What do you think about near-death experiences?
I’ve been engaging with the topic of near-death experiences (NDEs) for several years now, and the more I read and listen, the more striking it becomes how consistent these reports are across cultures, ages, and backgrounds. There are thousands of firsthand reports available online. On nderf.org (the Near-Death Experience Research Foundation) alone, there are over 5,700 documented reports. Thousands more can be found in books, interviews, and YouTube channels where people openly share what they experienced. What stands out to me is not just the sheer number of reports, but how remarkably similar the experiences and sequences often are. Because of this frequency and consistency, I personally find it hard to dismiss these experiences as mere coincidence, fantasy, or hallucination. Many people also report that they were afraid to talk about their NDE for decades, only realizing later in life that they were not alone and that others had experienced almost the exact same things. From a scientific standpoint, near-death experiences are still not truly explainable. The existing explanations—such as lack of oxygen, brain chemistry, or hallucinations—do not convincingly account for the clarity, structure, and depth of these experiences, nor for the verifiable observations some people report while clinically unconscious or in cardiac arrest. Because of this, I think it’s worth looking not only at whether NDEs happen, but also at what people experience during them—and what these experiences might tell us about life itself. A commonly reported sequence goes something like this: Many people suddenly find themselves outside of their body, often floating above it. Interestingly, they frequently say they no longer identify with their physical body at all. They see it as a dead body below them—and they feel completely fine with that. There is no panic. Instead, they describe feeling more alive, more aware, and more real than ever before.