LOSING FAITH vs. GAINING PERSPECTIVE: How Trauma and Loss Can Increase Spiritual Awareness

Most people, when faced with trauma and loss, will search for a way to understand the event based on familiar cultural or religious assumptions, and their reactions can vary widely from embracing religious ideas more fervently to abandoning spirituality altogether. Because trauma, grief and loss can fracture one's beliefs about good and evil, security, the nature of God and one's place in the universe, re-evaluating these beliefs has the potential to either cause bitterness or offer tremendous personal growth.

Anybody who's ever cared for an infant or toddler knows that a developing infant sees itself as the center of the universe, and begins life with a sense that the world is made up of "me objects." Ryan LaMothe, in his article, Trauma and Development: A Faith Perspective explains that as a child matures, he begins to recognize a world of "not me" objects, and this shift is fraught with anxiety. As he begins to experience the less reliable, less familiar world of "not-me" objects, he discovers that an all-knowing "parent/protector" cannot be relied upon to provide security. LeMothe equates this conflict to a spiritual belief in omnipotence, or a supernatural "parent" that is supposed to provide this type of security and protection. These beliefs cannot help but be shattered by traumatic or negative experiences.

A psychological trauma disrupts the belief that that there is order, safety and continuity in life . When trauma survivors with deeply-held religious beliefs discover that the protective mother could not keep them from harm, many experience a "crisis of faith." If faith is defined by a belief that God rewards us for piousness by protecting us from harm, then that faith will certainly be challenged when harm occurs. Those who see God as a protector may feel deceived or punished, while someone with a different spiritual outlook may see the same experience as an opportunity to become more connected to the Divine, to overcome ego-attachments, or to re-evaluate their values and purpose in the world.

As freethinking human beings, we have a choice as to how we perceive an experience or event. Bereaved parent Mark Ireland wrote about his young son's death in his book, Soul Shift, "I could feed it my grief and pain or I could feed it my wonder and faith. Once I changed my outlook, I realized that my loss was not a meaningless accident. I woke up to a greater potential and gained a reference point from which I could contribute to the universe in new ways."

Ireland's statements express a redefinition of attachment in response to grief. When positive aspects of the lost relationship can be integrated into the bereaved person's life, the event can be viewed with tenderness rather than pain, and with spiritual openness rather than spiritual confusion. Bereaved individuals are constantly being advised by well-meaning friends to "let go." But what if we don't have to let go? What if we could just re-define our attachment and allow the relationship to take a new form? This can also be true for our beliefs and religious ideals. Rather than detaching completely from the world of faith, an experience that causes us to question our spiritual values can help us create new values and a new way of understanding human experience.

There is no more transformative experience in human life than trauma or tragic loss. Nothing can hurt us, scar us or heal us more, and nothing brings us more valuable growth lessons The gift of trauma changes us permanently and profoundly. It may change us physically due to illness or injury, it may annihilate our sense of security and status quo, and it may rob us of relationships, habits and beliefs that made the world safe and logical to us. It may also wake us up, shake us loose, move us forward and cause us to think more clearly and more deeply than ever before.

Regardless of religious beliefs or affiliations, when faced with trauma or grief, we find ourselves at a crossroads where there are unlimited options, including a bitter rejection of spirituality. But we can also choose to allow the life-altering event to integrate with our personalities, alter our perspectives and help us to focus less on what happened, and more on why it happened and the valuable lessons gained.

Therein lies the gift, because when an experience cuts to the core of everything that defines us, we are forced out of our spiritual lethargy, and an opening is created that is highly receptive to growth. If we nurture that opening, if we honor it and work with it, we can discover previously unimagined worlds of wisdom and choose enlightenment over annihilation.

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Terri will be a workshop presenter at the First Annual Afterlife Awareness Conference in Phoenix, AZ. April 29 - May 1, 2011. More about Terri can be found at www.AfterlifeAwareness.com <http://www.AfterlifeAwareness.com>

 


The Culture of Bereavement

by Terri Daniel© 2008
Excerpted from 
"Embracing Death: A New Look at Grief, Gratitude and God."

I'm normally an outgoing, very verbal person who is comfortable with emotional exposure. But during the first two years after my son Danny's death, I went into radio silence in terms of sharing my true feelings with people. I'd moved to a new town and made new friends, but they knew a different me… the A.D. (After Danny) version of me. And I barely knew that person myself.

I could talk to them about my divorce or the other dramas in my life, all of which were safe topics that anybody could relate to. But the subject of my son's death and the black hole in the middle of my heart was something so taboo and unspeakable that I barely mentioned  it. People were comfortable as long as they felt that I was doing fine and putting the "tragic" event behind me.

In deep grief we suffer alone. Death is so untouchable in our culture that the bereaved themselves become untouchable, and bereaved people are frequently shunned by their social groups, family members and colleagues soon after a death occurs. Our society is sorely lacking in etiquette guidelines for dealing with death and bereavement, so the preferred method is usually to sweep it aside as quickly as possible. The standard for bereavement leave in American companies is only three days, after which we're expected to get back to work and back to normal. While friends, colleagues and family members may gather to bring food, help with funeral arrangements and offer condolences for the first days or weeks after a death, many of the bereaved find that after the calls and cards stop coming, nobody speaks of the event again.

In our culture, the less attention drawn to our grief the better, because our grief makes other people uncomfortable. Yet one of the greatest gifts we can give to someone who's lost a loved one is to stay in touch and speak of the departed a year later, two years later, five years later and beyond. Even though I published a book about my son's life and death, there are members of my own family -- people who knew and loved him -- who have not read my book because they're unable to touch the core of their own grief. Sadly, for most bereaved individuals, within a month or two, our grief is neatly filed away and forgotten by the people who love us.

In Judeo Christian America, we are taught, as children, how to behave in a museum, at a birthday party or in a classroom. We're taught how to speak respectfully to our elders, how to say please and thank you and how to act appropriately in various social situations. But nobody teaches us how to behave around death.

I once had a client with whom I worked for several years. He became a dear friend and spent a lot of time with my family, frequently joining us for holiday dinners and backyard barbecues. He was like an uncle to Danny, but didn't come to Danny's funeral and never said a word to me about Danny's death. We just carried on our business relationship as if nothing had happened. In the same vein, a widow once told me that her husband died of a heart attack while playing golf with a friend. The traumatized friend didn't come to the funeral and was not heard from until more than a year later. Similarly, many bereaved parents find themselves ignored on Mothers Day, Fathers Day or the child's birthday, even though they would cherish some support and acknowledgment on these important dates. It's also common for the friends and family of bereaved parents to avoid talking about their own children for fear of triggering grief, pain and envy in the parent who has lost a child. But all this does is isolate the bereaved person even more. It does NOT help to avoid the truth. None of us has the right to deprive another of reality.

It's understandable that we would be uncomfortable about the death of a child or someone who dies tragically, because it brings home the reality that none of us is ever truly safe from harm and we're all potentially vulnerable to such a fate. But why shy away from the death of an elderly person who was seriously ill, for whom death is a natural, expected event?

In my 80 year-old mother's social circle of elderly widows, it's not unusual for their married friends to stop socializing with them once their spouses die. The widows form their own social networks and become excellent support for one another, but they're acutely aware that they've been shut out by the couples who were once their closest friends.  

I hear stories like this all the time. Is this is a behavior peculiar to modern America? Is it different in Australia or England?  Is it human nature, or is it culturally programmed?  Does it vary among different social structures or communities? Do African Americans deal with death differently that American white people? Do Catholics behave differently than Jews? Do poor people respond to death differently than rich people?

My friend Mukesh Chaturvedi is a writer and attorney in India who recently wrote this fascinating description of how death is handled by traditional Hindus:

"Helping a family when a death occurs is both a spiritual and social duty. There are no professional undertakers here, so it is the family's task to care for the body and the cremation. For the first 13 days there are continuous ceremonies. The responsible family member, usually the eldest son, performs the last rites, which includes lighting the pyre, and during those 13 days he will be somewhat of a  hermit while relatives care for the rest of the family. Women cry a lot, and are encouraged to do so. On the 13th day, there is a feast, and religious ceremonies can continue for up to a year. Many marriages are arranged during this period because the community is so tightly massed together.

The death of very old people is always celebrated, and people start planning the feast immediately. Death is accepted, understood and honored here. Lots of what people say on such occasions reflects philosophy of the Bhagavad Gita [sacred Hindu scriptures]. They say, " He is not dead, he has only left his earthly body behind.

Perhaps you know of this  Islamic tradition… if you meet a janaza (a funeral procession with people carrying a coffin), you are supposed to walk alongside it or help carry it for at least 40 steps.[1]

What a beautiful tradition! Not only are Muslims required to stop what they're doing to honor the passing coffin, they are required to walk alongside it, to be part of it, and allow it to be part of them. It's an excellent way to personally and publicly embrace death without fear or repulsion.

Odani Keiko, a Japanese journalist, says that dying in Japan has been increasingly handled quietly and covertly in hospitals, but  there are still strict social conventions related to honoring the dead, attending funerals and maintaining relationships after a death. It would be unthinkable to avoid a funeral or leave a social circle just because somebody has died.  

"The Japanese are not burdened with guilt about facing God, so perhaps this makes the concept of an afterlife easier to accept," Odani says. "It's believed that human souls still live after death and come visit the family in mid-summer. I still remember the old days when people made animals out of  cucumbers eggplants and sticks and put them on streets to greet the return of the dead. The dead are clearly more loved than feared." 

George Bonano, a professor of clinical psychology at Columbia University whose work focuses on coping with grief and trauma, recently conducted a study comparing grief processing in the U.S. and China. Bonano noted that the focus of grief in western countries is mainly on accepting the finality of death, so western grieving is very much about breaking bonds with the loved one. By contrast, in China it is believed that the person isn't really gone, and there are rituals and behaviors designed to acknowledge the continued presence of the departed.[2]

"They have a responsibility to help the dead person on his journey," Dr. Bonano says. "Because of this belief, the sense of loss isn't as important as working with the dead to help them find their way. This task helps people feel connected, so grief is much easier to deal with. Some of these practices include cleaning the grave regularly, bringing offerings of food and burning paper replicas of everyday objects that the dead might need in the afterlife, such as shoes or pots The most common paper offering is paper money. In cemeteries and ancestral halls, the Chinese literally burn bags of paper money, which they send as offerings to deceased loved ones."

While most of us can't imagine burning bags of money, the idea of "afterlife care" links the world of the dead with the world of the living in a way that blurs the boundaries between us and expands our view of existence. Can you imagine how different  bereavement would be if our culture supported us in maintaining an after-death connection? And if we could learn how to be  consciously and fearlessly involved in the dying process -- for ourselves and for others --  the  whole circle of birth, death, dying and the afterlife could be approached with eyes and hearts wide open.

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[1] http://www.hizmetbooks.org/Endless_Bliss_Fifth_Fascicle/Bliss-5-Chapter-16.htm When seeing a janaza, Muslims who happen to be in a store, in a cafe, etc. should at least carry it forty steps, walk behind it for a while, and say the Fatiha and other prayers for his soul. It is written in Maraq-il-falah and Halabi-i kabir that when seeing the janaza it is tahrimi makruh to stand up and wait with your face towards it.

[2] http://www.tc.columbia.edu/news/article.htm?id=5433

Where can I find hope in the face of death?

Syd and Danny

It is interesting, even funny in a cosmic joke sort of way, that the people at Children's Hospice asked me to write about the impending death of a child today, of all days. I've written on this topic extensively over the past few years and have even written books and conducted seminars on the subject. But today, the day the request came, happened to be the day I discovered a new facet of the irrational, pointless guilt that lives just beneath the surface of my grief.

My son Danny had a rare metabolic disorder called Metachromatic Leukodystrophy (MLD) that transformed him from a normal, happy seven year-old into a wheelchair-bound teenager who could no longer speak, wore diapers and could not sit up on his own, use his hands or control his body in any way.  During the last year of his life he'd even lost the ability to urinate and defecate on his own, so catherization and enemas became part of our daily routine. Remarkably, he was still able to eat until about three months before his death, though his ability to swallow diminished by degrees. Tube feeding was an option of course, but it would have done nothing to prevent the rapid progression of his illness. The next phase would have been blindness, constant choking on saliva, recurring bouts of aspiration pneumonia and excruciating pain as his muscles shriveled and contracted. I could not see the sense in having a well-nourished child who spent all his time dealing with pain, suffering and terror. Allowing him to die in relative comfort was by far the most compassionate choice, and thankfully I was supported by family members, friends and an enlightened medical team in this decision. In the words of my friend Margaret whose daughter Sydney also died from MLD, "If  I try to keep Sydney alive, she will have to pay the cost of my inability to accept death. Letting her go is my way to suffer for her instead of making her suffer for me."  

I mention Margaret because today, on the sixth anniversary of Sydney's death, she wrote a story and posted it on our online discussion forum for MLD families. She talked about the rare honesty she shared with 9 year-old Sydney on the matter of her impending death, and how Sydney had no fear at all, but brightly anticipated her transition as if she were planning a trip to Disney World. Margaret was my mentor and trail guide through the child loss journey. She knew things that nobody else knew, like how important it was not to tell Sydney that she was "sick," because children think that if they're sick they'll get better. Instead, she told Sydney she had a "disease," and made sure Sydney knew the name of the disease. While she was still able to talk, Sydney would say to people, "I have Leukodystrophy."

Margaret spoke hard-core truth to Sydney in ways that most parents would find unfathomable. She told her plainly and clearly that she would die soon, and Sydney understood this with a sacred acceptance that stunned everybody around her. Sydney started talking about death to anyone who would listen, and interestingly, two days after her diagnosis, before anyone told her about it, Sydney said to Margaret,  "Are you gonna miss me when I die? Because heaven is where I’m supposed to live.” 

Sydney knew. Lots of terminally ill children do. When my Danny was four years old -- six years before he showed symptoms or was diagnosed -- he used to tell me that he came from Jupiter and would be going back there soon. He even gave me detailed descriptions of life on Jupiter and of the other family that was waiting for him there. I'd ask, "When are you going back?" and he'd reply casually, "in a few years." He knew too.

Danny's return trip to Jupiter turned out to be a mystical and beautiful experience for both of us, and though I have some intense regrets about his last days (like the fact that I was tending to mundane household tasks in another room when he took his last breath), Margaret's missive today re-opened my deepest wound. The one thing I would change if I could do it over again is that I would have talked more to Danny about his death early on, while he was still able to speak. He was diagnosed at age ten and given a 5-10 year life expectancy, and I wanted him to enjoy those years without worrying about death. Children in our culture know nothing of death except what they see on TV and in movies, and it's not a pretty -- nor an accurate -- picture. So I told him the truth about MLD; that he would be in a wheelchair and would lose his ability to talk, but I didn’t tell him enough about death, because I didn't want him to worry about it. By the time I did start preparing him for it by leading him on guided meditations, taking about friends and loved ones on the Other Side and assuring him that we'll always be together even if we're not in physical form, he'd already lost his ability to speak, so he never got to ask questions or tell me what he thought.

I know now that he would have responded exactly like Sydney did, because he knew. It would have felt right, as if Heaven was where he was supposed to be.  I know that now, and I also know that death is neither an enemy nor an ending, but a journey of awakening for the person who has died and for those who remain on earth.

For those of you who have yet to walk to the door with your child, I give you these words from a spiritual teacher of mine, who said this to me during Danny's last days:

"For now you will be bathed in light and allow nothing else into your existence or awareness for the sake of Danny. Nothing else will exist for you. The ritual of transition begins, and it is up to you to bring only light and peace into the circle of honor here, as though no two people exist in the world except for you and Danny - no different than childbirth."

The Way We Perceive Death is a Choice

by Terri Daniel
Excerpted from her book,
"Embracing Death: A New Look at Grief Gratitude and God" ©2009

"You're on the deck of a boat watching dolphins play. The dolphins arc up above the surface and then dive under the water, disappearing from your line of sight. Isn't there something inside you that naturally knows the dolphins still exist? That they're just completing that circle under the surface even though you can't see them anymore? You don't worry that they're gone forever. You know they're somewhere, and that they're coming back, whether you're there to witness that return or not. Above, below, above again. Why wouldn't it also be this way with death?"  

- Mary McDonald-Lewis

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       When my 10 year-old son Danny was diagnosed with a degenerative illness that would end his life within five years, we began a sacred, transcendent journey that led us through disability, death and beyond. Part of this process involved my helping him to understand life and death in a way that would not only be comforting, but would give meaning to his life and help him face his death without fear.

       As his illness progressed he lost the ability to speak, and by age 12 was unable to talk in full sentences. We were never able to have an "adult" discussion about death, and I had to feel my way intuitively through his perceptions, emotions and life experience in the hope of discovering whatever beliefs and images he held about the end of physical life.

       Like most American children, the only information Danny had about death came from television, movies and video games. Although he couldn't verbalize this, I imagined that he thought of death as a violent, angry, terrifying event. He'd never known anybody who'd died, not even a pet. His grandparents were alive and well, and although some of the elders in our family had died, they were virtual strangers to him.

       Once, when Danny was about six years old, he told me that when people die they go to "Ghost City," a magical place "where kids can drive cars and go to school to learn about fun stuff."  When Danny began facing his own death, I wondered if this precious image was still in his mind. Thankfully, our family legacy was not a religious one, so we were free from visions of everlasting torture in hell or a heaven filled exclusively with saved Christians. His mind was completely open, which gave me a rare opportunity to fill it with beautiful, peaceful images, free of fear and judgment.            

       During the last years of Danny's life, I searched libraries and websites for material on positive, non-judgmental traditions and mythologies about death, and was particularly drawn to Buddhist and Native American stories. I read these stories to Danny, and imparted to him a vision of death and the afterlife that resonated with my own heart, incorporating my personal belief in reincarnation, the essence of our spirits and the possibility of communication between dimensions. As I wrote in my previous book, A Swan in Heaven… "At night I’d lay by his side singing to him and telling him that I would be OK on earth without him and would see him very soon. I told him that in Heaven he could have any kind of body he wanted, and he could visit me anytime and neither of us would be lonely because our souls would still be together. I explained how there was no such thing as linear time on the other side, and that people can be in more than one place at the same time. I told him everything I knew, everything I’d learned in my metaphysical studies, hoping he’d understand and wouldn’t be afraid of dying."  

       Religious doctrine, literature, sacred hymns and ageless folk songs impart nightmarish imagery of a "cold, lonesome grave," the "icy hand of death" and "the dreary regions of the dead." Add images of turning to dust, being eaten by worms and a 50/50 chance of an eternity in hell, and the fear of death is securely seated in the minds of many children by the age of six.

       Even the blissful images of death keep us from a meaningful understanding of the sacred transition from physical to non-physical existence. Sitting next to Jesus on a throne or floating on a cloud playing a harp for eternity doesn't explain or justify our purpose on earth, and offers us a stagnant, rather pointless afterlife. This leaves us with three basic ideas about death:

1. Judgment - We'll go to a good place or a bad place depending on our behavior.

2. Separation - We'll be somewhere else, away from loved ones, where we can't be contacted.

3. Permanence- We're gone forever, and all life experience stops.

       The primal fear of death is at the root of all neurosis. The ego's innate terror of extinction may be the driving force behind extreme behaviors that are designed to establish dominance and control, such as violence, war, abuse, corruption, abuse and bigotry. This is not only true for individuals. It's true for families, governments, religions, corporations and nations. The ego cries out, "what will become of ME?" and acts from an instinctive fear of disappearance and loss of identity. One could think of this as a survival instinct, but it begs the question… what, exactly, is trying to survive?

       I talked with a woman recently whose teenage daughter was dying from a rare disease. She said to me unapologetically, "I like my separateness. I don't want to merge into the void. I don't want to relinquish my individuality."

       That's the personality talking. It's the voice of the human ego wanting to survive, to be recognized and to be in control. The essence of us -- the soul -- knows that it can't disappear. But the ego -- the personality -- lives in fear of annihilation. On the soul level we are eternal; we are parts of the whole, like a blob of mercury from which pieces can separate but are always magnetically drawn back to the blob. Our souls have individual paths, tracks, histories and intentions that are acted out when we break off from the source into separate bodies during our incarnations on earth. But we are never truly separate, and always return to source, whether via dreams, visions, meditation or physical death. If we live in a multi-dimensional reality, then we don't disappear after death, but continue to resonate on a higher frequency. Embracing this view can help us release the fear-based notions of punishment rather than correction, judgment rather than loving support, and an eternity of idleness rather than limitless opportunity for growth.

       This view also gives us a new way of understanding and processing grief. I know a man whose son died in a train collision at age 16. The boy was a talented actor, musician and compassionate animal activist. The father laments that his son died before he could fulfill his potential in these areas, and sees his son's death as the tragic "waste" of a life that could have contributed so much to the world. But our existence can never be wasted if the work of our souls continues after death. It's as if we worked for a company and got transferred to another branch of the company in a new city, doing the same work in a different locale. This young man's love of art and animals, along with the gifts, lessons and growth tools he provided to his loved ones, continues now in another form. His life is far from over. And the guidance, love and energy he radiates from the Other Side provides boundless gifts of awareness and expansion for his loved ones on earth as well as members of his soul family in the non-physical.

       We've all heard the cliché, “nobody’s ever come back from death to tell us about it, so there's no proof that the soul lives on."  But that’s not really true… lots of people have had near-death experiences and communication with departed loved ones, and there are thousands of books on the subject. The Gallop poll reports that 21% communicate mentally with someone who has died, 75% believe in angels, and about 5% of the population has had a near-death experience.[1]  When you consider the millions of people who've had these experiences (far more than the polls actually record), there's actually more proof in favor of a world beyond the body than against it.

       I began receiving impressions and messages from my son less than an hour after his death, and these messages were the basis for my 2007 book, A Swan in Heaven. Our dialogs continue to this day, and they guide the work I'm now doing as an author and spiritual teacher.  I'm certain that the conversations Danny and I had about death during the last years of his life are what made this possible. We looked at death a certain way and it became our reality. The way we experience death is a choice. Where we put our energy will become true for us. If we believe in hell and judgment, we will carry that belief to our deaths and to the deaths of our loved ones, and the death experience will be filled with stress and fear. If we believe that death is the continuation of a rich, expansive journey, then the experience can be understood, embraced and enlightening for everyone involved.

HOW WE LEARN ABOUT DEATH

       Most modern Americans never see a dead body unless it's been embalmed and dressed up for a funeral. But in many other cultures, people are exposed to death throughout their lives. In countries suffering from war or famine, in tribal societies, in cultures that accept death and in most places where people live close to the land, death is not hidden or sanitized.

       During my childhood, when an aged grandparent, aunt or uncle died, the younger children weren't allowed to go to the funerals because the adults thought it would be too upsetting. When I became a mother I could see the flaw in this logic, and true to my role as the black sheep of the family, I encouraged my adult siblings and cousins to take their little ones to these funerals, recognizing these events as opportunities to teach children about the cycles of life and death. My family's preference for avoidance and suppression did more to create fear and superstition in the children than to protect them from it.

       It's probably fair to say that most people view death in one of these three ways: 

1. Heaven and Hell

We have one life to live on earth but our souls live on after death, and if we follow the rules of our culture and our religion, we will be rewarded after death with a conflict-free eternity, recognized by our god and our peers as a good or righteous person. If we don't follow these rules, we will be judged for our sins and sentenced to an eternity in a place of terror from which there is no return or redemption. When dying or grieving, this view leaves us terrified that we may have failed in life, and gives no reason for our experiences on earth other than an ultimate reward or punishment after death.

2. There nothing but the physical

In this view, there is no such thing as a non-physical world. When we die, our bodies decompose and we're gone, flat lined, forever. There is no soul or spirit, and no afterlife. The physical body is all there is, and after it dies, there is nothing left. A lifetime of achievements, losses, relationships, growth experiences, issues and creations remains frozen in time, because this one lifetime was our only encounter with existence. When dying or grieving, this view leaves us feeling utterly abandoned as victims of random chaos in a finite system. It exacerbates the feeling of permanent loss for the bereaved, making the grief process more difficult.

3. The soul lives on for the exclusive purpose of growth and awakening

The soul continues to broadcast its energy after the body dies. It continues its journey, sometimes embodied during incarnations, and at other times disembodied and continuing its work from non-physical realms. The soul continues to live and be part of the human panorama. When dying or grieving, this view gives purpose to one's life on earth, and provides limitless opportunities for expansion, correction and creation, no matter how short or how tragic the current physical life might have been.

       Whatever your belief system may be, the ideas you absorbed as a child were handed down by your tribe… your family, your culture, your social circle and your religion. This includes television, movies, books, art, education, relationships and other sources. But as you evolved as an individual and were exposed to new information, through the use of your free will and critical thinking skills, you mixed-and-matched with your childhood beliefs to create the theology you now have. When I was a child, my tribe told me that God punishes bad people and rewards good people. I moved out of that belief in the same way many of you moved through the beliefs of your own tribal origins. It's an evolutionary process in which we choose to keep some ideas and reject others according to where we are along our spiritual paths. But in the beginning of each earthly incarnation, these beliefs are given to us according to tribal tradition.

       I conduct a wonderful little exercise in my workshops that's a spin-off on the "telephone game" that many of us played in elementary school. In this schoolyard game, a group of kids form a line, and the person at the front of the line whispers a story the person next to her, and that person whispers it to the next, and that person to the next, and so on down the line. At the end of the game, the last person to hear the story recites it to the group, and it is barely recognizable as the original story told by the first person in line.

       The variation of this exercise in my workshops illustrates the value of discernment and intuition in helping determine what we believe to be true. In this exercise, I begin by asking three people to leave the room, usually an older person, a younger person and a person who is not a native English speaker. While they're gone I tell the rest of the group a story, usually a Native American death or creation myth.

       Then the first person from outside is brought in and a member of the group recounts the story. Then the second person from outside is brought in, and the first person tells to the story to the second person. After that, the third person is brought in, and the second person tells the story to him or her. As you might expect, by the time the story reaches the third person, the names of the characters have been either changed or forgotten, details have been omitted, timelines skewed, words replaced, and the entire meaning of the story lost. All it took was four people and 15 minutes.

       I intentionally choose the oldest person in the room, the youngest person and a non-native English speaker because this is how we have received most of our religious teachings, translated and from language to language, handed down orally from elders to children, carried across constantly-changing political and linguistic borders, and frequently altered according to the personal preferences of the storyteller. By the time writing and printing became possible, the original stories were modified beyond recognition. The teachings of the Buddha were shared orally for 400 years before they were ever written down. The first recorded gospel of the New Testament was written 70 years after the death of Jesus, and 300 years later many of those teachings were rejected by the Emperor Constantine because they didn't fit neatly into his vision of a Christian Rome.

       Many words might have a particular meaning in one language during one period in history, but end up with a completely different meaning at another time in another language. The English word "heaven" for example, is derived from a Middle English word that means to "heave or throw," which is related to the Old English word "hebben," which refers to a handle one uses to raise an object, which may relate to the cliché of moving heaven and earth. The Middle English word "hevi" refers to a state of "heaviness" which may have something to do with heaving, as in "lifting up," which somehow translated into the word "heaven," referring to something that resides high in the sky above us. But what was the original word from the various Bible translations that spanned Aramaic, Greek, Hebrew and a thousand other languages over the years? How can we possibly know which word was intended by the original authors, much less its meaning?

       This is why we have nothing to rely on but our intuition… the resonance of our hearts with the scriptures, teachings, beliefs, myths and stories. Our intuitive skills are the only tools we have for sorting through the ideas that are presented to us throughout our lives. In other words, the only way to know what is true is to listen to our souls talking to us.

       When we release traditional notions and replace them with our own innate sense of truth, it is possible for intuition to remove fear, especially as it relates to death. Most of us have experienced dreams, visions and impressions that feel as if we've been contacted by loved ones on the Other Side. Many of us have experienced flashes of thought, sounds, verbal phrases, kinetic incidents and even music or scents that we felt were sent to us by some sort of "higher" force, be it departed loved ones, angels or other non-physical guides. Yet we dismiss these experiences as coincidences, oddities or freak events. But if we trust these experiences, if we trust what feels true, we can be led to a whole new way of seeing our world, including the world beyond the physical. What’s the point of spiritual work -- seeking, praying, meditating and studying -- if not to help ourselves find peace? We are just as able to choose a theology of fear as a theology of love, and in doing so, we can begin to see that in death there is no disappearance and no loss of identity. And in seeing that, a great peace, grace and acceptance can come into our lives, changing the way we live and die.

       Let's return for a moment to the telephone game. One of the myths we work with is a Native American creation story in which a young warrior steals the sun, moon and stars from the lodge of a greedy chief who wants to keep these things for himself. The warrior carries the celestial bodies into the sky and places them there, and that's how the sun, moon and stars were created.

       This story is no more rational than the idea that we live a limited number of years, have no control over what happens to us, are being watched and judged all the time and when our bodies give out we go to a place in the sky where our deeds are examined and we are sent to one of two places in remote, non-physical locations where we remain for the rest of eternity. In this system, there is no opportunity for growth, correction or healing because we had one chance, and the window was open for a short time. If we blew it, we were done forever.

       But what if there's no time limit? What if there's no time?

       The other day while waiting in my dentist's office I leafed through a beautifully illustrated book about the human body. The book was published by a worldwide mega-publisher, and I was delighted to find that it contained a section on near-death experiences (NDEs). It quoted various scientific theories about how NDEs are the result of either the brain's neurotransmitters shutting down, a lack of oxygen to the brain, REM and dream activity or even the possibility that the tunnel experienced by many NDEers is simply a memory of coming through the birth canal. The writer summarized by saying that NDEs are probably just a spectacular final fireworks show produced by the brain in the last seconds before we go into oblivion.

       If there is not a consciousness that lives beyond physical life and we have only one lifetime on earth (even if we only live a few seconds after birth), then what's the point in even studying these questions? If we come from oblivion and return to oblivion with a short span of time in human bodies in between, then we aren't actually coming or going anywhere on this journey. The journey would be pointless.

       But if some aspect of us is eternal, or if we live over and over again in different bodies, locations, cultures and environments that are specifically chosen to further the growth of our souls, then life and death suddenly have more meaning and the loss of a loved one appears a little less permanent and overwhelming. If we could shift our perceptions away from the idea that life exists only in three known dimensions, perhaps we could understand  death as something other than a permanent loss. And in that shift, we could find a zone of comfort and acceptance in which we know that our relationships continue after death.

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[1] http://www.nderf.org/nde_attitudes.htm