46 replies to this topic

[Laurie Ann]

~Ever since my step-mom passed away (a few weeks ago), I've wondered more times than I care to imagine, on what it's really like after you pass away. When she was laying there on the ventilator, she'd make motions with her body as if her soul was struggling to leave her body. Meaning, she'd raise both arms up slightly, then her chest, then she'd rest again. She did this a few times.
I just think alot about what happens afterwards, ya know. Maybe it takes a few days to get your soul into Heaven. For the couple of days after she passed away, it was gloomy & rainy. Then 3 days later, the sun was out with all its brilliance. I just had a feeling that this was her first day in Heaven (go figure, I don't even believe in Heaven or Hell). Anyhoo....I think this is a very good discussion.

[aloha_spirit]

Erato, something you said resonates with me.

A few days after I started my 2-year religious mission, had a dream where I knew I wouldn't see my paternal grandparents again in this life. I was already on my mission, so I couldn't run away and visit them one last time, nor were phone calls allowed. Roughly a year later my grandma passed away (I was still out of country on my mission). Plans were made for me to visit my grandpa on my way back home, but due to unforeseen circumstances the plans were changed. Grandpa passed away weeks before my next scheduled visit.

What happens at the exact moment of death? My sect says when the spirit leaves the body, the body dies. Beyond no longer having a physical shell, all I can do is speculate.

[~*Jazzy*~]

meanderer, on Oct 26 2007, 08:12 AM, said:

On another site I belong to, someone's "signature" on his profile went something like:

"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, in his sleep; not screaming and crying like the passengers in his back seat".

I just thought that was funny....

Ok meanderer, we must both have a very morbid sense of humor! lol

[Mark London]

This a good post !

This is only from experience, and beileve me, I have had my fair share of these.

When it is our time, usually a white mist will appear around us and a loved one who has previously been deceased will generally collect us and off we go (this is the long and short of it of course)

Sometimes though we may not be ready to go, so therefore we try to hang on or fight it, but if we are in pain at that point we just want to get over it and be released from the hell of it.

Also if the family try to fight with them ans dont want them to die then this can be quite difficult for the person dying as they dont want to upset their family and their energies force them to stay on this plain.

I know it was concise but I could write a book on this subject.

[erato]

Laurie Ann, on Oct 27 2007, 02:11 AM, said:

~Ever since my step-mom passed away (a few weeks ago), I've wondered more times than I care to imagine, on what it's really like after you pass away. When she was laying there on the ventilator, she'd make motions with her body as if her soul was struggling to leave her body. Meaning, she'd raise both arms up slightly, then her chest, then she'd rest again. She did this a few times.
I just think alot about what happens afterwards, ya know. Maybe it takes a few days to get your soul into Heaven. For the couple of days after she passed away, it was gloomy & rainy. Then 3 days later, the sun was out with all its brilliance. I just had a feeling that this was her first day in Heaven (go figure, I don't even believe in Heaven or Hell). Anyhoo....I think this is a very good discussion.

All of your comments are so interesting but I would like to comment on something that L-Ann mentioned.

Funny you should notice the three days because in alot of cultures the soul rests in a transitory place and then on the fourth day (or night) the spirit moves on. This is why in most pacific cultures there is a big feast on the fourth night to commemorate this. On the fourth night after my mum's passing, we had close family (just her sisters and my cousins) over and we had dinner and some wine (my suggestion) to celebrate and toast her life's accomplishments. The traditional fourth night would have been a huge community feasting and exchanging of traditioal gifts but in this day and age, that's just too expensive and plus my mum didnt want a traditional funeral. But I thought it was significant that we commemorate the fourth night.

There is a 'old' belief that for the first couple of days the spirit rests in pulotu (place of the spirits) and there is great happiness, singing, dancing, a general playfulness. Then on the fourth day, the spirit moves to the next level or dimension. I dont know all the details but we are told that there are 7 levels of heaven or dimensions.

Just thought I'd share.

Big hugs

~e

[freyjasdottir]

I think what happens is as unique as the person involved and that it isn't quite the same for any two people. I know and have spoken with at least three people who have had near death expierences and each of those has had different things happen. I was holding my grandfather's hand as he passed. Every death is as individual as the life that proceeded it.

[aloha_spirit]

erato, on Oct 29 2007, 06:08 AM, said:

Funny you should notice the three days because in alot of cultures the soul rests in a transitory place and then on the fourth day (or night) the spirit moves on. This is why in most pacific cultures there is a big feast on the fourth night to commemorate this.

This 3-day transitory state is also why Jesus waited to resurrect Lazarus and then himself. Jews believed that the spirit hung around for 3 days, so the person wasn't truly dead until that 3rd day.

It was my understanding that in the South Pacific (Tonga, Samoa, New Zealand, etc) that the families would hire professional mourners to cry out. Guests bring food for a pot luck that lasts days and days, but the feast is normally somber. Of course, all my information comes from second or third hand sources.

[erato]

Aloha yes you're right there is some similarity to the Biblical three days but in fact in mythology (Sina and Tingilau for example) where the soul is able to be brought back to the land of the living before the end of this 3 day transitory period. I have heard of the traditional mourners but havent come across it myself in Samoa. Some families do however have a big shindig on the fourth night dancing and partying etc to celebrate the life of the loved one (it's all abit much for me) but its been known to happen.

But we digress, sorry for the diversion guys.. great thread

~e

[Christmommie]

meanderer, on Oct 26 2007, 08:12 AM, said:

On another site I belong to, someone's "signature" on his profile went something like:

"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, in his sleep; not screaming and crying like the passengers in his back seat".

I just thought that was funny....

When I read that quote, I actually Laughed Out Loud! Thanks for sharing!

Edited by Christmommie, 06 November 2007 - 02:34 PM.

[tonighth]

meanderer, on Oct 26 2007, 08:12 AM, said:

On another site I belong to, someone's "signature" on his profile went something like:

"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, in his sleep; not screaming and crying like the passengers in his back seat".

I just thought that was funny....

I heard this for the first time about 2 years ago and I laughed like a fool and laughed everytime I thought about it and used it every chance I got to boot lol.

[Tantric Kitten]

I think it is a personal experience that has some commonalities and many more differences.

I honestly believe that the people who see loved ones around them are those who need those people with them to make the transition and who have asked for/expect that sort of death. I don't think it's a result of endorphins being released... I think endorphins being released are a result of the comfort and love and gratitude that one experiences in that situation.

I also REALLY don't believe in the "three day transition" thing. It's not how I've experienced death (not my own, that of close loved ones). Maybe if you believe in it strongly enough it happens. My experience is that the person is free at the instant of death. When my father died, I watched an angel come into the room, hold his hand out to my father and take the hand of my father's spirit that got up and left, leaving my father's body behind. My father's body, at that same moment gave the long, slow, last breath stereotypically known as the "death rattle". This wasn't hallucinated... I had a vision that this was how it was going to be weeks ahead of time and it's how it was. My stepmother has, somewhere, a tape of hymns that was demagnetized at the moment the angel stepped into the room. I am also perfectly aware that not five hours later my father came to me (after having gone through what must have been the fastest orientation in the history of death) while I was at Target to keep me from crying in front of the cashier who so thoughtlessly asked me how my day was going as she rung me up (I'm being facetious... please don't bash me for the choice of wording). I have had other much-loved people come to me at the moment of their death even though I was miles away from them. I've watched every single one of them cross over into the light... not hang around their body. I think that the three day transitory state came about because every so often someone would be in a deep, deep coma and thought to be dead... and after three days you're going to be SURE someone's dead (as in, they start to rot and smell and turn colors...).

Anyway, death is a personal process... everyone experiences it differently and science can never explain it properly because once you die you're gone (an NDE isn't death... it's a choice made at the point of death before you've gone irrevocably) and can't really relay what exactly happens. Science also can't really explain the human soul... the essence of who we are... because it doesn't work on scientific principle.

Edited by Tantric Kitten, 20 November 2007 - 05:18 PM.

[windesire]

~*Jazzy*~, on Oct 26 2007, 01:35 PM, said:

meanderer, on Oct 26 2007, 08:12 AM, said:

On another site I belong to, someone's "signature" on his profile went something like:

"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, in his sleep; not screaming and crying like the passengers in his back seat".

I just thought that was funny....

Ok meanderer, we must both have a very morbid sense of humor! lol

okay I can't help but put my two cent in....

whatever happens it can't be that bad...people are dying to get there.

[flyingorb]

I suspect the circumstances and beliefs of the dying person determines what occures after death. It is probably different for each person and shaped by their beliefs Several years of research have lead me to the inescapable conclusion that noncorporial life is possible and does indeed exist, so there is life of some sort. we will just have to wait and see.
Another fragment of the puzzle to consider. My Father recently died, I was the last to leave the hospital room and being somewhat sensitive to the presence of spirits, I knew he was following. I know with absolute certainty that he was with me in the van as I drove home and then to his house to see Mom. There was no further contact or sensing of his presence after that. I'm not trying to convince anyone as you must convince yourself in your own time and manner, just something to consider.

[leonie]

One word, a very big scary word... KABOOOOM!

XD sorry... I try not to think about what happens at the end hopefully it will be something good.

[Rosemary]

Those of us who are around the dieing begin to see their departed relatives and others around them and that is because they have come to help them upon their death.

Even having someone follow you home in spirit is to be expected as they say goodbye.

Now I will go further and say my Guide in the Spirit World once after I asked just what happens after we die came into my dreams and I went pop and suddenly I was up in the Universe with cold wind blowing around me and I looked down and there was no body and I looked around and I could see everything, and remember everything.

He said that is a reinactment of what its like to die.

Of course others are there to join with the spirit of the newly deceased and show them the ropes of the Spirit World.

The most important thing I have learned is when the Earthly body dies the Spirit leaves the body with all its intelligence and memories both good and bad.

I am saying this here because it means the Intelligence and the Brain are too seperate things after death and the intelligence lives on and the body and head are just empty recepticles left on Earth.

I am hoping that Knowledge with help others to more scientifically look at the body and brain and what we believe about it as Doctors and Scientists and others believe it to be.

It also causes me to think about what Doctors refer to as the Subconscience mind of individuals, and wonder if some of those subconscious thoughts aren't memories of past Lives and also the thoughts of spirits who are communicating ideas and thoughts through us without our even being aware of what is happening.

We have all heard stories of people like Andrea the woman from Texas who said voices told her to kill her children and send them to Heaven to be with God.

Its possible she did hear voices and the voices she heard may have been an Evil Force telling her that so she would end up in Prison.

It could have also been an enemy of hers who wanted to get her away from her husband so he could be free of her and go marry someone else and sometimes there are Evil Relatives in the After Life who can actually take voer the minds of humans and put these kinds of ideas into their head.

This may have been a little more than you wanted to know but I believe I have been given this information so I can help others here on earth to analyze their thoughts both good and bad and see what could be influencing our thinking.

I have learned all these things from my Guides in the Spirit World and some of it is just like the Bible says be strong against Evil.

Edited by Rosemary, 27 November 2007 - 06:55 AM.