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 from the Near Death Experience Research foundation - Bronwen C NDE - EXPERIENCE DESCRIPTION:

My NDE was actually 2 experiences. The second followed the first by perhaps 3 months.

1: The first was caused by falling several meters headfirst down a cliff and landing on sandstone rock. A small tree I was levering myself up on came away in my hands.

I found myself traveling rapidly upwards into the sky. I had an immensely joyous feeling of lightness. I remember looking back at my crumpled body on the rock below and observing that "I" was not my body. I could see everything below me very clearly.  Below was the Hawkesbury river, and the beautiful bush surrounding it. I was heading towards some very beautiful cumulus shaped clouds. I had no fear, only joy.

I looked back again and saw my boyfriend who I was very much in love with, standing beside my body. In real time this would have been several minutes after I fell, as he was quite a way behind me and it would have taken some time to get down the steep cliff.

I was a long way away by now and still traveling upwards, but I could feel exactly what he was feeling. He was very distressed. My heart filled with compassion for him, which I guess was what brought me back.

2: I am joining these two experiences together as I have always believed they are related. My (same) boyfriend and I were visiting a friends New Year's Eve party.  The party was in the main room of a small house, and was packed with people. It was before midnight. I remember feeling vaguely discontent, as if I wasn't where I really wanted to be. I was standing about one meter from the only door into the room, looking across the room at my boyfriend. Suddenly i was no longer in this room, but facing an enormously tall angel. Surrounding both of us was radiant light.

I knew this angel, and he knew me. I felt no fear, only joy and immense happiness. We communicated non verbally. The angel was 'reminding' me of the power of LOVE that was actually THE power of the universe. It seemed that I already knew this, but 'he' was just reminding me. We communicated for what I would have estimated to be about 20 minutes, then with no warning I was abruptly back on earth, in the same place I had been standing when the experience first happened. The astonishing thing was that it was obviously hours later as there was no-one in the room other than a sleeping body crashed on the couch.

My boyfriend was not there, and when I eventually found him by calling out through the darkened house, he had been asleep upstairs as he had searched everywhere and not been able to find me. I had been physically removed during this experience.

The effect of these experiences on my life was profound.  Overnight I had become intensely empathetic. I could feel any pain or suffering and sense of isolation of people passing me in the street. I had an overwhelming sense of needing to Do something… my search for what this something is, has dominated the rest of my entire life.

The sense of the reality of these experiences has far eclipsed anything else in my life.  By this I mean. everything in comparison has been far less real.  I could not use the words 'God' or 'Love' for many years as the reality of these words is so much greater than our 'normal' usage.

Q:  What emotions did you feel during the experience?....Bliss.  Peace.  Joy.  Freedom.  Happiness.  (For both experiences)  

Q:  Did you see an unearthly light?....Yes....Beyond what we call light.  Intense white radiant warm glowing light.  This mainly in Experience 2, but the light was also very bright in the first experience.

Q:  Did you seem to encounter a mystical being or presence, or hear an unidentifiable voice?....I encountered a definite being, or a voice clearly of mystical or unearthly origin    The being was an angel as described above.  Very tall, benign, full of joy and love.

Q:  Did you seem to enter some other, unearthly world?....A clearly mystical or unearthly realm....In the first experience the world was still visible as if in the body.

In the second experience, there was nothing but Light, (and the Angel of course)

Q:  Did time seem to speed up or slow down?....Everything seemed to be happening at once; or time stopped or lost all meaning....Time in these 'other' dimensions has no relevance at all

Q:  Did you suddenly seem to understand everything?....Everything about the universe....I saw and experienced that Love is truly the power of the Universe…. that everything is made of Love.

Our earthly understanding of this word is immensely far from the experience.

Q:  Did you have any changes in your values or beliefs after the experience that occurred as a result of the experience?    Yes     A complete change from being a disillusioned agnostic, to someone who sees the evidence of "God", of Love, everywhere and in everyone. 

I remain disillusioned about the motives and practices of religion…. ALL religions!

Q:  Do you have any psychic, non-ordinary or other special gifts after your experience that you did not have before the experience?....Yes     I can feel/read where people are in their souls.  This has given me a heightened sense of compassion for people in trouble, people who are struggling. I see their "higher selves", their potential. 

Q:  Have your relationships changed specifically as a result of your experience?....Yes....Initially I felt isolated as I could not share this great joy I had experienced adequately with my friends.

I also had become hyper empathetic and could "read" into peoples hearts, which I was struggling to cope with.  It has taken me a long time to learn how to cope with this. Now, although I am still highly empathetic, I can walk through life more normally.

Q:  Have your religious beliefs/spiritual practices changed specifically as a result of your experience?....Yes    From agnostic to profoundly spiritual and grateful.

Q:  At any time in your life, has anything ever reproduced any part of the experience?....Yes    I have had a great number of mystical experiences since these NDE described above.

These were both the beginning, and the most dramatic and vivid as they changed my view entirely of life on this planet.

Q:  Is there anything else that you would like to add about your experience?....Only that I still would like one day to be able to adequately share my experience with other people.