We are all fascinated by the idea of death, and look to people who claim to have experienced it and came back to life to share what they felt and witnessed. Dr. Jan Holden has made this her career: she studies near-death experiences that have taken place all over the world. Her conclusion? That souls exist.
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We’ve already told you about the woman who died for 9 minutes and says she visited the afterlife. Now, we’ll share Dr Holden’s findings with you, and explain why she is so convinced about the existence of souls.
More near-death experiences
Dr Holden, talking to the Mighty Pursuit podcast, explained that there are more and more near-death experiences documented. This is because of advances in medical technology:
We know that these experiences have occurred throughout history, and across cultures but obviously in greater numbers recently.
Dr Holden has combed through reports of near-death experiences and found that there is some part of our consciousness that is not attached to our body. She said:
After 20 seconds of the heart not beating there's no more measurable brain activity, so if the brain is not functioning and yet the person later reports things that happened during that time – that they perceived from a position outside their body – it just challenges what materialists believe, that conscious experience can only be the result of brain activity.
Visiting heaven
Dr Holden referred to several examples of situations that prove some sense of awareness while dead. She talked about Dr Mary Neal, top surgeon from Wyoming, who was clinically dead for a brief period after being trapped underwater in a boating incident. Dr Neal was submerged, with no access to oxygen, for almost half an hour. Amazingly, she recovered unscathed, but what she experienced stayed with her.
She claimed to have seen heaven - and she is not the first to report such an experience. She said: ‘I could feel my spirit peeling away from my body. I rose up and out of the water and I was immediately greeted by a group of people, beings, spirits.'
Awareness though dead
Another example she shared involved a 20-year-old who had been in a car accident. The woman, Trisha, had a near-death experience during the surgery that followed. Dr Holden said that, over the course of her near-death experience, Trisha believes she ‘left’ the surgery area where medics were working on her body. She witnessed her mother praying in the waiting room, and could hear her even though she was praying silently.
It gets spookier: Trisha then wondered where her stepfather was. She traveled to a part of the hospital that had vending machines and saw him putting money in and taking a candy bar. Dr Holden revealed:
She thought, ‘That's weird,’ because her parents were health food nuts and they never ate refined sugar. But it was later verified that he was just so nervous that he just broke down and had a candy bar – so it defied her expectation.
The doctor added: ‘There’s literally no way she could have known that information.’
Rejecting sceptics
Dr Holden has faced some scepticism around her findings. Some believe that patients, semi-conscious on the operating table, have picked up what medics are saying around them. Dr Holden said:
We've got lots of cases where people perceive things that are just too much of a stretch to think that [medics] even would have talked about this.
There is another theory that clings to the rational idea that patients generate memories while they’re losing consciousness and simply remember them when their minds are fully awake. Dr Holden said:
But that one’s refuted by cases where people are perceiving things that happened in the middle of a substantial period of unconsciousness.
This doctor seems convinced that souls really do exist. Another doctor who has studied over 5000 near-death experiences believes that an afterlife ‘certainly’ exists. It all remains a great mystery, as with most things surrounding dying and death - and perhaps that’s for the best!
Read more:
⋙ This woman died and discovered how the antichrist corrupts people on Earth
⋙ This man died for several minutes, came back to life and revealed what actually happened
⋙ This woman who died for 14 minutes says she visited Heaven
Sources used:
Daily Star: 'I've studied dozens of near-death experiences – there's proof souls exist'
Insider:I've studied more than 5,000 near death experiences. My research has convinced me without a doubt that there's life after death.
