From: fupkonto@hotmail.dk   
      
   Hi   
   Well, good solid proof, and a converted atheist - those are features I don't   
   think I can offer.   
      
   But read my story and judge for yourself.   
   I am a science-based person. I believe in what I can see and measure. I love   
   math, physics, chemistry, biology - all the "hard stuff".   
   But as many others I have attended sunday school, gone to church regularly,   
   am married - and my kids are baptized. I consider myself a cultural   
   christian, though I consider a belief in the christian god as  irrational.   
   Sorry - no offence meant, that's just how it is.   
   I don't want to start a discussion on evolution and intelligent design, but   
   believing in a supreme being as the inventor and creator, maybe even an old   
   bearded man, is at the moment too big a mouthful. And the question is not   
   how, but why...   
   For a great many years I didn't offer any thoughts on anything   
   supernatural - then a couple of years ago I underwent surgery. I hadn't   
   given it any considerations. It was quite a minor thing - just a pop in and   
   out hospital to have my gall bladder removed - 36 hours at the most. But,   
   but - as you might have guessed the operation didn't go as planned.   
   I didn't have a "traditional" NDE - I didn't walk through a tunnel, I didn't   
   meet angels or god or my passed away realtives. But I had this sensation of   
   being part of a unity - I "dreamt" that someone came and asked me to follow,   
   not by words, but it was clear that I had to come. He showed me a coffin and   
   I got the impression, that what I was to see was very important. There were   
   others there too, shadows, persons,  I couldn't  distinguish one from   
   another - I looked into the coffin, and the bottom became like quicksilver,   
   and was held up like a mirror that reflected the light very sharply - it was   
   like looking into the sun - then I woke up in the intensive care unit, all   
   wired up on monitors and with nurses and doctors buzzing around like bees on   
   a honey pot.   
   But really, this was not the most significant about this experience - that   
   was two matters - first of all that I told this to my wife, before I was   
   told about the problems during the operation, which is  at least to me very   
   important. It is not an experince invented for the occasion!   
   Secondly what I consider even more important was that this was not - even   
   though i wrote it in the start - a dream. This is as real to me as any other   
   memory. I can recall this - now some years after - as clear as thinking back   
   on the say my breakfast this morning. It is not a dream, it is a memory.   
   What i experienced was real - I was there, I saw it, I felt it.   
   I also have to emphazise the tremendous sensation of comfort. It was not a   
   scary experience - it was a sensation of being a unity - I really think I   
   caught a glimpse of eternity and all-knowing.   
   But have I then become religious? My answer would have to be - "define   
   religious!". I have not become more religious in the sense that I read teh   
   Bible or attend church. I still consider it irrational. But...I am religious   
   in the sense that I consider physical death to a new start instead of an   
   ending. I don't want to use the word soul - it has implications I cannot see   
   the consequenses of.   
   Somehow I think, that there is a "core of being" a part of our consciousness   
   which is carried on.   
   And if not, then so be it - if what I experienced is death, then I do not   
   fear death.There is nothing scary about that - on the contrary. It was warm   
   and comforting.   
   After my hospitalisation I haven't had any sequelae. I have become more   
   assertive and more selctive on my time spending - and more prone to seeking   
   quietness. It is not that I don't like noise, talking, music etc., but I   
   need to have periods of silence.   
    I continue to consider belief in a "god"  quite a task, but I have become   
   more open to what is part of this world or not...   
   Just because we cannot see or measure it, it doesn't mean it isn't there.   
   Maybe we just haven't found the ways to do that.   
   I said earlier that the question to me wasn't how, but why...   
   Those questions are still open for answers. And though I think there is no   
   life after death, there might still be being after death.   
   But from there to reincarnation, soul wandering and all that stuff there is   
   quite a way to go.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)