Maturing into helping the world
Jeroen
Luminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlands Veteran
I was just watching these NDE video’s on YouTube and it struck me…
In a way perhaps processing a spiritual experience is not so different from processing a near death experience. Both lead to questions about the meaning of our life here in this world, and turn towards helping others. The woman in the video above took some years to recover and started doing humanitarian work and creative pursuits in her spare time. I thought it was a beautiful story.
Serendipitously, I also came across a website about latihan yesterday, which is a spiritual practice about letting god or the lifeforce move and develop you from within. Many people involved in this find their life direction changes as well. It strikes me that once you have learnt to answer some of those crucial life questions, you evolve into more compassionate directions.
Comments
This man also had a special story…
He had a near death experience from a suicide attempt in which god told him to “tell people I love them”, and he changed his life from working hard to accompanying special needs kids. I think in many ways these near death experiences are blessings.
Of course if he really saw god is debatable, he is convinced but that is his conviction based on his worldview. A Buddhist might see something quite different. The lady in the video above said hers was “her designer death”, an experience just for her.
I'm under the impression, that if one has been indoctrinated/conditioned with the concept of a god, ( this seems to be the case for many people, even if they are not particularly religious) the mind will automatically look in a god-centric way to understand a dramatic life experience...
Which no doubt some will become all round better human beings, more empathetic, show more compassion toward other sentient beings and not take their own personal life circumstances too serious...others might become even more god-centric becoming born again into whatever their religious beliefs were in a more fundamental way...
That seems to be rare. If you look at the studies that have been done around the changes in life approach amongst NDE’ers the vast majority of them go in the direction of greater meaning, openness, love and service, not more fundamentalism.