#WHATIS
#WHATIS
A NEAR-DEATH
EXPERIENCE?
DR PENNY SARTORI
This edition published in the UK and USA 2016 by
Watkins, an imprint of Watkins Media Limited
19 Cecil Court
London WC2N 4EZ
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Design and typography copyright © Watkins Media Limited 2016
Text copyright © Penny Sartori 2016
The author has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without prior permission in writing from the Publishers.
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Typeset by Manisha Patel
Printed and bound in Germany by GGP Media GmbH
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-78028-898-7
www.watkinspublishing.com
Why read this book?
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER 1
What are the features of NDEs, and are NDEs the same as OBEs?
CHAPTER 2
How distressing are NDEs?
CHAPTER 3
Who has NDEs and under what circumstances do they occur?
CHAPTER 4
What are the life-changing effects of NDEs?
CHAPTER 5
Can science explain NDEs?
CHAPTER 6
What can NDEs teach those who’ve never had one?
CHAPTER 7
What are the wider implications of knowing more about NDEs?
What next?
Further reading
Acknowledgments
My aim in writing this book is to provide an accessible guide to Near-Death Experiences (NDEs) for anyone who would like to learn more about them. Most people have heard of NDEs but the common features of these events and their meaning in the context of our lives are often shrouded in mystery. I passionately believe that NDEs have something to teach all of us, even if we have never ourselves had a near-death experience or anything like it.
This book will help you to …
1 Learn the major features and defining characteristics of NDEs as compared with other spiritual experiences.
2 Learn the difference between NDEs and out-of-body experiences.
3 Learn from the stories of those who have experienced an NDE.
4 Learn to identify an NDE if someone you meet describes one for you.
5 Discover how to validate the NDE experience for someone who’s had one.
6 Better understand the dying process, and the importance of dying with dignity.
7 Release your fear of death, and help others release theirs.
8 Improve your powers of empathy and understanding.
9 Challenge yourself to explore your own mortality.
10 Learn the importance of living mindfully – understanding how every moment matters.
11 See how your own actions impact upon those around you.
12 Consider the interconnectivity of all living things – humans, animals and the Earth.
13 Explore the nature of consciousness, and what it means to be conscious or unconscious.
14 Feel inspired to show love and compassion in all your undertakings and relationships.
15 Consider how learning about NDEs can help improve our healthcare provision.
16 Reflect on different cultures and belief systems – exploring both their similarities and differences – and how that manifests in experience of NDEs.
17 Consider your wishes for your own life and death, and how you wish to be treated as you die.
18 Become more open to talking about death frankly with those around you.
19 Enjoy the experience of expanding your understanding of spirituality in general.
20 Be inspired to delve further into this fascinating subject.
From this list you can see that I want to inspire you to consider NDEs as a learning tool for your own life. That applies as much to those who’ve never had an NDE as it does to those who have. I want to motivate you not only to further your knowledge of NDEs, but also to consider other, related aspects of spirituality. A spark of interest in NDEs can lead to an exploration of your own mortality and consciousness, as well as to an investigation of your own spiritual beliefs and how you formed them. Spirituality gives life meaning – it inspires us to live happy and fulfilled lives. It is not the same as religion, which is a doctrine – a set of given principles to adopt and interpret in light of your own circumstances. Spirituality invites you to seek your own life truths and to apply them to your life in order that they fulfil you.
In the Introduction I explain how I became interested in NDEs as a nurse and the story of my subsequent research and work with NDErs around the world. Chapter 1 sets out the characteristics of NDEs, while Chapter 2 explores whether NDEs are pleasant or distressing experiences. Chapter 3 looks at the circumstances that can lead to NDEs, and who has them, while Chapter 4 reveals how NDEs change lives. Chapter 5 delves into the science of NDEs, highlighting the latest medical research into the phenomenon. The final chapters of the book look at what we can learn from NDEs, how we can be more sympathetic toward those who’ve had them, and what a greater understanding of these experiences could mean for humankind as a whole.
This book is designed to make NDEs as accessible as possible, with the help of the following features:
• A Q&A approach that chapter by chapter explores the questions that are often asked about NDEs.
• ‘Case Study’ boxes that share real-life experiences of NDEs.
• ‘Focus On’ boxes that suggest practical ways of putting the lessons learned from NDErs into practice in everyday life.
• At the end of the book, a ‘What Next’ section, including a further reading list, suggests how to continue your investigations – there is so much more to say about NDEs and there are so many more fascinating things to learn.
The following abbreviations are used throughout the book for key terms:
NDE – near-death experience
NDEr – near-death experiencer
OBE – out-of-body experience
DBV – deathbed vision
STE – spiritually transformative experience
For many, death is a taboo subject. We might think that death is for other people – perhaps the ill or the elderly – and not our concern. Until, that is, something drastic happens: perhaps our own diagnosis of terminal illness, a near-miss accident, or the death of someone we love. Given that death is the only certainty in life, it is strange that we rarely spend time thinking about it. Paradoxically, though, when we do contemplate what it means to die and we think about the process of dying, we open ourselves to discovering the essentials of living a fulfilled, connected life.
After a brush with death, many people report experiences they find hard to put into words. This tongue-tie is often because what happened felt like no experience they’d ever had before. How can any of us describe something for which we have no tangible frame of reference? And if we can’t ourselves understand that experience, or expect that anyone else has been through it, how can we share it? The term for an experience that occurs in the moments between life and death is a ‘near-death experience’, or an NDE. Historically, many of those who’ve had one have been reluctant to talk about it. That’s something I want to change.
Advances in healthcare mean that, year on year, far more people are surviving cardiac arrest and critical illness than ever before. It is therefore highly likely that the numbers of people encountering NDEs will also increase. The information about NDEs offered in the following pages will, I hope, help all of us understand such experiences better, with both the experiencers (the NDErs) and those of us who hear NDE accounts benefiting from improved understanding. Learning from others who have been affected by NDEs can lead to great insights into the impermanence of life. This knowledge is incredibly empowering, helping us to enjoy our lives while we have them, and soothing away our fears relating to death.
I began a 21-year nursing career in 1989. At the start I worked throughout the hospital, in various departments, but eventually I found my vocation in intensive care, where I nursed for 17 years. Here, I was confronted with death on such a frequent basis I had no choice but to face up to the single certainty that death comes to everyone. It does not care for age (it is not only for the elderly), and sometimes it takes us entirely by surprise (it is not only for the ill). During my career I nursed thousands of patients through their deaths; and I’ve nursed loved ones at the end of their lives, too.
Early on in my career, as I cared for a dying patient, an upsetting encounter threw me into a deep depression that forced me to question life and death. Soon after I read a book about NDEs. I was filled with preconceived ideas and scepticism, but the book opened a sense of fascination within me and drew me to find out more. As a result I undertook the UK’s first long-term prospective study of NDEs at the intensive therapy unit (ITU) where I worked. I spent five years interviewing patients who survived their admission to the ITU, asking them if they had any memories of the time during which they were unconscious. Then, after eight years of intense doctoral study, in 2005 I was awarded a PhD. It is more than 20 years since my fascination with NDEs began, and I have lectured at conferences all over the world and amassed a database of hundreds of accounts of NDEs. I believe I have a duty to share my knowledge in order to help other people understand what NDEs are and why they are so important.
This book feels timely to me as we are increasingly open-minded about the links between mind, body and spirit. Recent years have seen greater acceptance of spirituality in general and especially in relation to patient care in hospitals. We are lucky to be able to benefit from powerful technology and deep scientific understanding of life and death, but we also now realize how important the spiritual aspects of life are to our overall well-being.
When I began my research more than 20 years ago, it was very difficult to find someone who was willing to talk to me about their NDE. Many people were wary of me (would I question their mental health?), others struggled to put their experience into words, and some simply did not want to share this deeply personal aspect of themselves. Gradually, as people got to hear about my work, more and more of them made contact with me. Nonetheless, when my book The Wisdom of NDEs was published in 2014, I was not prepared for the huge response it would receive.
A few weeks prior to the book’s launch, my publisher called me to say that a national newspaper was going to feature my text in two articles. My initial reaction was one of alarm: how would the general public respond to my research? By the end of the day in which the first article was published, social media saw to it that my book was known all over the world. The majority of the comments I received were very positive. In itself, this made me realize that attitudes toward NDEs (and spiritual experiences in general) had changed a lot since my research began. Furthermore, the article encouraged many people to talk about their own experiences. Instead of the two articles originally planned five were published, one featuring the accounts of NDErs who were willing to share their stories publicly, alongside their photographs. It was a breakthrough.
During the first few weeks following my book’s publication, I received around 200 emails a day from NDErs all over the world. More than a year later, I still receive hundreds of emails a week. But it’s not just that people who’ve experienced an NDE are more comfortable than ever before talking about their experiences – there’s also a healthy curiosity about NDE among those who’ve never had the experience themselves. Slowly, we’re learning that perhaps science does not have all the answers. In fact, there is much we can learn from NDEs that we can apply to our everyday lives, regardless of whether or not we have first-hand knowledge of this particular spiritual phenomenon.
Now is an exciting time to be exploring further what it means to be human in life, death, and consciousness. I hope that the information in the following pages helps you on this journey.
NDEs transcend all other human experience; they are more than physical occurrences, being more numinous or mystical in nature. Many people imagine that NDEs must be dreamlike, but this is not the case. A dream is transitory and often vague, whereas NDEs result in heightened states of awareness: the senses become more acute – colours may appear more vibrant, smells may be more vivid, and sounds may become audible over otherwise impossible distances. Often the NDEr may become aware of events that are occurring in a different location. It can be an extraordinary, overwhelming experience that leaves the NDEr facing important life changes.
NDEs usually occur spontaneously and unexpectedly, when someone is genuinely near death or during a life-threatening situation (see case study, pages 22–3), so it may take a while for the person to realize what is going on. No two NDEs that I have ever heard of are the same, although many share certain characteristics and go on to result in significant life changes (which we’ll talk about later in the chapter).
The most common characteristics or themes were first identified by Dr Raymond Moody in 1975 in his book Life After Life (see the list, opposite). Not every NDE comprises all of these components – some may have just one or two.
Characteristics or themes may come and go, and don’t necessarily occur in any order. Some may be intricate and in-depth, others may be simple.
This list summarizes Moody’s findings about the most commonly shared features of NDEs:
• Hearing the news of being close to death (or of being dead)
• Hearing ‘white’ noise
• Having an out-of-body experience (OBE)
• Experiencing feelings of peace and tranquillity
• Travelling through a dark tunnel
• Seeing a bright light
• Entering another realm
• Meeting those who have already died
• Meeting a ‘Being of Light’
• Communicating without words
• Experiencing a ‘life review’
• Feeling a sense of unity or interconnectivity
• Experiencing distortion of time
• Coming to a barrier or point of no return
• Being sent back to life
All the points on this list are explored in more detail on pages 24–9.