Bryce Bond's NDE

Analytical readers can easily find parallels and correlations between documented UFOlogy cases and other categorizations of 'unexplained phenomena.'  An example was provided in the preceding article "The Maureen Puddy Case" that included instances of 'voice hearing' — a phenomenon chronicled as having occurred throughout the ages.

Famous people associated with voice hearing considered in previous blog articles include Muhammad, Martin Luther King, Joan of Arc, and Socrates.  An incident of voice hearing was also mentioned in an article about Bryce Bond.  While continuing to report about aspects of UFOlogy among other metaphysical topics, some of my posts will supplement or expound upon previous ones.  In this article, I am presenting Bond's description of his Near Death Experience (or 'NDE').

This photo is from Higher Techniques to Inner Perfection: "Bryce Bond is a top motivation speaker in demand at major universities, corporations, and numerous global organizations.  Presently he produces and hosts a TV show, Dimensions, dealing with parapsychology, and has recorded six record albums, been disc jockey on a popular New York City radio station, and is author of A Touch of Alchemy and Self Healing: A Personal Transformation."

The following account is an excerpt from Higher Techniques to Inner Perfection (1986).

There is no end, no finality, no termination to life.  Physical death is but a transition, a transformation of the soul from its physical bondage into its spiritual life.

Can you believe that?  Can you honestly believe in the truth of reincarnation?

Nothing is as ever as true for us as that which we have experienced.  And the fact of the matter is that many of us have likely experienced evidence of life's continuity, indications that physical death is not the end to life's journey.

How?  You might ask.  By witnessing the process of a loved one's transition.  Not the sudden wrenching from life by violent death or sudden death.  Rather, the slower process of dying.

If you have ever shared in another's experience of making that transition, then you are likely to be aware that much of his dream state, even waking state, is focused on people he has known who have made the transition before him.  His thoughts, his dreams often incorporate deceased relatives or friends.

Although some may say these dying people are going through delusional states, in reality they are not.  For just as there are guides along our way, so too do our loved ones come back to help us make the transition from the physical state through death into the spirit world.

Until recently, this attitude would have seemed a superstitious belief handed down from "primitive" man.  However, research on terminally ill patients has confirmed this fact.  And those touched by a near-death experience corroborate this understanding.

If it is difficult for you to accept this fact, that is OK.  As I said before, the greatest teacher is our own experience.

For myself, I know the truth of what I say.  I know it because I have experienced the near-death experience.  And it is an experience I would like to share with you.

It happened many years ago.  I was having dinner with some friends.  It was an elegant affair, candlelight, wine, good food and wonderful company.  However, as I took my first bite of food, my mouth and throat began to feel strange.  My nose started to run.

Minutes went by, and my throat became very restricted.  I found it difficult to breathe.  Then my nostrils began to close as well.  I could hardly breathe.

Suddenly, I was filled with panic.  Leaving the dinner table, I headed for the bathroom.  My body was heating up.  Perspiration dripped from my body.  I felt delirious, and wanted to vomit.

I had to literally fight in order to breathe.  Yet, the more I fought to breathe, the more restricted my throat and nostrils became.  I banged my fists against the wall.

By this time, my friends were aware of my predicament. They raced into the bathroom.  I know they must have asked me a million questions.  I heard them, but I could not respond.

Instead, I pointed to my nose and throat.  Through primitive sign language, I tried to make them understand I could not breathe.  They tried to comfort me, but I did not want to be touched.  I was fighting for my life.

Helping me, my friends took me to the elevator, down to a car and rushed me to the hospital.  In the hospital emergency room, the last thing I remember was a nurse telling my friends: "Would you please get him off the desk, he is knocking the papers to the floor."

I blacked out.  Then my vision came back, but it was quite bizarre.  I saw myself leaving my physical body in a crumpled heap on the floor.  I could see my friends trying to pick me up, interns running to my side.

The next thing I knew, I was in a long, dark tunnel.  At the end of it was a light, a very brilliant light.  I was moving rapidly toward the light, and could hear a whooshing noise in my ears.

I felt strange, a weightlessness and I had the subtle realization that I could breathe again.  My conscious mind's focus was on the light just ahead of me.  The light was shimmering, and very intense.  As I got closer to it, it became like a misty film.  I went through the light, experiencing it as a momentary tingling sensation.

And then the light gave way to the most incredible view.  The only way to describe this panoramic vista is to liken it to a beautiful summer's day in the country.  There was a dazzling illumination before me, the colors unbelievable, some of them beyond the visible in our physical dimension.

I could see people walking in the distance.  The horizon was filled with mountains, trees and lakes.  I heard sounds of great beauty, sounds beyond description.  As I stood there, it was not cold and it was not hot.  It was . . . PERFECT.

Suddenly, I heard a dog bark.  I saw a dog racing toward me.  But it was just not any dog.  It was the dog I once had, a black poodle named "Pepe."  I couldn't believe it.  An emotional floodgate opened inside me.  Tears filled my eyes.  Pepe jumped into my arms, started licking my face.

As I held him, he seemed so real, more real than I had ever experienced him before.  I could feel him, I could smell him.  I could feel his weight and hear his breathing.  And I sensed his great joy in being with me again.  I cried with happiness.  I had loved this animal while he was alive, and now being with him again, he seemed more real, more loving.  I felt my tears being licked away by him.

When I looked up for a moment, I saw a man in his forties.  He was standing in front of me, smiling.  He looked familiar, but I could not place him.  I looked again and recognition clicked.  I was amazed.

I realized the man was my stepfather, whom I loved very much.  The reason I hadn't recognized him right away was because he looked so different from the way I last saw him in his earth life.  He had died at the age of seventy from terminal cancer.  At the age of eight, my stepfather had contracted infantile paralysis.  It left his body very deformed, necessitating the use of crutches for him to walk.  Later, when he was in his sixties, cancer struck.  The cancer took its toll on his physical body, which began to shrink and shrivel.  He had suffered greatly with the agony and pain of the cancer.  And my last vision of my stepfather had been his lying in his death bed, begging me to bring him a gun so he could shoot himself.

But now before me, he was standing straight and tall.  He was not using crutches.  There were no deformities.  Instead, he appeared to be in a state of perfect health, looking as if he were in his early forties.  I was completely overwhelmed.

Again, a surge of emotions filled me with joy.  This man, in his new body, was my beloved stepfather.  I placed my dog on the ground and stepped forward to embrace my stepfather.

Suddenly, a strong voice was heard in my consciousness, telling me: "Not yet!"

I did not understand.  I screamed out: "Why?!"

Then this very strong inner voice said: "What have you learned?  And whom have you helped?"

I was dumbfounded.  The voice seemed to be outside myself, as well as within.  Everything stopped for what seemed a moment.  I had to think of what was asked of me.

I could answer whom I had helped.  But I could not answer what I had learned.

While this was going on, I could feel the presence of my dog moving all around me, tugging playfully at my pants.  I was pondering those two questions in my mind.  I kept hearing them over and over within my consciousness.  As I reached to embrace my stepfather, I looked into his eyes, which were filled with the greatest love.  I heard him say to me, "I love you, my son!"

At this moment I shouted out, "I love you, Pop!"  He seemed to be only about ten feet from me.

My vision moved along the horizon and there, standing hand in hand, were my dear grandparents, looking radiant and healthy.  They were beautiful, youngish looking, smiling and waving to me.  My heart at this time was experiencing emotional joy, a release, a freedom of knowing that we never die, only the old outer shell is discarded.

We remain the same reflection, the SOUL reflection as the physical body once was.  Then I heard other barking, and there appeared a few of the other dogs I had once had.

There is really no way possible to make you believe what I tell you as truth, unless you have the same experience.  As I stood there for what seemed to be an eternity, I wanted to embrace and be absorbed and merge.  I wanted to stay.  The unbelievable sensation of not wanting to come back is so overwhelming.  That was the moment I felt myself being pulled away and back.  It is like I have gained the knowledge, I have had the experience, I have expressed my emotional feelings to the ultimate.  I could not prevent my returning into the tunnel of narrow focus.

It felt like a giant magnet was pulling me.  My heart was going in one direction and my physical body in another.

I did not even have time to say good bye.  Yet I had the most extraordinary feeling that I will see them all again.  There is no time and space there!  I was now racing backward in time, in the long dark tunnel, the light at the end was fading rapidly.

This time the whooshing sound was even greater.  My consciousness was being stretched like a giant elastic band ready to snap.  When I snapped, I awoke in a subtle state of shock and a light pain in my body.  I was now back in my body, and the first thing I witnessed and experienced was the hypodermic needle being plunged into my arm.

I heard a voice say: "Welcome back."  I never asked who said that nor did I care at the time.  It was told to me that I was out for at least 10 minutes (dead).  Brain cells begin to die in four minutes!

The cause for this incredible event (experience) was an allergy to pine nuts used in pesto sauce which I ate that night!  My experience is similar to those shared in the books of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, and Dr. Raymond Moody and a whole series of books relating to clinical death, as experienced by many others.