The visual was accompanied by a feeling of absolute love and peace. Once outside the building, I was immersed in a bluish white light that had a shimmering appearance as if I were swimming underwater in a crystal clear stream. Dispassionately, I departed from the building. I had a clear realization that my family would be fine. She had one child in front of her, one behind that person and one to the left. I went diagonally through the room, over my wife who was painting children’s faces. Instead of bothering with the stairs, I passed through the wall into the room where everyone was. My mind was racing frantically trying to record and make sense of what was happening.Īt the top of the first flight, the stairs went up and left into the second flight. I remember being disconcerted that, by the time I reached the top of the stairs, I had lost all form entirely and instead was just a ball of energy and thought. I saw that as I reached the third stair, my legs began to dissolve. As I started to climb I looked down at the stairs like I would normally do. I turned and started to climb the stairs to where I knew my family still was. Seeing no point in staying with my body, my thoughts then moved to walking away. I was shocked, certainly, but otherwise I felt no reaction to what should have been the most emotional of life’s events. Interestingly there was no strong emotion accompanying my apparent death. I, whatever I was now, was capable of thought and reason. This cosmic realization of consciousness meant that my self-awareness was no longer in the lifeless body on the ground. At that moment I suddenly had one simple, ineloquent and rude thought, “Holy shit, I’m dead.” It suddenly occurred to me that I was thinking normal thoughts, in the same mental vernacular I had always possessed. I spoke to the people around my body but they could not see or hear me I could see and hear everything they did and said. I watched as a woman who had been waiting to use the phone dropped to her knees and began CPR. To my astonishment another look confirmed it was me! A motionless body was lying on the ground some ten feet behind me. As she approached I could see she was looking beyond me to my right and headed that in that direction. Nothing made sense.Īt that moment, I heard my mother-in-law scream from the top of the stairs above me. Yet I seemed also to stand motionless and bewildered staring at the phone dangling in front of me. As my body was blown backwards, I felt “me” move forward instead. Despite the stunning physical trauma, I realized something strange and inexplicable was happening. The force of the lightning blast threw my body backwards like a rag doll. My Near Death Experience & Out of Body Experience A powerful bolt of lightning had struck the pavilion, traversed through the phone striking me in the face, as its massive electrical charge raced to ground.
![darkstorm viewer 2014 darkstorm viewer 2014](https://c8.alamy.com/comp/EFCX5M/beautiful-dark-bay-arabian-horse-in-sun-against-dark-storm-clouds-EFCX5M.jpg)
Simultaneously I saw a brilliant flash of light exit the phone hand piece I was holding. When it was about a foot away from my face, I heard a deafening crack. With my left hand I pulled the phone hand piece away from my face to hang it up. I let the phone ring eight times, but there was no answer. I ambled around the building to the pay phone and dialed my mother’s familiar number. In the midst of the revelry and chaos, and unbeknownst to me, the beautiful sunny day had surrendered to powerful dark storm clouds moving swiftly in over the lake.
![darkstorm viewer 2014 darkstorm viewer 2014](https://t00.deviantart.net/64Wlk65QkplLU4Q5X57FtXunmyE=/300x200/filters:fixed_height(100,100):origin()/pre00/4f84/th/pre/i/2014/192/1/e/silverfeather_and_darkstorm_by_riverspirit456-d7q9cxk.jpg)
A payphone was attached to the wall on the side of the building.Īs the thought occurred to me to call my mother and check on her, I remember seeing a few light sprinkles of rain. The ground level included picnic tables and barbeque pits. We had gathered on the second floor of a lakeside pavilion. While the children ran amok screaming and playing, I prepared the party barbeque.
![darkstorm viewer 2014 darkstorm viewer 2014](http://renewpd.weebly.com/uploads/1/2/4/8/124858111/340685672.jpg)
About twenty relatives and their siblings were in attendance. The occasion was my in-laws celebrating their annual group birthday gathering. It was a beautiful August day at Sleepy Hollow Lake in Athens, New York in 1994.