I couldn't help it, and got another "Near Death Experience" book on the Kindle, "After the Light," by Kimberly Sharp. The introduction struck me immediately, where she referred to everyday life as the "Flatland" - exactly how I have expressed it for several years now. That is, that our consciousness of this life is extremely limited - which becomes clear after certain epiphanies. For me, the first epiphany came when I was shot in the eye with a BB at age 9 and had a genuine, very clear out of body experience, but there are many other kinds. The most life-shattering, though, must be the NDE
Here, the sufferer almost always is ushered into a vision of heaven, where he learns far more deeply the truths of the universe (among many other things). In this book, she focuses on her own experience at age 22, which brings her to change her life radically. However, she does not really even know why she is doing this. To explain this unconscious change, she recalls the last thing she remembers from her NDE: a voice telling her, "you will forget everything you have learned here, except as it becomes manifest." This blog has delved into the frustrating nature of this part of human existence before - for at times of epiphany we might come to know what existence is about, then forget this knowledge, left then only with the feeling. This occurs to me as I read these books - I know what they are getting at, as if I've been there myself, but cannot say exactly why.
This is so in part because the nature of our everyday communication, both with the self and with others, uses a tool, language, that is simply inadequate for transmission of certain ideas. It is why objective researchers can claim that such experiences are only neural misfirings - because they simply cannot understand what the subject has experienced. To the subject, there is little doubt - the knowledge, including that of immortality and Divine Presence is absolutely real - far more real than this flatland, this cardboard representation that our daily perception leaves us with.
This "forgetting" is also because, as part of the inner knowledge tells us, we are here to learn, grow, suffer - all of the above - because our lives here are necessary, and they cannot be meaningful if we have full knowledge of Being. That would be as if everyone knew the lottery number every day - there would be no game, and nothing to win or lose. But why? Why this need for ignorance that makes free will possible, and thus this game? For this is what creates the misery and treachery in the world - ignorance on a cosmic scale.
For Kimberly Sharp, free will (and ignorance) must be, so that one might choose good over evil. This is theologically sound as well, for in a limited world, every positive must have a negative - just as to see forms in light, we must have shades of darkness. But why the game in the first place? Most theologians agree that the Good is the fundamental, and in eternity must win. In fact, there is really no contest. If so, again - why the game?
This I have yet to figure out, and it may be - and probably is - beyond my reach.
But these books fascinate me because what is described I feel I know; and just as with Kimberly Sharp, I know as it "becomes manifest."
One of these truths that have become manifest to Sharp, is that nothing in life is trivial - nothing. There is no random coincidence. Without insight, this might lead to paranoia. But with careful and open introspection, coincidence might then offer us sign posts for our better future. I know that I can recall many of these, including the meeting with the woman who would become my wife, which has changed almost everything in my life.
So look with new eyes - the meaning of what you see might well be within you, ready to "become manifest" and lead you to a higher calling. If nothing is trivial, neither are any of us. Somehow, the stars are the destiny of all of us, even in this flatland. FK
Here, the sufferer almost always is ushered into a vision of heaven, where he learns far more deeply the truths of the universe (among many other things). In this book, she focuses on her own experience at age 22, which brings her to change her life radically. However, she does not really even know why she is doing this. To explain this unconscious change, she recalls the last thing she remembers from her NDE: a voice telling her, "you will forget everything you have learned here, except as it becomes manifest." This blog has delved into the frustrating nature of this part of human existence before - for at times of epiphany we might come to know what existence is about, then forget this knowledge, left then only with the feeling. This occurs to me as I read these books - I know what they are getting at, as if I've been there myself, but cannot say exactly why.
This is so in part because the nature of our everyday communication, both with the self and with others, uses a tool, language, that is simply inadequate for transmission of certain ideas. It is why objective researchers can claim that such experiences are only neural misfirings - because they simply cannot understand what the subject has experienced. To the subject, there is little doubt - the knowledge, including that of immortality and Divine Presence is absolutely real - far more real than this flatland, this cardboard representation that our daily perception leaves us with.
This "forgetting" is also because, as part of the inner knowledge tells us, we are here to learn, grow, suffer - all of the above - because our lives here are necessary, and they cannot be meaningful if we have full knowledge of Being. That would be as if everyone knew the lottery number every day - there would be no game, and nothing to win or lose. But why? Why this need for ignorance that makes free will possible, and thus this game? For this is what creates the misery and treachery in the world - ignorance on a cosmic scale.
For Kimberly Sharp, free will (and ignorance) must be, so that one might choose good over evil. This is theologically sound as well, for in a limited world, every positive must have a negative - just as to see forms in light, we must have shades of darkness. But why the game in the first place? Most theologians agree that the Good is the fundamental, and in eternity must win. In fact, there is really no contest. If so, again - why the game?
This I have yet to figure out, and it may be - and probably is - beyond my reach.
But these books fascinate me because what is described I feel I know; and just as with Kimberly Sharp, I know as it "becomes manifest."
One of these truths that have become manifest to Sharp, is that nothing in life is trivial - nothing. There is no random coincidence. Without insight, this might lead to paranoia. But with careful and open introspection, coincidence might then offer us sign posts for our better future. I know that I can recall many of these, including the meeting with the woman who would become my wife, which has changed almost everything in my life.
So look with new eyes - the meaning of what you see might well be within you, ready to "become manifest" and lead you to a higher calling. If nothing is trivial, neither are any of us. Somehow, the stars are the destiny of all of us, even in this flatland. FK
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