Discussion NDE, after life, unexplained?

[Kaput]

Just curious, has anyone here ever had a NDE or paranormal experience?
The possibility of an even worse afterlife (hell) scares me.
Personally, I've survived some bad accidents, but never actually "died".

 

[Escaper Boy]

Hmm, does Astral Projection count as "paranormal" experience?

When I was 18-19 years old, I was very invested in finding the "truth" regarding God, religion, and afterlife. I read everything I could get about spirituality, reincarnation, NDE, cosmology theory, scientific view, even the New Age woo-woo stuff.

This was the time I came across the information of Astral Projection. I was interested with it because this was an experience that I could use to find the "answer". I thought if I could do it, at least I could confirm that I have a soul.

Long story short, I tried many techniques I read from internet. I did meditation. I listened to binaural beat audio (I don't think it helped). I messed up my sleep schedule by setting alarm at 2 am in order to "practice" my OBE everyday.

After trying really hard to induce sleep paralysis for like 2 months, one night, I managed to achieve separation. I exited my physical body, I felt pretty much floating. I could feel like I possessed a head and torso. But, I didn't feel my hands and legs. It's almost feel like my whole "body" turned into medium size balloon.

My bedroom was dark, but I somehow could "see" the color of the wall, where was the chair/desk/door. When I look at the door, there was a weird black shadowy "thing" floating near my door. It's hard to explain who/what that "thing" was, my first instinct was pretty much saying danger, danger!

I mentally tried to move my astral body back to my sleeping body asap (I was scared, lol). I immediately woke up with electric jolt sensation. My whole head to toe were tingling like crazy.

Since then, I tried really hard to replicate what I did in order to Astral Project again. No such luck. I couldn't repeat it. A part of me is kinda skeptic about it. Maybe, I was only dreaming or hallucinating. But, I remembered the experience felt so real, completely different from dreaming experience.

You can say I'm 85% believe I'm more than my physical body. The other 15% part of me believe there is no such thing about soul or afterlife.

 

[suicideofpeace]

Try to read DEATH the book written by shelly kagan who is professor yele university

And try to watch interviews of steven hawking

Both of dont belive god and afterlife

The former explans using philosophie
afterlife is not existence

The latter explans using physics ,in universe god is not existence anywhere

 

[Kaput]

Hmm, does Astral Projection count as "paranormal" experience?

When I was 18-19 years old, I was very invested in finding the "truth" regarding God, religion, and afterlife. I read everything I could get about spirituality, reincarnation, NDE, cosmology theory, scientific view, even the New Age woo-woo stuff.

This was the time I came across the information of Astral Projection. I was interested with it because this was an experience that I could use to find the "answer". I thought if I could do it, at least I could confirm that I have a soul.

Long story short, I tried many techniques I read from internet. I did meditation. I listened to binaural beat audio (I don't think it helped). I messed up my sleep schedule by setting alarm at 2 am in order to "practice" my OBE everyday.

After trying really hard to induce sleep paralysis for like 2 months, one night, I managed to achieve separation. I exited my physical body, I felt pretty much floating. I could feel like I possessed a head and torso. But, I didn't feel my hands and legs. It's almost feel like my whole "body" turned into medium size balloon.

My bedroom was dark, but I somehow could "see" the color of the wall, where was the chair/desk/door. When I look at the door, there was a weird black shadowy "thing" floating near my door. It's hard to explain who/what that "thing" was, my first instinct was pretty much saying danger, danger!

I mentally tried to move my astral body back to my sleeping body asap (I was scared, lol). I immediately woke up with electric jolt sensation. My whole head to toe were tingling like crazy.

Since then, I tried really hard to replicate what I did in order to Astral Project again. No such luck. I couldn't repeat it. A part of me is kinda skeptic about it. Maybe, I was only dreaming or hallucinating. But, I remembered the experience felt so real, completely different from dreaming experience.

You can say I'm 85% believe I'm more than my physical body. The other 15% part of me believe there is no such thing about soul or afterlife.

Wow! Thank you for sharing. Sounds intense and terrifying.

 

[Addy92]

I've TRIED DMT changa. That was crazy.

 

[Kaput]

What haopened?

I've TRIED DMT changa. That was crazy.

What happened?

 

[Addy92]

It was weird. I saw everything from outside my body. I saw myself socialising.

 

[Eeyore]

Never had one but I think there is no hell. There is a temporary pause in which you reflect on life and what not and then you go again. Buddhism reincarnation and that shit to me seems most likely. Someone might say I believe that because I want to exist after I die but its not like that. I think there is some kind of order to this universe but it doesn't mean that there is god or that god is what we think it is.

 

[EddieAllenPoe]

I don't know how a person could ever really know the truth about an afterlife until after they've actually died. That's not a fun or satisfying answer, but it's at least an honest observation. It would seem that if you actually care about what's true, you have to learn to tolerate uncertainty.

There are many people on here who say they WISH for nothingness after death. They have very little reason to believe it will be nothingness. But that doesn't stop them from believing it. They're simply happy to believe it will be nothingness. It's not knowledge, it's an opinion. I'm guessing that they hate life so much now that they cannot tolerate the possibility of an afterlife. They'll often try to prove this is true by saying we don't remember being conscious BEFORE birth, so they believe it's obvious we won't be conscious AFTER death.

This sort of reasoning is flawed... Lacking memory of consciousness PRIOR to birth does not automatically mean we were not alive or conscious BEFORE birth. It certainly doesn't prove our consciousness will cease after death. It only shows that some people don't remember anything before birth. It neither proves nor disproves an afterlife.

Flip side, I've often noticed how deeply religious and spiritual people can talk for hours about their beliefs without needing much evidence or reason. They'll often derive their beliefs from scriptures or hearsay. Why would they trust scriptures or hearsay? It would seem to be because they wish for their beliefs and opinions to be true. Their opinions are no better than people who wish for nothingness.

Personally, I find it hard to believe our consciousness ends after death. It actually would seem to be highly improbable. Simply being alive in the first place to ponder my existence ONCE seems about as absurd as winning a national lottery a trillion times in a row. I have no reason to believe that every "near death"/"out of body"/"reincarnation" story is simply made up. I think they're evidences of things we do not understand.

You ever had a dream that seemed real until after you woke up? I have. I think it's possible that what we call physical reality may actually be connected to a "higher reality".

Flip side, It certainly does appear that we would stop existing after our brain dies. It also seems obvious that most people won't read what I've wrote. So why did I bother writing it? I don't know. I guess I enjoy talking about these things.

 

[EmotionlessWanderer]

The best method of research is just to point a gun at your own head and pull the trigger. Dark jokes aside, I believe in OOBE's and the Astral Plane as an afterlife. To me it seems possible compared to most religions.

 

[Eeyore]

Of course we don't know anything about what comes after death but it is intriguing to think about it. We are all gonna go through that and we still have no clue. I read some stuff about children remembering their past life and then forgetting that stuff after age of 5. Very interesting and I recommend to others to check that out. I also sometimes have strange dreams that seem very real or like they are from some alternate dimension. We are still confined to our planet and can't travel to other planets so our understanding of universe is very limited. Who knows what else is possible. There is probably some kind of life form that knows what happens after death or maybe they don't even die. But like you said, this stuff can lead to believing what you want to happen. Like those people who prepare for doomsday scenarios, ufo cults, flat earthers, conspiracy theorists. Because our lives are not that interesting we want something exciting. Questioning stuff and exploring is fantastic and everyone should want to know more about the world but some people get very carried away by some stuff.

 

[EddieAllenPoe]

The best method of research is just to point a gun at your own head and pull the trigger. Dark jokes aside, I believe in OOBE's and the Astral Plane as an afterlife. To me it seems possible compared to most religions.

I know you're joking, but that reminds me of reading about the time L. Ron Hubbard, the notorious founder of Scientology, "came up" with a technique he called R2-45. He said it was a sure fire way to know we have souls but "it's frowned upon" by society at this time. It's hard to know if he was joking or being serious. I'm pretty sure a lot of people took him seriously. Sometimes fact is stranger than fiction....

 

[Kaput]

Of course we don't know anything about what comes after death but it is intriguing to think about it. We are all gonna go through that and we still have no clue. I read some stuff about children remembering their past life and then forgetting that stuff after age of 5. Very interesting and I recommend to others to check that out. I also sometimes have strange dreams that seem very real or like they are from some alternate dimension. We are still confined to our planet and can't travel to other planets so our understanding of universe is very limited. Who knows what else is possible. There is probably some kind of life form that knows what happens after death or maybe they don't even die. But like you said, this stuff can lead to believing what you want to happen. Like those people who prepare for doomsday scenarios, ufo cults, flat earthers, conspiracy theorists. Because our lives are not that interesting we want something exciting. Questioning stuff and exploring is fantastic and everyone should want to know more about the world but some people get very carried away by some stuff.

Yes, I wonder, given the prevalence of stories reported online. Closest Ive come was a sleep.paralysis once. Not the same.

 

[netrezven]

I used to believe that death is equal to what it was before i get born - nothing.

 

[lost_soul83]

I don't know how a person could ever really know the truth about an afterlife until after they've actually died. That's not a fun or satisfying answer, but it's at least an honest observation. It would seem that if you actually care about what's true, you have to learn to tolerate uncertainty.

There are many people on here who say they WISH for nothingness after death. They have very little reason to believe it will be nothingness. But that doesn't stop them from believing it. They're simply happy to believe it will be nothingness. It's not knowledge, it's an opinion. I'm guessing that they hate life so much now that they cannot tolerate the possibility of an afterlife. They'll often try to prove this is true by saying we don't remember being conscious BEFORE birth, so they believe it's obvious we won't be conscious AFTER death.

This sort of reasoning is flawed... Lacking memory of consciousness PRIOR to birth does not automatically mean we were not alive or conscious BEFORE birth. It certainly doesn't prove our consciousness will cease after death. It only shows that some people don't remember anything before birth. It neither proves nor disproves an afterlife.

Flip side, I've often noticed how deeply religious and spiritual people can talk for hours about their beliefs without needing much evidence or reason. They'll often derive their beliefs from scriptures or hearsay. Why would they trust scriptures or hearsay? It would seem to be because they wish for their beliefs and opinions to be true. Their opinions are no better than people who wish for nothingness.

Personally, I find it hard to believe our consciousness ends after death. It actually would seem to be highly improbable. Simply being alive in the first place to ponder my existence ONCE seems about as absurd as winning a national lottery a trillion times in a row. I have no reason to believe that every "near death"/"out of body"/"reincarnation" story is simply made up. I think they're evidences of things we do not understand.

You ever had a dream that seemed real until after you woke up? I have. I think it's possible that what we call physical reality may actually be connected to a "higher reality".

Flip side, It certainly does appear that we would stop existing after our brain dies. It also seems obvious that most people won't read what I've wrote. So why did I bother writing it? I don't know. I guess I enjoy talking about these things.

Well keep writing it down and I'll keep reading it! You make some great points and I enjoy reading your posts that cover a topic from all angles and viewpoints. Thank you!

 

[Exile]

There is zero evidence of life after death, only wishful thinking. I read years ago about a hospital where doctors decided to test the claims of many patients to have had a near death experience and floated above their bodies during surgery. It was very simple - they placed signs in places in the operating room that could not be seen from below. No one was ever able to say what those signs said.

To those who say that we have no evidence either way, so each belief is equally valid, no, they aren't. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and the burden of proof lies on those positing some kind of supernatural existence.

Weird things happen when our consciousness is altered. When I got anesthetics as a kid to get my tonsils out, I believed that the operating table had suddenly broken in two and that I would fall off one of the edges. That never happened but at the time I would have sworn that it did.

 

[EddieAllenPoe]

There is zero evidence of life after death, only wishful thinking. I read years ago about a hospital where doctors decided to test the claims of many patients to have had a near death experience and floated above their bodies during surgery. It was very simple - they placed signs in places in the operating room that could not be seen from below. No one was ever able to say what those signs said.

To those who say that we have no evidence either way, so each belief is equally valid, no, they aren't. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and the burden of proof lies on those positing some kind of supernatural existence.

Weird things happen when our consciousness is altered. When I got anesthetics as a kid to get my tonsils out, I believed that the operating table had suddenly broken in two and that I would fall off one of the edges. That never happened but at the time I would have sworn that it did.

Somebody on here opened a thread asking "What did you dream about last night?" Ever since they posted it I kept trying to recall my dreams but my memory of the details fade pretty fast after waking up. It's probably no more than ten minutes after I wake up that I don't have any memory of my dreams at all. I know I'm having them though. Do you think that means there is zero evidence I'm having dreams? Am I just making it up? That's obviously not a rational view. You can't simply throw your bias onto thousands of Near Death Experiences and say you've proven they aren't real because you can't test them. Just because you can't conduct a falsifiable scientific test on near death experiences doesn't mean they're not real or valid. It's a valid reason to be skeptical though. It's not "zero evidence" or "wishful thinking". The stories are evidence of something happening and it's unlikely simple wishful thinking was the cause. You just simply don't know because you can't know.

 

[Exile]

The fact that you're comparing dreaming, for which there is extensive scientific evidence, and near death experiences, for which there is none, tells me all I need to know about your relationship to facts and logic. It's not bias to state a fact.

 

[EddieAllenPoe]

The fact that you're comparing dreaming, for which there is extensive scientific evidence, and near death experiences, for which there is none, tells me all I need to know about your relationship to facts and logic. It's not bias to state a fact.

Ugh. No. It's very similar. You have probably had dreams and so you're just less likely to doubt I've had a dream. Some people claim they've never had a dream. Why would a person like that believe I have dreams when I sleep? I don't think hooking EEG monitors up to people's heads constitutes "extensive scientific evidence" of the reality of dreams. It's ultimately a subjective experience.

If I made the claim that I had psychic or clairvoyant abilities, then you might be able to test my claims. Because I'm claiming to know things which you could objectively test. For example, there is something called Zener cards which have been used to show how many so-called "psychics" were making predictions that were indistinguishable from random guessing.

Have you ever been clinically dead and later came back to life? You probably haven't. The number of accounts of people who have died and come back to life is rare but it's not "none". There are many people who have claimed that they were conscious after being dead. We wouldn't be talking about it if this were somehow not the case. Do you have to believe their stories? No. There's many people who believe they're simply experiencing a hallucination of the brain. But it's a belief. It's not a "fact". Claiming your belief is a fact is beyond stupid. You simply cannot know something like that. There's not going to be some kind of damn test for it. First of all, you could never control for variables because death is often sudden and unexpected. You're also simply never going to know what the experience of death is like until you're dead. You can make all the measurements you want... but numbers can't tell stories.

 

[Exile]

No, it's not the same in any way. Do some reading on the range of scientific study of the biological/physiological aspects of dreaming. I don't need to take someone's word to know that people (and other animals) dream. And it's not just EEGs - there are neurotransmitters that are affected and other physical/chemical changes. There is nothing equivalent for NDEs. No scientific evidence whatsoever.

What one dreams about is a subjective experience. The science of what happens to the body is not.

 

[Broken]

I don't believe in an afterlife. We don't know anything from before were born so I think death will be the same.

 

[EddieAllenPoe]

No, it's not the same in any way. Do some reading on the range of scientific study of the biological/physiological aspects of dreaming. I don't need to take someone's word to know that people (and other animals) dream. And it's not just EEGs - there are neurotransmitters that are affected and other physical/chemical changes. There is nothing equivalent for NDEs. No scientific evidence whatsoever.

What one dreams about is a subjective experience. The science of what happens to the body is not.

Oh. My apologies. I guess that does settle it then. There is no scientific evidence whatsoever. Case closed. I guess I should just go do some more reading or something.

 

[Exile]

Oh. My apologies. I guess that does settle it then. There is no scientific evidence whatsoever. Case closed. I guess I should just go do some more reading or something.

You really should.

 

[Eeyore]

You really should.

Your response on this is actually anti science. Every thing we discovered was mostly born from speculation. We have no firm evidence of what comes after death but these things we mentioned in the thread might give us some clues on what might happen. It is stupid to dismiss those clues because they havent been scientifically proven because how would you test them? Hawking wrote about parallell dimensions and we still dont know if they exist but why would I dismiss that possibility that they do exist?. We still havent even reached that point where we can prove that they do or do not exist. We also have no evidence of alien life, yet everything points to that there is a high probability that we are not alone in this universe. Same thing with this stuff.

 

[Exile]

Apples and oranges again, as well as nonsense. Observation is what drives scientific enquiry and evidence and logic are used to develop and change theories. Ideas about other dimensions, multiple universes and life elsewhere in the universe are based on a foundation of solid scientific enquiry and theories that match the observable world. Again, there is nothing like this for NDEs or, for that matter, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, who I'm sure you concede is just as legitimate as any other deity.

 

[Eeyore]

I never said this thing is absolutely true and real. I said that I don't know but I definitely won't exclude that possibility. As a humanity we are still not advanced species to be able to understand this stuff. I am though convinced that there could be other specie that understands death and what happens afterward. This is not flat earth nonsense because we have a ton of evidence that the earth is round. We can see that easily with our eyes but we cannot see afterlife or what happens after. There are two possibilities: that we just cease to exist in any form or something else happens. That we just cease to exist could be true but there are a ton of stuff we have yet to unpack. Our religions, psychedelic, near death experiences, children talking about their previous lives(telling names that really existed, describing house and family or previous dead family members that they couldn't see in this life) etc. Experiences like that tell us that maybe there is something else that we still don't understand. Excluding something we don't even understand as nonsense is completely anti science. We should be curious and we should explore and test out in order to advance as species. And here you go: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6172100/. This is evidence that we should definitely keep an eye on this.

 

[Alan James]

Ketamine can cause near-death experience (NDE). People are completely alive and well and still experience NDE. Looks like it's not death related.

This Study Found That Ketamine Trips are Similar to Near-Death Experiences

Other psychedelics can lead near-death experiences too, but in new research, ketamine's effects were found to be the closest.

tonic.vice.com

Karl Jansen, Ketamine and Near-Death Experiences

Near-Death Experiences and the Afterlife discusses about Karl Jansen, Ketamine and Near-Death Experiences . Did you enjoy reading this post, we have more!

www.near-death.com

 

[BridgeJumper]

Hmm, does Astral Projection count as "paranormal" experience?

When I was 18-19 years old, I was very invested in finding the "truth" regarding God, religion, and afterlife. I read everything I could get about spirituality, reincarnation, NDE, cosmology theory, scientific view, even the New Age woo-woo stuff.

This was the time I came across the information of Astral Projection. I was interested with it because this was an experience that I could use to find the "answer". I thought if I could do it, at least I could confirm that I have a soul.

Long story short, I tried many techniques I read from internet. I did meditation. I listened to binaural beat audio (I don't think it helped). I messed up my sleep schedule by setting alarm at 2 am in order to "practice" my OBE everyday.

After trying really hard to induce sleep paralysis for like 2 months, one night, I managed to achieve separation. I exited my physical body, I felt pretty much floating. I could feel like I possessed a head and torso. But, I didn't feel my hands and legs. It's almost feel like my whole "body" turned into medium size balloon.

My bedroom was dark, but I somehow could "see" the color of the wall, where was the chair/desk/door. When I look at the door, there was a weird black shadowy "thing" floating near my door. It's hard to explain who/what that "thing" was, my first instinct was pretty much saying danger, danger!

I mentally tried to move my astral body back to my sleeping body asap (I was scared, lol). I immediately woke up with electric jolt sensation. My whole head to toe were tingling like crazy.

Since then, I tried really hard to replicate what I did in order to Astral Project again. No such luck. I couldn't repeat it. A part of me is kinda skeptic about it. Maybe, I was only dreaming or hallucinating. But, I remembered the experience felt so real, completely different from dreaming experience.

You can say I'm 85% believe I'm more than my physical body. The other 15% part of me believe there is no such thing about soul or afterlife.

Is it possible to achieve astral projection without meaning to or practicing? Recently I had a string of dreams during which I first couldnt move at all, not even my eyelids, and then separated from myself and did things outside of my bed while still sleeping (if that makes sense), then I would wake up shocked because Im still in my bed and it felt so real. Sometimes I would even see entities after I woke up in my dream and started exploring.

As for near death experiences, never had one. I wasnt drowning long enough to die, just long enough for asphyxia to kick in.

 

[Alan James]

I have never experienced anything like it (but I was not in such states, I didn't die). But in my childhood I saw a very strange hallucination (I think so - I'm a skeptic, this can't be real) that I remembered for the rest of my life. I do not understand what it was.

The following happened: I was 5 or 6 years old, in the evening I went to sleep in my room like usual, I heard my parents watching TV in the next room, lay for 20-30 minutes and couldn't sleep. The room was dark but not completely, at a distance of about 2 meters one could see quite a lot. I definitely didn't sleep, started to get out of bed and felt something strange, incomprehensible feeling and noticed some silhouette in the opposite end of the room. I thought that my mother came into the room and was going to ask what she wanted, was going to open my mouth and froze when I saw that this "I didn't know what" had 2 big horns on his head, this creature slowly came closer to my bed and I saw his head better and I realized that this is definitely not a human. I didn't know what to do, but I was not scared - i was shocked, I didn't expect to see something like that and stood still not knowing what to do and how to react to it. It certainly wasn't some kind of monster or animal, it wasn't scary at all - despite the large upward and backward horns on the head and the fact that it wasn't exactly human, this creature looked beautiful, I probably never saw anyone more beautiful. I kind of felt that this is something very clever and certainly from the "good guys", that I have nothing to fear at all. His head was very similar to how dragons are usually depicted and his horns were like those of a dragon, but his face were very graceful and it had very beautiful eyes. The body had long clothes and some kind of metal equipment and electronic devices - the body itself was hard to see. The clothes were black and from some strange ribbed fabric, like a mixture of fabric and metal, it was very elastic and followed the movements of the body. It was obvious that this creature is not only reasonable - it is much smarter than humans, uses some very advanced technology, there was something magnificent in it, a strange sensation. It just stood and looked at me, I don't know exactly how much time, I didn't notice because I was in shock, my thoughts were "what the hell am I supposed to do?". Then it just disappeared - it is there and after a split second it does not. I jumped out of bed and ran into the room to my parents, I was shaking, I felt very strange, I do not know how to describe it.

 

[foxtail]

You can say I'm 85% believe I'm more than my physical body. The other 15% part of me believe there is no such thing about soul or afterlife.

That's a very interested experienced. I like your tag 累坏了... I should be angry about what happened to me but instead I'm just tired.