The
late
Betty Bethards
was widely known as a spiritual healer,
meditation teacher, psychic and mystic.
She helped many people find meaning in the
cycles and stages of life, including the
transition called death. She was well-known
in metaphysical circles as a very wonderful
and spiritual person who was blessed with
a special ability. One of her more unusual
claims to fame was that Elvis Presley died
while reading Betty's book
Sex and Psychic
Energy
in the bathroom. Concerning her own near-death
experience, Betty explains, "After
my first death experience, I lost all fear
of dying. I realized that life and death
are part of a continuum of being. Then I
began to find real meaning of my life here
on Earth. Death is nothing more than leaving
the body, just like we do every night in
the dream state. We all leave the body at
night. If you jerk as you are falling asleep,
it's a bad take-off. If you dream you are
falling , it's a bad landing coming in.
If you awaken but can't move your body,
you haven't fully merged with it yet. Just
take a few deep breaths, relax and you'll
be fine."
You can read more
about Betty and her psychic abilities at
her
website.
On July 30, 2002, Betty herself made the
transition herself through the door called
death. Although she has left this world,
her teachings will live on.
The following
pages are excerpts reprinted by permission
from Betty Bethards from her book,
There is No Death,
in which she gives her description of what
happens when we die. Other books by Betty
are
The Dream Book,
Seven Steps to
Developing Your Intuitive Powers,
From My Heart
to Yours,
Be Your Own Guru,
and
Techniques for
Health and Wholeness.
1. Betty Bethards' Near-Death Experience
My
first experience with death challenged all
my old beliefs about the nature of reality
and why we are here in the first place.
I learned that if we are ever to come to
terms with the meaning of our lives here
on Earth, we must understand the meaning
of death. Only then can we see it with a
total perspective, fitting all the pieces
of the puzzle together. Otherwise, nothing
makes much sense.
I
returned home one night from a bridge game
with a burning sensation in my chest and
went right to bed. An hour later I awoke
to find myself hovering over the bed about
two feet above my body. A voice said to
me, "You're going to be very sick with
pneumonia. Get to a doctor.
[After
two doctor visits which did not help her,
she ran a temperature of 103 to 105 degrees
and was on the road to death.]
Suddenly
I was twenty feet across the room. Everything
I considered "Betty" to be - memory,
personality, senses - was looking back at
that shell on the couch. I thought, "Gee,
she's sick. I don't want to go back."
Then
a very gentle voice said from behind me, "You
don't have to go back, but this is death
if you choose to stay."
I
had a body which appeared the same, was
wearing the same clothes, and was raised
about two feet off the floor. I wasn't frightened
at all, but felt wonderfully enveloped in
peace. I knew then how Jerry had appeared
to me ten years earlier. It was as if I
could see things clearly, and knew that
there was no such thing as death. I realized
then that one never dies, but changes vibrations,
and goes on living and learning on other
levels.
I
really want to go back. But then I started
seeing pictures of my four children flash
before me. It was a tricky way to get me
to make up my mind to return to the Earth
plane and finish what I was supposed to
do. I was fine with seeing each child, knowing
they could take care of themselves without
me, until I saw my eighteen month old son.
I knew he still needed me, and at that point
I made my decision. I had to go back.
As
soon as I thought this, the voice said to
me again, "Unless you take an antibiotic
within the next twenty-four hours, you will
no longer have a choice of whether you wish
to remain on the Earth plane."
It
was after this experience that I knew there
was no death and that it wasn't the way
I had been taught to believe. I didn't know
how it was, but I was determined to find
out. I had to wait two years before the
teachings began coming to me.
[Within this period of time, Betty became
more and more psychic until she was able
to communicate with her spirit guides.]
2. Not the Same
For Everyone
When the soul
has been exposed to the opportunities it
chose for a particular lifetime, it is allowed
a release from the physical body. The soul
knows when the time for release has come. Death
is easy - life is hard work.
Death
is not the same for everyone. It depends
upon how you have prepared yourself during
that incarnation, how old a soul you are,
how evolved your awareness, and what lessons
you chose to learn through the death experience.
You may have chosen to learn courage and
to build strength through a physical death
with suffering. People who die slow deaths
from such things as cancer or strokes are
often givers who have never learned how
to receive. Their souls may choose a slow
death in order to allow others to give to
them. But you can learn your lesson
and move beyond the need for pain and suffering
in dying. You may, in fact, have chosen
a fast and easy death. Either way it is
not a punishment, but a process of growth
for both you and those around you. It allows
you and others to work through difficult
situations with kindness and compassion.
3. Seeing the
Invisible
When you approach
the time of death, often you're able to
see relatives who have crossed over standing
around you. The etheric body slips
easily in and out of the physical, and many
times a person near-death talks to beings
who are invisible to others. Doctors for
the most part think you are hallucinating,
but you're not. Whether death comes rapidly
or slowly, your loved ones know ahead of
time when you are coming, and are there,
prepared and waiting, happy that you have
been released.
4. The Tunnel
and the Light
First, you may
experience your whole life flashing in front
of you much as a drowning person reports
this experience. Next, you will go through
what appears to be a dark tunnel or dark
tube which has a very bright light at the
end. Most entities are just drawn to
the light without anyone saying, "Go
to the light." It's a past soul memory
of having left the body many times, and
knowing what to do.
This
light is from higher astral levels, and
you follow it to the one you have earned.
However you have lived your life on the
Earth side determines how high you can go
into the light on the other side.
There
is nothing to fear. You leave your body
every night as you enter the sleep state.
There is no difference. You cannot be harmed.
Fears
are within, and this is why you must work
to release yourself from fears on the Earth
plane, because you will carry these same
fears over to the next dimension. As above,
so below!
5. Hanging Around
the Living
Some people may
want to hang around their old surroundings
on Earth rather than go on to discover for
themselves the beauty and wisdom which is
offered to them on the other side. This
may take a long time, but they are coaxed
along slowly. Nothing is forced on
a soul, neither attitudes nor understandings. This
is why we are always counseled here on Earth
never to force our beliefs on another person
until one is ready to hear them. The
free choice of every individual should be
acknowledged.
6. Seeing Loved
Ones and Teachers
When you die you
are greeted by loved ones first so that
you may understand what has happened. There
is a big celebration, like a birthday party,
heralding your arrival. Family and friends
who have gone on before you are there to
celebrate your arrival.
There
is always good at the time of your cross-over. Even
people who have lived lives of selfishness
will know and understand the rejoicing. Whatever
you have sown you are going to reap in terms
of structuring your experiences and lessons
which continue on the other side. But the
first few days of cross-over (as you know
time on the Earth plane) you are allowed
to be with your teachers, and those who
have loved you in the past. You are able
to see those you left behind and to hear
their thoughts and words. The first six
weeks we stay very close to our loved ones
on the Earth plane.
You
are given glimpses of things you expected
to see in order to bring you comfort. You
may briefly see a teacher you worshipped
in your lifetime: Jesus, Buddha, or another
guru, according to your expectations. After
the first seventy-two hours, however, you
are gently brought out of many of your illusions
and shown that you have not landed in an
ultimate paradise with gold paved streets. Of
course you could choose to create these
for yourself on this plane, but once you
truly understand you would most likely choose
to be around that with which you felt most
comfortable.
If
you don't believe in God or an afterlife,
you will probably be kept in a sleep state
for the first two to three day period. You
will wake up in a beautiful meadow or some
other calm and peaceful place where you
can reconcile the transition from the death
state to the continuous life. You are given
teachings in the hope that you do not refuse
to believe that you are dead.
On
the other side you see things with a clearer,
more objective nature, but you are not given
total knowledge because you would not understand
it or be ready to use it, any more than
while you are here on Earth. We are
given knowledge only as we are ready to
receive it, whether we are in or out of
the body.
7. After the
Homecoming
After the first
six weeks the soul meets with what may be
called a loving board of directors. It is
composed of teachers and other higher beings
who have walked with you. These beings
help you review your past life, to begin
to look at what was learned and not learned,
and what you wish to work on or do from
this point. No one judges you, and this
is important to keep in mind. You are
the one that judges yourself and decides
what is best for continued growth.
You
will be given teachings, training, and anything
you need to help you prepare yourself for
your next incarnation. But this is
not given immediately. You can choose your
own pace and need not be hurried through
the realms of the next realms. It may take
centuries for your soul to know what is
best for your development once you return
again to a physical body. It may take
a great deal of reflection before you determine
a purpose and direction for your next sojourn
on Earth. Since we reincarnate in groups
we usually wait 80 to 120 years before we
come back.
Also,
as part of your training, you are allowed
to watch people on the Earth plane to see
how they handle situations when they reincarnate. Very
few people in a physical body realize that
their behavior is a teaching ground for
those who are out of the body.
8. Reviewing
Past Lives
As you are ready,
and as you choose, you will be shown your
past lives. If you do not believe in reincarnation
it may take a long time before you are able
to deal with this. Eventually, you must
learn to understand yourself in a continuity
of growth over many lifetimes. You
must recognize all the strengths you have
built and all the karmic ties you have created
which must be dissolved.
By
the time you are given the privilege of
reviewing all past lives and integrating
the knowledge learned, you will have reached
a state of total objectivity. You will feel
no remorse or condemnation, but will see
it as merely a review of why situations
occurred and had to be worked through.
The record of
your life is very private. Only those
who have walked with you as teachers are
allowed to see what is called your
akashic
(or life) record. If during your lifetime
you ask that a psychic tune into this record,
he or she will only be given a minimal amount
of information from it which is particularly
relevant to your immediate problems or concerns.
You,
too, can tune into this record through meditation
and get insight and clarity on the problems
you are dealing with. Your own attunement
is much more accurate than asking a psychic
or someone else to tell you about yourself. This
builds up a dependency. We may need
clarity or help at times, but should never
develop a dependency on others. Our whole
purpose is to gain strength and learn how
to make our own decisions.
9. Religious
Beliefs
Your religious
beliefs have little to do with what you
experience in the transition from one realm
to another, except that you would be allowed
to see briefly the teacher or guru that
you followed. Regardless of cultural or
religious beliefs, you will have the same
basic experience at death (just as mystics
of all great traditions attune to the same
universal energy). What counts is what
comes from the heart, not what one professes
to believe. It means nothing whether
or not one was baptized, for example, or
whether one has various other rites administered.
How ridiculous to rely on meaningless words!
The
true meaning of baptism is an initiation
of the spirit, an opening awareness to the
God consciousness. People receive this inner
baptism when they are spiritually prepared.
You
will not suddenly be sitting at the feet
of a man with a long white beard called
God. God is within, whether you are
in or out of the body. Your awareness of
the God force will not be greater on the
other side. If you insist upon searching
for God, you will do this for awhile until
you get the idea that you are following
an illusion. We must go through at least
four more realms beyond the astral before
we could even begin to understand the energy
of the God force. God is love in all
religions, so the more we live love the
closer we are to God.
10. The Idea
of Purgatory
Catholics understand
purgatory as a place or level of consciousness
one goes for further understanding. It
is an intermediary state that gives one
the opportunity to develop further clarity.
At first it is like being in fog, just as
many people walk around on the Earth plane
in a fog. They don't have the clarity
to understand how they are setting their
lives.
If there has been
much negativity during an incarnation, or
a
suicide,
one must spend some time contemplating what
has happened.
It
is a holding place where souls who are confused,
who do not want to let go of their earthly
attachments, or who choose not to grow will
remain until such time as they allow themselves
to be released to flow once more into the
light.
Purgatory
is a place of your own making. We see souls
who are punishing themselves here on the
Earth plane. This continues after death
just the same as it would if they were still
in the physical body. Many people must suffer
in order to feel worth. When they finally
learn this is a negative number they are
running, they can move on.
11. The Meaning
of Hell
What about the
reality of a place called hell? Hell is
a level of consciousness which can be experienced
in or out of the body. It is a lonely
place where one is not allowed to be in
communication with anything other than one's
own negativity.
Souls
do not enter this level unless they need
to experience it for their growth. Many
people who commit suicide will have to go
through this hell of their own making in
order to become aware that this is not what
they are striving for. The soul must learn
that it does not have the right to take
its own life, that it cannot kill, it cannot
hurt other people; nor can it judge others
for we have no knowledge of what they came
back to do and learn.
Many
people at one time or another have experienced
this plane. Alcoholics going through the
DTs and people on drugs, may also see it.
It is a plane of total darkness where we
must confront the fears we have built within
our own minds. Understand that fears have
no reality unless we choose to give them
reality. As soon as we are able to
meet them directly, to face them, they dissipate. This
lower level is not for one's punishment,
but rather to provide the opportunity to
confront and move beyond the negativity
created by oneself.
The hell fire
mentioned in many traditions is symbolic
of the "kundalini"
energy (Holy Spirit, God energy, or Creative
energy) that dwells within the seven energy
centers or chakras within man. Fire is symbolic
of the cleansing and purification of the
soul.
The
struggle between higher and lower self or
what some call God and the Devil causes
growth, until finally the negativity or
the destructive elements are completely
overcome.
12. Laws More Protective
Through
questions and answers I have received information
about what it is actually like to be on
the other side. First, my channel has pointed
out that the laws are much more protective.
We need no longer be exposed to both good
and evil, for we have already experienced
that. We see the bad only if we choose to.
Those who are living in harmony will not
be imposed upon by the ignorant, but can
visit the lower planes to help another if
they choose to do so.
For
example, if you loved someone who is on
a lower vibration than you are, you are
allowed to visit anytime you choose by simply
lowering your rate of vibration. This may
help the entity greatly by encouraging self-love
and growth. However, the entity will need
to incarnate again on the Earth plane to
test out these new lessons, because it is
the Earth experience that determines your
stage of evolution.
13. Marriage and Unions
There
are unions of souls on the other side, and
marriage as such is optional. If couples
prefer to remain together they may do so,
as long as their interests and growth are
taking them in the same direction. If they
choose to go in different directions, there
are no hurt feelings. There is no possessiveness
or demands. You are free to go your own
way, in your own time, at your own choosing.
Married
couples will be reunited after death, and
may choose to stay together if they want
to, provided they are on the same level
of vibration. This is free will. If you
have been married three or four times, you
will find that you will want to be with
the one whom you truly love. It could even
be someone from another incarnation. You
will be with those you love, and there is
a total merger which is a much higher experience
and a deeper love bond than anything you
can know on the Earth plane.
This
total merger is like stepping inside one
another's auras, a total blending of energies.
It's a way of expressing love and sharing.
What you know on Earth as a sexual relationship
takes the form of a higher merger of souls.
There is no need for sexual organs on the
other side unless you choose to have them.
For this merger of energies is far superior
to the physical mechanics of the sexual
experience. This merger is not limited to
husbands and wives, but may be experienced
by any two souls who are loving and caring.
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