidance
Before NDE (percent): 32
After NDE (percent): 86
General population (percent): 44
Average interval between NDE and interview: 19 years (Sutherland19)
After my NDE I felt like a child learning how to walk. The world around me overwhelmed me. I couldn’t find my place in the world. For months I couldn’t bear light and noise, TV and radio, not even music, which I used to love. Sometimes I think I’ve got a new problem because I’ve become hypersensitive to too much noise.
Some people experience an increased sensitivity to alcohol or develop an allergy to conventional medicines, which then sparks an interest in complementary or alternative medicine. It is possible for metabolic rates and energy levels to change, and people to recover faster and look younger. There are frequent reports of electric phenomena: at emotionally charged moments, in particular, the body can emit an electromagnetic field that interferes with electrical equipment—lights go out, the computer crashes, the car starter fails, or the supermarket checkout scanner refuses service.
Another strange thing was that after my NDE every piece of equipment I touched, such as lamps, dishwasher, kettle, the light in the cooker hood, it broke. I gave off energy everywhere.
Some people do not wear a watch because it stops as soon as they wear it on their wrist. Thinking that the watch is broken, they buy a new one, only to have the same thing happen. Some discover the ability to direct healing power at others, which enables them to help people with physical or psychological problems. There are also reported cases of inexplicable self-healing after an NDE.20
Enhanced Intuitive Sensitivity
Without really wanting to, many NDErs feel inundated with information from or via another dimension. This appears to affect between 84 percent (Ring’s study) and 92 percent (Sutherland) of people, making enhanced intuitive sensitivity one of the most common but also least spontaneously reported consequences of an NDE (see table “Symptoms of Enhanced Intuitive Sensitivity”). All of a sudden these people have a very acute sense of the emotions of others. Heightened intuition can cause major problems. Clairvoyance, enhanced sensitivity, and precognition can feel extremely threatening.21
NDErs rarely volunteer information about their heightened intuition in interviews. Neither do they have the right words for it. Indeed, what could they say? That they have become paranormal or something? A researcher or other interested party will have to ask targeted questions and explain that a great many people experience enhanced sensitivity after their NDE. Most of us have had the odd sensation of thinking about somebody only to find that when the phone rings it is the person we were thinking of. Synchronicity, as the phenomenon is called, is quite common and refers to the not strictly causal, or seemingly accidental, concurrence of events.
Symptoms of Enhanced Intuitive Sensitivity
Experience: Clairvoyance
Before NDE (percent): 38
After NDE (percent): 71
General population: 38
Experience: Telepathy
Before NDE (percent): 42
After NDE (percent): 86
General population: 58
Experience: Precognition
Before NDE (percent): 49
After NDE (percent): 86
General population: NA
Experience: Déjà vu
Before NDE (percent): 73
After NDE (percent): 85
General population: NA
Experience: Enhanced intuition
Before NDE (percent): 54
After NDE (percent): 92
General population: NA
Experience: Dream awareness
Before NDE (percent): 44
After NDE (percent): 79
General population: 42
Experience: Out-of-body experience
Before NDE (percent): 8
After NDE (percent): 49
General population: 14
Experience: Spirits
Before NDE (percent): 22
After NDE (percent): 65
General population: 27
Experience: Healing ability
Before NDE (percent): 8
After NDE (percent): 65
General population: NA
Experience: Perception of auras
Before NDE (percent): 13
After NDE (percent): 47
General population: 5
Experience: Psychic phenomena
Before NDE (percent): 55
After NDE (percent): 98
General population: 39 (Sweden)
Average interval between NDE and interview: 19 years (Sutherland22)
However, in the case of post-NDE enhanced intuitive sensitivity, such synchronicity is much stronger.
When I felt a bit better again, I was so unbelievably paranormal, it was creepy. Before this incident I’d had now-and-then premonitions, but this was different. From my bed in the town of Utrecht, I could see who was in the room next door, and I knew what food the priest had ordered. It’s easing off now, but I still understand people better, and yes, sometimes I can literally read and intuit people’s minds.
People suddenly sense emotions and sadness in others, or they sense that somebody has a serious illness. For example, there was the case of a young father who saw a brain tumor in his eighteen-month-old daughter. Unable to explain why he suspected that she might have a tumor in her head, he did not visit his family doctor. Three months later, when she suffered her first epileptic seizure, she was referred to a neurosurgeon who decided to operate on her brain. Similarly, people sometimes sense a person’s imminent death. And more often than not these premonitions are correct. Enhanced intuitive sensitivity leaves people feeling extremely insecure; struggling to deal with the information that comes pouring in unbidden, they often withdraw into themselves. They avoid busy places, such as supermarkets or public transport. They do not dare to talk about this new and unwanted quality for fear of being rejected or even declared insane. After all, other people tend to become very nervous when they know that somebody “can look right through them.”
I couldn’t talk about it, or I would have been committed to an institution.
Another post-NDE phenomenon is the ability to see auras. Even children sometimes spontaneously report seeing all kinds of beautiful colors around people. Equally, NDErs are often aware of invisible energy fields with which they can help others. Indeed, some decide to volunteer in the palliative or terminal care sector, not just to share the insight that death is not the end, but also to help terminal patients by bringing peace of mind and alleviating pain.
Psychological Problems After an NDE
Were I a composer of books, I would keepe a register, commented of the divers deaths, which in teaching men to die, should after teach them to live.
—MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE
The NDE remains a largely unfamiliar and misunderstood phenomenon, as society cannot readily accommodate this kind of spiritual experience. The resulting tension can lead to psychological problems. Talking about the NDE is usually impossible. Prejudice means that when people do try to broach the subject, they are often misunderstood and even ignored or ridiculed. Sutherland’s study shows that when people tried to discuss the NDE, 50 percent of relatives and 25 percent of friends rejected the NDE, and 30 percent of nursing staff, 85 percent of doctors, and 50 percent of psychiatrists reacted negatively.23
Despite the positive memories of my NDE, it was also a very lonely period because of the lack of understanding (and the resulting fear and self-aggression) I felt from those around me.
The issues arising from the inability to share the NDE with others—that is, the negative interaction with others—are known as “interpersonal” problems.24 They include a feeling of exclusivity or a sense of isolation from others without an NDE; a fear of being ridiculed or rejected by others; problems reconciling personality changes with the expectations of friends and family; an inability to communicate the meaning and impact of the NDE; difficulties maintaining old patterns that have lost their meaning since the NDE; trouble accepting the limitations and shortcomings of human relationships compared with the unconditional love experienced during the NDE; conflicts with relatives about the marked personality changes, seen as a “social death of the former personality” and sometimes absurdly high expectations of relatives who learned about positive post-NDE changes from popular science writing, radio, or TV programs.25Friends and family often struggle to accept personality changes, but they may also put the NDEr on a pedestal, expecting an all-forgiving personality to emerge, with the patience of a saint, miraculous healing powers, and the gift of prophecy. And if the NDEr fails to meet these unrealistic expectations, disappointment and rejection ensue.
I had to find my place in the world, but how? I felt so vulnerable. For years I couldn’t stand myself. For a long time I couldn’t enjoy anything and suffered the vicissitudes of life.
People are transformed by their NDE. And nobody feels this more acutely than a spouse. The NDEr is no longer the partner he or she originally married. It is on account of such relationship problems that Nancy Bush cites a divorce rate of up to 75 percent.26 However, a number of social factors also play a role in divorce: a loss of interest in money, “social death” caused by the loss of a former job, estrangement within the family, and an inability to function in our material and competitive society. For all these reasons, people with an NDE struggle to resume their former role in everyday life and find it difficult, and in some cases nearly impossible, to maintain human relationships, with all their earthly limitations. Because of the negative reactions from those around them, people may gravitate toward repression and denial, which make the integration process even harder. In fact, some NDErs begin to doubt the veracity of their experience and keep silent for a long time.
I knew nothing of NDEs, I thought I was the only one, and I had the impression that others thought I was a bit loopy.
The problems that affect people primarily on the inside, known as intrapersonal or intrapsychic problems, include constant anger and depression over the forced return to life.27 The difficult and painful acceptance of the return is called the reentry problem. Other problems may include reconciling the NDE with previous religious and philosophical beliefs or overidentifying with the experience and seeing oneself first and foremost as an NDEr. Some people doubt their own sanity, afraid that the NDE is a manifestation of mental instability. At times, the NDE and the ensuing personality changes seem scarcely credible. People feel different, occasionally even better and more privileged than people without an NDE, but keep their distance for fear of being ridiculed or rejected. It is very difficult for NDE survivors to explain to others how and why they have changed so much. What follows is a period of intense loneliness coupled with feelings of depression at the rejection of what they perceive to be the most impressive experience of their life. The awareness of being back in the sick body, with all its physical pain and limitations and sometimes permanent symptoms, causes frustration and keen nostalgia, whereas the NDE itself had been a beautiful, blissful experience. Physical and psychological adjustment to everyday life can hinder the integration of the new values and insights and lead to a posttraumatic stress disorder, and even (though seldom) to suicidal tendencies.28Coming to terms with a frightening NDE is even harder because such an experience is often accompanied by strong feelings of guilt. Just like a positive NDE may leave a person feeling privileged, a hell experience may prompt revulsion and in many cases self-rejection. People have a tendency to fully identify with the negative experience rather than acknowledge that every experience, including a frightening NDE, merely represents one aspect of their personality. Talking to others about the frightening NDE is virtually impossible. The result is total silence, which generally precludes any chance of integration and actually increases the fear of death.
If the NDE was experienced during a (failed) suicide attempt, people usually refrain from making a second attempt because the experience taught them that they remain burdened with the problems they tried to escape. They come to realize that it is better to solve problems in this life because the other dimension offers scant opportunity for solving their earthly problems.29
From:
Consciousness Beyond Life
The Science of the Near-Death Experience
Pim van Lommel
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