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Anyone that knows me knows that I simply love holidays because they provide an occasion to honor and celebrate something or someone that makes life more meaningful and memorable. These are the special qualities that turn holidays into holy days for me. Most holidays I honor and write about are either American National holiday such as; "Independence Day, Memorial Day, Thanksgiving Day and Veterans Day". Other holidays I cherish are celebrated globally such as; "Christmas, Easter and New Years Day". There is however a holyday I honor each year which is much more personal in nature and on which my life has been influenced as much if not more than any other holyday of the year. Although it's not a holiday posted on the calendar or on which any Local, State or Federal offices are closed, it's a day I honor each year and celebrate as both a Memorial and a day of deeper personal recollection and reflection. My phone, snailmail, fax and e-mail are still in service but normally go unattended. It is a day off from work as well as disconnected from my usual worldly duties and pre-occupations. It is usually a day of fasting and silence and although this day changes each year, the date is always the same: August 28th or as I also like to call it: ^828^. This date holds special personal significance because it commemorates the Anniversary of an "NDE" or "Near Death Experience" I encountered on an early Sunday afternoon in 1966 during a drowning accident by the boardwalk at Santa Cruz beach in California.
The impact of this day playing in the ocean as a child continues to influence my life up to this day and the central reason I have considered and decided to publish excerpts from my personal diary here is that sharing it in the past has seemingly been a help to others who have experienced or are evolving their understanding of their own personal NDE encounters. I have also received requests from those who know or have known friends or family members involved in NDE's and so I share my personal experience, insights and some of the research information I have gleaned on the subject. If my modest contribution here can in anyway shed some light on the blessings and challenges faced by those who are faced with incorporating the after death experience into their otherwise "normal daily lives", then I will have fulfilled my desire.
In past ^828^ Anniversary editions of Sacred^Sunday, I have shared excerpts from single chapters of the current manuscript that has been evolving over these many years and although I had intended to publish the manuscript into a book format, my writings of the memories of that Sunday continue to evolve and I haven't as yet been able to write an ending to the manuscript so I have postponed the book's publication date yet again. It's one of those things in life that must announce it's own conclusion and arrival in completed form. I'm looking to see how it turns up myself. I am keeping an informal list of those that have expressed an interest in the book when it does materialize and invite any that may be interested in being included to contact me via email. In the meanwhile I have decided to share multiple excerpts of some of the various chapters in the manuscript with you. It is my sincere wish that this offering will help promote a deeper understanding and more compassionate insight into the life after death encounter so that the life before death experience may also be more meaningful and appreciated. The following chapter excerpts presented are best read by taking a few moments between each reading to think about or visualize what is being described in each paragraph of the experience. I have my own very personal rituals which unfold naturally for me every year on the 08-28 date and I invite any one who wishes to share in a contemplative moment with me at Noon this Sunday to "light a candle" and share a prayer or reflection for personal and Global Peace and Well Being. Of course if you can arrange to take this time "at or by the Ocean" as I plan to, or by any water source (i.e: a lake, pond or stream) this time may become even more meaningful for you. Being by any water source and simply listening to your breath for a few minutes will be an integral actuator of any special time you may choose for yourself. My personal ritual includes floating atop the water with my eyes closed and listening to the sound of my breathing.
Please consider sharing this message with others..."
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"Birth on Earth"
(Chapter One: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
One of my earliest memories occurred at around 11 months of age. The only reason I know this was because it was the day my Mother brought my younger brother home after his birth from the hospital. It was daytime during the month of latter December and my Mother was holding and rocking me in her arms. I recall hearing crying and being put down in my baby crib as I watched my Mother leave the room. I suddenly felt a shiver of fear, like something was wrong, very wrong. The combination of hearing cries which I know now came from my newborn brother and the sudden departure from the closeness to my Mother left me with the root core sensation that my short life was somehow at an end. This was my first real memory of separation from what I know to be life and something deep inside me cried out for help although I made no audible sound. At that very moment of a fear of dying, I observed the light in my room growing more brilliant as though someone had turned up a dimmer switch on the Sun and a deep feeling of calmness began to fill me and come round and all about me. At some point during the continual increase in light brilliancy I felt myself being transported out of my crib and directly throughout the house into a room above where my mother was holding and rocking my baby brother and in that vision complete tranquility filled my baby being. Only many years later would I be able to understand that I had encountered my first out of body and Soul travel experience as an infant.
I am often asked why Sundays are so important and special to me. It's not an answer I can give quickly because there are so many reasons. I suppose it really started back in early childhood. I came from an Italian-Irish and devoutly catholic upbringing which meant we didn't eat meat on Fridays, as usually Mom prepared tasty tuna or grilled cheese sandwiches. I went to confession on Saturdays at which times I recall making up a few sins cause I usually couldn't recall many of my own, and we went to mass regularly every Sunday morning. I was an altar boy at our church and loved lighting the candles before celebrating Mass. These were all fine memories but the most wonderful memory was that on Sundays the entire family would be together, go to mass, then the eight of us would pile into the family station wagon, and drive out to acquire our Sunday jellyroll donuts, maplebars and frosty A&W root beer sodas. Then we'd all drive home, eat our tasty treats and attempt to fairly distribute the comic section of the Sunday newspaper. Most Sundays, we'd go out for a drive to the beach or a state park. Being in California that usually meant going to Vasona Lake, Big Basin State Park or Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk. This combination of childhood events left in me, indelible memories of a loving family and a closeness and celebration of life which I have... (Chapter One Manuscript continues...)
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"Return to Sender"
(Chapter Two: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
I have come to believe there comes a time when the unknown is encountered, an answer is needed, and a life, if it is to continue, depends on somehow receiving a response. Such a time came for me on the afternoon of Sunday August 28th 1966, under the ocean in front of the boardwalk at the beach in Santa Cruz, California. With our swimsuits on and sandwiches with cold sodas packed in the cooler, my three brothers, two sisters and Mom and Dad all piled into the families 1958 red and white Ford station wagon. As always, Dad led us in our "safe travel prayer" consisting of a "Hail Mary", a "Glory be to the Father", and a petition for a safe trip after which we backed out of the driveway, down our neighborhood roadway and off onto the Junipero Serra highway to highway 17, headed for the Santa Cruz beach and boardwalk.
My brothers and I had always loved jumping into the ocean and we equally enjoyed playing a game we aptly called; "Cutting the waves". The object of the game was to bounce atop or jump over an approaching wave while keeping our heads above the water. I was the tallest so I was most able to go further out into the breaking surf than my brothers. As we frolicked together on a beautiful sunny Sunday and over each subsequent ocean wave, my unique ability to venture a bit further out into the Sea had begun to reach it's maxim as waves began washing over the top of my head as I held my breath. Just as I began to wonder if I better be backing it up toward the shoreline a little, I felt my body drop down, as if off the edge of a ledge. My body wasn't just dropping, I actually felt pulled down deeper into what I now know were Ocean undercurrents. What was once a game now was becoming a sudden and serious panic in every member of my anatomy as I began struggling more desperately for a single breath of air. I swam hard and as fast as I knew how to get back to the top of the ocean for a breath of life. I'm not sure how much actual real time went by but it seemed like a lifetime and as I became more exhausted with every movement and felt like my lungs were meant to explode I experienced a single bright image flashing into my mind. In my self created and now disoriented state, what I had thought was swimming up for air was in fact an image of me swimming down deeper all this while. The single bright image I saw was like a big picture taken of me at a distance indicating the swimmer pointed head first toward the bottom of the Sea. All this time I had expended with every last bit of my life force had been propelling myself even more deeply beneath the Ocean's blue. At that very moment, with that single big picture image, everything inside me, simply gave up...
Like the final straw, or the last grain of sand falling through an hour glass, without any idea of what was happening, I felt my mind stop and my body begin to drift... I could feel the full force of the ocean's currents carry my seemingly lifeless body smoothly along as it glided it effortlessly under the sea like a feather blowing in the wind. Only years later could I realize, unlike other Near Death Experience (NDE) reports, there was no darkness or tubular tunnel with bright light at it's end waiting for me. Instead a feeling of complete weightlessness and surrender from any struggle or concern enveloped my entire being. As I continued to float along, an all consuming warmth began to generate itself within followed by an all pervasive white and golden glowing light which filled and surrounded me from all sides. My state of perception of this once most frightening life and death experience was now much like that of looking through the eye of a video camera while filming something and that something happened to be my body floating underneath the ocean. Without any sense of judgment or the need to make a decision about controlling or changing what was happening to me, I was simply noticing all that was occurring and seemingly thrust into the position of being an observer. During the subsequent years I have had many flashbacks and dreams of these moments under the ocean and somewhere in the playback of these images I see that however these moments would unfold, I would not see things as I had the... (Chapter Two Manuscript continues...)
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"A Separate Reality with the Heaven Seven"
(Chapter Three: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
Noticing my body floating like a leaf in the ocean currents somewhere below my point of view I recall wondering to myself; "With which eyes do I see my body..?" Not anticipating a response I was startled to hear a voice whisper; "Not with eyes of that body do you now see..." Although a bit surprised at hearing an unidentified voice I seem to be able to remain completely calm and at peace within as I had just heard that I had eyes and a vision that were not of my physical body. By this time I had forgotten all about drowning, all about breathing, all about struggling and even about where these questions and answers were coming from. It seemed like I was at the movies and images, very personal and familiar images, began streaming into my being and across the screen of my mind. It was only years later that I recognized I had my second introduction to my Soul body which I could both see and hear independent from my physical body and which continued to float unencumbered some distance away from my new and present point of view.
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At some moment during what was now becomming a timeless experience, the appearance of seven glowing and human shaped beings emerged gracefully forward out from within the brilliance of the golden white light and had encircled themselves all around me. A sense of deep reverence for them came forth naturally from within and I watched myself gently bow my head as they each in turn came to a position in a now completed circle about me. I immediately became aware that I was engaged in a question and answer exchange with each one of them. There seem to be no actual audible words spoken, just a kind of silent telepathic communication, like someone whispering quietly but clearly in a soft and gentle manner and which I somehow could hear within my own inner stillness. The questions were the kind I remember asking all of my life. The difference now is that they were all being answered at lightning speed. A question would arise within me, I would look slowly upward, share a short glance directed at one of the seven and receive my answer. I clearly recall thinking that there was no question that these radiant glowing beings did not have the answer to. It also became more apparent to me that they already knew all of my questions in advance of my asking them.
One of the questions I had asked was: "Who are you..?" the response was immediate; "We are your family..." I remember then thinking, "My family..?" and before my thought could continue further the answer continued;
"What is born of flesh is flesh, what is born of spirit is spirit..." Yes I thought of the Bible phrase and this is the way it went with each question and every answer like some symphonic fugue between me and them. To this day I do not remember all of the questions I had asked or answers I had received but that dialog between us so many years ago now seems to be unfolding itself over the passage of time. What might have taken seconds to transpire has taken many years to unfold and continues to do so to this day.
As I encountered each radiant Being, I felt as though they were touching me on the inside, releasing profound memories and feelings within me that I can only describe now as the kind of unconditional Love a Mother would have for her infant or children. Realizations came forth that might have taken days, months and years to evolve in my former life. They now unfolded in mere seconds and in... (Chapter Three Manuscript continues...)
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"My Journey to the Heart of the Sun"
(Chapter Four: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
Although the seven radiant beings of light did not come out and say it, I have ever since referred to them as my Guardian Angels. As we traveled "Home" and I had no idea where that was, I observed that three of them proceeded the rest of us. Two were on either side of me and the other two followed closely behind. The eight of us together remained in this configuration during the entire journey and the knowledge of their presence was incredibly comforting and powerful within me. All consumed in a wonderment, I looked from forward to upward and witnessed what appeared to be the Sun. It looked as large as a full golden moon rising over the horizon except there was no horizon and as we began passing through solar flares of fire I was surprised that the fire was not hot and did not burn and that we could safely enter and travel through this burning sphere of blazing golden white flames. Once we arrived at what seemed to be inside of the Sun, the atmosphere there was of a balmy coolness not unlike an early sunrise morning on a Hawaiian island with the gentle trade winds blowing and the sweet scent of tropical flowers lingering in the air. We then passed through another sphere of white and golden sacred fire rings and toward what appeared to be a city of light at the core or heart of the Sun.
The next thing I saw I shall never forget. A brilliantly opalescent Mountain range with Waterfalls and luminous Oceans surrounded by a system of incredibly translucent and multi-colored light structures with countless communities of glowing human shaped beings gracefully attending to what I can only describe as purely loving and life affirming activities and celebrations which perpetually gave thanks and glorification through endless and streaming Sound and Light expressions. Many of the light beings had hands lifted or waving creating what appeared to be circles or spheres of light generating like the ripples in a pond. All this while I continued to realize that in this heavenly place within the heart of the Sun were all the things of nature I so loved while upon the earth with one major defining difference, the light shined from within every being, place and thing while those same things upon the earth could be seen only by light reflecting off the surfaces of their forms. There were no reflections of light here, just the pure living light itself emanating from within itself.
As we all floated along, the atmosphere surrounding the numerous translucent structures in the cities of light was sweetly fragrant much like the scent of vanilla or amber. There was no gravity, no hunger, no aging, no disease, no richer or poorer, but only breathless visions of deathless delights. Translucent beings in and around glowing temples and mansions with glistening fluid bodies of opalescent beauty, surrounded by radiantly misting rainbow fountains of light and bountifully blooming gardens all so pleasing to all my soul's... (Chapter Four Manuscript continues...)
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"Vision of Decision"
(Chapter Five: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
And although it seemed just at the moment I might have forgotten all about earth life and say something like, "I think I'll just stay here forever..." a short series of images about the effect of my departure from the earth began to unfold. While I was floating on glorious streams of rainbow lights, I now watching intently as I was given to see some future images of friends and family attending the funeral of the child who had drowned at a Sunday picnic at the beach. I observed the result of my absence from earth and it's effect on my Mother's heart and her days of regret yet to come. The sorrow I saw and felt there was enough to congeal my decision to return without any further doubt or question. Now the seven guardians reassembled themselves in a circular formation as I was given to reviewing all my options for returning to earth and how this would be reconciled with all I had seen and experienced so deeply in this heavenly place.
It was a short meeting. I was told it wouldn't be an easy journey back to life in the physical and that the greatest challenge facing me was how I would be able to reconcile my experience of life in the soul body in this heavenly world with a return to the gravity laden physical body left back on the earth. Now it was to be my memory of a transcendental spiritual life that would test my ability to complete my journey on what I have subsequently described as; "the thicker grit of sandpaper world." How would I know if I could accomplish this. I knew I had to return. I communicated silently to all present my intentions and that I somehow understood the great challenges of my return to earth and with that, a golden cord of light appeared proceeding out from within my soul body and linking all the way back to my physical body with the cords connecting me on both ends, making what had been forgotten now... (Chapter Five Manuscript continues...)
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"Walking the Line"
(Chapter Six: excerpt) �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
Like a great hand carrying my tiny physical body lying supine
within it's palm facing up, I felt swiftly lifted up and through the ocean waters until my body popped up like a long submerged cork onto the surface of the ocean and I could hear my lungs burst open as air now rapidly rushed back into them. My first vision as I floated upon the waters was the Sun in the sky almost half way down to the horizon as it's warm life giving radiance seem to light up all my senses like a Christmas tree. A few moments later without remembering how I arrived I was walking, make that floating or gliding straight down the middle in walking crowds of people and carnival rides along all the boardwalk. I witnessed cords of light tied in and through the tops of the heads of all persons, animals and even the seagulls gliding just overhead as I continued my movement fluidly forward. Like puppets on solar strings of light, everything moving unwittingly along for the most part and not a single person seem to notice my presence there. It was the first time I felt completely invisible to the naked eye of people all around and about me. It was the first time I saw such strings of golden light animating life forms along their way on the boardwalk at Santa Cruz Beach and it would be the last time I...(Chapter Six Manuscript continues...)
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"Breathe like the Ocean"
"A Sacred^Sunday Contemplation Exercise" �1976 Beautiful Dreamer Publications
transliterated by: "Michael AngelOh"
This Contemplation Exercise is recommended for practice upon awakening each morning or before going to sleep each evening. I suggest you or a friend or family member read the following script into a tape recorder so that you may practice it undisturbed at anytime you may wish.
Go to the
"Breathe like the Ocean" Contemplation Exercise
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