Jim B NDE

Experience Description

I was in a plane crash. It was a small wooden experimental plane and after I finished crashing into the tree trunks at the edge of a lake (I was aiming for the shallow water with my engine having stopped), there was no plane left around me- only the portion behind me to which I was still seat-belted.

A nearby fisherman saw the whole thing and call 911 and kept me propped up, gasping for air, as my lungs were ruptured and barely working.

The medical evacuation helicopter landed as nearby as possible, and they pulled me from the wreckage and flew me up to Hartford Hospital.

With my ruptured lungs, all my ribs broken, my right leg a pretzel and a torn-up mouth, I was in really bad shape. They told my wife it would be touch and go for the next week with multiple serious and long operations, with a high risk of failure involved. They put me into a week-long coma.

Somewhere in that time, I woke up on the Other Side- a place I came to understand as the In Between.

Here is the recounting of my NDE:

I appear in this otherworldly place to find myself resting on one knee, high up on a terraced rooftop of an abandoned building. I’m bent over in stomach pain and with great effort look up.

I see an amazing, panoramic skyline of a purgatorial city… gray buildings stacked upon gray buildings stretching all the way back to a brooding skyline. Apocalyptic clouds hover over the metropolis, storm-heavy.

In this gothic world, there are no sounds. I’m not deaf, it’s just that quiet.

Kneeling in its shadow all along, I suddenly notice to my left the only real thing of interest- a large egg-shaped structure formed of open latticework, with many gears inside. Monolithic. Austere. And finely crafted-- the egg is maybe four stories high, its intricate lattice constructed of a dull metal as gray as the world surrounding it.

Another wave of nausea hits me.

I say out loud, 'I don’t think I can stand this.'

Inside the egg, there is an immediate whirring of sector gears- the kind of partial arc gears you see in clock-like mechanisms. These move in all directions within the confines of the egg.

With great effort, I draw closer, studying the egg and its moving gears within.



What follows is a conversation that was telepathic and a characterization of what was communicated.

Me: What is this thing?

As I stand before the mighty mechanism, a disembodied VOICE responds within my consciousness.

'This is the future birthing into the now.'

I see the gears— some which appear solid and some not- passing through each other in a physically impossible manner. The otherworldly dance of the gears is complex- like a 4-D model of time. They come to rest and I reach through a gap in the side of the egg.

'This is the process of Becoming.'

My fingers brush one of the more solid appearing gears. As I touch it, within my mind I see something like a video feed of future events. Then I double over in pain.

With a reflex, I rip the gear out, pulling it through the egg’s lattice wall and throw it over my shoulder. The machine responds by spinning its gears around again, recalibrating for the loss of one, whispering with a light clacking sound into a new configuration.

'What’s happening now?'

'Each gear is the probability of a thought, word or action in your future. Your destiny is resetting itself around what you have removed.'

'How did I know I could do that? Pull that gear out, removing that future moment?'

'Why else are you here?'

'I have no idea. I don’t even know what this place is.'

'You are in the In Between.'

'In between what?'

'Everything. The Impossible Now between the past and the future.'

'That makes no sense whatsoever.'

'It’s impossible in its short duration. Yet here you are, standing inside the eternity of a single moment. Do you remember who you are in the world to which your body belongs?'

I look blankly into space, squinting with the effort to remember.

'I have no idea.'

'Then you see the truth in how the past is dust.'

'OK. Why do some of these gears- these futures that I touch- make me sick and not others?'

'All choices have unintended consequences, some unfortunate and some not. The pain each brings is your guide.'

'Where are the gears that feel good?'

'You’re not here to feel good.'

More gears emerge within view, some passing through others, several clear and definite, many less defined and hard to focus on, though all bringing with them their clear images of meaning.

Each time they come to rest, I pull out a gear that I feel by my pain to be to my future detriment.

A new gear swings into view. On this one I see a Ferris wheel and happy grandchildren whizzing by, fingers grasping their car, LAUGHTER… they smile at me, or through me, looking off into their own world.

Obviously, I let that gear pass by.

At one point I look at the growing pile of gears.

'It’s starting to look like if I don’t have a bad future then I have no future at all. Even though I now feel less pain, am I going to die sooner from doing all this?'

'Your destiny has to fit itself around futures that aren’t meant to be. Your number of breaths are already counted. I will worry about your last one. '

'I don’t know how comforting that is.'

'Eliminating bad choices doesn’t mean you won’t make wrong ones. You won’t know they are wrong until after they pass. Since right and wrong are variables you have no control over, the answers to what comes tomorrow are a waste. Better is understanding the beauty of how everything fits and re-fits together'.

'So what am I missing here, in my lack of understanding?'

'What is clearly before you. Grace. No one deserves heaven- it can only be given by Grace. It is your birthright, but it must be chosen at the expense of the world that separates us.'

'This fixing my future is painful. And I feel ashamed that I’m not doing it with some moral compass. I’m only guided by pain. I don’t even know where or when these futures happen.'

'Where is no more important than what or when. Removing your enthusiasm to further chain yourself to the world isn’t as painful as carrying the crushing weight of those chains, once forged around you.'

'It's as if this place was made so I can only do one thing and one thing only, with no chance to screw it up.'

'If those with choices make poor use of them, then offering fewer possibilities could be called mercy.'

I watch a gear disintegrate into dust as it passes out of view, from the present into the past.

'You can’t change the past. But you can make better choices in the future. Everything is interconnected. And pay more attention to your relationships. Be gentle with everyone, as I am gentle with you.'

'Gentle? What’s gentle about all this?'

'You prayed for something for which being here is the answer. And now the man who fell from the sky is not the same who flew up into it.'

I look up into the stone-gray sky and then out across the seemingly dead and abandoned city. I look back to the egg and reaching up, place my hand upon it. And I say out loud:

'I think I can live with this now.'

That’s when I wake up on this physical plane of existence and find out later that I was away for 1 week. I can tell you that I did not stop the entire time while in the In Between, yanking out those gears in order to feel less sick. But time doesn’t seem to move at all there, and it’s not like I had a physical body that needed to rest, eat or sleep.

I find it interesting that I speak out aloud only twice while there- once upon arrival and then when I leave. And I say that second sentence because it becomes torture to watch the machine’s gears spin around over and over, in readjustment to my changing future.

The experience continues to unfold and offers new insights on a daily basis. In comparison to more commonly experienced NDEs, mine differs in these ways:

Tunnel. I do not experience the traveling down a tunnel to the other side. Rather, I just appear in the In Between.

Meeting loved ones or anyone else. I see not one other being there. However, I know I am not alone.

Life review. I do not have a life review like that usually reported. However, in considering what I believe may represent one, it makes me ask as to its purpose. Where it might be the same in function, if not in form. In that the gears I can see are the most probable emerging events within the egg representing my future, I believe these to be the fruit of my past, and my pain some measure of that as well, from a spiritual perspective. However, in that we can’t do anything about our past, my attention is directed to a different atonement- to simply take the net balance of my past as pain in which to guide future decisions to be better ones. And that provides the means to remove those things in my future, those probabilities, which I might be tempted to choose, even if they are attractive to an as yet unknown propensity of my mind.

A feeling of unconditional love. Again, in contrast to this, I compare the In-Between to a military boot camp. While there is no feeling of love when you're getting the crap kicked out of you by your drill instructor, the purpose is to help you survive what comes next, to strengthen your resolve to push on and to create not courage, but Heart. That and to make better, informed, decisions to ensure your survival and success. This is love, just not the huggy kind of love.

Boundary of no return. I don’t see one. I don’t think it is meant that I should see or have that option. When I am in the In Between, I have absolutely no memory of my life here, or anyone in it. If someone comes to me and asks if I want to go back or go on, I have no idea what they mean. I am that lost in the infinitude of a single moment- the Impossible Now.

I wonder why no gear, even those representations I can see as positive, makes me feel good. At best, they simply feel normal. Perhaps it is that Right should feel normal, and I am more focused on the process of setting things up to be right than experiencing the content of right living. I mean, you can build a pool without ever getting wet. I also feel that where I was, Equanimity (Peace) was the superior emotion to feel. Joy or Sorrow are inferior, for each carried with it either avoidance or attraction. Peace is the baseline from which all else can be expressed. I would say I was stripped of any personalization- no ego, no personality, no desire other than to stop hurting. I was simply a creature of purpose- to remove the bad gears.

As my consciousness and memory returned and I was moved to a rehabilitation hospital, my experience unfolded further. I even wondered if I was dead and my being in a hospital was a mental construct, I'd created to come to terms with realizing was dead. The first person I shared that question with, along with my emerging understanding of my NDE was my main nurse. She started crying. I asked why and she said that she didn;'t want me to die because I was magical. I asked her to explain and she she said that in all her years of working there, she sees how every patient gets only one doctor and they're so busy that they can spend only 15 minutes per day with each patient. For me, it looked like I had 3 doctors, and they'd stay for over an hour. My nurse would pause at my door to see hwat we were talking about, and it was just normal stuff. She said I had this radiation that the doctors simply wanted to be in. And she had never seen this before. It was like the 'power' I brought back was being likeable. Perhaps it is Love. I don't know. But it did seem, and still does, seem to be part of my story.



Background Information:

Gender: Male

Date NDE Occurred: 10/6/2016

NDE Elements:

At the time of your experience, was there an associated life-threatening event? Yes Accident Surgery-related While under general anesthesia Direct head injury Other Was in a 1 week induced coma, suffered respiratory failure; though don't believe i was ever declared

After my plane crash, was placed in a week-long coma for several 6+ hour risky operations- some with only a 2% chance of success. All my ribs were broken, both lungs ruptured, my right leg was severely fractured and place in an ex-fit, and the skin on my chin was hanging down and needed to be sewn up in order for me to speak. Somewhere in here, I suffered respiratory failure in the hospital- was in a breathing machine. I have no memory of any of this, or up to 2 days prior to my crash. Nor do I have any memory after approximately 7-10 days of coming out of the coma and the NDE.

How do you consider the content of your experience? Neither pleasant NOR distressing

Did you feel separated from your body? Uncertain only events of the earth I saw were in the future- of them, one has come to pass. the other almost did but was moved off into the future for now.

I lost awareness of my body

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 Laser focus, with a psychic vision and understanding of what I was doing, how things fit together no matter our efforts to change them, and the beauty of God's creation in that dynamic.

At what time during the experience were you at your highest level of consciousness and alertness? The entire time. Though I was so focused on the purpose given me, that I may have not been generally conscious of anything I wasn't doing or looking at.

Were your thoughts speeded up? Incredibly fast

Did time seem to speed up or slow down? Everything seemed to be happening at once; or time stopped or lost all meaning

I was in the Impossible now- which I'd equate to Planck Time- 10 to the minus 44 seconds. Meanwhile, 1 week passed here on Earth. But for something pure energy, there is not time.

Were your senses More vivid than usual? Incredibly more vivid

Please compare your vision during the experience to your everyday vision that you had immediately prior to the time of the experience. I could see the life and purpose within things.

Please compare your hearing during the experience to your everyday hearing that you had immediately prior to the time of the experience. The only thing I could hear were the soft clack, clack, clack, sounds of the gears of my future whirring around.

Did you seem to be aware of things going on elsewhere, as if by ESP? Yes, and the facts have been checked out

Did you pass into or through a tunnel? No

Did you see any beings in your experience? No

Did you encounter or become aware of any deceased (or alive) beings? No

Did you see, or feel surrounded by, a brilliant light? No

Did you see an unearthly light? No

Did you seem to enter some other, unearthly world? A clearly mystical or unearthly realm Apocalyptic cityscape, storm clouds heavy with rain but not raining, and the large egg-shaped lattice work sculpture housing the events of my future, each event represented as a clock-like sector gear.

What emotions did you feel during the experience? none. however, every time I pulled a gear/experience out from my future, my entire life has to recalibrate with all of the gears spinning around. After seeing this every 15-30 second and 24/7 for an entire week, it was becoming torturous to see it again. That's when I said, 'I can live with this now'.

Did you have a feeling of peace or pleasantness? Relief or calmness

Did you have a feeling of joy? No

Did you feel a sense of harmony or unity with the universe? I felt no longer in conflict with nature

Did you suddenly seem to understand everything? Everything about the universe I saw the same future events spinning around and around but was told not to focus on those unimportant things- that the more important thing was to see how everything kept fitting back together, to accommodate the change in choices I was making for my future. Process was more important than Content. Understanding/Meaning was more important answers/purpose.

Did scenes from your past come back to you? No Only in how they defined the choices of my future. Otherwise the Past is dust, I was told. And I saw this.

Did scenes from the future come to you? Scenes from my personal future I saw everything, but was told not to focus on them, as the content of my future was not as important as how the universe simply worked to provide it. I do remember a couple of personal, nice things- one came to pass (home renovation) and the other, I assume will (grandchildren).

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

God, Spiritual and Religion:

What was your religion prior to your experience? Other or several faiths Follow an Eastern Path- Sant Mat.

Have your religious practices changed since your experience? No

What is your religion now? Other or several faiths Still follow the same path, but it has been of little help in understanding my NDE- Quantum physics has offered MUCH MORE insight.

Did your experience include features consistent with your earthly beliefs? Content that was entirely not consistent with the beliefs you had at the time of your experience My eastern spiritual path has been of little help in understanding this experience. Quantum physics however, has been amazingly insightful in my analysis.

Did you have a change in your values and beliefs because of your experience? Uncertain Still unfolding.

Did you seem to encounter a mystical being or presence, or hear an unidentifiable voice? I heard a voice I could not identify Described in my story. Kind of stern in tone.

Did you see deceased or religious spirits? No

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

During your experience, did you gain information about premortal existence? No

During your experience, did you gain information about universal connection or oneness? Yes I was told clearly, 'All things are interconnected'

During your experience, did you gain information about the existence of God? Yes He was speaking and dragged me there to clean my life up.

Concerning our Earthly lives other than Religion:

During your experience, did you gain special knowledge or information about your purpose? No

During your experience, did you gain information about the meaning of life? No

During your experience, did you gain information about an afterlife? An afterlife definitely exists Yes As I was alive and where the dead go, that implies proof. I was also depersonalized- I had no memory of this life at all.

Did you gain information about how to live our lives? Yes

Thoughts & Reflections

The In Between isn’t a place you go to or come from. It’s simply a place you are.

In sharing my experience of the In Between, I'm aware of how individual an experience it is, in terms of how it is constructed. I doubt its representation as I saw it exists without my attention there to engage it, though I know the machinations of the egg are currently underway on a more latent and sublime level, the gears ticking by one second at a time as my future unfolds.

What’s interesting is that the In Between is such an unknowable enigma but reveals to each person insights in accordance with their ability to see within, based on who they are at that moment.

Having spent a week (in our time here) yanking out events in my future, I initially wondered if I had shortened my life. I can't be sure that everything re-fit together into a smaller, more compact package of destiny, or if something else (an either/or proposition), filled the space. If my life is shorter, having been over to the other side and knowing we continue, I'm not too concerned. Better to live a shorter, better life than one that makes you sick both here and in the hereafter. But the question also reminds me of a story I read one time, where a wise man acknowledged that our destinies are indeed written in our palms, but if you can't change your future, what good does it do you? Yet God's Grace is not written in our palms, or in the stars. With it there are unexpected things can happen as you're living under a different set of rules than those of destiny. Rules bent in which the impossible can happen, locked doors are thrown open, hardened hearts become soft, the evil try righteousness on for size and when your situation seems hopeless, help shows up at the last minute- so often that you learn to recognize it as His pattern.

More on the last-minute help from Above. Part of the art of letting go is the fading desire for intensity. This plane is all about intensity, full of experiences for the curious. No harm in that, just as going to an amusement park fulfills the same purpose. As we engage here, we try different things to see what we enjoy, what to avoid, what we're good at and supposed to 'do for a living'. Along the way, some our efforts are successful and some fail, as the world measures them. A sneaky form of attachment here is that when we are successful, the world praises us, we take the credit because we feel endorsed, we feel connected, we feel loved (for that day), and we translate that into words like 'destiny' and 'purpose', then preach to the young to follow our path and become pillars of society.

The downfall is when we try but do not succeed. Having established the pattern of accepting credit for our successes, we also are tricked into taking the blame for our failures, when we've tried just as hard in either case and work as diligently as those next to us who hit pay dirt. All we should hold ourselves accountable for is our effort, and leave the results to God. Again, it's about the journey of Becoming than the destination of Accomplishment. Of course, there are exceptions, things for which immediate action needs no thought to justify. But for the long-range goals and relationships, many times 'the things isn't about the thing (that you think it is)'.

In contrast to intensity is the sublime. Moving from the always-active to the always-still is when we change our perspective and frame of reference, and subtle patterns become observable behind the noise. We see the ways in which the world (and beyond) really work.


I've been asked several times if I had a bad premonition on the day I crashed. Whether before takeoff if I was feeling nervous in any way about flying.

I'd say my greatest trepidation was before the first test flight, as one would expect. As I landed in one piece on the trial flight, even though I didn't like the way the plane handled, I had a sense of how to fly it.

I will admit that going up again was like riding a horse that's thrown you; you have to do it because tomorrow you'll want to do it even less. Continue along that way and eventually, you'll never ride again. But did I feel anything that said, 'Don't fly today'? No.

It is a very valid question given the psychic value of the out of body experience, but there is a better question:

'Had you known that you would crash and what would follow, would you have been strong enough to get into the cockpit and fly anyway?'

I don't know about you, but my heart and my instincts tell me how I should be able to answer that question. And it's an answer most of the world won't agree with. Yet is an answer that reveals what is more important to me. Though I would like to think I'm strong enough to say yes, I suppose that I'm not- that lack of merit equating to no foretelling of the crash. One day, I do expect to know what's coming next, even if it is unpleasant, by having the single-mindedness to go through whatever is coming at me, understanding its place in my journey.

At the same time this makes me ponder- why don't we know our future? Could any parent prepare their child's lunchbox, tie their shoelaces and send them out the door to school, if they knew that in 5 minutes a car would jump the curb at the bus stop and kill their baby? This makes me think that if we can't see the future, perhaps it's because we choose not to. People come and go in and out of life every day. But if we lived with the pain of knowing who was next, we would hold back for fear of getting hurt and we would not engage in the ways we're meant to. Again, from the viewpoint of Understanding versus Answers, I see how the answer to 'Who's next?' is less important than the understanding of making every moment count, and never parting in anger.


Random Thought:

When I returned home from the hospital and began to write down my experience in the IB and my re-entry here, I test flew my story with a few people who I considered trustworthy. By that I mean self-introspective people who would read without initial judgement and with an open mind. Of this small population, some responded with enthusiasm and wanted to hear more and continue to be supportive. A couple asked, 'What the hell is this all about?' which I thought funny and somehow endearing. The ones who puzzle me are those who went absolutely silent and I've never heard from again- and they used to check in on me at least to see how I was healing. I'm more puzzled than saddened by this. We weren't close but at least in one or two cases these people drove some distance to visit me when I returned home. Now, silence. I think I will now reach out to them to see why. If my story hit them in a certain way, I'd like to know. Perhaps they didn't like it, were ambivalent, or liked it but simply had no words or response. If I hear anything interesting in this follow-up, I'll post it here.


One year after my time in the In-Between, it was if I'd been given that time to heal and gather my strength for some changes to be made. From the outside, you’d think those changes were meant to be in my worldly life, but it soon became obvious to me that these were internal changes, and yes- with some reflection in the outer world. In these changes, I see some things that I find interesting in themselves, and more so in their implications.

Many times in my past, help would come just in the nick of time- it might be financial, it might be a job, it might be a premonition…it might be in warzones. Help probably came in a million other less-obvious ways to which I was oblivious.

With time and repetition, I gained some experience in seeing or sensing the patterns in which I was helped, and so with that came the trust to worry less and have faith, even when waiting to the last minute. It became a game in fact, using the last few minutes in which everything was about to turn to disaster, to look more deeply into … everything…. for the emerging help coming.

At this 1-year mark since visiting the In Between, I knew a new insight was being both given and asked of me. The last-minute help would still come when needed, but instead of magically coming through unexpected sources, God was asking me to take the lesson of interconnectedness and see how it worked through my relationships, which makes sense on so many levels. So, He told me this was coming and what to watch for- watch the people, and the relationships- and take nothing personally. Watch how He works through people. And so, I did. There are a lot of take-aways here, and they will continue to unfold as I look more closely at the pattern, and it repeating itself.

One thing immediately interesting was to realize that God can work through people and they have no idea what's going on. Think about that. Everyone is on their own journey, and most of us walk it with this illusion that we're in control of at least a few minutes of our day. Aside from how the interactions between free-will and fate answer “what did you do today?” the fact that God can work through anyone to do what needs doing is intriguing. When this happens, what is that person feeling right then? Do they feel good, purposeful, confused or …. what? Seeing this when it happens, I’m now in a place to recognize it, and ask. My task is to ask in a way that seems natural to the conversation, to influence the answer in the least way possible.

Another question about this dynamic: take someone who worries about the net-total each day of virtue & sin. If they are religious, they may hope that the net-total favors virtue. I’m really paraphrasing and simplifying here, so just walk with me as I shortcut. In that we may not be aware that day that God used us to help someone, but that on that day let’s say it happened, for that time period was the person without sin? Could those God-inspired actions ever color so outside the lines as to be- as the world sees it- unlawful? All it takes to go from being a good citizen to a criminal is the whimsy of the pen of a media-hungry politician, so allow the question a little flexibility.

In the bigger picture, since God can work through anyone at any time, where is the question of eternal damnation? Is this a simple choice of us asking Him to simply fill our days not with the actions of our desires, but His? But there were those who prayed for that, who at the same time lit the stakes with evil witches tied to them. So, this is a pretty arguable point, I’ll grant you. But I think there is a middle path here, and I don’t think my perception of Him working through people is wrong. I’m just wondering- if this is indeed true- where does judgement come in?

I’ll park this for now and let it idle.

More later.


06JAN2018

How many times have you heard people wonder if there is free will or fate? To what extent has the illusion of free will contributed to our suffering, versus making choices with a sense of being beholden to another person or higher purpose? Yet for the play we call Life to move forward, this illusion seems necessary to the drama.

The first thought I have is that there is both fate and free will. Fate is what happens to you throughout the day over which you have no control- suddenly losing your job, suddenly winning the lottery, a loved one having a bad day who distractedly says something dismissive and hurtful, having or causing a traffic accident. All these things in which we may have a minor role of awareness or action, but not necessarily the outcome. But to the unexpected loss of a job, we can choose to become despondent or feel liberated; to the impossible winning of the lottery we can choose to spend, save or donate; to the loved one who doesn’t realize they hurt our feelings, we can respond with offense, let our baggage make us defensive or become still and understanding- seeing the passing moment for what it is. A traffic accident that we’re involved in as either an instrument of the cause of party to the effect, we have myriad choices on how to respond and therefore define our roles in the range of possibilities.

In the 3rd paragraph of the Thoughts & Reflections page, I’ve shared my thoughts on fate being written in our palms. Free will is not written, but can be guessed by the pattern of fateful events continually coming our way from choices we will make. For many people, free will is pre-programmed by a long and intense history of stimulus/response. Though Pavlov’s dogs were rewarded and conditioned to salivate when they heard the bell, on some level it could be argued they still had the free will to slobber or not.

In sharing the story of how the future is written in our palms, I also said Grace is not. That’s where another possibility between free will and fate exists, when God takes over and directs our actions, without us knowing. As much as for any reason, this can occur in answer to our prayers. I mention this a few paragraphs above. God may help us by working through others, and He may also answer our prayers by moving us to act in unexpected and new ways. We may have no idea why we’re suddenly inspired to go left when we’d usually go right, or thoughtfully listen when we’d normally fill the silence that’s pregnant with meaning with our own comforting noise. But in those moments, God’s Will works through us. I’m curious to meditate more on this, because this is where living within His Will and not being necessarily conscious of It come together. If we were aware, it might give rise to pride.

And I’ve seen, when all else fails, God design a situation unique to us for which there is no other choice than for events to unfold in an unavoidable way. The only way we can atone for our past is to change the course towards our future. The future, as a set of probabilities, is more important than our past, frozen without change.


11JAN2018

I was thinking the other day, if the egg-shaped machine of the future’s gears of experience tick by one second at a time, as things unfold, are experienced and then fade away, and that is what we call 'living life', then how do I account for the constant whirring around of my future with no impact on my earthly life at that moment? Seeing those gears whirl around would have been a time-accelerated view of my life, but I didn’t come back as an older man, or from a years’ long sleep. I’m thinking that as I was in the IB, and not on earth, my life was suspended here for that one week, and therefore the machine could start, stop, recycle and begin again without impact to my life. As if my vacancy put things here and there in Neutral.

I also ponder how something so personal as the actual machinations of one’s life, down to the most microscopic granularity, could be represented as something so impersonal as a machine. Is it because that’s just how it is and my ego is affronted? Or is it because that’s how I view my life, from arm’s length and detached? While it indeed may be that I saw it that way because I didn’t get enough hugs as a kid, looking at one’s life objectively does have advantages.

Another thing, since I’m on a roll. When I was in the IB, I had no memory of the past or life left behind here. Because there, the past isn’t important- whether your viewpoint is that the past is dust or cast in concrete, it doesn’t matter to the certainty of Now and probabilities of the future. Also, with no consciousness of the past, there was no will or memory to return. Therefore, the only way to come back is to be sent back. If someone had walked up to me and said, 'You can go back or you can go on', I would have simply shrugged. Just shows how we have no control over anything.


22JAN2018 - Random Thoughts

I was thinking the other day:

1 - I am sure the machine-type appearance of my future- the egg housing with the gears inside- is particular to me. Perhaps my way of seeing things and the way something would need to appear to me to call out my intuition of how it works is what shaped it. I don't know if it is an automatic thing- you show up like a key and the right lock presents itself, or if there is some hand behind the scenes that does that with the ability and go even further to give you what you need, and in ways that for years may not be discernable. I wouldn't be surprised either way, but I'm sure that whatever you need one second from now is there.

2 - The next question is, for anyone else who might have had a similar experience, in whatever form it would take to them, would the workings of their future have appeared also as something so impersonal as - for me - a machine? Or might it take a more organic form? For example, instead of a machine with gears/choices I needed to remove, might someone else see an intriguing garden with weeds that needed removing?

3 - Why does it matter? Only because looking at every second of one's life- the past and the future, implies a large measure of intimacy. It doesn't get much more personal than that. So, my question could be: was it not the choices that were impersonal or represented as the gears needing removing, but the effects of those choices upon me? Meaning, if I was feeling the effects of my choice, as neutral or bad, then that was by grabbing the associated gear. If that's the case, was the gear itself the choice or the result? The cause or the effect? Based on the Interconnectedness, are they One? I think they are. I think it is our illusion here that would appear that some people get away with things- the uncaught thief, the anonymous insult hurled, the prowling serial murderer- but in the IB, I can tell you that you will feel the impact of things you've done that you will never have a clue about. As one mystic said, 'To breathe is a sin', as we kill millions or organisms in the air with every breath. It simply can't be helped. But know in our hearts that the alternatives are not is what is desired by God. The trick is to find the answer of what suffering that is woven into the very fabric of our experience of being here is acceptable by the Divine and that we can pay off, if possible, daily so as to not be more than we can handle in one lump sum? The best answer I've gotten to that is daily meditation- connect to the Divine and burn off the things that attach you here.

4 - This is why the machine looked so impersonal. Because it is built according to the Law. The Law of Karma, Sowing and Reaping, Giving and Taking, Ups and Downs. And the Law is impersonal, as everyone knows. However, as one can ask the jury or judge for mercy, so can one ask for God's Grace. As choice and consequence are interconnected, we make it easier for God to help us when we make good choices, rather than bad ones from which we need rescue. God prefers to work within the law that he himself created and allows to exist, and so should we. Let the miracle be that we come to that place and sense its rightness to not be violated, rather than needing to be saved from the gallows every other day.

5 - Which brings me to my experience. God did not break any rules of saving me from unfortunate choices as much as he gave me a mirror of reality without benefit of ego-filters so that I could feel without protection of denial the effects of those choices, and remove them from my path. Not so that I could encounter them as temptations or miscalculations, but so that they would be removed from my life altogether. If I ask why this Grace of rewriting my future was given to me, it was surely in response to something I've asked for. Perhaps an answer to the prayer of 'help me change'. As I have no idea what changes I made other than I believe them a removal of bad things, I can only go step by step. In the end, it seems God still wants us to know through discovery and experimentation, rather than mere rote memorization of moral codes.

6 - No one ever made a cake by singing a recipe. You actually have to roll up your sleeves, get the ingredients and through trial and error, make a cake worth eating.


22JAN2018

I'm not a joiner. My nature is to keep to myself. In learning, I always tended to the master/apprentice relationship, which is about as 1-on-1 as it gets. With more individual attention, I did much better in learning. Most of us would fit into that category.

Knowing this, God met me head on when I was little, speaking to me in the way I best understand.

It was in June, 1969. We lived in Jacksonville, Florida. I was asking my parents about God and wearing them out with all the questions. Finally, they told me to go down the road to church- Highlands Baptist Church, on Broward Road. So, I put on my suit (I was 12 years old) and walked past the 4 or 5 houses to the church, ready with all my questions.

I sat in the pew and saw the minister up on the stage, talking to a bunch of people and obviously too busy preparing his talk to deal with me. So, I just oriented myself by watching him, his body language and demeanor, looking at the crowd around me, and so on.

My issue with regular preaching what for a kid- 'open your heart to Jesus' literally means nothing. Even conceptually, I had no idea what that meant or how to do it. To know you want God but be told the way to do it is unintelligible could cause panic. Like 'you can't get there from here'. That would be one of my questions for the minister, for sure. If the instructions had been as they are for something like yoga and meditation, 'sit in this position, breathe like this, just relax, look into the darkness between your eyes, repeat this mantra....', then reading like a checklist, a child can follow that.

At the end of the service, I was ready to jump up and walk over to him but it seemed like everyone in the church was ahead of me and in line to shake his hand, invite him to lunch or dinner, gain some counsel or just get a blessing. If I thought it wasn't opportune before his service, there was absolutely no chance now of speaking to him. It didn't occur to me to try his schedule during the week. So, I just left and went home, determined to strategize a way to talk to him next week.

So next week came and again I went. I thought to sit where I could get to the preacher at the end of his service in quicker time and neared the front of the long line or people.

But now we had a new preacher, going through the same preparation as last week. I looked at a woman sitting next to me in the pew and asked where Reverend Coolidge was. She said, 'We got rid of him'. I asked why and she informed me that he did the unthinkable and married his daughter to a black man. I correctly intuited that in thinking that explained everything, I could now end the conversation and look straight ahead- which she would simply interpret as shock born of righteous indignation. Actually, I was confused even worse than before. As I said, this was the South in the late 1960s, so it's not a guess as to what the predominant racial attitudes were, and that I was reminded of right then. But it made no sense to me. Even then I knew that spirituality shouldn't care about such things, and yet here were such concerns flooding the church. I didn't even hear the sermon, and I couldn't leave before it ended as I realized now that everyone there must be crazy and I did not want to attract their attention. Best to lay low, get out with my head down and then ask my mom to help me sort it out.

So I walked home (never went back to that church) and asked my mom about what had happened over the prior week. She responded almost as if a bit of forgotten news, and told me that Reverend Coolidge had indeed married his daughter to a black man. Reverend Coolidge was a Cherokee Indian- was a very interesting (as in 'cool') looking man. His younger daughter, Rita, was soaring in her music career and her slightly older sister, Priscilla, was also a rising star. Reverend Coolidge married Priscilla to Booker T, of Booker T and the MGs. Look him up online and you will be amazed at his talent and the company he kept. Legendary. So, it was natural that 2 such people might meet and fall in love, and I understood that. Yet the only thing so many people saw was color. Having been raised in this time and in this place, I also understood the prevailing sentiment of the congregation. But I also understood, and knew, that is was wrong. In that there were no answers as to why it had to be that way, this is when I began to intuit the greater importance of understanding over answers.

God was saying that it was wonderful that I wanted to know Him, given my effort that day. But if I walked the ways of man, I would come out with more questions than I went in with. If I walked with Him, he would pick out my tailor-made lessons just as He did today, and where answers might fail, understanding would be given. Part of that understanding is that it might be easier to avoid Sin by staying at home than going to places of worship.

Ever since then, this has been my Path. And this is partly why I am not a 'joiner'. No disrespect, I just coloring outside the lines.


3FEB2018

On my Home Page, the scene I have is the one I saw upon immediately arriving in the In Between. I have mentioned elsewhere that the artwork I have now is incomplete- the egg-shaped machine of my future should be full of sector gears, each ticking away a second at a time as the associated thought, word or deed begins, passes and ends.

At the end of last year, I was directed to meet someone with whom we might have mutual interests. I met with Tony at his location in a nearby town, in which he rents space to start-ups, artists, events, etc. The goal is to stir things up by giving people space to be creative- in art, business, technology, you name it- and then meet each other and further collaborate on new ideas. I imagine a next possible phase might be 'business incubator', though it will likely be more than this. Interestingly, this turned out to be his logo- the sector gear, like I'd seen in the IB.

Picture

Also late last month, I met a very nice man in the film and advertising business named Nestor. As I'm working on a media idea to help share my experience in the In Between, it seemed natural to share this with him. I was surprised by how interested he was, the excellent questions he asked and the general overall sense that he got it. Since then we've had a couple of calls, and then yesterday he sent me this- it's just outside his office in New York:

Picture

I'm sure you can see why I find this interesting.


7FEB2018

I was reading the news today, Science section. I enjoyed reading this article, as it points straight at something I learned in the In Between, but had not deeply considered yet. It makes perfect sense too.

Just as soon as you begin to feel comfortable with how things are interconnected, no matter how far apart they are, they throw a curve ball at you: that a change in one thing not only changes its interconnected companion on the other side of the universe, but also on the opposite end of time. That things right now impact you that cycled through the birth and death of their suns and that you will have an impact on something that won't exist for billions of years. Wow.

You thought quantum mechanics was confusing? Check out entangled time


18FEB2018

I went driving today, where I do my best quiet thinking, and listening.

Here is that the IB revealed to me today.

There was no tunnel of light, no out of body perception of the room I was in and its activity around me. I simply appear in this otherworldly place to find myself resting on one knee, high up on a terraced rooftop of an abandoned building. I'm bent over in stomach pain and with great effort look up.’

I see an amazing, panoramic skyline of a purgatorial city…gray buildings stacked upon gray buildings stretching all the way back to a brooding skyline. Apocalyptic clouds hover over the metropolis, storm-heavy.

In this gothic world, there are no sounds. I’m not deaf, it’s just that still and quiet.

Kneeling in its shadow all along, I suddenly notice to my left the only real thing of interest- a large egg-shaped structure, an open latticework of gray metal, with many gears inside. Monolithic. Austere. And finely crafted-- the egg is maybe four stories high, its intricate latticework constructed of a dull metal as gray as the world surrounding it. Another wave of nausea hits me.

I say out loud, 'I don’t think I can stand this.'

Inside the egg, there is an immediate whirring of sector gears- the kind of partial arc gears you see in clock-like mechanisms. These move in all directions within the confines of the egg.

With great effort, I draw closer, studying the egg and its moving gears within.

What follows is a conversation that was telepathic and a characterization of what was communicated.

Me: What is this thing?

As I stand before the mighty mechanism, a disembodied voice responds, again, within my consciousness.

This is the future birthing into the now.

I see the gears— some which appear solid and some not- passing through each other in a physically impossible manner. The otherworldly dance of the gears is complex- like a 4-D model of time.

They come to rest and I reach through a gap in the side of the egg.

This is the process of Becoming.

My fingers touch one of the more solid appearing gears. On its surface, I see something like a video feed of future events. Then I double over in pain.

With a reflex, I rip the gear out, pulling it through the egg’s lattice wall and throw it over my shoulder. The machine responds by spinning its gears around again, recalibrating for the loss of one, whispering with a light clacking sound into a new configuration.

Me: What’s happening now?

Response: Each gear is the probability of a thought, word or action in your future. Your destiny is resetting itself around the now missing event.

Me: How did I know I could do that? Pull that gear out, removing that future moment?

Response: Why else are you here?

Me: I have no idea. I don’t even know what this place is.

Response: You are in the In-Between.

Me: In between what?

Answer: Everything. The Impossible Now between the past and the future.

And I Say: That makes no sense whatsoever.

Response: It’s impossible in its short duration. Yet here you are, standing inside the eternity of a single moment. Do you remember who you are in the world to which your body belongs?

I look blankly into space, squinting with the effort to remember.

Me: I have no idea. I can’t remember anything.

Response: Then you see the truth in how the past is dust.

Me: OK. Why do some of these gears- these futures that I touch- make me sick and not others?

Response: All choices have unintended consequences, some unfortunate and some not. The pain each brings is your guide.

Me: Where are the gears that feel good?

Response: You’re not here to feel good.

More gears emerge within view, some passing through others, several clear and definite, many less defined and hard to focus on, though all bringing with them their clear images of meaning.

Each time they come to rest, I pull out a gear that I feel by my pain to be to my future detriment.

A new gear swings into view. On this one I see a Ferris wheel and happy grandchildren whizzing by, fingers grasping their car. LAUGHTER...they smile at me, or through me, looking off into their own world.

Obviously, I let that gear pass by.

At one point I look at the growing pile of gears.

Me: It’s starting to look like if I don’t have a bad future then I have no future at all. Am I going to die sooner from doing all this?

Response: Your destiny has to fit itself around futures that aren’t meant to be. Your number of breaths are already counted. I will worry about your last one.

Me: I don’t know how comforting that is.

Response: Eliminating bad choices doesn’t mean you won’t make wrong ones. You won’t know they are wrong until after they pass. Since right and wrong are variables you have no control over, the answers to what comes tomorrow are a waste. Better is understanding the beauty of how everything fits and re-fits together.

Me: So, what am I missing here, in my lack of understanding?

Response: What is clearly before you. Grace. It is your birthright, but it must be asked for then chosen, at the expense of the world that separates us.

Me: This fixing my future is painful. And I feel ashamed that I’m not doing it with some moral compass. I’m only guided by pain. I don’t even know where these futures happen.

Response: Where is no more important than what or when. Removing your enthusiasm to further chain yourself to the world isn’t as painful as carrying the crushing weight of those chains, once forged around you.

Me: It's as if this place was made so I can only do one thing and one thing only, with no chance to screw it up.

Response: If those with choices make poor use of them, then offering fewer possibilities could be called mercy.

I watch a gear disintegrate into dust as it passes out of view, from the present into the past.

Response: You can’t change the past. But you can alter the future. Pay more attention to your relationships. Be gentle with others, as I am gentle with you.

Me: Gentle? What’s gentle about all this?

Response: You prayed for something for which being here is the answer. And now the man who fell from the sky is not the same who flew into it.

I look up into the stone-gray sky and then out across the seemingly dead and abandoned city. I look back to the egg and reaching up, place my hand upon it.

(I say this out loud)

Me: I think I can live with this now.

That’s when I wake up, back on this physical plane of existence and find out later I was out for 1 week. I can tell you that I did not stop the entire time in the In Between yanking out those gears in order to feel less sick. But time didn’t seem to move at all there, and it’s not like I had a physical body that needed to rest, eat or sleep.


16MAR2018

I have recently been invited to a luncheon in NYC and the topic for discussion is 'Kindness Unedited'. I find the topic and the location of this event interesting for 2 reasons:

1 - When I left the IB, I was told to pay attention to my relationships, because everything is interconnected. 'Kindness' as a reason to get people together for a meal, fits.

2 - The location of the luncheon is exactly where the egg-shaped artwork shown above sits. Out of the entirety of New York, I find that interesting.

I guess I'm meant to go.

Also, I am fascinated how the things I was shown in the IB are constant as subjects of quantum phenomena in my science news feed. My inability to clearly focus on the machinations of my possible futures until they become concrete realities of the present seems logical and philosophically obvious. Yet when you really see this in action, there are subtleties at the edge the math may not show. I believe that if we can intuit how things work at a quantum level, we can influence them in a way that yesterday would have appeared as magic. I wish I could be more definite with that thought, but right now I can't.

I'll just have to look for an opportunity to present itself and try.


17MAR2017

As I saw the gears spinning around, I was puzzled as to why I could clearly see their representations of things I’d think, say or do but not the gears themselves. As much as I tried, it was simply impossible to focus on them. To a point, yes, but oddly their background was in focus but not the gears themselves, even when stopped.

Then I realized that you can’t focus on a probability because it is a representation of several possibilities, which aren’t yet in a single place- to be focused on- until one supersedes the others and becomes the singular present. It is a poetic statement that the housing of all the gears birthing from the future to the present appears in the shape of an egg.

All of this was showing the quantum reality of time, entanglement and how all things are interconnected. Not only across impossible distances, but across all time. There are entangled particles that are a universe apart, but when you change the state of one, you instantly change the state of its entangled mate, no matter the distance in space or even in time. There are things that happened at the beginning of time that are, not will, affecting other things at the end of time. Therefore, what of what we call time between the beginning and the end of the universe, if what occurs impacts a particle at the beginning of time instantly impacts its entangled mate at time's end? I imagine that as we therefore travel along the arrow from one to the other, we are not traveling toward an end, but to the Source. Reaching the end, we reach the beginning.

One way of looking at it is that everything is already happening all at once. Time is the artificial construct by which the story plays out with a beginning, middle and end. And yet, though that implies that everything future is as scripted and concrete as the recorded past, you could say in one sense that is true and yet what you have to get used to is that each possible probability actually does spawn its own moment in time, with its own future, allowing every possibility to play out. It’s our limited ability to focus on only one reality at a time that keeps us from seeing all parallel possibilities come into expression simultaneously, and then see their timelines extending into the future. Yet it can be done.

This also makes sense of the statement in quantum physics that says the observer affects the outcome of any event through the simple act of observation. Yet when every outcome is occurring, the question is not how our watching events unfold affects them, but why do we see only certain (or one) outcome instead of all? Because we are following the script of a particular timeline. The best answer I can give as to why one timeline over another defines our observable, and observational, lives is destiny, karma, etc. A deeper question is, is there another version of us that split off from the present into an alternate future? Meaning, is there more than one of each of us, all living in billions of parallel realities simultaneously? If so, which one are we? Or is individuality, like time, an illusion and we are as infinitely probable as everything else?

If this is so, where rests the question of salvation and damnation- if in some realities we are gods and others, demons? Or is that the play where our growth into godhood is to know each version of ourselves, each flavor of reality, intimately? Is this what it is to be children of God?

OK, so if the above describes the usual but impossible ways in which everything plays out moment by moment, then how do I explain what’s going on here in the IB? If all realities are happening, then what is there for me to change? And where are the other Jims while I am here doing this? Is there a place where we’re all ever going to meet, in one place and in one time? And then I realized, I was being given a chance to remove choices across universes, not just mine. I was consolidating the realities to an increasingly singular set of circumstances and thereby aligning the Jim path across all possible timelines.

Then I realized that this is how God is bringing me home. That all of me wanted this and it fell on one of us, the me at this time and in this place, to pull it off. That’s a lot to realize is at stake.

And as I pulled out the things that felt wrong to keep, I pondered the machine’s whirring around to reset the gears to futures that won’t exist. I understand now that all my parallel futures will become more similar, as I’ve reduced the choices my alternate selves will make, and that points to a convergence of realities. Perhaps the number of realities popping out of the present is based on our own individual desires, which are many. Many enough to ponder, “what if”? as we decide whether to turn left or right, to choose wrong or right, to choose the dark and the light- and every shade between. Perhaps as our desires fade, so do the number of ways we ponder them. The man with few desires is a man with few paths to walk. The man with no desire has no path to walk. In one sense, he is free to not be bound by time or space, and be everywhere there is to be, and at the same time. He can understand all the choices before us, and the fruits of each. Understanding causality from this perspective, he is also free from having to walk any more paths. He is done. It is done.

In seeing the resetting of the machine’s gears to those cancelled futures, the lesser man would try and remember every scene of major events as they whipped by- when to buy into the stock market, or make a major real estate purchase, and then when to sell- just in the nick of time. Who they would marry and when, who close to them would die and why, and on and on. These facts are answers to the big questions in life. What do I do for a living? Who will I marry? How will I die? But the greater man doesn’t worry about the answers because they are a one-shot deal to each parallel reality anyway. It’s the understanding, not the answers, that threads the multiverse together. By limiting the numbers of paths the present can take, your limited understanding, by definition, is increased to include them all. It may sound like a trick, but it’s how God bends the rules without breaking them.

19MAR2018

I posted this a year ago on FaceBook. Seems appropriate to also place it here:

On the condition of lost innocence, by Wordsworth:

'Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;

The Soul that rises with us, our life’s star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar.

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come,

From God, who is our home.'

30MAR2018

I've been quiet for the past couple of months, working, thinking and meditating on my story. Seeing how more of it is unfolding. One concept from the In Between that came up was the Impossible Now. It was 'impossible' because of its incredibly short duration, and its infinitude of width. By design and how we fit within it, you are forced to be Present- as In That Moment present. Inside it, there is no past and no future, but it is infinite in its expanse across universes. This is why it's easy to get lost within it and experience difficulty even thinking or talking- for as you normally in speech, thought or writing are thinking of the next thing to say as you get this one out, in the Impossible Now you forget the next thing you would think of saying as soon as it flashes into your mind. It's like you are simultaneously in an observer mode even as you are speaking. I guess from being in this place, I sometimes read what I write while in there and wonder who wrote it, as I have no memory of doing it.

I sense also an association of this impossible thin-ness of the present with walking a razor's edge of focus. When we focus down to that quantum level of infinite shortness of Now between the future and the past, the width of a razor blade becomes wide enough to walk upon.

I'm understanding from quantum physics more about where I went, what I saw and what I experienced. That the impossibly intersecting gears of probable futures were appearing to pass through one another as a representation of the super positioning of all possibilities. That they are in flux, coming to the fore and retreating again as the uncertainty of their selection to become 'real' itself ebbs and flows, based on a million things. Finally, one of these waves of probability collapses into a dominant particle of manifestation and that's what we call reality. This is why I couldn't see all of the gears clearly, though I could the events they represented. The gears were hard to see because of their probable natures even though their meanings were clear.

I've spoken before about the importance of Understanding over Answers. That is because Understanding reveals Meaning and Answers reveal Purpose. Both are important, but purpose can take you only so far.

When I was removing the gears representing bad choices in my future, I have said that I wasn't guided by some moral compass or recitations from holy scriptures. I was guided by the pain of the choices I’d made, and those of the choices my current path would present for me and were likely to be made. As I removed them, I have no idea what they were, nor did I need to. They hurt me, so I got rid of them. It was that simple. The need to know what they were was replaced by the understanding that they were bad for me. It doesn’t mean I won’t still make wrong choices, but they won’t be bad ones.

And if you still think answers are more important than understanding, I’d ask you to consider how that worked out for Adam and Eve, when they traded the fruit of understanding and meaning in the Garden of Eden for that of answers and purpose in the world.


19JUL2018

Back in late May, I went to visit my mother and help her with the final paperwork preparing for her eventual move to an assisted living facility. During the few days I was there, we accomplished everything needed.

On my way home, I noticed I felt differently, about my connection to life. This was a marked change since my plane crash and how I felt about the In Between and my connection to this world.

I would characterize it as feeling lighter in spirit, happier. But I also felt more engaged to the world and less moment to moment mindful of the IB in the same connected way as before. That bothered me, as I never want to lose that connection to the Beyond the NDE gave me.

Yet I thought further on it and asked, 'Isn’t helping my mother the correct response to the IB’s telling me to 'pay attention to your relationships', as it tossed me back to Earth?' So, if following orders resulted in differences of feeling about that which commanded me, then it must represent not just a change of state, but an evolving state, sanctioned by that giving the orders.

The admonition to 'pay attention to your relationships' goes much deeper though. Read on.

Returning home in this lighter spirit, I received a phone call the next day from a customer, asking me to consider coming to their business and heading up an entirely new division that would significantly increase their revenues. My interpretation was that this call was either the result of the lighter sense of being, or the lighter sense of being was in preparation for it. But I also had a feeling that this call wasn’t to bear the expected fruit, but a warm-up.

A week later, my mother called to tell me she fell and broke her hip, and needed me. As I was packing the car, a former associate called me to tell me about his 6-month startup that had more business than they could handle and would I take them on as a customer. They increased my business significantly. Thankfully, I was able to perform my work for them, as for my other customers, remotely (meaning, from mom’s kitchen table).

In my initial conversations with this new customer, I felt as if they needed me, and liked coming to know me, not for what I could bring them, or my skills, but because of who I am. I could feel that subtext as strongly as if it was spoken out loud. I told them all at our first dinner of my NDE- as it is important to me and I decided to just get it out of the way. And besides, since the IB was facilitating this opportunity, it could perk up the ears of anyone sensitive to such a message, engendering further conversation.

Still, between helping my mother with everything and working to assist this very demanding and new customer, I was aware in how on the surface my connection to the IB was different in that I couldn’t think about it 24/7 non-stop, yet my deeper sense of connection to it, to the feeling that everything at every single moment is exactly as it should be, did not change.

During the next 5 weeks, my understanding grew.

My mother, who is very independent, would occasionally become very unhappy when dealing with her aging physical state and its further limitations expressed by her injury. In those moments, she talked to me just like she did when I was a child. I always knew she was unhappy back then today understanding it’s because she was far more driven and intelligent than those 1950s and 60s circumstances would have allowed. Her frustration vented towards me then and again now was one that assumes whatever you do and however you approach a problem (or life) was wrong and that you needed her to tell you how to do everything. Add to that a hardworking but emotionally absent father, and you have a young man arriving at the threshold of adulthood with no experience in confidence-building activities or a positive self-image based on the reinforcing and approving reactions of others. And that’s how I became a young adult- with little self-confidence, with low self-esteem and pretty much no feelings of self-worth. I knew I had to get out of town and away from my parents. I knew I had to redefine myself. That’s when I met my first wife-to-be and we went to Africa for 2 years, so I could learn filmmaking.

The difference in being on the receiving end of this type of parenting in my early 60s though is that the IB had changed me in a way that I didn’t take it personally any longer. I could see the process behind my mother’s interactions with me, much as seeing the gears of my future and how changes in them would refit my destiny together. And as I felt my years-long set of reactions start to surface, I simply challenged her respectfully not to speak to me in that way. And believe it or not, she changed her tone and wording- focusing on her appreciation of my being there, sympathetic to how all the extra running around must be taxing my own injured body. I told her, sincerely, that I was happy to be there to help, and so we did this for a total of 5 or 6 weeks.

In this time I flew back to CT to give my IANDS talk about my NDE and enjoyed that very much.

I continued to ponder the changes in my mindfulness of the IB though.

Then the unfolding of an answer began.

'Pay Attention to Your Relationships'. How so few words could mean so much. That wise and profound was the speaker of those words….

I believe that the change in my energy level- to a higher and increased state, one in which I felt happier, younger and more energetic, was precisely because of who I am becoming, the call from the one customer was a warm-up, a sign, if you like, and the next call that was substantive was why I needed that energy boost. And that my understanding of how our self-image is based on our continual subconscious and overt feedback from others given on a continual nonstop basis is what forms us as people- in terms of our self-image, our self-worth and esteem, our sense of contribution to life itself….and of course, our sense of connection to others.

As adults, any feelings of inadequacy and how those feelings defined critical decisions in life- whether pushing on for one’s dreams or settling for a mediocre job with a less than ideal income, marrying an unsupportive or self-absorbed spouse and raising entitled children…so much of this can be traced back to the childhood beginnings and evolution of a self-image based on low self-worth and the pattern of choosing the associated types of probabilities that collapse into ones’ singular reality.

My summary of events, granted by insight given by the IB, is that The IB not only gave me the opportunity to make better choices in the future by the process of elimination of many bad ones but in removing those representing obstacles to my evolution into a better person, I would now be presented with increasingly confidence inspiring relationships expressed through business. And I would very aware that these opportunities were not so much a product of my knowledge or skills I could bring- which are sufficient I believe, but as a direct result of the kind of person my time with the IB was allowing me to become. This is how my relationship with the IB is evolving, in how my relationship with myself is evolving. In short, this is healing.

And returning to be with my mom for 5 weeks to revisit the patterns of behavior on both our parts that led me down a warped sense of self needing healing, was gracious by God, as he used the shield of the IB’s powers of detachment to show me objectively what the process was and how it works, yet I was able to stay removed enough from it to detach and then rebuff it in a respectful way to see my mother’s behavior change. I don’t know if that works backward enough to heal her heart but in how she showed that an advanced age she could change, it does verify how amazing a woman she is- now so set in her ways that she can’t still learn and grow. In short, I hold no ill will for those years in which her anger and frustration diluted her love for me as her child. The IB and age have removed me from that.

So The IB, in telling me to pay attention to my relationships, has shown me and evidenced to me the deep, granular to a near quantum hair-splitting level, these details. And as always, these parts fit together with the prevision of fine machinery. There are no gaps, there is only “look closer” to see how those gaps fill in, in ever deeper and nearly invisible ways.

And sharing my experience with the IANDS group I could say felt like feeding my soul.

This change in my connection to the IB is analogous to an introverted child who stays in their room, reading comic books. A loving parent will tell them to go out and play with other kids. Eventually, the parent may have to create a condition outside they know will pique their child’s interest and draw them out from their room into the world outside. The child may wonder why they leave to leave the status quo, and they have some feeling of separation anxiety about being more than ten feet away from their parent, but as they begin playing with the other kids, they peek every now and then, looking for their parent to watch from around the curtain, wanting their child to have a good time. I believe this is the current snapshot of where I am with the In Between. And together, our relationship to each other grows and I am not departing the experience, but now expressing it on other aspects of my life, and therefore becoming more one with it, not less.


29JUL2018, addition.

I was contemplating how Einstein's equation E = mc-squared essentially states that as we (as matter) approach the speed of light, our mass approaches infinity, distance approaches zero and so does time. Meaning, if/when we transition from matter to light, we are everywhere there is to be and at the same singular moment. This is one of the reasons I feel I was in a single moment in the In Between, while my body aged 1 week here. And in my talk, I referenced Max Planck, the 'father' of quantum physics, born before the Civil War. He believed in a non-personal God, much like I experienced Him in the IB. Impersonal as in He is our natural state. It's not like our arms wake up happy to see us, we simply know what to do with them the minute we realize we have them. Kind of like that. And Planck Time, where quantum phenomena are observed, is in the Impossible Now of the In Between, measured as 10 to the -44 seconds, or a hundred millionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of 1 second.

I also referenced an earlier mention of how there are at least 2 entangled particles, one at the beginning of time, and the other at the end of time. Across an infinitude of space and an impossible expanse of time, whatever happens to one immediately happens to the other. The interconnectedness of all things. Therefore, within the 'in between' those two particles of immediate causality, everything else - The Present/The Impossible Now/Planck Time - exists. I was shown how the Impossible Now is impossible because of how thin (in duration) it is, yet unimaginably wide, across universes. In that single moment of the In Between, it makes sense that I was light, not only because my body was here, but because the egg-shaped machine of my life was at a standstill. Either it is because where I was (as light) no time passes (it doesn't for light), or I was moving so fast (as light) that it's like working on your car engine while it is running, because, at the speed of light, you could take the whole thing apart and put it back together again between piston strokes. Either way, I understand. In a state of that stillness where we aren't collapsing one of an infinite number of probability waves into a singular particle of present reality, we become light.

'Be Still and know that I am God' takes on a deeper, experiential, meaning.

The more Still we are, in that Impossible Now between what comes next and what turns to dust, the more in suspension our realities coming forth are. The more we reside in a state of pure Potential and come closer to this unmanifest aspect, the closer we are to the Highest (Unmanifest), God. In that suspended unexpressed state of all and equal probabilities, we are every place there is to be and in every time there is to be. We are One with all there is.


02SEP2018.

Spiritual studies and quantum physics state that every moment is infinite with probabilities, our conscious decisions continually collapsing one of them into our present reality. There is also the theory that every one of those probabilities has a reality in which it is chosen, with every moment spinning off into an infinite number of directions. If this is so, then how can you travel back in time and create a paradox, no matter how much you want to? Whatever you choose to do would have its own timeline with consequences for sure, but this means your original timeline would remain intact where the time traveler chose not to alter history. If anything, such an exercise, if you could observe it from a higher frame of reference, would identify the specific timeline out of many that you are on.

And yet, if we're all one soul, interconnected, and living out each of these infinite number of realities at the same time, doesn't this speak to our divine infinitude? This only hints at what 'children of God' can mean.

Thoughts on Stillness.

It's at our still point of meditation, where we become present, that we realize we're within the nexus of all probabilities.

'To the mind which becomes still, the entire universe will surrender'. Lao Tzu, Tao Teh Ching.

'Be still and know that I am God' Psalm 46:10.

The word 'still' here is translated from the Hebrew meaning to 'Let Go'. Elsewhere in my writing I mentioned I heard reference in the In Between to the Art of Letting Go, and in the sharing of my NDE said, 'That all the force of Will you need is found in the art of Letting Go. Always live Life in celebration of the individual spirit. For no one and no thing, can stand before the brilliance of a truly naked soul.'


20SEP2018

Tales of feeling Joy and Unconditional Love. What is the emotional state we should be going for?

There was a king who heard of a holy man, a carpenter, in a village within his kingdom. He sent for his high priest and asked that he travel to the village and check the carpenter out. So, the priest dressed in normal clothing and traveled by normal means to the village, without the trappings of his office. In his disguise, he found the carpenter and stopped to talk to him while he worked. The priest noticed that the carpenter was building a casket. They make small talk and after a while, the priest was wondering where the holy part was. The man just seemed to be like anyone else. Suddenly, a neighbor ran into the shop, announcing to the carpenter that his only son had just fallen off the roof and died. The carpenter then nailed in the last nail and looked up, not at the neighbor but at the disguised priest, and said, 'I know'.

Obviously, he was spiritually-inclined and knew more than most of us. But in this, where was his joy? I would feel closer to the target to say that he had Peace, but I'm not sure the concept of joy is relevant.

Explore this with me. What do you think? Is joy the goal or is equanimity superior?

Is not the state of equanimity, beyond joy and sorrow, that allows for the full experience of pleasure and pain without the attachment and resistance that normally accompanies them, the better choice?


27OCT2018

No lies are allowed in the In Between and after having been there, I don’t think it possible to lie to myself here as I did before. Thinking about it, we generally tell ourselves lies to get through life and sometimes, just today. But the intensity of the purpose-driven version of me and the “nowness” of my time in the In Between made for no dreams, no illusions, no lies. There was no memory of the past or anyone here. There was no fear, no joy. Just extreme laser-like focus.

One of the things I’ve had a clear feeling about when I was in the In Between was this enforced honesty. I characterized it initially by saying that being there was like looking in a mirror of truth, one that strips away the ego and lies we tell ourselves in order to look into the mirrors in our homes and not wretch. None of us are perfect or have gotten to where we are by being perfect. Many of us have made less than ideal choices. What happens when you arrive in a place in which such self-delusion simply can’t occur? I wonder if this is the reason that I felt sick to my stomach during the entire time of my experience there. That I was stretched to my limits of being there to the point of pain.

When I was given the opportunity to reach forward into my future and feel the sector gears representing choices, some made me feel more nauseous and added to the pain I was already feeling. It was with an unthinking reflex that I pulled them from within the construct of my life and threw them away. After a week non-stop of removing bad choices from my future using not a God-pointing compass but the pain if I were to embrace and live those probabilities, I came to realize I was feeling a little less sick. Enough to say that I could now live with the changes. That’s when I was sent back.

It was Brilliant that I couldn’t see the choices I needed to discard. As I had to reach up high into the egg giving birth from the future to the present, I could only go by feel. If I could see the gear that showed me winning the Powerball but felt horrible because I’d become a complete ass by doing so, I’d have been tempted to keep that event in my future, promising to not become worse than I already am. But I was only given the blindness of feeling as my guide. This is what was meant when said to me that 'If those with choices make poor use of them, then offering fewer possibilities could be called mercy.' And so, I kept pulling, nonstop, 24/7 for a solid week. I was also told this:

'Eliminating bad choices doesn’t mean you won’t make wrong ones. You won’t know they are wrong until after they pass. Since right and wrong are variables you have no control over, the answers to what comes tomorrow are a waste. Better is understanding the beauty of how everything fits and re-fits together.'


31OCT2018

It is mostly reported that what we see and experience in a Near Death Experience is presented in ways we can make meaning of- each is tailored to our state of development and understanding.

As the 'place' most people report going to is pleasant and comforting (not all are), I wonder if those who appear to be our loved ones who've already died and welcome us there are actually spirits whose job is to help us transition and could care less how we color them in?

If we are coloring in the place with things comforting and familiar, why not those who meet us as well?

Each according to his or her nature.


01NOV2018

Have you ever asked, 'What is the best version of myself?'

It's natural to reflect back to the happiest or most productive times of our lives. Personally- with friends and family during holidays or some momentous occasion, or professionally- achieving some goal that resulted in recognition, a promotion and/or salary increase.

What if the best version of yourself wasn't when everything was going right, but when everything was going to hell and you were getting your ass kicked?

Why are the heroes in stories not those who were born and lived forever with a silver spoon in their mouths, but those who were knocked down over and over again, sometimes only picking themselves up from the dust because if they didn't, it's right there they would starve? Is it because all of us know adversity of one form or another and so this is how we identify with the hero's journey, or because we admire their strength and determination to not fail? Do we love the hero for whom success comes easy or the one who holds back nothing, having or about to lose so much that there's nothing left to hold onto?

There is an old saying of the Bushi (Samurai) when faced with an unwinnable battle: 'When a Samurai draws his sword and throws his scabbard away, he is free to fight his finest battle'. he will never need his scabbard again because, on that day, he will not re-sheath his sword. Little does it matter whether he wins or loses as the world measures it, it is only important that with courage and heart, he fought his battle ever. This is because he simply Let Go.

What if we model that example when faced with what seems an insurmountable challenge?

What if we lived that way every single moment?

When this life is done and if we are given the opportunity to look back on it, will we love the version of ourselves that was happy as our place in relationships defines it, or when we went alone to fight our most fearsome dragons? Even if we don't win, will we evaluate our performance with that score, or that we found within us the courage to try?

At the end, which is better? What will people remember us for? Is this not the stuff of ballads?

Consider for a moment then, that getting the crap kicked out of us is the opportunity for us to see what we're really made of. That in so doing, this is our finest moment. That this is the best version of ourselves.

At some point, when the battle is over and we reflect back on our struggles, if these are our finest moments, are we willing to return to that struggle to continue the work of man-making? Or do we acquiesce into mediocrity, with nothing more than a few trophies that gather another layer of dust every year.?

What will be our legacy? What is it we carry forward into the Great Beyond, that which will be our new foundation of growth and firm step in our evolution?


06NOV2018

The past is dust. You can try to atone for the past but only in making better choices in the present, as the future unfolds its infinite possibilities into the now. Using one's desire to do better, to think better and to be better will filter the choices we make to a fewer set of probabilities, and blind us to other, unfortunate ones. We may still make wrong decisions, but they will not be the same bad ones grounded in the seven vices.


17NOV2018

In contrast to many NDEs, I felt no joy in the In Between but more an intense sense of purpose, like I was/am on a mission. I guess removing bad choices from my future could be Happiness but the exercise was not joyful, per se.

Happiness without joy but with purpose is part of the quantum level hair splitting I to do now.

St. Catherine of Siena said: 'Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.'

She also referred to what happens in the In Between as the perdition of the fires of love. Not a pleasant place but a good place. The fires in which the noblest are forged.


Thanksgiving; 22NOV2018

While in the In-Between, I believe I was inside a single moment. In a place where time stands still, you don’t change. You don’t grow and you don’t diminish. You stop identifying with the parts of you that change and begin to see and identify with that which doesn’t change. Have this impression stamp itself hard enough upon you, and you’ll see an after effect upon returning that allows you to sit motionless, staring at a wall for 6 hours. You feel fewer desires because they are associated with change and stimulation- things you feel less associated with now in communing with the sublime.

I guess this is part of being present, of becoming a blank slate or still and reflective pond. If you look at something, it exists. When you look away, it doesn’t.

Some NDEs don’t result in bringing back psychic powers. Maybe the experiencers come back with nothing more than a Connection. With their change in perspective, they may bring back wisdom. I realize even within the NDE community that there is an interest in knowing what you saw and any abilities you might now have. But fewer ask, “What did you learn? How are you wiser?” More than wisdom, most want the entertainment of stories and the demonstration of powers. Maybe it’s that folks have taken a bite of life’s apple and are still chewing before they can take a bite of whatever “wisdom” anyone else can share.

The IB may tell us to pay attention to our relationships, but there is an aspect to walking with God that’s incredibly solitary. There are things you can’t share because people will think you’re crazy or the experience is so personal, but eventually it’s because your frames of reference that give the Walk meaning are themselves transcendent and no one has that frame of reference to understand.

There is a difference between sitting in a theater with the entertained and distracted masses and going solo on an expedition. At some point, if you love adventure movies, wouldn’t it be natural to get on a plane or ship and go have an adventure? And when you come home people will want to know about what you saw and hold the souvenirs you brought back, but few ask what you learned about others or yourself.

Answers and Understanding are both important, but we are neither the answer or the understanding. We are the question- that’s why we search.


25NOV2018

Thank you to those who have visited and taken the time to read this. The challenge is that so many of us think we have all the answers we need. I deal with it myself- it’s human. Not to diminish the bruising of hard-won truths but new epiphanies are always ready around the next corner. That’s why when we re-read spiritual books, they can seem like a new, fresh read. It’s because we ourselves have changed. As we walk toward God, He runs toward us. Every father’s hand since Adam rushes to help us, every killer’s fist since Cain will try and stop us. In the end, it isn’t about wrestling our destiny from this war-torn place. It’s about letting go, to live within a new set of rules- God’s Grace. In our palms may be written our destiny but upon no palm or movement of any star is the dictation of His Grace, for it is in living only moment-by-moment, free of worry, that we are free at all.

During your experience, did you gain information about life's difficulties, challenges and hardships? No

During your experience, did you gain information about love? No

What life changes occurred in your life after your experience? Large changes in my life Using the IANDS Aftereffects page- I definitely am on that list.

Personal relationships- desire to have, struggle though. Wife and I have been in marriage therapy for a year- and the experience was 2 years ago.

Empathy- now I can't go into rooms with people in them sometimes- depending on their purpose for being there- this began with my first physical therapy session in the hospital. I would call myself an extreme introvert and I can feel people's energy states.

Healing- I don't have to do anything, just be nearby, and sometimes not.

Lights flickering, including bring an entire store's computer system down onetime when I started talking about the In Between and really felt one with it. This has happened other times too.

Have your relationships changed specifically because of your experience? Yes struggle. My wife feels left out.

After the NDE:

Was the experience difficult to express in words? Uncertain Yes and no- it was as if some of it was too big to immediately convey and was like a file I had to download, and then unpack when I got back. It is still unfolding.

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. I find it interesting that this 1 week of intense experience and memory is book-ended by several days of no-memory, physical shock, dealing with anesthesia, etc.

Do you have any psychic, non-ordinary or other special gifts after your experience that you did not have before the experience? Yes Described above- electrical sensitivity, empathy, healing. Super Likeable!

Are there one or several parts of your experience that are especially meaningful or significant to you? My Detachment to anything here. The fact that the In Between isn't a place you go to or come from, it is simply a place you are.

Have you ever shared this experience with others? Yes IANDS, www.inbetweneproductions.com, radio, and then a few friends.

Did you have any knowledge of near death experience (NDE) prior to your experience? Yes reading only, not first hand.

What did you believe about the reality of your experience shortly (days to weeks) after it happened? Experience was definitely real I wondered if I was dead and being in the hospital was me trying to come to grips with it (as a construct)

What do you believe about the reality of your experience now? Experience was definitely real More real than real

At any time in your life, has anything ever reproduced any part of the experience? Yes I am always there, still.

Are there any other questions that we could ask to help you communicate your experience? thank you