I firmly believe I experienced an NDE, yet the conditions leading up to it were quite different from the standard. I was a sophomore in college, enrolled in a very rigorous engineering program. My never-end drive to succeed academically drove me to exhaustion, and I really didn't have many friends. Additionally, I suffered from asthma that could make breathing difficult. I was pretty depressed! Friday night fun for me involved studying, and then lighting a candle to watch it burn out. (Although I'm smiling now as I type those pathetic lines, honestly that’s what I used to do!) Then, the most amazing event occurred in my life.

I was alone in my dorm room, and I had been studying. Suddenly, I didn't feel right. My asthma kicked in, so I lay on the bed. Feelings of depression and despair swept over me, and (now I don't quite know why), I said I didn't care if I stopped breathing and died. I just didn't care; I was so sick and tired of everything. Then, I involuntarily arched my back, and knew I died. It's so hard to describe, because I was not ill or involved in an accident. It’s hard to describe the course of events that happened afterward because they occurred simultaneously and lasted forever (but obviously did not).

I found myself enveloped by the most magnificent, brilliant light that radiated love, peace, and understanding. Like other accounts posted here, I never saw nor sensed my physical body. Yet, at the same time, I believe I was kneeling at the base of an enormous throne of the whitest marble, except I never actually saw it. It was an act of voluntary submission and reverence. And, then, after an eternity but instantaneously, I felt I was hurled back into my body through my chest.

Amazingly and immediately following this return, I found a freedom in my lungs, a freedom from asthma that continues today.

Although I wish I could tell more, I don’t recall any tunnel. I never saw anyone, nor was I met by any deceased family members. I didn’t experience a life review, boundary or hear and sense that I had to go back.

Yet, as many have described, the event changed my life. Initially, I hungered for spiritual nourishment to feed the hunger borne from being in the presence of the divine. But, after attending various conservative, right-leaning Christian denominations, I left the church. The doctrines are far too restricting and hateful compared to what I experienced firsthand (or, soul). The best description I've found is from the Tao.

Teh Ching: "That which can be described in words is merely a conception of the mind. Although names and descriptions have been applied to it, the subtle reality is beyond the description."

For about 10 years after the NDE, I possessed extraordinary extrasensory perception. Most noticeably, I could read people's emotions, which was almost expressly their grief and pain. Equally, I found the words to comfort and ease their mental turmoil. Although it sounds like such talent would be cool or fun, it was actually very draining, a heavy burden to bear. Gradually, as I stopped going to church, it seemed to dissipate. Today, I describe it as intuition rather than fully sensing others' feeling.