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This is Part 5 of a series of posts relating a stunning, unprompted after-dinner conversation with my six-year-old grandson. A conversation in which he shared insights into what he referred to as “heaven” … insights gleaned from personal experience.
(Click here to start at the story’s beginning.)
In the last post, Part 4, Huxley described ways in which heaven (what I refer to as the spirit world or the Other Side) is organized. He explained it contains a variety of different “heavens,” and also places where souls reside … what he (and the Bible, as it happens) called “mansions.”
We left Part 4 with Huxley having revealed heaven isn’t just for those who have died.
So, what’s THAT all about??
We leave our bodies when we sleep
According to Huxley, sleep is not the benign activity we may assume it to be. No, apparently during sleep, kids go to “Kid Heaven” and play.
Seriously??
In fact, this seemed to be quite a fun prospect for him. He named two of his current friends who he said are there with him each night when he goes to play.
Um, wow, okay … once again, many questions came rushing to mind.
But before I had the chance to ask any of them, he began to provide answers. Starting with the question of, well … transportation, so to speak. I mean, just how is it that he and others get there?
Huxley matter-of-factly explained …
“We float up to heaven.”
Gee, why didn’t I think of that … ?
Continuing on, he pre-emptively addressed another question … when do they come back?
“We return to the real world when a bell rings … so we’re back before our parents come upstairs.”
It sounds like they’ve got an early-warning system in place to ensure their parents find them “at home” when they come up to check on them. Good thing, as I can imagine the consequences of missing the deadline could be rather disastrous!
Although …
Now that I think of it, this may explain something that happened a few years ago, something which totally puzzled me at the time ….
Brief side trip down memory lane
I remember having two of our other grandchildren visiting for a few days when they were seven and four. Given their ages, they slept in the same bed.
One night, the four-year-old woke up screaming and I raced out of our adjoining bedroom and burst in through their door, expecting from the decibel level to find blood and broken bones strewn across the room …
Thankfully, she was fine. Just a bad dream, waking up scared and confused about where she was. Whew, crisis averted!
As my racing heart began to settle back down, I glanced over at the seven-year-old … lying 18 inches away from her … and realized he was still fast asleep. Seriously.
He hadn’t moved a muscle. Not even flinched. Throughout the entire episode ….
Are you kidding me?? I couldn’t make any sense of it at the time, but now?
Hmm, I wonder. Maybe his “bell” hadn’t rung ….
Back to Huxley’s sleep revelation
Huxley continued to explain this phenomenon of going to heaven each night, adding, “We go to play for 5 minutes.” I don’t know if this duration was meaningful or just a six-year-old’s way of interpreting time.
That said, I find it interesting that it’s often stated there is “no time” on the Other Side … 20 years in our world can feel like 10 minutes over there. Or for those versed in the Bible (2-Peter 3:8-9) “ … With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. … “
So, perhaps Huxley isn’t the only one with a distorted sense of time!
Huxley went on to make the point that a friend of his, who he says he currently sees each night in “Kid Heaven for Six-Year-Olds,” won’t be in “his heaven” after Huxley turns seven. I took this to mean his friend is younger and the age rules are strictly enforced!
Do ALL kids meet up in heaven during sleep?
As Huxley related this, I recalled he had a childhood friend who tragically died a few years earlier, and I wondered to myself if and how this friend might be present in all this.
So, I casually asked Huxley whether he saw this particular boy during sleep time, simply referring to him by name.
Huxley paused, appearing momentarily perplexed. Then he looked at me across the table and asked quietly, under his breath … “Did he die?”
When I replied, yes he did, Huxley thought a brief moment and then said quite matter-of-factly, “Then he’s in Rest-in-Peace Heaven.”
Interesting ….
Sidenote: After this very young boy died, Huxley asked Julia whether they could … get this … “send a message and light” to him. I found that super intriguing … at the time, Huxley was just turning FOUR years old. (Julia cleverly rigged up a lantern they released into the sky.)
And do they always come back … ?
It sounded like Huxley had a lot of fun in “Kid Heaven,” and, well, I have to say I started to get a bit nervous. I mean, at some point, might he, er … um … decide just to stay? Gulp!
So, I gently asked him … after visiting there each night, did he want to come back to what he referred to as the “real world”?
He was very earnest … “Oh, yes.”
Whew, that’s a relief!
What about us?
It then occurred to me to ask about the rest of us … do adults also go to heaven when we sleep? He didn’t hesitate in answering …
“Yes … but you’re on a different level.”
Okay, I get it … given all I’d heard so far, that actually made sense.
Consistency Check – Do we leave our physical bodies when we sleep … or ever?
As I write this, I’ve just returned from lunch with a friend where during an unrelated conversation, she unknowingly shared something directly relevant to all this …
She told me she recently remembered that as a child, she was always excited to go to sleep … because she enjoyed floating over her body.
Wow, how cool is that?? Not only that she experienced the floaty thing, but that she remembered it and shared it with me right now … without knowing what I was working on.
Her story helps to demonstrate what I’ve discovered … this is yet another VERY commonly reported phenomenon. It’s called astral travel or out-of-body experience. And it’s described exactly like Huxley (and my friend) described it … “floating up, above the body.”
Let’s check in with some of these expert sources ….
Near-death experiencers join in
As it happens, this is a phenomenon that’s reported to occur not just when we sleep. It’s also a frequently occurring feature of near-death experiences (NDEs).
I’ve posted two excellent books … both written by medical doctors … describing scientific research into NDEs (briefly mentioned in the last post), and they each address out-of-body experiences.
The first is “After,” a book reporting on 45 years of scientific research into this field by Bruce Greyson, M.D. In it, Greyson states …
“More than 80 percent of the experiencers who’ve participated in my research report having had a sense of being outside their physical bodies.” (Ch. 6, pg. 70)
He goes on to say …
“Among the experiencers I’ve interviewed, this sense of leaving the body and later returning to it is usually described as easy, painless, and instantaneous.” (Ch. 6, pg. 70)
Hmm, sort of like “floating up” … ?
The second book … “Evidence of the Afterlife” by Jeffrey Long, M.D. … lists 12 elements that researchers have determined NDEs may include. First on the list … ?
“Out-of-body experience (OBE): Separation of consciousness from the physical body.” (Introduction, pg. 6)
Mediums also report this
In the last post, I referred to a book by a world-renowned medium, James Van Praagh … “Adventures of the Soul.” It has a variety of great information about that very thing … adventures of the soul!
Van Praagh addresses our nocturnal adventures too, stating …
“At night during our sleep state, our astral body (connected by the silver cord) can travel the Astral Planes spontaneously. We can visit our loved ones who have made the transition, and we can seek counsel from our guides and teachers. This is where the phrase “Let me sleep on it” becomes clear.” (Ch. 3, pg. 42)
He refers to our “astral body” … an energetic body … because, of course, our real body doesn’t go anywhere.
And the concept of a “silver cord” is also something I’ve seen mentioned many times before … an energetic connection that secures the energy body to the physical body. (I guess so we don’t go floating off and lose our way back … yikes!)
We can learn to do this leave-your-body stuff
Although this isn’t something I’ve personally pursued, there are people who actually go through training to learn how to astral travel … at will.
I know, right?? Like, why in the world would anyone WANT to learn how to do this??
Well, guess what? Apparently there are tangible benefits that arise from this experience. Benefits similar to those resulting from a near-death experience without having to go through the … you know, the near-death part … always a bonus.
According to William Buhlman, described as a noted expert in out-of-body travel, some of these benefits are:
- “Personal verification of our immortality
- A decreased fear of death
- Increased psychic abilities
- A more expanded concept of self
- Spontaneous healing”
Wow … that’s quite a list.
I lifted this information from the article, “What is an Out-of-Body Experience?” on the website of the Monroe Institute … an organization which describes itself as a “world leader in human consciousness exploration.”
I’m not personally familiar with the works of Buhlman, but I have frequently run across the Monroe Institute. It appears to be one of the most well-known, reputable organizations that provides this opportunity.
The founder, Robert Monroe, has written several books on this subject. Years ago, I read one of them and found it mindblowing… “Far Journeys.” (Fair warning, he’s not kidding when he says “Far …”.)
(If you’re interested, here’s a link to the founder describing his experience … Bob Monroe’s first Out-of-Body Experience (OBE)).
From work travel to astral travel
Then there’s the corporate lawyer, Garnet Schulhauser. This is a fascinating story (and relevant to the topic at hand, but I’ll get to that). First, let me tell you what happened ….
Schulhauser was working for one of the top two corporate law firms in the Canadian business centre of Calgary when he had a real-life encounter that completely changed his life … meeting his spirit guide.
I mean, this guy was straight-laced, fully steeped in business and the law, and he discovers he has a … a what?? A spirit guide?? Uh, huh, … sure.
But he didn’t just meet him and that was that. Oh, no. This spirit guide started teaching him … teaching him about how life REALLY works.
As you can imagine, this all completely upset Schulhauser’s “button-down-shirt-and-tie” persona. And he had to wrestle with this big-time, because his guide directed him to share these lessons being imparted with the world … by writing and publishing a book.
Hah! I bet that’s not something they teach in law school … !
I met Schulhauser in my local community after he’d recently retired, written the book (“Dancing on a Stamp”), and was arranging for its publication.
I observed how uncomfortable he was with all that was going on. I mean, he was still struggling with loosening his corporate tie yet here he was, on the verge of “coming out” of the spiritual closet.
In my discussions with him, I found him super credible, and raced to the store when his book arrived on its shelves.
I devoured it cover-to-cover, finding it addressed many fascinating fundamental concepts. It was much like what Huxley was doing with us now, except more extensively, of course, and, well, using … “adult-speak.”
But apparently, that one book wasn’t the end of it, which brings me back to why I’m raising this story here.
Subsequently, Schulhauser writes that his guide took him astral travelling … during the wee hours of many nights. The objective was to show Schulhauser further lessons of the Universe … lessons he was also meant to share with humanity.
(To his credit, Schulhauser went on to write four more books to do just that.)
So, Schulhauser’s “play time” may have had a different purpose than Huxley’s, but he too was elsewhere at night while his body slept.
Hypnotherapy gets the last word
Michael Newton, PhD, (introduced in Part 3) sums up this phenomenon in his book, “Journey of Souls,” by saying …
“Besides leaving at the moment of death, souls may also come and go when the body is sleeping, in deep meditation, or under an anesthetic in surgery. The soul’s absences are much longer in cases of severe brain damage and coma.” (Ch. 15, pg. 267)
So, yeah, leaving our body when we sleep, as Huxley disclosed, and at other times too, is actually something that’s commonly reported by multiple and disparate sources.
Sidenote: I have to say this is a concept that actually offers me comfort because it seems to apply also in the event of a sudden, painful death. I’ve read that when such an event is about to happen … whether for human or animal … the soul actually leaves the body just beforehand, avoiding the difficult experience altogether. I have found this thought gives me much peace of mind.
But on a lighter note, I’d say this all puts an interesting spin on some of those nighttime dreams … !
In our next post, Huxley continues with his revelations. This time, he conveys an intriguing insight into what living in the spirit world is actually like …
(Click here for Part 6.)
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