Death and Dying, A Spiritual Perspective

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Article from Kevin Core

In the West death has always considered to be something to be avoided, in fact most people don't even like talking about death. If you have ever been in hospital where people are actually dying they always pull the curtains around that person so nobody sees the death. It is always considered to be something to be hidden, and in the old days they even placed that person in a room separate from everybody else.

My grandfather, when he died in a hospital in Lancashire , England , in the middle of the night, he died alone, with the curtains pulled around him, because they didn't want the rest of the ward to be upset by the fact that he was dying. This is pretty sad really because death is part of life and we all go through it, not just people go through it but everything dies or let's go of one form so it can be reborn in another form, and it's just part of the cosmic process.

But again it seems like Western society has again taken what is natural and shunned it or put it to one side or perverted it into some kind of fearful thing to be avoided at all costs. Part of the Ascension is that the whole thing around death and dying is being looked at so that humanity can recognize that there is a spiritual aspect to death and dying, and that's really what this article is about.

I also remember when I was a child, and most of you probably do, that when a relative died the fact that that person had died was mentioned in hushed whispers if you were around. I personally was told to go upstairs or go to another room so they could talk about the death of a person I was very close to because they had died. The whole situation creates a mystique around it and the fact that when people go to funerals, they go into great grief and misery because they believe that that person has just disappeared, never to be seen again. The whole situation generates fear around death. Now, I have to say in some societies in the world this is not true. In fact the majority of the world; this fear of death seems to be felt more in the West than in any other place and they have this very limiting view. In Ireland they welcome all of the family into a room where the person who has just died is laid in a coffin and they have a three-day wake. Three days is important as I will try to explain later. The wake is open for friends and relatives or anybody to come and view the person as they lie in their coffin and they celebrate that person's life. This is really not done in the West generally.

One of the reasons why this is so important is that viewed from Spirit, death is not considered to be a death at all. When you leave the physical body to raise your consciousness to a higher level, Spirit does not see this as a shock, horror event at all. In actual fact it is the mirror image. It is viewed by Spirit to be the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to that person because in Spirit, you leaving the higher realms of Spirit to incarnate on the earth is considered by Spirit to be death. When you are on the higher planes you are totally aware of who you are, in the sense that you have a perception of all the lifetimes you have ever lived on this planet and others, your origins, where you came from before you became part of the human race on earth, because most of us are eternal beings of light. That full knowledge is anchored into your consciousness when you are on the higher dimensions.

To incarnate here you have to go through bands of energy which wipe your memory clean so that when you are born here you start off being totally disconnected, as an earthly consciousness, from any knowledge about who you are on the higher planes, and from Spirit that is considered to be a death, which it really is.

So you start here with no perception at all about why you are here or what this reality is all about. The only thing you have to go on is what you are told as part of your childhood, and what's actually anchored into your DNA, and societal values. The society we live in has gradually disconnected from spiritual knowledge and the information we are given as children has slowly distanced itself from the truth, spiritually.

When you come into incarnation you are part of a group, a spiritual group. When you decide it's time to come into incarnation to learn a lesson or to take on a spiritual mission, there is kind of like a big party, you all get together with your friends on the inner plane's, and you all say goodbye, and you descend into this incarnation here. All of your friends in Spirit are very sorrowful to see you go. When you are here they are around you all the time but you don't really perceive them at all, unless you are very clairvoyant or you have one of those senses that do that. When you leave the incantation there is a very big party on the higher planes to welcome you back. So viewed from Spirit, death is the most amazing experience and the most joyful event. Yet again the mirror image is always done on earth so death here is looked on as a very somber event. Everybody here is very sad, everybody wears black and death is not considered to be a joyous process at all. Even if the person that has died has had a lifetime where they have been suffering a lot and they have had an illness where they had been suffering for many years, the fact that that illness has now finished and they are not suffering any more doesn't make any difference at all. The people still feel that there is nothing to celebrate and only grief is the appropriate emotion to feel. So to reiterate; death as seen from Spirit is the most amazing thing and it is a welcoming home of a degree that we are very unaware of, the joy that actually comes from passing over from this life to the next, from leaving one dimension to transit into another.

So why is death coming up now to be looked at?

Well, when you leave this incarnation, which is this physical vehicle, the only thing that you lose is this physical body. Everything else is the same. Your emotions are there, your identity is there, and you will even look the same on the 4th Dimension. There is nothing that is not there except your physical body. You will even take the illness that you died from or if the condition that you died from is an emotional or mental one, you even take that with you. There are places in Spirit where you have to go into a place similar to a hospital to get the energy removed from your system because you have taken it with you. The only thing that you leave behind is your physical body.

The process of letting go of that physical body is a spiritual practice, it is an art. There is a good way to do it and the not so good way to do it. Most of us in the West are practicing the not so good way to do it. One of the things that holds humanity back from going forward spiritually is the fact that we die in a very bad way. What that means is that if you approach death and take your last breath in a state of emotional trauma or believing that it should not happen, or in a state of anger or fear or rage or anything like that, it actually conditions the place in consciousness that you end up in when you pass through this barrier on the other side, and you find yourself in another reality. That reality is totally conditioned by the frame of mind you are in when you take your last breath.

All of those people who die, who take their last breath, in anger of fear or in loneliness where will they end up? Just imagine my grandfather who was in the space of being in a hospital, there was nobody that he knew and he took his last breath in that space surrounded by curtains. So what frame of mind did he die in? It is this not recognizing the mechanics of what death is that has caused untold amounts of suffering in the world for thousands of years.

We have no excuses, because the knowledge of death and dying has been around for longer than that. Many races on the earth hold that knowledge, the Tibetans hold it, the Egyptians held it, the Greeks held it, the South American tribes held it and still do. It is only in the West that we very vociferously go into the space of fear etc.

Now why that is you have to make up your own conclusions I suppose...

However, there is something we can do about it, and there is a movement, a very slow movement, where people are putting out very strongly that there is an alternative way to die and actually to help the person to die.

Now most of us who've done healing know that you can do a healing into death. So if you get a client who comes to you with an illness, and you recognize the illness is their doorway out of this incarnation, you also realize that the healing you can give them will allow them to make that transition in peace. So the healing can be given to a person who is dying and support them in that process. The healing will clear the fear, the anger, jealousy, the rage etc.

Most of us don't know why we do it but the reason is to help that person create a more balanced place to be, so that when they pass through this electromagnetic barrier between the dimensions they find themselves in a better place than they would be if we had not done the healing in the first place. You can actually help a person to die well!

I did this with my grandmother who died in 1995. Up until that time I used to work at a hospice in Bradford , England , just as a volunteer. I would do healing on people who were going to die that night; I did not do this openly because it was not accepted at that time in the hospice. Also at that time, I had an interest in the process of death and dying and I felt guided to look at the Tibetan teachings on the subject, so when my grandmother got cancer (she was 96) I spent the full three days leading up to her death with her night and day to help her get through that space. When she actually died, she died in the most perfect way because I had created a space over three days; doing healing and meditation around her that allowed her to totally let go of anything that would have conditioned her consciousness to go into anything that might take her to a negative place. When she left her body, she left through her Crown chakra.

When people leave the body they can go out a number of ways. Most people who don't do any spiritual work go out through the solar plexus, and of course this is where we store all of our emotional stuff. So people who go out through the solar plexus generally go out with all the packaging that they have had in this lifetime. Another place to go out is from your heart. This way of leaving the incarnation is relatively new, and is afforded to those people who live their lives in the heart centre the way. The most powerful way however, that all spiritual teachers use, the spiritual way, the Initiate way, is to go out through your Crown Chakra. My grandmother chose this way at the time of her death. This was a lady who did no spiritual work in that lifetime, but just doing the work with her over those three days created enough space around her to make a difference, and obviously there were beings from Spirit around her that I had called in, which allowed her to leave through her Crown chakra.

My grandmother has been allowed on the inner planes to be part of my guide team, and I feel her presence around me now and then to help with specific things. At that time I was friends with a medium in the Spiritualist Church who deals specifically with working with people who have just passed over. I was with this lady a short time after my grandmother's death and she indicated to me that my grandmother was around me, which I knew she was, and my grandmother was absolutely over the moon, excited, because when she died she had gone out through her Crown chakra. She indicated it was one of the most amazing events and I indicated through the medium that yes, I had seen her go through her Crown chakra.

We could do this for everybody who dies. There is no reason why we can't. My grandmother lived in a nursing home for the last two to three years of her life and those places are not the best places in the world to take your last breath in either. In England , they are manned by very young girls who are paid very low wages and they have no idea of what death and dying is about at all. They are very fearful of it but they cannot get any other job. So a person who is dying ends up in a place where nobody has any idea about what's going on with them at all, and when a person is ready to die, everybody clears out of the room and leaves them to it. Nobody is there with them at all. So again, if you think how many nursing homes there are now in England alone, and this happens in every Western country, how many people are dying every day in that space? This causes us to wonder why the Western psyche, the Western consciousness is so traumatized, because remember even though those people who are leaving the incarnation are coloring all of humanity by their experiences. Every one of those people who are dying in a very bad space has an effect on humanity as a whole. A lot of the fear around is coming from this one place so this is why we need to look at it and do something about it.

The Hospice Movement arose from a recognition that people need to die in a place which is more conducive to where they want to be in that time. When I worked for that movement they would not allow any spiritual work to be done in that place because hospices are funded specifically with regard to political correctness and they did not want to be seen as having anything to do with anything like healing, or spiritual work at all. I have been to about three or four hospices where they have a small chapel which is always set aside from where everybody is and I feel it is there for political reasons to be seen. Since that time, I have now heard that a small number of hospices in the Bradford area are allowing healers into their space in a limited way.

When I worked in the hospice in 1995, that was the situation then. Any kind of spiritual work was not allowed at all. It was very much frowned on and the new one which opened in Bradford about five years ago was the same . The main reason why I had to leave the hospice in 1995, was that somebody found out that I was a healer, and as soon as the administration found out this fact I was asked to leave as a volunteer, even though I had been working there successfully for four years. I had to leave a job which I thoroughly enjoyed because they were totally fearful that the media and the trustees would get to know that there was a healer in the hospice.

At the time of writing this article I have to say that it feels as though the times and changing. I have heard that some of the hospices around Bradford are now allowing healers to practice. This has occurred, however, only in the last couple of years. As far I am aware there is no structure in place for allowing the healer or a spiritual guide to be present around the dying person at the moment of their death in order to facilitate a perfect exiting from this incarnation.

So the situation is changing slowly but nobody is doing the work that needs to be done. In my studies of the death and dying process one of the best sources of information was the American spiritual teacher called Ram Dass. He has done a lot of work since the 60s in America but again not very successfully because America is very closed, always has been and very much so even now to this kind of work and he has tried to set a few projects off and to my understanding they have never really met with any success. Also, a friend of his call Stephen Levine has also worked with this and has published a number of very good books on the death and dying process, and on grieving. However, there is a new wave coming through now and we really need to look again at the process of death and dying again.

Anybody who feels guided to do this, to go into hospices etc; it is an amazing space to be in when a person is dying. When you are around a person who is dying, and when that person is about to take their last breath a space opens up around them. The process that a person undergoes when they are dying lasts a total of seven days. For the three days leading up to the day that they take their last breath a space opens up, a vortex opens up, because that person is actually transferring their consciousness from where they are now, to where they're going to be, over a seven-day period. Just the fact that their consciousness is in the place that they are going, creates a space around them. To be in that space is amazing. It is an amazing time.

So I recommend it to anybody to help a person to go through this. If you are very open at the time a person takes their last breath you can observe that person slipping out of the physical body. This is also an amazing thing to observe if you got the eyes to see.

What most people find difficult when confronted with the possibility of death around a friend or relative is the emotional attachment. The emotional stuff that arises comes from the belief that you will never see that person again. What I am trying to suggest in this article is that this is totally untrue.

I would like to reiterate again that the only thing that changes around that person is the fact that they do not inhabit the physical plane body. Everything that was the sum total of that being is still there, except the physical plane body. That person, as a 4th dimensional being, is not in some faraway place but is here. All dimensions exist in the same space. So these beings are around us, and if a friend or relative dies they are around you, literally within three days of dying. However, because Western society believes that when a person dies they are gone it creates a thoughtform, the belief, that you will never see that person again. Instantly, you believe that, it brings down a barrier. If a friend or relative has just died and they are around you desperately trying to make contact, to let you know that they are okay, that they have not just disappeared, that barrier which you have created in consciousness is something they cannot get through to make that much needed contact. So even in Spirit this attitude towards death causes a great deal of suffering. This is because the loved one who has just left you on the physical plane cannot get through to make contact with you in consciousness. They see you grieving for them but are in consternation because they are right next to you saying "I am okay, and I am here"; but you cannot hear them. You are closed to the fact that that person is still around. So not only does the process of death and dying need to be looked at, but our own perceptions about what happens to a person when they have died needs to be sorted out.

My grandmother was around me for days after her initial death, and still is. Even good friends that you have had passing conversations with, when they die, if there was some kind of connection between you, they will be around you, and anybody who is open to the fact that death is not an ending will perceive when that happens. The Spiritualist Church all over the world has done a great deal of work, and a service to humanity, to show that when people die they do not just disappear. A very good medium in the spiritualist church will be able to give you information about a loved one who has left the physical plane in the past year, or even a period much longer than this. If such information is given, the communication from the loved one feels as if that loved one has only just left the physical plane. This is because time exists differently on the 4th dimensional plane. In truth, it does not exist at all so a person who has left the physical plane within the last five or even 50 years will feel as though it is only yesterday. So there is no timescale as we know it on the 4th dimensional plane, in the perception of our loved ones who exists there.

So how can we help people who are dying?

If you remember what I said at the beginning of this article, the frame of mind that you are in at the moment of death colors the place where you will find yourself in the 4th Dimension. What you can do as a service to a person who is dying is to observe where they are in consciousness. A lot of people resist the dying process because they have what we call unfinished business. So you may have a person who is dying, who has a son that he has not seen for 10 years, where they parted in acrimonious circumstances. It may be that this person will hang on, and hang on because he wishes to heal the rift with his son. When you come to the end of your incarnation everything becomes clear; all of the stuff, the personality stuff, the ego stuff, drops away. You are as clear as a bell for the last three days of your incarnation. This is when people want to tie up any loose ends, and put things right. What you can do is a service, and what people will do as a service in the future, is that you make sure that you can do everything possible in your power to help that person finish any business they may have on the 3rd dimensional plane, so that when they take their last breath they leave no unfinished business behind. There is no fear, no anger, no worry, they have said goodbye to everybody that they needed to.

In the West, there has been a perception that you cannot take children into see a person who is dying. This has caused immense suffering to the dying person who wishes to connect with those children but is denied the opportunity. This comes from an inappropriate perception that the children will be upset by seeing a person who is dying. In my experience this is not the case. I have allowed my children to visit relatives on the day they were dying, and my children accepted what was there. When my stepfather died I recognize that he was grieving the fact that he could not see my children. I therefore brought them to see him on the afternoon of the day that he died. They thought it was great and so did he. It was only after they left that I realized he had been hanging on to say goodbye to my kids. Once that had been done he went into a space of total peace, and that night he left. My kids did not process, they did not go into fear, and ultimately were very glad that they could see that person for the last time. For the person who is dying, if they leave this incarnation in a space of regret, this will colour where they end up on the 4th Dimension.

So this is the service that we can do. We can perceive where the person is in consciousness and do our very best to bring before that person all that they need to sort out, so that when they take their last breath they take it in total peace, and joy, and happiness; because if that is the space they are feeling when they die, that is where they will end up on the 4th Dimension: a place of peace, joy, and happiness.

Our vision, Christine and my vision, is that some day in the near future there will be hospitals which specialize in helping people to die well; where people will go to understand the process of leaving the incarnation and to embracing that process. It will be staffed by people who wish to be in their space, and to do their spiritual practice by helping these people to die well. They will dedicate themselves to accompanying these people to the very gates of death, so they do not go through the process alone. They will embrace the energy of death, which is renewal, and use that space to transform their own consciousness.

So we need to embrace the fact that death is not an ending, it is just a change in perception. As this realization comes in, many more people are now being able to see clairvoyantly, to see psychically. As we embrace the fact that death is not an ending, the human race in the West is expanding their perceptions to embrace this. More and more people are now recognizing that what we perceive in this reality is just a small part of a bigger picture. This is part of the overall activation of consciousness which the energies of the Ascension are bringing in for the human race. This is going to pop the bubble of the perception that this is all there is.

This is certainly what needs to happen because in our society we are very energetically encouraged to believe that what is before our eyes is the only thing that truly exists. There are all sorts of reasons for this, none of them to do with Spirit at all. It is more to do with how the society is structured, and why. It is part of the illusion which is created by this society, but it has a catastrophic effect on the whole of human consciousness because of all the fear and anger it anchors there.

Death itself is a process. Everybody goes through the same process, whether it's a person dying, a planet dying, a solar system dying, or a galaxy dying, or anything dying. The process of dying is a transition into higher level of existence. Whatever it is that is making that transition goes through a set of reactions; reactions to the event. A lady called Elizabeth Kubla Ross was a lady who did the foundation work in the 60s on death and dying in the West. She spent her life's work working with people who were dying and observed and helped them through that process, and tried to understand the process itself. She observed that when you are dying you transition through six emotional states. The first one is relief. This is relief that you actually know what is happening. Circumstances occur where somebody will actually tell you that a condition exists in your life which is going to bring that life to an end.

The next one is denial. This is the belief that what you've just been told is wrong. It cannot happen to you. Other people die, but how can this happen to you? You are not ready to die. You do not know how to do it. You do not know the rules.

The next one is blame. You give yourself a hard time for finding yourself in this situation.

Another is resentment. Why should this happen to me? Why can't it happen to that person over there, or that one over there?

Then there is despair, anger, frustration.

The other thing that comes in is grief. Your perception tells you that you are about to lose your life. Your life is who you are, who you perceive yourself to be, your identity; and you are about to lose it.

All of these emotions constantly arise, sometimes quite rapidly over a short period of time so it feels that you are on an emotional rollercoaster.

In the West this can be a traumatic experience because it is the one thing that is going to happen to all of us, and there is no manual. You feel totally disempowered because there is nowhere to go where somebody can tell you how to deal with the situation. This is where the fear comes in. Nobody wants to talk to you about it, and nobody will tell you how to do it well. The other hurtful thing is that most of your friends and family will not want to go anywhere near it. They will not want to talk about it in your presence, because it will bring up their own fears of their own mortality. So you find yourself totally alone, facing the most important thing that will ever happen to you in this lifetime, with no help coming your way at all. This is why the spiritual perspective on death now needs to be circulated worldwide to those who want to hear.

So the person who is dying is going through the most traumatic experience they will ever have in that lifetime with nobody to give them any support. This is where, in the future, people who choose to do this work in service will help these people and dispel the energies of fear surrounding death in the West. We know the process. Elizabeth Kubla Ross knew the process. The Tibetans have known the process of death and dying since Atlantian times, 14,500 years ago, but this knowledge is just not put out in the West. However, this is now changing. You can get the book "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" by Sogyal Rinpoche which gives the knowledge held by the Tibetans about the process of passing through the veils of death. We can read and understand this material, become familiar with the process, and help these people get through it.

As I have said, this process has been known for thousands of years. Every spiritual tradition in the world has, within its mythological or mystical structure, the knowledge of how to tackle the death process. The Hindus have it, the Tibetans have it; it was taught in Greece using the allegories of Hades, Persephone, Demeter, of crossing the river Styx by boat and paying for that journey with two coins. All of that teaching came out of Ancient Egypt.

In the Egyptian tradition, the 64 Neteru, are the Egyptian gods or archetypes of consciousness. In the last group of eight of these gods, the name is given the Duat, and that group of God's are the ones who guide or process the being who is going through the dying experience; all who are passing through the Underworld. In the Egyptian Book of the Dead a full description is given by the Royal Scribe Ani of 21 levels of the Underworld, each with its pylon or entrance, guarded by its dual guardians. In psychological terms these texts give a complete description of the levels of the unconscious mind that have to be transmitted through successfully to raise a consciousness to the next higher vibration.

The Underworld in any tradition, including the Tibetan even though they call it the Bardo, is how to get through that space that you have to go through in order to make the transition to the next level. So the knowledge of how to pass through the veils of death is totally cataloged in any one of these traditions. Reading any one of these instructions will show you how to pass through the veils of death; it will give you the rules and show you what will happen. It is what happens to everybody, whether that body is a person, a planet, a solar system, or a galaxy etc. The process of death and dying follows known archetypes.

All of these traditions encourage you, that as part of your spiritual practice, you should practice for the day that you die, so that it does not come as a big shock, and you enter the space of the Underworld totally unprepared.

In the West, if you are going for the most important interview in your lifetime, wouldn't you prepare yourself beforehand for the interview? If you were going to a foreign country where you had to negotiate hard terrain, wouldn't you buy a map and study it first? In relation to death and dying in the West not many people go there at all, even people doing spiritual work, but this is a spiritual practice that is well worth doing.

We all do meditational practices where we visualize what it would be like to be in this place or that, how it would feel, what we would see etc. None of us do spiritual practices about what would it be like when we take our last breath, and where we will be. What will it be actually like when I take my last breath and leave this incarnation? None of us do this, and yet it is one of the most profound meditations you will ever do.

If you do this meditation it will totally prepare you for the experience because even though you may have been doing meditation for 30 years, if death catches you unaware, the moment you leave that incarnation and your mind is not in the moment, you may find yourself in a place you may not wish to be. You could have done 30 years of meditation, sitting in blissful states, and then just because you walked across the road and never saw the bus, you find yourself in a place on the 4th Dimension you are not prepared for. You may have been thinking about doing the lottery when suddenly you find yourself in the 4th dimension. What was on your consciousness? I need money. So what will be the environment you find yourself in that space? Las Vegas in the sky, pulling that handle for thousands of years.

But seriously! It is well worth doing this daily practice of contemplating where you wished to end up in consciousness at the moment of death. This is a daily practice undertaken by the Hindus. So we should all take on board that this is a necessary practice for us to consider. If you did this on a daily basis, and you did find yourself leaving the incarnation suddenly, you have already prepared the way, your mind knows the path it has to take and so nothing is left to chance. Death never catches you unaware, because you have done it so many times as a meditation that you already know what to do.

Let us talk now about the Underworld. I will talk about the Egyptian concept of this as it is probably the most well-known. The Underworld is a representation of your own subconscious mind. As you take your last breath, you enter a consciousness state where you review your whole life, so everything you have done in that life you are now faced with. This is not myth it is an actuality; it is real! Every spiritual tradition, over the many thousands of years, has always represented the journey through the underworld in the same way. Some of these traditions have been many thousands of miles apart, with no physical contact at all, and yet, they perceive the same archetypes that have to be tackled on this journey through the unconscious.

So at the moment of death you will undergo a journey into your own subconscious mind where you are faced with the contemplation of the decisions that you made in that lifetime, and the consequences of those decisions. In some of the spiritual traditions there is an aspect of judgement of the being that is making the journey, and to some degree this is true. The judgement comes from that part of you who projected itself into the 3-D reality to create the personality that we perceive ourselves to be here.

In the Egyptian tradition these are gods or archetypes of consciousness that one adopts in order to assess that lifetime. A process is undertaken whereby the heart of the dying person is weighed against a feather. What does this mean? What it means is that if the heart of the person leaving incarnation has any attachment to the third dimensional plane it will weigh down the heart. Things that can do this are attachment to material pleasures, to lower astral emotional desires, and to pleasures that the physical body can bring. The whole process of passing through the underworld is the releasing of the attachment to the third dimensional plane.

The service to ourselves of walking a spiritual path in this lifetime is the realization of the attachment we are encouraged to make to material pleasures, and the illusion of those attachments. Through walking this path in this lifetime you are already preparing yourself for the journey through the veils to achieve realization on the 5th dimensional plane.

In the spiritual tradition of the West, through Christianity, all references to walking through an underworld realm have been stripped away from the teaching. All that remains is Psalm 23 which states "Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, yet shall I fear no ill".

Yet at the time of Jesus, and through the spiritual tradition of the Hebrews, all the detail about the journey through the underworld was known. So why is there no reference to it in our Bible? It is as if somebody wished us to be totally ignorant about the process, and because of this there is so much fear anchored into humanity through death.

So what is this process of death and dying?

The process is actually divided into two parts. One is called the long death, and the other is called the short death.

The long death starts when a call is issued from a person's soul to withdraw from the physical vehicle and return home. This immediately sets up an interior process and reaction whereby various chemical changes occur, and certain shifts in consciousness are activated to prepare the person for withdrawal. The timescale involved in this can be many years, a few months, or even a few weeks.

The short death involves a period of seven days. The first three days lead up to the day whereby the person will take his last breath on that day. On the fourth day the person takes his last breath. For the remaining three days the person then withdraws from the physical/etheric body and travels the path of return.

Why seven days?

The reason is that seven is an archetype of creation. In the Bible the world was created in seven days. In any one moment your consciousness is spanning seven days. In the now moment, where you are reading this article, is the fourth day. Your consciousness is projecting from this moment, three days into your possible future; and at the same time it is withdrawing from the three days of your past from this moment. So in any one moment your consciousness is spanning three days either side of the day you find yourself in now.

To give an example of this! How many of you reading this article have found yourselves approaching a holiday and as you get closer to the date of your departure you find yourself finding it harder and harder to focus on your everyday reality. So if you were at work, as your last day approaches, you find it more and more difficult to concentrate on the job in hand, until on the last day before you go, concentration on work is virtually impossible. Why is this? The reason being that three days before your departure date a part of you had already set out on the trip. On the second day more of you has left, until by the third day there is not a lot of you actually hear.

Of course this also works in the reverse. When you are on holiday, it can take you anything up to three days before you actually let go of your life and work back at home before you start to really enjoy your holiday. As you begin to approach you're leaving date to return home, you find yourself thinking more and more about what you will have to face when you get back. You start to latch-in to the problems you feel you will have to face when you return back to work or home. Again, this is because three days before your departure date you start to return home in consciousness. This is a cosmic archetype of consciousness.

Therefore, as you sit in the room reading this article your consciousness is actually spanning seven days and this is one of the keys to the understanding of manifestation, of bringing what you wish into your life in any one moment.

This is also the key to understanding the process of death, of withdrawing from the physical body. So a person who is dying goes through the process over seven days, takes seven days to die, to leave this incarnation on the third dimensional plane. There are three days that lead up to the day where they take their last breath. On the day before they take their last breath, whether that person has had a serious illness, or had an illness which has affected their consciousness, such as senility; on the day before they die they appear as normal as they ever were before they had the illness. I am talking here very generally.

They appear to be normal, without pain, in very good spirits, very animated and willing to chat in a very good humour. Everybody who is around them, their family and friends, are amazed and feel that a miracle has happened. However, this state may continue for about 12 hours, but soon after the person then lapses into a state of unconsciousness. Then, again very generally, that person will remain in that state for another 12 hours leading up to them taking their last breath.

It is here that I wish to emphasize that although the person has taken their last breath physically they have not necessarily left the physical body. The process of abstraction from the physical body can take another three days. Their consciousness is still attached to the physical body for a further three days.

It is said that a person who has taken their last breath and is in the process of detaching from the physical body, will be called back to that physical body at the same time they took their last breath, on each of the successes three days following the day they took their last breath.

In many of the spiritual traditions, including the Buddhist, a person who has died is not touched for three days after they have taken their last breath. This is to allow the person to complete the process of abstraction undisturbed. This is also why in the Bible, Jesus was interred for three days, and then arose again.

As in the example given above whereby we accept that our consciousness is constantly scanning a period of seven days, we can see how a person who is about to die has visions of people in the room that nobody else can see. This is because their consciousness is already transiting into the 4th Dimension, so in actual fact the person who is dying perceives two realities at the same time. It is a truth, that as the time of death approaches, death being the last breath, the person that they were connected to most in a loving way, who has already passed over into the 4th Dimension, is allowed to guide the dying person through the process. For a person doing spiritual work, or an Initiate, the Master in whose ashram they are a part will come to guide his student back into the ashram.

Staffs who work in hospices know the signs very well and can indicate to relatives very accurately when that person will take their last breath.

In the West, this process which has been known for thousands of years is not recognized, and can cause great difficulty to the person who is dying who is trying to leave the physical body in a harmonious way.

When my grandmother died, and I assisted her over the three days leading up to this, she chose to leave through her Crown chakra. She was a resident in a nursing home, and the staff in his home were told that when one of the residents died they had to instantly insert their false teeth into their mouth at the moment of death because later it would be impossible to do so. This was to preserve the looks of the person for the relatives to see at the funeral. When my grandmother died, the staff duly rushed in to perform this service but I declined. This was because my grandmother was in the process of extracting herself from the physical shell through the Crown chakra. Anybody manipulating the physical body at that time could have easily dissuaded her from the task. Again, it is ignorance of the process which can cause much distress to a person who is dying.

For me, the Irish have the most perfect way of dealing with death. When the person has died they are gently placed in a coffin, which is then placed in the living room of their home, and a three-day celebration ensues. As that person is drawn back to the physical body at the time of their death over the next three days they find themselves surrounded by all their friends and relatives in celebration of who they were. What better way of leaving the third dimensional plane than that!

The subject I would like to touch on now will certainly present itself to many of you reading this article in your lifetime. When a person is dying the senses start to become very acute, and this is very well known. The order in which the senses activate at birth, now start to deactivate in reverse order at death. A person who is close to death will start to decline eating food, followed closely by declining to drink. The timescale of this is very variable. The last sense which remains right up until the moment of the last breath is hearing. This sense can become so acute that you could be 10 feet away from the person and they could hear what you are saying in a whisper.

Our perception of being around the dying person is quite the reverse. To see a person close to death you would think that they would be totally unconscious, without any attachment to physical plane reality whatsoever. Relatives who visit a person in such a state tend to voice their opinions of that person believing that they cannot hear them. They can quite easily fall into discussions about negative situations in which they found themselves and the person who is dying. Contrary to their belief that person can hear every word and react in consciousness to it. This again, can cause untold misery and anxiety to the person who is dying and an awareness of this should be made available in all situations where relatives are visiting a dying relative or friend.

The reaction of the dying person to what is said about them can create a situation in consciousness that will influence where they end up in consciousness as they pass into the 4th Dimension. We must constantly be aware that when we are with a dying person all that we think, say, or do, has the potential to influence the environment in which that person finds themselves when they leave this incarnation.

It is here that I would like to deal now with the actual process of abstraction from the physical body.

From that part of ourselves which projects consciousness into the 3-D realm a call is issued for that part to return to the whole.

This causes certain reactions to occur which are as follows:

A: This causes certain physiological effects to be felt, in connection with the heart, the nervous system, and the endocrine system. These effects are known to the medical profession and have been catalogued by them.

B: Our nervous system has its etheric counterpart and in the Hindu system these are known as the nadis. They are the electromagnetic energy filaments which penetrate every nerve in our bodies. It is through the etheric body and the nadis that our soul connects to this incarnation. They react to the directing impulse of return issued by the soul and reorganize themselves for abstraction from the dense physical sheath. This is felt as a vibration which runs through the entire nervous system.

C: The effect of the vibration which thrills through the etheric nervous system causes a change in blood chemistry. This change comes through the glandular system which injects into the bloodstream a chemical which affects the heart. The life thread is anchored in the heart and this chemical starts the process whereby this life thread is separated. It also evokes a reflex action in the brain which causes loss of consciousness and or coma.

D: Another vibration ensues, whereby the nadis, the electromagnetic filaments penetrating every nerve in our bodies, are separated from the physical aspects of those nerves. The etheric body is thereby detached from the dense physical body but still interpenetrating it.

There is a pause at this time. This allows the above process to continue in the right timing for the person involved, with the least amount of effort, trauma, and as painlessly as possible. The detachment of the nadis is first evidenced in the eyes. When you are around a person who is dying you will notice that close to the day they take their last breath their eyes change. There is a kind of peace that descends on the person, the resistance to dying goes, and they begin to accept what is happening. This is the time, no matter what the illness, where the person seems to be fully here. It is at this point in the future when all the relatives and friends of that person will be in celebration around them; to celebrate their life together and to wish Godspeed to that person on their journey.

Next, the organized etheric body, already loosened from the dense physical sheath by the nadis, gathers itself for the final departure. It withdraws from the extremities towards the doorway by which it will exit the physical body. These exits are labeled above. In a person who is dying, as seen from the 3-D plane, all heat from the limbs starts to retreat into the main trunk of the body.

At this point another pull is felt. As the vital body which has animated all of the cells of that body is withdrawn, the being which is the elemental aspect of the earth calls back unto itself the matter of the physical body. Again, if you are around a person who is dying, this is evidenced by a notable pallor of the skin, which takes on a pale configuration and waxy appearance. At this point the vital body is preparing for exit, and the physical body is preparing for dissolution.

It is here that another pause can occur. It is also here where sometimes the physical elemental of the body in question can resist the process, and tries to retain hold of the disappearing life force which animated it. However, when death is inevitable and is overlighted by the call of the soul, this pause lasts only for a few moments.

The etheric body now detaches itself in gradual stages through the chosen exit until its emergence is complete. It is at this point, as we observe the dying person; they take their last physical breath in the 3-D world. Contrary to popular belief, the vital body which has now been released from the physical sheath does not travel to its next port of call. It is still influenced by the physical body, and this influence can persist for a period of up to three days or longer. As has been mentioned above, the vital body, which is the sum total of the person who has died, minus the physical sheath, is still influenced by that physical body. This can most definitely occur if the person who has died has had a very earthly existence and has been attached to the physical form and physical desires.

Next comes the dissolving of the etheric body itself. As the pull of the soul continues, it causes the energies of which the etheric body is composed to reorganize and withdraw, leaving only the electromagnetic/pranic substance of which the etheric body was composed to return to the general reservoir of planetary pranic substance.

It is worth noting here that the process of cremation is recommended as a way of severing completely all ties to the physical body. Destroying the physical body by fire is a purification process which severs all connection to the physical body by destroying the etheric body. For those members of humanity who conduct a lifetime centered on the dense physical, enjoying material pleasures, and coveting material desires; where the pull of the soul is weak and material attachment is strong, this connection to the physical body can be overwhelming. If the physical body is not destroyed by fire, the attachment of these beings to the physical body can last for many, many years.

Conversely, the person who has done spiritual work and recognized the illusory nature of attachment to the material plane, will make the above transition very rapidly indeed. In either case, when the person has severed all ties to the physical body, they stand in their subtle bodies ready for what Djwhal Khul, through Alice Bailey, calls "The Art of Elimination".

As has been indicated above, at the moment there are three types of human beings in incarnation at the moment. The first is the person who is centered in emotional drama and the astral plane. The second is that person who is heart centered, whose focus is on recognizing that their actions affect others and take responsibility for those actions. The third is the person who has undertaken a spiritual path, who recognizes in consciousness that they are part of a greater life, they are connected to all things as part of that greater life and assume responsibility for that life.

The next part of the process affects each of these three groups differently.

This process is the relinquishing of the astral and mental bodies, so that the recently released incarnated being can once again bathe in the glorious light of their soul.

In the person whose mind is undeveloped and has been centered in emotional drama, the elimination of the astral body can take a long time. It is done by a process of attrition, by re-living over and over again in the dense matter of the astral plane, all of those attachments to feelings and desires created in the recently requited incarnation, until such time as the person in question tires and recognizes the unfulfilment of such desires without connection to a physical body. Most of these desires are created through the animal aspect of the physical body, and without that physical body to feel the desires and experience them all is of no import. It is this recognition which causes the being on the astral plane to finally let go of these desires.

In the person who is heart centered and has developed mentally, the process takes two forms. This person feels their attachment to the mental plane and gravitates to it, letting go in the process of any attachment to emotional desire. Once in the mental body the person becomes aware, at that level, of the glorious light of their soul, however dimly it may shine. This awareness of the soul causes this being to reach out for it, and in doing so shatters the constructed mental body.

In the person who is spiritually orientated, in total consciousness, they focus on two things.

This person clears any attachment to astral matter or thoughtforms by calling in light from their soul. It is this light which dissolves any attachment that this being has to the astral plane. Next, this being is given Words of Power by the Master in whose Ashram he is a member. By sounding these Words of Power on the mental plane, it creates a downpouring of soul power which causes such an expansion of consciousness that it brings about the shattering of the mental body. That being can now stand free in the Ashram of their Master and bathe in the light of their soul

At this point, depending on which of the three groups the person is centered in, activities ensue that creates the future path for that person. Again, the mechanics of this is known but is not part of this article.

Some words here about the space that you find yourself in when all connections to the physical body have dropped away. Space and time as we know it no longer exists. A timelessness ensues which brings a clarity unknown to us in this physical incarnation. For those beings polarized in the emotional body they turn their attention totally on that body to work out unfulfilled desires.

For the person who has been heart centered, as the sense of time drops away they see the past, the present, and the future presented in one moment. Both for the being polarized in the emotional body, and being who has been heart centered, and is polarized in the mental body, as the timelessness is recognized, in that moment there is a soul contact. The whole of the incarnation that being has created is revealed. The three major conditioning factors in that incarnation are presented, and all else drops away and fades out of their memory. It is these three major conditioning factors that dictate the next incarnation that being will take.

In all traditions there is a description of a place we end up when we die. Some call it heaven, various indigenous peoples have other names for it, the Theosophists call it Devachan. In all cases it is a description of a place we go to enjoy the fruits of good deeds. This is a misinterpretation. As the person going through the experience makes that soul contact, and timelessness is revealed, the eternal Now Moment is presented in all its glory. As we travel through incarnation after incarnation, we come to recognize that all exists in a single point of infinite glory, beauty, and existence. For the person who has developed heart centeredness and the initiate, the full import of this is now moment is revealed causing an upwelling of ecstatic bliss. As this moment exists out of time as we know it, contacted from the 3-D realm, it appears to be infinite, eternal, without end. This is the heaven that is talked about.

For the spiritual person, the path that leads to death is a familiar one. They have spent a lifetime connecting to the higher planes, recognizing themselves more as Spirit than as the incarnated human being. They have spent many hours in meditation, raising their consciousness to connect with the Divine. They embrace the fact that we have many incarnations in the 3-D realm, and they recall into consciousness the many times that they have died before. Death has no fear for this person, because they know that death is life, and life is death. The death is not an ending but a return home where the glory of their soul waits with open arms to welcome them back.

They know that the call to return has come for two reasons, either the physical body is no longer capable of holding their consciousness and in some way has worn out, or that their mission in 3-D has finished and they are being recalled to join the Masters on the higher planes. In either case, the person submits gladly to the process and looks forward to meeting old friends again.

As death approaches, the person spends more and more time in meditation. They recall life's lessons and their reaction to them. They search for any attachment to thoughts and desires connected with the 3-D realm, and release those attachments. As they contemplate this lifetime they will start to feel if the path of return is there for them, and they will start to do the work to construct the next body that they will inhabit. They will bend their will to constructing the most perfect physical body that they will need to learn the lessons of the next lifetime; they will imprint on that body all the knowledge of the mysteries that they have learnt in this lifetime.

They tread, through meditation, the path that they will walk when they take their last breath, the process listed above. They will know where they are going and, understanding the process, and will walk the path unmolested by any being so that they may end up in the Ashram of their Master.

They recognize that their approaching death is not a separation from their loved ones, quite the opposite. They know that once they leave the physical body they will be able to connect to their loved ones in a more powerful way, to know their hopes and fears and to guide them through those. In this lifetime they have connected to the deeper aspect of every person they have met, and as such, that imprint will accompany them on their journey undisturbed.

When the spiritual person feels the time has come where death is approaching, they gather around themselves the friends they have done spiritual work with in this lifetime. Those that cannot be there in the physical, they ask to be there in essence. They also summon around them all the Beings of Light that have supported them in their spiritual work in this lifetime and ask them to wait for them on the threshold.

I recommend that no more than seven people are needed to hold a space around the bedside as the person prepares to leave. As I mentioned above, it is important the kind of space that is created around a person when they take their last breath. For a spiritual person, music can be played which holds a special significance for that person, and will raise their consciousness to connect to the Divine. The lighting in the room should be predominantly orange, as this greatly enhances the separation of the etheric body from the physical shell. There should be a candle burning, so that anything that is released in the process of taking the last breath will jump to the flame and be consumed. Again, in Alice Bailey, Djwhal Khul recommends that Sandalwood as a perfume should be burnt to facilitate the separation of the etheric body. The Master that I associate with the death and dying process is of course Djwhal Khul who is the Tibetan Master, and of course the Tibetans hold the tradition of death and dying. Another recommendation is that Aura Soma sprays can be used around the room and over the bed of the dying person. The obvious choice would be the Djwhal Khul spray.

As the time approaches, the person's friends in the room describe a circle of protection around the space. They summon the Four Mighty Archangels of the four quadrants to stand in those places. They sit in silent meditation as their friend takes their last breath; for those with eyes to see, as the door swings open, they see a Mighty One come forth to welcome their comrade. There is a shift in the space, like a slight breeze passing through the room, and their friend is gone.

It is said that one who does the work will pass through the gates of death in full consciousness, and for their friends who have accompanied them to the door, they will also see the path that they will walk in some future time.

So how do we do a healing for a person who is dying? Well, as we have said above, it is all about attachment. As we have said, by being with the person in the space for three days prior to them taking their last breath, we can do all in our power to help them connect to the people they need to in order to say their last goodbyes. However, we can also help them through healing.

The kind of healing I have always done is to help that person, through sympathetic resonance, to sever all ties to people, places, or events in that lifetime. This can be done by summoning in the energies of the Archangel Michael, or any other cosmic force which provides a clearing of karmic connections.

We thank, on behalf of the person, the body in which they find themselves, for the service it has done to allow that person to learn the lessons of the 3-D realm.

We contact the soul of that person and connect it to their consciousness so that it may direct them in the journey they are about to take.

We summon the angels that guide beings through death, these being the Archangel Azrael, the archetypal forces of Anpu (Anubis), Tehuti (Thoth), Amenta, Hades, Persephone, etc. We also call on that person's Guardian Angel, which has guided them throughout that lifetime.

Such is the power of the service that we can do that I relate the experience I had when I did this for my stepfather when he died. He had died in the hospice in which I had worked, and I had done the work for him as I have described above. However, because of the connection to the physical body which can still be there for three days after taking the last breath, it is vital that we do the healing for those three days. It was, then, that I found myself in the funeral parlour where his body was interred. It was the second day after his death that I had been there to do this service. I did the meditation/healing and as it completed, to my astonishment, I saw him lift out of the physical shell, but what was more extraordinary was that I perceived two other deceased people in the back of the funeral parlour who also left with him.

We have discussed above that this process of seven days of abstraction from the physical form applies to any living thing. The process that we are in at the moment is that the being that we know as Gaia is now abstracting herself from her physical form, which is this 3rd dimensional planet. She is undergoing the process of traveling through her Underworld to be reborn on the 4th dimensional plane. What happens in death to any other being is happening to Gaia. If you think about it, and look at what is happening in the world we are definitely in the process. If you observe any person who is dying what happens to the physical body? It starts to deteriorate, it starts to show signs of wear, it starts to show signs of falling apart. You only have to look around to see this process in the world at this time.

Not so long ago I read in a newspaper that the Amazon rainforest was known as the lungs of the world. Now it has been re-categorized as one of the worst polluters of the world because of all the destruction of trees by burning. It is one of the worst sources of the hothouse gases which are affecting the weather at this time. It does not take a great jump in consciousness to see the analogy with the disease of the lungs in a human being. What sign is that when the lungs of the world have become bronchitic?

My feeling is, and I have to stress that this is only my opinion, that we are in the three-day process leading up to death, to the last breath of Gaia on the 3rd dimensional plane. In 2012, that magical date is when Gaia will take her last breath on the physical plane. Then for the next three days there will be dissolution of Gaia from the 3rd dimensional plane. I also have to point out here that a day in the life of a planet is not a day as we perceive it. It encompasses a much vaster period of time as we conceive it. It is therefore that I leave the speculation of how long that may be to you.

Again, my feeling is, just as it is the truth for a human being, the body that Gaia will inhabit already exists on the higher dimensional planes. All of the species that appear to have become extinct are now inhabitants on that planet, as are many of the human race who have left recently due to natural and created disasters.

Just as a human being takes seven days to transit to higher dimension, so Gaia is undergoing the same process. I feel that this is what the ascension is truly about. Ascension is about leaving behind an old vehicle, it falls into dissolution, and you are reborn in another vehicle on a higher dimension. It does not strike me, therefore, that the 3rd dimensional earth is going to be reborn. How can it? We all know that we are transiting into a higher dimension. So this focus on cleansing the earth, on cleansing this and cleansing that, it's pointless because what is happening is just a natural process. The earth as a 3rd dimensional being is dying. It is our inability to accept the process of death that we are struggling against which causes us to say we cannot let go of this beautiful earth. However, this being which is the earth is transcending into a more beautiful thing, on a different plane which is going to be even more beautiful than this earth. But like all beings it has to let go of the old physical form in order that it may be reborn in a more perfect form on a higher plane.

Some may say that humanity has done a great disservice to the planet by causing so much destruction, and pollution. However, if we look at the analogy of the planet as a person and treat the condition the earth finds itself in as a disease, we have the following situation.

A person, who goes through an illness, generally uses that illness as a means to do a kind of spiritual work. All illness, all bad things that happen to us, are a service because we push against them. It is only when bad things happen that we actually look inside and say "why me?" When you look inside yourself and ask this question you generally try to define who you are. Who is it that is feeling this? Why do I feel this? Why is it happening to me? So you start to do inner thinking. You ask the question "what is going on?" When illness comes it prompts you to consider your own mortality. You start to think about greater things and who you really are. This is the service of all negative conditions.

For me, Gaia is in this space. What humanity has been doing to Gaia over the last 300 years, since around 1750 and the start of the Industrial Revolution, is to create a negative situation for Gaia to push against in order for her to re-define herself. It has given her the impetus to realize she is more than she considered herself to be and to make the decision to ascend to another level of consciousness. This is the service that humanity has done for Gaia. We have provided the thrust block that she has pushed against in order to reach for a higher level of consciousness. It has allowed herself to recreate another body for herself on the 4th/5th dimensional plane, and to now transition to it.

Humanity are atoms in her body, in a way like a disease in Gaia just like a disease in a person; but if that person has any kind of philosophical thought about the condition they find themselves in, they see that the disease has served them in service.

What is happening to the earth now is a necessary component to allow the being whose body it is to make a decision to look inside and see who she is, and decide I am Divine. And in that moment of knowing she is Divine she has completed all karma on the 3rd dimensional plane and is now transitioning to another level.

In conclusion, I would like to say that I have only briefly touched on the most important parts of this process. It is a vast subject, and one that needs to be addressed quickly. My feeling is that we are approaching a time where large numbers of humanity will start to leave the 3-D realm. I am assured by spirit, that there is no greater service needed on the planet at the time than the dissolving of the fears surrounding death.

For those of you wishing to explore the subject further, the references I have given in this article, for me, are the best that I have come across. For those of us in the West, by far the most informative are the books " A Treaties on White Magic", and " Esoteric Healing", both by Alice Bailey, channelled from Djwhal Khul.

I would also like to say that for those of us doing spiritual work, the same archetypes come into play as we let go of one level of consciousness and seek a higher one through initiation while still in the 3-D body. The understanding of this process will allow you to make these transitions with the least possible effort.

Kevin Core.

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