Life After Death
From New Age Village
"If you want to know what death is like, then become aware of your own consciousness as it is divorced from physical activities. You will find that it is highly active. With practice you will discover that your normal waking consciousnes is highly limited, and that what you thought of once as death conditions seem much more like life conditions."
-- Session 539, p.143, Seth Speaks
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Introduction
What Happens After Death?
Upon death, a variety of things can happen. Some people die in a conscious manner; they have lived consciously, so they die consciously. They maintain consciousness throughout the whole transition, and are ready to move on to the next step, whatever that proves to be, almost immediately. They normally greet their loved ones and then continue with what they were doing before they incarnated. They may take on a project of study, become a spirit guide, or work for the benefit of humanity in other ways.
Others, especially those who have lived unconsciously, die unconsciously, or in turmoil. They may be confused by their experiences during this time. They may be full of remorse for things that they did that they did not wish to face while alive. They may go into isolation for a long period if there is a need to come to grips with those things or other issues they did not meet on the physical plane. They may go unconscious and not come to self-awareness again for a long time. Someone who is in a lengthy coma on the physical plane may continue in unconsciousness on the astral plane after death. In other cases, the essence leaves the body during a coma and is conscious on the astral plane, and continues in consciousness after death.
Heaven and Hell
Someone who believes in heaven and hell might experience one or the other after death through psychic projection. On the astral plane it is relatively easy to create your image of reality. Other souls might play along with it for your benefit, but the show has little depth to it. If a person is full of guilt and shame that needs to be cleansed away or at least acknowledged, creating “hell” might be useful temporarily. Its monsters are symbols of what is within.
Earthbound Spirits
Those who remain earthbound are those who, when they were incarnate, were extremely attached to the physical plane. They did not see beyond earthly pleasures and pain. Those who were addicted to cigarettes, drugs, food, or alcohol are sometimes earthbound after death because they are still craving the substance in their consciousness. Of course, they have the opportunity to let go of their addictions any time, just as they did when they were physical. It is easier to let go of addictions while you are still physical, but if you have not done this, they are there to be faced on the astral plane.
Between Lifetimes
How long do people usually wait between incarnations?
It is quite individual. Some souls feel uncomfortable on the astral plane and cannot wait to get back into a body, taking the first one that becomes available. Others may feel complete with the cycle of lives they have done and take vacations that could translate into millions of years on the physical plane. However, we would say that fifty to eighty years is most typical.
Some souls, especially those who are almost finished with the physical plane, are picky about who their parents are, what kind of bodies they have, and so on, so it can take a while to find what they are looking for. It is rather like coming near the end of a game and needing only certain game pieces.
Fear of Death
Your physical body is programmed to survive. The fear of death largely springs out of its survival instincts. You need this natural mechanism. If you did not have a certain level of survival instinct, you would lose natural reflexes that protect you in dangerous situations. But your experience of this instinct can be transformed. If you are living with alertness, it is not necessary to have an attack of fear to motivate you to look both ways before you cross the street. If your body begins to trust that you as its occupant are going to take good care of it, it can relax on an instinctual level.
It is helpful to realize that you have had many bodies before, and may have many more in the future. Death is not the end. Although a number of your deaths were no doubt traumatic, you have also had many easy, peaceful passages. Death does not have to be traumatic.
Any fear you face is lessened. If you recognize and accept whatever fear of death you have, you can reduce it. You might try vividly imagining your death, making friends with it. You can also reduce your fear of it by working with both your painful and pleasant past-life deaths through regression.
The manner in which you die is one of the most important choices you make. If you die with a high consciousness, your death can be a blessing not only for yourself but for those around you as well.
-- Shepherd Hoodwin
Topics
Classic Texts
- Raymond or Life and Death - (Sir Oliver Lodge) - After his son, Raymond, was killed in World War I in 1915, acclaimed physicist, Sir Oliver Lodge, visited several psychics and wrote about the experience in a number of books, including the best-selling "Raymond, or Life and Death" (1916).
- The Vital Message - (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) - Conan Doyle, the famed inventor of Sherlock Holmes, was also an avid enthusiast of Spiritualism.
Articles
- Soul Substance - Classic article that attempts to provide scientific evidence for the existence of the soul.
- Life After Death: Death is Merely a Changing Room -
