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What to call the Other Place. The World Beyond (22) described by those living there. Albert Pauchard.
Thanks to the many readers who gave a variety of suggestions as to the name for Heaven, the place or state of consciousness we arrive at after death, whether we like it or not. We really have no control over life and death, beyond the physical capacity which we have on earth, and the mental ability beyond. There are hundreds of words and phrases used in all our languages to name and describe where we are taken after the death of our body. From the fact that people can come back and tell us what is happening to them and where they actually are, we can assume that material science is wrong, if it concludes that because person’s brain is dead and the senses inert, that person as an individual soul no longer exists. If they say that visions and ecstatic cosmic experiences while we are alive are no more than the mis-firing of certain epileptic brain cells, there goes the foundation of all our religions out the window! But we have our second sight, and other psychic abilities, through which the minds of our so-called dead friends and relatives communicate with us. That experience is not imagination, or hallucination. It is very evidential, and factual.
Whatever we eventually decide to call the world after death, in these compilations I will continue to employ the different terms used by the spirit communicators themselves. Other compilations use the usual well-worn words, with such titles as Hello From Heaven, Glimpses of Heaven, the Cosmic Cradle, Glimpses of the Beyond, Visions of Another World, the World Unseen, the Journey Beyond, the Cloud of Unknowing and so on. An acronym might catch on, such as LOTOS (life on the other side) as someone suggested, but that would only be good for the English language, and is not translatable, and it has already been used in other contexts, as someone else googled it to find out! Visits to the spirit world are described as Soul Travel, Higher States of Consciousness and various ecstatic states such as Samadhi, Satori, Nirvana, and the locations described as Devachan and other Theosophical terms, or the Summerland (Andrew Jackson Davis), for example.
Other suggestions were Next Existence, Spirit Life, Life Ad Infinitum, and Place of Liberation. Betty White lived in her Unobstructed Universe, Swedenborg simply visited his Heaven and Hell, Dante had his Heaven, Hell and Purgatory, and, as for myself, I would humbly offer my own preference, taken from my own brief NDE when I felt that I went to the Other Side, Over There. I felt myself intact, still in my body, without going through any tunnel, but just flying across a valley, on the other side of which I met grown-ups (I was 11 at the time), grandparents and others, who knew me, and talked with me as I stood there, bathed in warm, all-embracing golden light. It must have been some kind of borderland, because I saw no buildings, just the valley, and the people I was with on the top of the ridge on the other side of the valley, with the flat land stretching off into the far distance, like out West on the Prairies. The terrain was a brown, sepia colour, plain earth and nothing growing that I could see. There was an overwhelming feeling of love and total acceptance, and I longed to be there forever with these loving people.. But I was told I couldn’t stay, and was so disappointed when I found myself back here.
Albert Pauchard (1878 – 1934) the Swiss Psychic Investigator, returned to describe his experiences of the Other World in sittings held for his wife Antoinette between 1935 – 1937. Here is what he had to say, sitting on the border between two worlds.
"After my physical death I was alone. I always liked to be alone. The world in which I found myself was marvellous. The best idea I can convey of it, would be perhaps to compare it to an immense park – a natural park. Such places exist on earth, but this was beyond anything one could imagine. It was like a direct answer to my yearning for beauty. The trees, the flowers, the most beautiful shrubs gave the impression of being a sublimation of their equals on earth. It was the same with the whole landscape. I cannot describe the joy of life and the exquisite grace of thousands of tiny little creatures that danced and played from flower to flower. At certain moments the breeze carried the sweet harmonies of perfect music to me – then I seized my violin and joined the orchestra. Although music had been a living joy at all times, yet never did it mean so much to me as in those moments.
How long did the ecstasy last? A day, a year – I could not tell. But there came a time when my soul could no longer vibrate with all the joy and beauty. Finally, I think I went to sleep. On regaining consciousness I found myself in my usual terrestrial-like surroundings. I felt a deep yearning to get away and find my lost paradise again. Without knowing how, I returned once more to that place of beauty and harmony, yet my soul was now incapable of responding to it. For the first time I felt that I was ALONE in this paradise. I wanted love, friendship and brotherhood. A voice told me to look for my brothers and sisters in humanity. I saw a narrow, winding path. I took it. I walked quickly. It was very long. But, eventually, I perceived in the distance what seemed to me the silhouette of a large city. The streets were crowded with people. Nobody took any notice of me. Finally I arrived at a beautiful spacious place in the shade of an old cathedral. I recognized, not far away, a former friend on earth, a rich and very popular actor. For some time we had practised music together. I had the feeling of needing to render him a service. We had been friends for a while, but I had moved away, and in the years that followed, he tried in vain to get in contact with me again, but I always refused. Now, it was he who stood there before me. However, my feelings had changed. It was I who was happy to see him, to see a familiar face. Full of joy, I went towards him with outstretched hands. All joyous he embraced me but then a sharp pain made me start. Taken aback, he looked at me painfully and withdrew, murmuring under his breath ‘Again! Always the same.’
His reaction plainly showed me that it was not really his fault. [Pauchard tells how everyone he tried to approach caused him pain in this way. When this desolate situation became unbearable he prayed for a little light and understanding.] Almost instantaneously the darkness grew lighter, and as quickly as though a heavy cloud had been withdrawn from the sun that it was hiding, the daylight reappeared. I saw myself in the middle of a large plain, sitting on a boulder surrounded by big stones. Somebody was sitting near me, an elderly man with an infinitely good and noble face, reassuring me with a smile.
OLD MAN - You asked for understanding. Are you sure your desire for enlightenment is sincere?
PAUCHARD - Oh yes! Quite sure.
OLD MAN - Well then, don’t be afraid, come closer up to me. [He took Pauchard’s hand and turned it palm upwards]. That is the cause of your pain.
[Pauchard says he saw an extremely sharp thorn which had entered the flesh of his hand. Gradually he discovered many more thorns in various parts of his body].
OLD MAN - Your irritability, vanity and mistrust while on earth have produced them.
PAUCHARD - I understand that only I myself can extirpate these thorns, but how?
OLD MAN [by now they were communicating telepathically, not through spoken words] - By facing them steadily. You possess the excellent qualities required for good friendship – if only those thorns would not make every contact impossible.
Pauchard concluded this story by saying: - I must add that the thorns have completely disappeared now. I have liberated myself of them simply by facing them directly.
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The difference between my conditions in the beginning [over here immediately after my death] and now is, that previously imaginative creation took place involuntarily, while at present I exercise it by means of a well-directed will-power. This can be learned little by little. The same applies to persons I meet here.
You understand, there is no difference in PLACE, as far as I am concerned. Only a difference in quality. For instance, the vibrations are more intense, more rapid. At my present stage, the light which seems normal to me would have blinded m in the beginning.
Then again, I see around me landscapes, and buildings as well. Yes, even churches, factories, chemical laboratories, construction yards….. But all that enveloped in a light which I can only describe as heavenly. Things do not seem to be lit from outside, but carry their own light within themselves and radiate it spontaneously.
Here, every being and every thing is a light within a light – and not a light within a darkness which it would lighten…. I seek a better explanation, but cannot find any. I do not mean that there is none, but one has to take into account the limitations caused by your terrestrial mentality…. These impede me from giving you descriptions other than approximate.
I just mentioned laboratories, factories, construction yards. Here, every one finds it possible to express his ideal and fulfil his earthly dream. There exists no limitations of the brain, or of external conditions. His conception is luminously expressed, and spontaneously takes form. This is not the result of clear and profound thinking. It is more a response to our aspirations.
Man will take up the same occupation – but this time thoroughly thought over and duly ripened – then he is reborn into the world of intelligence – or what you call the mental plane. Please understand well, that the worlds – or spheres of existence and consciousness – are not marked by precise boundaries. One never lives exclusively in one world. Yet, the worlds here seem more differentiated one from another – more specific, if one could say so – than on earth. I will endeavour to explain clearly what I know about it.
Down below, one does not live only in the material sense. Behind the material expressions are the astral energies – the forces of desire and the emotions. But that is not all. In order to achieve what desire seeks to attain, the intervention of an intense mental activity is required. Well, the same thing happens here. Only there is something else, namely: things carry within themselves their own light – and desire and emotions may be known directly within themselves. Do you understand?
The fact that desire, or aspiration, automatically finds its own realization in the particular matter of our world – because no heavy and resisting matter like yours on earth opposes it – this fact alone means that the cooperative intervention of the intellect is not so strictly required. Later on, a time comes when all one’s possibilities of spontaneous creation are exhausted. Then another desire crops up to understand the why and wherefores of things. It is then that one glides into mental activity.
My relationship with my environment here is a relationship which stimulates this latter activity. I find myself on the very border of the two worlds – the world of emotion and that of intelligence, which you call astral and mental respectively."
Pauchard’s story reviewed and condensed from “The Other World.” English edition first published by the Pelegrin Trust and Pilgrim Books in 1952. A useful work describing many facets of the Life Beyond
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