Guest Blog by Lou Manrique
Five years ago I had a near death experience. I was in bed, recovering from a respiratory ailment and tried, without success, to clear my throat. I suddenly discovered I could not breath! Try as I might, I could not inhale. While making attempts to do so, I surprisingly found I could exhale but not inhale! I immediately understood that I needed all the air that was currently in my lungs so decided to keep it there. I also could not talk.

Fortunately my wife, Tess, was home at the time, so I went to her in the living room and, with hand gestures, communicated my distress. She immediately called 911 as I stood there. With nothing more to do, I remembered a book by Jill Bolton Taylor, a highly recognized brain scientist who, while still in her 30s, woke up one morning and realized that she was having a stroke! Grabbing her phone to get help, she also realized that this was a remarkable opportunity to understand a brain crises from the inside, so began to take notes on her iPhone while awaiting help. She later published her experience in the best-selling book My Stroke of Insight.

I knew I had four minutes before I lost consciousness, and I had already used one of them, so I took out my iPhone and I, too, began to make notes. Time seemed to slow down, and the next events seemed to happen leisurely, even though they took only a couple of minutes:
• The hospital EMT, which was less than 2 miles away, got there in 2 minutes.
• While standing there waiting, I felt I should do something useful. I went out on the front deck giving the emergency responders less distance to go to reach me.
• They arrived in their recognizable red vehicle, along with an immense fire truck – I was beginning to feel important!
• While standing at the top of the stairs in the sunshine, I watched them having difficulty adjusting their gurney to go up the 19 stairs of our front deck.
• Now that over 3 minutes had passed since my breathing stopped, I was surprised to find that I could make the tiniest of an inhalation – I knew at that moment I would survive!

The two-man team finally reached the top of the stairs with their unfolded gurney and quickly asked “Where’s the patient?” I smiled at them squeaking out “I’m him – it’s OK – I can walk down”. They would have none of that and quickly strapped me onto the gurney for a rapid ride back to the hospital, siren’s blazing away.

In the ICU, the Emergency Medic quickly diagnosed the episode as “epiglottitis” which sometimes happens in a newborn baby, but is rarely seen in an adult (although George Washington succumbed to it). The ER doctor asked if I would be willing to stay in ICU for a few days, all wired up and monitored 24/7, rather than staying in a ward, where response would be slower if another episode occurred. It would also help them understand how such an event could happen in an adult rather than in a newborn.

I agreed to stay. I did not feel “at risk”, but felt compelled to help their research. And besides, I had a comfortable private room with meal service, my own TV, and the 2016 Olympics were just starting in Rio! I stayed for a week, but they still couldn’t figure out why this potential life-ending event happened in an adult! So, now you have the facts of the event, but here’s the important stuff! What did I learn from this near death experience?
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Once I alerted Tess and heard her calling 911, I relaxed, knowing that the next events were largely out of my hands.
Looking at my iPhone, I realized that over 2 minutes had passed and that I probably had less than 2 minutes before I lost consciousness. Then, some remarkable things began to happen:
• Knowledge and understanding began coming to me without effort on my part!
• This understanding was neither left brain (logic) nor right brain (emotion), but rather like easy and slow insight that was peaceful and pleasant.
• It was like a slowly enlarging spiral, which began with the precipitating event (a dot in the center – my breathing stoppage) and slowly grew and enlarged with each passage around the spiral.
• “Earthly” things, like my life, loving Tess, my home in Port Townsend, my library and stamp collection, and even the unfinished tasks on my “to do” list, diminished in importance. They were replaced by a sense of growing peace and understanding.
• I knew I was “returning home” – I was leaving my body behind and returning to the “life pool”, from which I emerged when I was born. I was peaceful and happy!

The understanding that came to me, quietly and without effort on my part, was knowing that all deaths are the same, and had always been so! Yes, the precipitating event might be war, or violence, or losing the ability to breathe, but that was just the dot at the center of the spiral. It got to be of less and less importance as the spiral grew.

It was also clear to me that body and life are two separate things, temporarily made into one during the period between birth and death. The body remains in the physical universe (“ashes to ashes, dust to dust”). Its physical-ness, is neither created nor destroyed. It’s simply re-transformed into new molecules and energy, returning to be part of the stuff that makes up the rest of the universe – yes, our bodies are truly of the stars after death.

However life is not physical, nor is it destroyed. It simply returns to the “life-pool” from which it came. In that sense, there is no difference in the “life energy” that animates humans, animals, or even insects. All life comes from the same source, and can neither be created nor destroyed. It simply transforms! And here is the significant understanding that emerged – all deaths are the same in how they unfold, and they have always been this way. What “caused” your death does not change the process!

Life and non-life have always inhabited separate universes, only coming together when a living thing is born, be it human, animal, or insect. If you think about this fully, not only is there no “heaven” or “hell” (beyond that which we create here on earth through our actions and behavior), but the beginning of “life” and its “ending” with death is the same for all! This is true whether you are a “Hitler” or a “Saint”. Both greatly affect life on earth, but all experience no difference in death. Life produces profound differences, in both the kinds of living creatures and how they behave, while death is truly a common denominator.

That understanding came to me in about one and a half seconds, without any effort, while EMT was wrestling with the gurney. It was probably similar to descriptions given by “drowning” persons who ultimately survived – time slows down and “life” flashes before your eyes. It is with peace and comfort that I look forward to my next great adventure!

By way conclusion – you might wish to pause before you lash out at a bothersome insect or hunt down an animal or do evil to another person. A part of who they are might well be a life trace from someone you love and lost. For I now understand all life is connected.