An excerpt from Rita’s World, part of an entry from last January.
Now, when we come to die – when we come to move beyond the internal division between things known to the earthbound portion and things known to the entire being of which the earthbound portion is one part – our own assumptions at the time we pass over may color how we experience the transition, in the same way that assumptions color any experience, mostly unconsciously so that to us it seems we get an objective report. If you expect to cross the River Jordan and see Jesus, you will, and that perception won’t be “wrong,” it won’t be “non-objective.” It will be an interpretation shaped by expectations – and this is always so. That’s why, incidentally, people who believe in nothing [that is, believe that nothing follows 3D life] sometimes initially meet blankness. For as long as their soul-perspective governs their perception, they get what they expect to get. Only when the overall being, what you have called the larger being, feeds its perspective does the returning new soul have its horizons broadened.
By the way, that is the retrieval process, though we never thought of it that way. When we in the physical extended to others no longer in the body who were “stuck” or bewildered, what we were doing was getting their attention, true enough, so that they could break out of their unconscious self-imposed isolation. What we didn’t realize was that the “helpers” or the unnamed forces behind our scenarios were actually that person’s own larger community opening the person’s perceptions. What we saw was a soul reacting to a scenario and responding – “seeing the light,” in a word. But what we didn’t necessarily see – I never did, anyway – was that the person wasn’t “going somewhere new” even metaphorically, but was handing over perception to a broader consciousness of which they were a part. Establishing diplomatic relations with the previously unsuspected rest of themselves, so to speak.
I did not go over expecting to see Jesus, or needing to see relatives or friends. My few days of coma provided me with a smooth transition of consciousness. But whether it had been smooth or not, my transition would have been the same process of moving from a limited to a less-limited perspective. As I knew what was coming, I didn’t have to experience it in sequential fashion. I had been relatively closed off and then I was not.
I think you are meaning that this is the same for everybody, not that you were relatively closed-off as opposed to relatively open during your life.
Correct. I am explaining as clearly as I can – even a bit pedantically, I am afraid – that my “past life review,” like anyone’s, was merely a matter of greater awareness as I moved beyond the constrictions of the physical part of the universe.
But bear in mind that this is still a simplified picture that does not convey various differences in effective consciousness caused by the change of terrain. Our new circumstances lead us to experience ourselves in very different ways, and it is this usually unspoken context that leads to so many misinterpretations.
For instance, while in the body, perhaps mostly unaware of “past life” connections or non-physical connections of any kind, one may live thinking oneself a unit comprising only 3D elements. But our opinions about ourselves do not change who we are, what we are. It doesn’t matter that you think yourself an orphan in the universe. You aren’t and couldn’t be. You were created, you came into being as a unique combination of elements that were to learn to live together, you were continually affected by internal adjustments among various elements, you expressed inherited traits not only from your physical heredity but from your non-physical heredity as well. You were less a unit than a family learning to become a unit, and each member of that family brought along its own heritage, which is why your life was a unique window into existence.
Well, you need to keep this unvarying fact in mind when you consider any other aspect of life either physical or non-physical. To the degree that you keep it in your mind as background, your perception of new aspects will be clarified. And this gradual process of clarification, incidentally, is why these things take time and perseverance to sink in.