Usually, a person who experiences an NDE is involved in some sort of traumatic accident, illness, coma, or life-threatening emergency where death is imminent. Somewhere in the interim between dying and actually being physically dead, the experience takes place. Experiencers, as they collectively call themselves, have reported seeing a bright light, being surrounded by love, or even communicating with other realms of awareness. While the validity of these claims is difficult to prove scientifically, the ubiquitous and overwhelming similarities among the cases has researchers questioning the possibility they are more than just coincidence.
The interesting part regarding all of these experiences, is the person in question does not die, but comes back to life after having been pronounced dead. This normally occurs after paramedics arrive and are able to restart the person’s heart, or after someone awakes from a coma in the hospital. However, unlike a dream that can be easily forgotten, this type of experience usually leaves a lasting and uniquely profound impression on the experiencer, leading him or her to question the nature of reality, their lifestyle choices, and other more esoteric principles.
It also encourages us to bear in mind we are all subject to death. Interestingly enough, NDE reports are much different than the ones claimed by lucid dreaming practitioners. Whereas lucid dreamers are able to control where they go and what they do, NDE’s are not as untethered. This is important to consider; while searching for an objective truth is far from the reason for bringing this up, it is a very human element which deserves more personal exploration. Since we each must expire and leave our human bodies someday, it evokes the question of life after death, and our ability to still perceive consciously our own identity and our own ability to continue living on after our bodies perish. Are we in control? Or is there a connective force guiding experiencers of NDE’s in their brief, immersive glimpse of the afterlife?
Can Our Dreams Be Useful: Understanding Precognition
What if these psychic phenomena could actually be used in a meaningful way? Sure, coincidences, gut feelings, and facing own’s own mortality are pragmatic. However, what if there were a way for this information to actually help people?
As it turns out, this type of practical advice is what precognition helps individuals to do. Precognition refers to an individual’s experience of having a strong knowing an event will occur, not only this, but that it definitely will occur. This foresight is commonly experienced in vivid dreams, mental images, or major paranormal experiences, which are difficult to explain, and usually are very unexpected. This involves knowing future happenings such as when a tragedy will take place, who will win a major game in sports, or other knowledge perceived prior to it happening. Usually, this precognition occurs with stunning accuracy and is very specific. Sometimes, the awareness is of something insignificant such as the outcome of an event, or a person who will be seen the next day when in public. However, most of the time it is a strong knowing about something serious; something which may elicit the potential or desire to be avoided. Precognition is a future dream where the receiver has a strong awareness of an event in the future and can usually use this information to make others aware of impending danger, when appropriate. Sometimes, precognition happens with trivial things such as knowing that the grocery store will be out of milk, and to go to another store, before ever leaving the house. However, for minor things, this is usually referred to as intuition. For larger events, precognition is more accurate.