Category: What Really Happens When We Die?

Sometimes I’m fortunate enough to have a conversation with my son. I ask him questions and he answers so quickly that I know the responses are not coming from me.

Recently, I was “talking” to him and doubt crept in. “Is it really you, are we really talking?” These doubts always frustrate my son. He doesn’t understand why I have trouble believing it’s really him. I said, “It’s not the same as when you existed on earth, I could hug you, see you, smell you. This feels so unsatisfying sometimes, because I’m not really sure you’re there the way I could be when you were in your physical form.”

He replied, a bit exasperated, “So you only believe what you can perceive with your five senses? Because you can’t touch me or see me I’m not here? Well, then I guess you don’t believe in air or electricity, because these can’t be seen or touched either.”

I get the point. I realize he is in an entirely different realm and it’s logical that my five senses are useless in perceiving him as he is now. After all, my five senses go with my physical form, so why would they help me sense something non-physical, and purely spiritual? In my physical form I’ve learned to negotiate my world by using these senses. The feedback from them tells me what’s real and what’s not-at least in the physical world.

But now that my son is in spirit, I need to use different senses to perceive him. I need to connect with my son mentally, through meditation. The bond we developed on earth is what allows us to communicate with each other spiritually. Being in a meditative state allows me to quiet my own thoughts so my son can come through.

Mother’s Day 2016(click here for post) changed my entire paradigm about life and death. On that day I realized that death is not the ending we think it is. People don’t just stop existing, the soul/spirit lives on. I can’t say I know what happens when we die, all I can tell you is that I know my son exists in some form, somewhere. Right now, I guess it’s not important for me to understand how this can be, I just need to fully embrace that it is true.

 

Rumi was a poet and spiritual leader born in 1207 in Afghanistan. He is known for his insightful poetry about life, death and love. If you’d like to read more about him, here is a good link:

https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/jalal-al-din-rumi

Below is a beautiful Rumi poem I recently came across. It reaffirms my feeling that death is not the end we think it is.

When I die, when my coffin is being taken out,

You must never think I am missing this world.

Don’t shed any tears, don’t lament or feel sorry.

I’m not falling into a monster’s abyss.

When you see my corpse is being carried,

Don’t cry for my leaving.

I’m not leaving, I’m arriving at eternal love.

When you leave me in the grave, don’t say goodbye.

Remember, a grave is only a curtain for the paradise behind.

You’ll only see me descending into a grave, now watch me rise.

How can there be an end?

When the sun sets, or the moon goes down, it looks like the end,

It seems like a sunset, but in reality it is a dawn.

When the grave locks you up, that is when your soul is freed.

Have you ever seen a seed fallen to earth not rise with a new life?

Why should you doubt the rise of a seed named human?…

When for the last time you close your mouth,

Your words and soul will belong,

To the world of no place, no time.

-Rumi

Hi All!

Part 1 was kind of lengthy so I’ll keep it brief today.

One thing I wanted to mention is that Ms. Dawn had a religious (Christian) upbringing and education, and sometimes her spiritual advisors bring Christianity into their description of the spirit world.

For example, she was told that everyone in heaven is 33, because Jesus died at 33. Therefore, younger people grow up to 33, and older people reverse age and go down to 33. I feel this is really the author’s Christian view coming through and I’m not sure I buy into it. Let’s face it, nobody knows everything. I just take in what makes sense or resonates with me and leave the rest.

I wanted to compare some of the things  Angela Dawn has experienced to my own experiences. It’s always gratifying to find someone else who has experienced the same things I have. It helps me form a clearer picture of the spirit world and allows me to trust my gut feelings more often.

I’m going to quote a few passages and then relate them to my own experiences.

Quote: “Yes, mum is here, mum is always here!” (Note, the author is British. Mum is mom.)

My Experience: I often say to myself, “I miss you, Nico,” and immediately I hear his voice saying “I’m right here, mom.”

Quote: (Author speaking about receiving communications from the spirit world) “If people want to call it my imagination that’s fine with me, but I never had such a great imagination. I had never been so inspired to write and never been able to write so philosophically.”

My Experience: I often doubted myself when I did inspired writing. I had done it even before my son died and felt I’d received guidance. It was clear to me the thoughts I was receiving were not my own. I even once connected with my boyfriend’s father, who was deceased. I have written “reply” letters from my son that included things I would never have thought of.

Quote: “When we are closer to earth, we take on the shape of our human form that we once had. Spirit is just a ball of energy…we take on many shapes depending on the level of vibration. We only need to take human form when we are dealing and communicating with humans.”

My Experience: At one point my son told me he was pure energy, and no longer in his human form. Because of this, I was puzzled when I visited a medium and he was speaking about Nico like he was in human form. He would say Nico was sitting next to me, he knew he was a young man (as opposed to a child or an older adult). After reading this passage it all made more sense.

Quote: “Everything is energy.” The author speaks about psychometry exercises, where an object takes on the energy of the person who was holding it.

My Experience: When I first came upon the site where my son died, it was a very emotional experience. I (thankfully) did not see him there, but there were some items from our home about the area. I just felt an overwhelming sense of sadness. I felt compelled to put my arms around the tree, since it was the last thing he touched (or maybe I just needed a hug). I felt profound sadness, almost as if the tree was an unwilling participant.

I know that trees don’t have human qualities, but I most definitely sensed a sadness coming from something other than myself. Could it have been psychometric energy from my son transferred to the tree?

In this picture, I wondered if the stool took on the energy from my son. This photo was taken the day after he died. The stool is in the same place as when he died. When I saw it, I laid my belly and chest across the top, bent over and embraced the stool. I stayed like that for a while. It brought me comfort.

I hope I gave you some insight into the book. It is available at Amazon in digital and book.

 

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I’ve read several books about life after death. I find the subject fascinating and enjoy comparing the experiences of the author’s to my own.

Angela Dawn’s book is about her spiritual journey which was guided by her mother, sister, and others in the spirit world. They urge her to write a book so that all on earth can understand more about the spirit world and their soul’s journey on earth.

The author communicates with the spirit world through, “inspired writing.” She calls this a form of “Mental Mediumship,” and it involves entering a state of meditation and receiving messages from loved ones or spirit guides. Ms. Dawn would then write as the spirit spoke. It’s important to note that the author is not a medium, just a regular Jane Doe.

The author believes that part of our souls remain in the spirit world while the other part remains with us on earth. We can live a more complete and meaningful life by connecting to the part of our soul in the spirit world through meditation.

The spirit guides say that we choose our lives on earth from the spirit world, then incarnate as humans to learn our lessons on earth and evolve our souls to a higher level. According to the guides, not everything can be learned in the spirit world and soul development happens faster on earth, especially if we undergo hardships and loss. We may intentionally choose a life of hardship in order to learn important lessons necessary to develop the soul.

If that’s true, I’m gonna be one heck of an evolved soul!

The overall message from the spirit world is that we are here to be as loving and kind to each other as we can. This is why we are put on earth, and if we are successful at it, our souls will evolve to a higher level.

Many of the experiences Ms. Dawn writes about in the book I’ve experienced myself. The book made me much more comfortable with the idea that my son was communicating with me somehow. I don’t really care if people think I’m imagining it, I believe it’s for real. I hear his voice in my head often, whether he is giving advice or making jokes.

To communicate with my son, I often use a method described in a book called “Growing Up in Heaven,” by James Van Praagh, a famous medium. One chapter, entitled, “Letters from Heaven,” discusses how our loved ones who have passed are very much alive in the spirit world. Van Praagh encourages people who have lost a loved one to write a letter to the person, then set up a date to receive a reply.

When the reply date comes around, the person briefly meditates to clear their mind, listens for the reply… and writes what they hear. Van Praagh encourages the writer to just “go with it,” and write whatever comes to mind. It is very similar to the “inspired writing” approach that Angela Dawn speaks about. His experience with clients has been that the results are quite accurate. He gives several examples of letters and replies in his book.

I have used this method to communicate with my son with a good degree of success. Although sometimes it seems like my thoughts are coming through as well, I’ve definitely received messages that were new information and went deeper than my thoughts could have. For example, when my son told me the ashes in the urn were not him, just his vessel, and that he was not his vessel (meaning he was his soul not his body). I would never have had those thoughts at that time and they were more profound than my own.

Part 2 is coming tomorrow. I will run down some highlights of the book and connect them with my own experiences.

I had to share this story of a sign from my son that a complete stranger experienced.

I go to physical therapy for my hand. At last week’s appointment a lovely therapist was chatting with me as she did my therapy. We were talking about kids and she had shared that her daughter was turning 21 the following week. She asked about whether I had children and I told her my story, including how I feel my son gives me signs by producing perfect rainbows at key times.

When I arrived for my appointment this week, the therapist took me aside and said she wanted to share something with me. She told me she had been doing yoga the morning of her daughter’s birthday, and was thinking about my son. She told her husband about Nico and his rainbow signs and said she felt sad because here they were celebrating their daughter’s 21st birthday, but I would never celebrate another birthday with my son. (Also, my son died when he was 21.)

Just as she was getting up from her yoga mat, she saw a perfect rainbow on her wood floor. She was stunned and took a picture, which she showed me. She said she understood the rainbow was from a crystal chandelier she had, but said she had never seen it form a rainbow like that, and it appeared at exactly the time she was talking about my son to her husband. She absolutely felt is was my son communicating with her.

She was very touched by this experience. So was I.

Nico and I lived with my parents since he was a baby. His father chose not to be a part of his life, so in many ways, my father (Nico’s grandpa) was like a father to him. We lived with my parents until Nico died, so he influenced him his entire life.

When my son was a teen, my dad started enlisting him to do summer projects. They would build things together. It was a great bonding experience and both of them enjoyed working the project from start to finish.

One of my favorite things that they built was this beautiful arbor.

My son passed in January and my dad’s birthday is in early March. It was one of those “firsts” we had to get through-grandpa’s birthday without Nico.

I was looking for a birthday card for my dad and I found this one!

I thought it was so perfect, it looked just like our arbor. The weird thing is that I found this card at a garden center, on my dad’s actual birthday. I was so excited about the card, then I opened it up…

It was a sympathy card! “Who we once loved we can never lose. They are a part of us forever.”

As soon as I read those words, I felt as if Nico was trying to wish his grandpa a happy birthday. I was just shocked and mesmerized by the card and what it said. It really felt like my son was with me.

As I was leaving the store, I paused to look at the card again, kind of stunned at what I was feeling. Just at that moment, a single drop of water fell from the awning above me, right in the corner of my eye, and trickled down my cheek like a tear.

“Happy Birthday, grandpa! I miss you…”

Hello Friends,

My belief about death is that it can’t be the end of it all. It defies the laws of science that say matter cannot be created or destroyed,  just change in form.

Why wouldn’t it be the same in death?

The body I knew as my son is gone, but that was only his physical form in this lifetime. What about his life energy? Some might call it his “chi.”

I, and many others believe that we are not just bodies, we are souls as well. Souls are complicated things. I don’t believe souls die, instead, I believe they separate from the body and go someplace else or reincarnate into a new person.

So what if my loved one passes and takes a break before reincarnating? What happens to that energy? Where does it go? Does some of it stay on earth? (Ideas, anyone??)

The above picture was taken about a day after my son died. As you can see, there is very unusual light play going on, it almost looks like an angel sitting on the stool with his back to me, looking over his wing.

This was the exact spot where my son’s soul left his body. I don’t believe in angels (I’m too much of a scientist) but I do believe in life energy. It seemed like some of his lingering life energy was still there, and that I’d captured it in the photo.

I have taken other extraordinary photos at Treehaven with similar or unusual light play. I always feel that it is my son letting me know he is still with me.

-Vicki

Hello Friends,

In this section of the blog I’m going to share some of the signs I’ve received from my son and talk about some interesting books I’ve read about what happens when we die.

Mother’s Day of 2016 was a tough day. Since my son had passed away in January of 2016, this was my first Mother’s Day without him. He was my only child. Adding to my grief was the fact that my son’s birthday was just days before Mother’s Day. It was another difficult “first” I had to get through.

I had agreed to go out with my mom and dad, although I was dreading it, because I was sure I’d see lots of moms and kids and that was going to be hard.

We went to a fancy steakhouse (Blackstone’s) for dinner. It is a traditional steakhouse, dark, with a huge dining room and a small dining area off to the side, apart from the main dining room. Instead of being led into the main dining room, we were brought to the smaller area, where I was greeted with this sight:

I should first explain that rainbows had become a sign from my son. The day after his death I was at our favorite pizza place, missing him terribly. As I was leaving a saw this:

I have never seen a more perfect rainbow! I felt it was a sign from my son, and I would receive many more, which I will share is future posts.

So, as soon as we entered the restaurant, I was greeted with rainbows! Again, they were absolutely perfect, showing every color in the spectrum.

The above shot is a close-up of the chair in the restaurant with the rainbow on it.

Seeing this was amazing. I could no longer say that the signs were wishful thinking, because I knew that my son would have tried to comfort me on that difficult day. Although it made me happy, I think it scared me more. That’s because the realization that my son was somehow communicating with me freaked me out a little. It really turned my belief system about death upside-down and I didn’t know what to think. I wanted to understand how this could happen. Where was he? How was this being done?

As a result of this and other experiences, I began reading books about life after death, in an effort to understand what was going on and driven by a desire to try to communicate with my son in a more detailed way.

 

 

 

I’m going to use this category to get into some thoughts I have about death and signs I believe I’ve received from Nico.

I wanted to keep it separate from the rest of the blog because it is strictly about my ideas and questions about what happens after we die. Feel free to share stories here and comment as well.