‘I had a blast!’ Michael Tamura is laughing out loud. His laughter is contagious – he has us all in stitches and he’s actually talking about when he died at Hiroshima in a previous lifetime! He’s irreverent, outrageous and hilarious – a perfect vehicle for getting his message across, a message that is in fact quite serious, that we need to not be afraid of death, but to embrace it, to choose to die well, in love and acceptance rather than in fear and denial. And he should know - he’s died and come back not once, not twice, but three times!

We were filming the Virtual Light Show, hosted by Barbara and Steve Rother, and Michael was one of the other guests on the show. We all had a blast! Where else would you film the Virtual Light Show other than in Las Vegas? With every conceivable light show in town, it’s a perfect fit! But this is a ‘light’ show with a difference and the ‘virtual’ aspect is that it goes out live on the internet and is watched by some 20,000 people around the globe. There’s a live audience of about 50 in the studio, so there’s nothing virtual about the applause you hear. And Sandie Sedgbeer is a great interviewer. She’s a bright woman, discerning, professional and she doesn’t let you off the hook!

The first guest, David Bennett, a fellow Findhorn Press author, shared his extraordinary tale of drowning, having a full blown near-death experience, including meeting his soul group and having a life review, and then miraculously, with Spirit’s help, being drawn up and out of the depths to the water’s surface. As he spoke I realized how much of an overlap there is between his work and mine. (Although, of the three guests, I was the only one who hadn’t physically died and come back – I’ve been through my own death and rebirth in other ways.)

After his near-death, David then spent 11 years living with the experience, but not able to share it, feeling totally isolated. This is so common and typical of people going through spiritual emergence and emergency, which, in a sense, is what that period was for him. It came to a head when he was suddenly diagnosed with terminal cancer and given weeks to live. But that’s another whole story and you’ll have to read his book!

Another aspect he spoke of during his interview was the heart-felt desire to be of service, to help others. I instantly recognized that – it’s the hallmark of moving successfully through spiritual emergence and emergency that I talk about in my book. But the main point he made that resonated with me, and he came back to it several times because it’s so challenging, yet so essential, is the whole issue of managing to integrate the experience. It can take years and we need the right support, the right information and the right therapeutic tools. Yet until we do that, we can’t really get on with our lives. For David, it’s as if his life was on hold for those 11 years.

After the show, over lunch, David and I talked about the term ‘experiencer’, which is also the language we use in the Spiritual Crisis Network; basically, anyone who has been through an intense transformative experience. The obvious conclusion he and I came to is that there’s a huge overlap between the work we’re both doing. So much so that I cover near-death experiences as one type of spiritual crisis in my book ‘In Case of Spiritual Emergency: Moving Successfully Through Your Awakening’. I included it because it’s one of the areas of transpersonal psychology where there has been a great deal of research. That research is what helps to give the field of spiritual emergency its scientific validity and credibility.

So whether you’ve been through an overwhelming period of inner transformation or a near-death experience, or whether you’re supporting clients or patients coping with that, there are resources, information and support available. Three places to start are David and my websites and the UK Spiritual Crisis Network:

www.catherine-g-lucas.com

www.VoyageOfPurpose.com

www.SpiritualCrisisNetwork.org.uk