by Mark Pitstick MA, DC

My e-books, ​audio books, audio programs, documentary film, radio shows, articles, and ‘Greater Reality Healing, Living & Helping Program’ are ​all FREE at SoulProof.com.  In lieu of payment, I ask that you fully use the products, share them, and help others as you feel called.

This evidence-based information and holistic resources will help you . . .

  1. Adopt a more accurate worldview based on contemporary understandings about ‘the big picture of life’ and live accordingly – whatever that means for you. (see article #19 ‘The Great News’ about the Nature of Reality at SoulProof.com)
  2. Experience shorter and lightened grieving after loved ones change worlds and other big changes that seem like losses. 
  3. Fine-tune yourself physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually so you have the vitality to handle life’s demands AND share your greatest gifts / soul’s missions. 
  4. Become more aware of, benefit from, and share life’s silver linings that always accompany opportunities masquerading as adversity.  
  5. Create the greatest life YOU have envisioned. (The term ‘YOU’ refers to your higher self / eternal consciousness / soul)
  6. Fulfill your highest purposes for being on earth and help make our world a better place. This is now practically possible as discussed in article #125 Eight Developments for Widespread Conscious Living Now. As enough people do this, widespread personal and planetary change will naturally unfold. 

To learn more about how you achieve these lofty goals, read the following articles at SoulProof.com/ArticlesAND watch videos at SoulProof.com/Greater Reality Program.  

Clinical Evidence That Life Continues After Physical Death

Significant scientific, clinical and firsthand experience evidence clearly indicates that you  survive after your earthly body dies.  That may sound too good to be true to you, so I’ll state it another way: a vast and varied amount of data strongly shows that the death of your human form is not the end of your life.

Gary E. Schwartz PhD stated in 2019: “Speaking as a scientist, I am now 99.9 percent certain that life continues after the human body dies.”   I am equally sure based upon my personal and professional experiences, and knowledge of the evidence.  Those are very high levels of certainty.  Many reputable scientists, physicians, and university professors now agree that the question of survival has been satisfactorily and affirmatively answered.

This evidence is grouped into three categories based on who is doing the analysis: research scientists, clinicians, or persons having the firsthand experience.

1. Evidence from Research Scientists
Evidence collected by a scientist requires a laboratory or research setting with double-blinded, experimentally controlled, and replicated studies. Further, the findings must be statistically significant, peer-reviewed, and published in reputable journals. Topics in this category include: studies of authentic mediums, postmaterial communication technology, and other scientific evidence.

2. Evidence from Clinicians
Evidence from a medical or psychological clinician requires systematic collection and analysis of data in a professional office, hospital, or field setting. Categories include: near-death experiences, past life memories, perinatal research, life between lives studies, terminal lucidity, and deathbed visions.

3. Evidence from Persons Having Firsthand Experiences
Evidence in this category, termed empirical, is perceived and analyzed by the person having the direct experience. Categories include: after-death communications, out-of-body experiences, shared-death experiences, and others.

In this article, I will share some of the clinical evidence that life continues after bodily death.  To learn more, read Greater Reality Living by me and Dr. Gary Schwartz.

Near-Death Experiences
Near-death experiences (NDE) occur when people are clinically, but not yet irreversibly dead. That means one or more of the following occur: the heart stops beating in a regular rhythm as measured by electrocardiogram, the lungs quit breathing, the brain no longer functions in a normal way as demonstrated by electro-encephalogram. During that time, patients have their eyes closed and are often in an emergency room or intensive care unit.

Despite all of the above, many people considered clinically dead have been aware of events occurring in the resuscitation room, adjacent areas, outside, and even on top of the hospital. After patients are revived – and before they can learn any information from family – they correctly describe detailed events that occurred during the NDE.

A large amount of NDE literature exists, thanks to investigations by many top university professors and physicians.  Studies of diverse age groups in other cultures show the same patterns or universality of reports. NDEs provide some of the strongest clinical evidence that consciousness is nonlocal, that is, exists separately from the body and brain. To learn more, we recommend The Handbook of Near-death Experiences edited by Bruce Greyson M.D.

According to renowned university researcher Ken Ring Ph.D., approximately ten thousand evidentiary NDE cases have been documented by doctors and university professors. This data strongly points to a continuation of consciousness after death of the earthly body.

Neurosurgeon Eben Alexander M.D. – author of Proof of Heaven, A Map of Heaven, and Living in a Mindful Universe – had a NDE after a severe case of bacterial meningitis affected his brain. During his weeklong coma, he came to understand deep truths about the nature of reality and consciousness. Based on his professional and personal experiences, Alexander believes the brain does not create consciousness. Rather, he maintains that awareness survives death of the human body.

NDEs reported by those who are blind constitute particularly impressive evidence that consciousness operates apart from the brain. In Books of the Dead, Stan Grof M.D., discussed: “… reported cases where individuals, who were blind because of medically confirmed organic damage to their optical system, could at the time of clinical death, see the environment. Occurrences of this kind, unlike most of the other aspects of near-death phenomena, can be subjected to objective verification. They thus represent the most convincing proof that what happens in near-death experiences is more than the hallucinatory phantasmagoria of physiologically impaired brains.”

In the foreword of Mindsight by Ken Ring Ph.D. and Sharon Cooper Ph.D., researcher Charles T. Tart Ph.D. stated: “The authors of this book have practiced essential science, real science. They have looked at the facts about NDEs, particularly NDEs among the blind, and provided us with extremely stimulating and thought-provoking material that we must take into account to come to terms with reality. These facts argue strongly that there is some very real sense in which we are spiritual beings, not just material beings.”

Past Life Memories
The phenomenon of past life memories is another category of evidence indicating that life does not end after death of the human body. Such memories can be perceived spontaneously while awake or dreaming. They can also be accessed with the aid of hypnosis during a past life regression. There are many such validated cases in the literature.

Brian Weiss M.D., former head of psychiatry at Mount Sinai Medical Center, wrote Messages from the Masters and other books about past life regressions. He has received thousands of phone calls and letters from psychiatrists, psychologists, and other therapists who have done past life regressions for up to twenty years.

Dr. Weiss stated, “The letters describe detailed accounts of past-life recall, of patients recalling names, dates and details of lifetimes in other cities, countries or continents. Some patients have found their ‘old’ names in the official records of places they have never even heard of, let alone visited in this lifetime. Some have found their own tombstones.”

Joel Whitton M.D., Ph.D. was Professor Emeritus of psychiatry at the University of Toronto Medical School and co-author of Life Between Life. He related clinical work with a client named Harold who, when hypnotized, described a former life as a Viking raider. Although Harold had never studied a foreign language in his life, he spoke comfortably and confidently in a strange tongue that experts identified as ancient Norse. Working independently, linguists who spoke Icelandic and Norwegian identified and translated some of these words.

During another past life recollection, Harold wrote what looked like a bunch of scribbles. The alphabet he used was identified by researchers as a long-extinct script used in Mesopotamia. That language bore no relation to modern Iranian and hadn’t been spoken for more than 1300 years. Of Harold’s past-life regression experiences, Dr. Whitton stated: “To me, the case remains one of the most convincing arguments I’ve seen for evidence of reincarnation.”

Many young children have spontaneously reported past life memories. In Children’s Past Lives, Carol Bowman M.A., related a case: “Desmond had been playing with his toy cars on the floor when he told his mother without any prompting: ‘You know, Mummy, I went to Aunty Ruth before I came to you, but I didn’t stay there very long.’”

Bowman continued, “His mother was stunned to hear her 3 ½ year-old say this. Her sister-in-law Ruth had given birth to a stillborn son ten years ago. But the family had a pact to never speak of it because it had been so traumatic for her. Desmond could never have overheard anyone discuss it.” Describing his time in Ruth’s womb, Desmond said, “One time I went to sleep, but when I woke up again, I wasn’t with Aunty Ruth anymore.”

The massive amount of objective research by Ian Stevenson M.D. is the most impressive evidence to date about the validity of past life memories. Stevenson’s books include Children Who Remember Previous Lives, Cases of the Reincarnation Type, Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation, Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect, andReincarnation and Biology. The world’s leading authority on the subject, he was the author of more than a dozen scholarly books and 250 articles.

Stevenson, who headed the department of psychiatry at the University of Virginia, spent most of his sixty-year career perfecting methods for verifying the past life memories of children. He and his staff compiled over 3000 cases from Asia, Europe, Africa and North America. Nearly 900 of these were stringently verified and 35 percent had birthmarks or birth defects that matched injuries from previous lives.

Since Dr. Stevenson’s retirement, doctors at the University of Virginia’s Division of Perceptual Studies continue to investigate cases of children who report memories of previous lives. After working with Dr. Stevenson for several years, Jim Tucker M.D., took over the project in 2002. In Life Before Life: A Scientific Investigation of Children’s Memories of Previous Lives, Dr. Tucker presented an overview of the research.

Life Between Lives Research
Michael Newton Ph.D. was a traditional counseling psychologist at the beginning of his career. However, while under hypnosis, several of his clients described glimpses of life before they were born on earth. Dr. Newton then began to systematically explore these reports through the eyes of his clients.

His work mapped out what subjects experienced before human birth. His Life Between Lives® approach used deep hypnotic regressions to access the time before coming to earth. Dr. Newton conducted this pioneering work for over twenty-five years before sharing his findings with the world.

Newton worked with over 7000 people during his thirty-five-year career. These clients came from around the world, yet a high degree of inter-client agreement occurred about specific details. His books Journey of Souls and Destiny of Soulsdescribe his findings.

In Dr. Pitstick’s documentary film Soul Proof, Dr. Newton stated, “I was a skeptic before about the whole process of past life regression and working with life between lives. What convinced me it was real was the consistency of my patients’ reports as they were telling me everything that had happened to them in their past life reports. It didn’t matter whether someone came to me who was deeply religious or an atheist, or any philosophical persuasion in between. Once I had them in deep hypnosis, they all told me the same thing about the spirit world and about their life between lives.”

In correspondences with Ann Clark Ph.D., RN, Director of Research for the Newton Institute, she stated: “To date, approximately 34,000 sessions have been conducted worldwide in twenty-three different languages. Findings about otherworldly realms have remained consistent with clients from different cultures, ethnicities, and religions. During sessions, individuals experience themselves as immortal souls. Further, they meet guides, departed loved ones, and wise beings who offer advice on soul lessons and life purpose.”

Shared Death Experience 
The terms shared death experiences / shared crossings describe NDE-like experiences reported by those present at the time of another’s bodily death.  These are described by healthy people during the time period just before, during, and after another person passes on.  Shared crossings usually occur when there is a close relationship between the dying person and family members, friends, or health care providers. 

I first heard about this phenomenon in 1999 when Dr. Moody described what he called empathic NDEs.  In his book The Last Laugh, he stated: “Dozens upon dozens of first-rate individuals have related to me that, as a loved one died, they themselves lifted out of their own bodies and accompanied their dying loved ones upward toward a beautiful and loving light.  Others have said that, as they sat with their dying loved ones, they perceived deceased relatives coming to greet the one who was passing away.  Lots of doctors and nurses have described to me how they perceived patients’ spirits leaving their bodies at the point of death.”

William Peters, MA, MEd, MFT, founded and directs the Shared Crossing Project.  Their website at SharedCrossing.com states: “A shared crossing refers to experiences that convey information pertaining to an impending death and / or to the perceived continuation of consciousness after bodily death.  This information often provides comfort and support for the dying as well as for loved ones and caregivers throughout and after the dying process.  Experiencers often report that they have received a gift or transmission crafted specifically for them.”

Shared crossings are in the ‘clinical evidence’ category because a number of physicians and psychologists have collected data this topic and consider it to be valid.  In a personal communication, Peters wrote: “After years of data collection and analysis, we are submitting a series of journal articles.  Our first one has been approved for publication in the American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (April 2021).”  His book, At Heaven’s Door: What Shared Journey’s to the Afterlife Teach about Dying Well and Living Better, was published by Simon & Schuster.  

Terminal Lucidity
Terminal lucidity refers to a return to mental clarity in a person with profound memory loss or mental disorder. Such cases during the days or hours before bodily death have been noted in patients with Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, psychosis, and mental disability. These events have been reported for over 250 years by doctors across the world.

German biologist Michael Nahm Ph.D. stated in a 2009 Journal of Near-Death Studies: “The literature concerned with experiences of the dying contains numerous accounts reporting the sudden return of mental clarity shortly before death. These experiences can be described as Terminal Lucidity. The most peculiar cases concern patients suffering from mental disability including mental illness or dementia.”

In the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Nahm and Bruce Greyson M.D. stated that out of 49 case studies of terminal lucidity, 84 percent occurred within a week of bodily death. In addition, 43 percent occurred on the final day of life. They and other researchers also published an article in the July 2012 Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics.

In his Huffington Post blog, When Alzheimer’s Victims Suddenly ‘Perk Up’ Just Before Death – What’s Going On? Stafford Betty Ph.D., professor at California State University, described a case: “An elderly woman never speaks; no longer recognizes her loved ones when they come to visit and shows no expression. By the looks of her, she is a human vegetable. And she’s been this way for over a year. Her brain’s cerebral cortex and hippocampus, necessary for memory, thought, language, and normal consciousness, are severely shrunken. Her brain bears little resemblance to a healthy one.”

He continues, “Yet something utterly astonishing is about to happen. As reported by both the nursing staff of her care unit and her family members: unexpectedly, she calls her daughter and thanks her for everything. She has a phone conversation with her grandchildren, exchanges kindness and warmth. She says farewell and shortly thereafter dies.”

Using the term ‘mind’ to describe consciousness, Dr. Betty stated: “Conventional brain science has no explanation. It has long been assumed that as the brain goes, so goes the mind, for the brain is what gives rise to the mind. Could it be that the conventional wisdom is wrong? Is it possible that the mind’s sudden and short-lived return to normalcy just before death is brought about, not by some inexplicable surge in brain functioning, but by the mind’s distancing itself from the brain? What if the brain does not give rise to the mind, as commonly thought? What if the mind uses the brain as its organ?”

Deathbed Visions
Deathbed visions are one of the experiences studied at the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. Their website states: “Deathbed visions are those visions or other experiences that a dying person may have in the minutes, hours or days before his or her death. Family members or hospital personnel may report that a dying person, previously weak or even comatose, suddenly revived, sat up, stared at a corner of the room and called out the name of a deceased loved one. In rarer cases, a bystander has had such a vision, either alone or simultaneously with the dying person.”

Only ten percent of patients are conscious just before their body dies, but estimates are that more than fifty percent of these experience a deathbed vision.

In his 2017 ThoughtCo.com article Deathbed Visions: Are Dying People Escorted to the Other Side by Loved Ones? Stephen Wagner stated: “Close to the moment of death, apparitions of deceased friends and loved ones appear to escort the dying to the other side. Such deathbed visions are not just the stuff of stories and movies. They are, in fact, more common than you might think and are surprisingly similar across nationalities, religions and cultures. Instances of these unexplained visions have been recorded throughout history and stand as one of the most compelling proofs of life after death.”

Wagner continued, “One of the first to examine the subject seriously was Sir William Barrett, a Professor of Physics at the Royal College of Science in Dublin. In 1926, he published a summation of his findings in a book titled Deathbed Visions. In the many cases he studied, he discovered some interesting aspects of the experience that are not easily explained. It was not uncommon for the dying people who saw these visions to identify friends and relatives who they thought were still living.”

Wagner concluded, “But in each case, according to Barrett, it was later discovered that these people had actually died. (Remember that then, communication wasn’t what it is today; it might have taken weeks or even months to learn that a friend or a loved one had died.) Barrett found it curious that children quite often expressed surprise that the ‘angels’ they saw in their dying moments did not have wings. If the deathbed vision is just a hallucination, wouldn’t a child see an angel as it is most often depicted in art and literature – with large, white wings?”

Marilyn Mendoza Ph.D. is a clinical instructor in the psychiatry department at Tulane University Medical Center and author of We Do Not Die Alone. In her Psychology Today blog, Deathbed Visions: Experiences of the Dying, she shared an example: “A patient dying of cancer had been very restless throughout the night. In the early morning, she opened her eyes and stared fixedly into the corner of the room where no one was standing. She said, ‘Mom, I’m so glad to see you.’ She smiled. After saying this, the tension in the room from the family eased. After her comment, the patient died peacefully.”

I hope this brief overview of just part of the clinical evidence helps you know more deeply bodily death is nothing to fear.  Far from an end, it is a new beginning in another phase of life that can be much more peaceful, happy, and magnificent than your best days on earth.             

                                           *       *       *       *     *       *      *

Thank you for telling others about this article!  Your life, and that of others around you, will be more enriched when you:  

  1. read the article again so you really know it.
     
  2. discuss with close family and friends to more deeply internalize it.
     
  3. take action steps that seem right for you.
     
  4. share it with others via social media, discussion groups, and other ways.

Hugs, love, blessings, and let it shine!
Mark

Mark Pitstick MA, DC

– a​uthor, lecturer, c​ounselor, and holistic chiropractic physician 

– spokesperson, researcher, and strategic planner for SoulPhone Project

– ​founder of ‘Greater Reality Healing, Living & Helping Program’

SoulProof.com     SoulPhone.org     ​​GreaterRealityProgram.com ​

University-based research has now scientifically proven that life continues after bodily death.  The SoulPhone Project will enable communication with postmaterial (so-called “deceased”) loved ones and luminaries who want to help us heal our world. How does this project, The Great News, and The 8 Developments affect the way you live and treat others and our planet?  (To learn more, see articles #35, 19, and 125 at SoulProof.com/Articles)

Dr. Pitstick is a master’s clinical psychologist, holistic chiropractic physician, and clinical nutritionist.  He has also helped others in pastoral counseling and suicide prevention / education settings.  His goal is to help you know and show that this earthly experience is a totally safe, meaningful, and magnificent adventure amidst eternity. 

To learn more about the Greater Reality Healing, Living, and Helping Program, visit the ‘Greater Reality Programs’ top tab at SoulProof.com and SoulPhone.org.  Also see  articles #19, 72, 82, 119, and 125 at SoulProof.com/Articles.

SoulProof.com provides many FREE resources: 

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In lieu of payment, he asks that you: (1) fully use and appreciate the products, (2) share them with others, and (3) help others in ways you feel called.

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Note: This article is intended as a reference source, not to replace professional treatment for physical, emotional, or mental problems.  The author disclaims any liability arising directly or indirectly from the voluntary use of action steps discussed in article. 

Dr. Pitstick created this article while ‘wearing the hat’ of a clinician, counselor, and educator.  His statements are based upon some scientific research; much clinical and experiential evidence; his personal experiences; and best current understandings.  This article does not reflect his role in the SoulPhone Project since that requires scientific data for all statements.