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Life After Life: Where Does Your Soul Go?

• Douglas James Cottrell PhD • Season 2 • Episode 16

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Death is not the end, but merely a transition back to where we came from. Drawing from four decades of metaphysical exploration and his own near-death experience, Dr. Douglas James Cottrell reveals the fascinating journey our consciousness takes after we shed our physical form.

What happens in those first moments after death? Dr. Douglas explains that initially, you remain right where you were—in the same room, fully aware—but suddenly freed from physical limitations. Your consciousness can now move anywhere at the speed of thought. Think of the moon, and you're there. Consider a loved one, and you're instantly by their side. This "post-existence," as he calls it, mirrors the pre-existence from which we originally came.

The doctor shares compelling evidence of continued consciousness beyond death, from his personal childhood experience during anesthesia to accounts of those clinically dead who later revived with detailed observations of what happened while their bodies were non-functional. These stories paint a picture of souls moving through what appears as a tunnel (possibly exiting through the third eye or heart chakra) into an expansive reality where thought becomes the primary mode of transportation.

Most touching are the ways departed souls try to communicate with those still living—through flickering lights, moved objects, or most commonly, dream visitations where they appear vibrant and healthy, typically looking about forty years old regardless of their age at death. Dr. Douglas recounts how his grandfather visited him after passing, confirming his presence by manipulating the bedroom lights.

Perhaps most thought-provoking is the revelation about the "celestial planning room" where souls apparently choose their upcoming life experiences, including difficult challenges that will facilitate growth. This controversial perspective suggests that all human experiences, even painful ones, serve a higher purpose in our spiritual evolution as we move through successive lifetimes gathering the full spectrum of human experience.

Ready to expand your understanding of what lies beyond this physical existence? Join us for this mind-opening exploration that challenges conventional thinking about life, death, and the eternal nature of consciousness itself.

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Announcer:

Welcome to Wake Up with Dr Douglas James Cottrell, your source for helpful information, advice and tips to live your life in a mindful way in this increasingly chaotic world. For over four decades, Dr Douglas has been teaching people how to develop their intuition and live their lives in a conscious way. His news and views of the world tomorrow, today, are always informative and revealing. And now here's your host, Dr Douglas James Cottrell.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Welcome to the Wake Up, the broadcast where curiosity leads to deeper understanding. I'm your host, Douglas James Cottrell, and my good friend and co-host Les Hubert is here with me, along with editor Jack Bialik, as we delve into the fascinating realms of life, metaphysics, spirituality and the pressing questions that shape our world. Good morning Les.

Les Hubert:

Hey, Doug, we've got an interesting question here for you. Assuming there is life after life, what happens when we leave this dimension? Where do you go and what do you see?

Douglas James Cottrell:

The short answer is, you go back to where you came from. The experience of passing the physical body, casting it off, passing away and coming to the end of your life, and then the soul leaves the body, which we'll talk a little bit about in a moment and you go into the ethers, into space. Well, you're actually in the same room, you haven't gone anywhere, and then, at the speed of thought, you move around and you go and you see different people. You're panicked, you're lost, you're without mass, and so you're floating around, but whatever you think about, you're there. And so where are you? You're in the Earth plane, right where you were in a physical form, a few moments ago. But now you're in the post-existence. The post-existence is the great beyond, and as you rise up, it's like being on the Earth. You're fully aware of the Earth. You look up, you see the clouds, and as you look up in the clouds, you're in the clouds. And then, as you look into the space, you see the moon, you're at the moon. And then you look beyond and you see the nebulas and the and the dimensions beyond, and you're there. And so, to answer the question, where you are, then, is where you came from. The post- existence is exactly the same as the pre-existence.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Now, in my experience, I haven't said this too many times, but I was there and I can remember that. Because when I was a youngster, it was very popular for children to have their tonsils removed, for no reason, other than you had a sore throat, apparently. It was a make-work project for surgeons. So I can remember going there, mask on my face, and I can even remember saying to the nurses: okay, here I go, and I was gone. I went into some place like behind me there, into... I'm going to call it a void. Space. But everything in that dimension, as I recall, was like a slow, moving spiral downward towards the Earth. And I was up at the top and I remember hearing a sound like this (whooshing noise). That's not exactly what it sounded, that's my best imitation, some 75 years later. Well, not 75, but close to 70. And so I remember that sound. And then I woke up.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Having talked to other people, over the years, who have had similar experiences, we come to that conclusion that that spiral downward was -- I'm going to call it a nickname, I'm going to say that's the spiritual slide that you jump on. And once you do that, you spiral down to another living body. So it's kind of like okay, so you have to jump on this slide, you know. Do you know when to get on, or when not to get on, how fast do you go and where does it go, down to the bottom? Well, that doesn't matter. The fact is that that's some memory experience that I had, because, as I was a child, you know, when they put that gas on you, they take you to a point of near death. Oh, wow. Any surgeon, or more exactly the anesthesiologist, will tell you that, that they take the person to near point of death and they keep them there and then they bring them back after the operation. Well, sometimes people remember that. Wow. And sometimes people talk to the doctor and say you shouldn't have said that I had big ugly toes. I heard you say that. They go oh, I'm sorry, but they say I was watching you. They're watching the operation going on.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So that consciousness, that self that's watching, is it a physical body? No, it's not, because your physical body is now on the table, on the operating table. But that consciousness, that mindfulness, that soul is outside the body. So in real life terms we have awareness of the soul existing outside of the physical body. In near-death experiences, people-- and I've done them on my shows here before in the past on a radio show and other --w e've We've had people recall their continued existence after they were clinically dead, only to be revived later, and then they were able to relate and tell stories. One we had was a doctor who was in an ambulance, an air air ambulance. The plane crashed, the patient passed away, as did one of the other attendants, and they almost passed away. But they technically were dead and they came back and they told everybody what was going on, what happened. Everybody was surprised that they came ., Gratefully gratefully surprised that the person came ,. the The doctor came back to life.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So what is this life after life consciousness? Where do we go? Well, we go everywhere at the speed of thought. And so if you wanted to go to the other side of the galaxy, you could be there in a moment. If you wanted to go to a planet, you could be there. If you wanted to go to your relatives' houses and scream at them, you would be doing that.

Douglas James Cottrell:

I know when a man's wife passed away he could feel her laying on top of him at the night that she passed away. He could feel the coldness, the coolness of it. And so that soul still, kind of, you know, halfway between physical-- let's say a physical existence or memory of the existence-- and whatever their soul becomes, which is kind of like an orb, a light or something like ectoplasm, which is a milky substance that appears and can take shape and can turn into the shape of a person, so you can recognize them. You know, I call them ghost people. When we become a ghost people, we show our friends our favorite outfits, clothes, hats, whatever, so they remember who we are. There's no such thing as ghost clothes, they're just the appearance. So the person who is still here can observe that person who's passed away and know it's them. So that consciousness takes on a whole new I, I, I, existence, and you become aware of yourself., but you're trying to go to e verybody. There's reports about people waving your hands in front of people you know, knocking on tables, pictures tilting, bells ringing. And what are these things? These are the spiritual beings trying to get our attention. When my grandfather visited me after he passed away, the lights in my bedroom flicked on and off and I said in half awake, half asleep, said Hi, grandpa, I know it's you, I hope you're okay. The lights stopped flicking.

Douglas James Cottrell:

ut the evidence of life after life and visitations from those people who are now discarnate is that they try to communicate back with us. The best is when they appear in our dreams. That's a visitation. And that's where you can see them and they're usually standing there at the foot of the bed, big smile on their face, looking like they're 40 years old. If they passed away when they're 60 or 70, look like they're 40 and mid-aged. They're looking good, just smiling and nodding. Mom or dad or grandma, grandpa, coming back to sort of let you know, I'm okay, but they can't and don't talk for some reason, because it's in the world of thought.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So where do we go? Well, when we pass away, there's all that tunnel effect, you know. P eople say they went through a tunnel. They could see themselves moving. There was like a light at the end of the tunnel. What if that end of the tunnel is right here on your forehead? Oh, wow, wow.

Douglas James Cottrell:

The soul is coming up through the body, leaving the heart and coming out through that psychic gland. It's referred to as the third eye. Wow, that's it. That's the orifice that you exit the body. Ah, okay, maybe it's not the forehead, maybe it's the chest. The sum total of your consciousness comes. Okay, maybe it's not the forehead, maybe it's the chest. Some total of your consciousness comes. It goes through the passageway in the body until there's that exit point and that's light, and it jumps through that and makes the transition into the post-existence.

Douglas James Cottrell:

I think that's really what it is. Heart is apparently where the soul resides. So maybe it's coming out of the heart, but maybe it goes up and out through this important area in the forehead where the pineal and pituitary exist. The pineal is supposed to be the psychic center. As the pineal opens up, your consciousness opens up and you can perceive with your intuitive third eye, if you will, like real life. It's a vision, it's a point. So if you're blind, you can see, as if you had eyesight. That's how specific it can be.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So let's assume that's what it is for this program that that tunnel you're going through isn't really a tunnel. It's your way out of the body and the orifice at the end that we perceive as the light. As people report, that's just you exiting the body. You're unsealed. Now I've had people tell me that they remember when they were up there in heaven on two occasions. This was reported to me that the person was up there as a soul and four beings angels came and said okay, you've been up here too long, you have to go back. And they said no.

Douglas James Cottrell:

I don't want to go Kicking and screaming. They went down and they held the soul in a body, a baby's body and this is the person telling me the story. They held me there until I couldn't get out. Wow, they sealed me in. I've heard two people tell me similar stories to that.

Douglas James Cottrell:

I remember talking to this man. He was middle-aged and he said I didn't want to come here. I still don't want to be here. I don't like this place. And I said, yeah, but you got a wife and a family. He says I never wanted to come here. It was always on his mind. He wasn't depressed or had any mental or emotional illness, he just didn't want to be here. He didn't like it.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Again, four and this happened by another person telling me four beings came along and said you've been up here too long. How long is too long? A thousand years, a million years? It didn't go there, but they came and they put them down. So that means that we have beings out there that are watching over us and looking after us in the ethers or in that great consciousness. So keep that in mind, my friends, when you're thinking about this, that when you say I didn't ask to be born, well, apparently you might not have asked, but you're here. Whether you were escorted into this life or you reluctantly chose it, or you became aware that this was a really good lifetime and someplace we want to be, you're here. Lifetime, and someplace we want to be, you're here.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Edgar Cayce, the great seer of the 1940s, once was doing some research about previous existences which he sort of came upon by accident. Once did an investigation, a past life recall if you will, in which he saw himself as a gambler on a Mississippi river boat, back in the days when cowboys and things you know, guns and pistols. He saw himself having this wonderful life as a riverboat gambler. Okay, fine, got it. And then he said that he liked it so much he decided to come back and do it again. So he had an encore second life as a riverboat gambler, back on the days when the riverboats went up and down the Mississippi.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So what does that say? Well, we have a consciousness, we have a choice, that we can choose where we want to go. Of course we are lethargic and we don't want to come back. And then the universe says no, no, you haven't been up here too long. Keep that in mind, my friends, because that was a very startling point to me to hear not one, but two people tell me similar stories. They did not know each other and they told me this story more than a year apart.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So where do we go? Well, out there in the universe, and or across the universe at the speed of thought. Now, when we're there, we're the ones that judge ourselves. You know, or do we go to hell or do we go to heaven? Is judgment day out there? Well, we're the ones that judge ourself. We say, okay, you're a really bad person. Well, you had destructive ventures in that lifetime. You were a marauder, you were a, let's say, a viking, and causing raids and whatever, raping and pillaging. So the next life you become somebody living in scotland or england and the viking raiders come down and they raid your family, your family's village, whatever.

Douglas James Cottrell:

And so you get to see, hey, one time I was a pillager, next time I'm a pilgrim, and one time I was the victor and now I'm prey. So this choice is what goes on in the post-existence. While we're going through all these aspects of deciding where we want to go, people remember sitting at a big table and choosing what they were going to do and what they were going to become. I remember two twins. These ladies were twins. They were six feet tall and 200 pounders. They were really not fat but really muscular people and they were abused as children terribly by their father. So at one point, when it got so bad, the one of the two sisters remembers a lady showing up and saying come with me, I'll show you. And as a little girl they went and they were sitting there and there was a table of many people sitting around like a board table and they were deciding who was going to be whatever. And the father said I want to know what it's like to abuse someone. Oh, wow. And the little girl said, okay, I'll volunteer, as did her sister. And the little girl said, okay, I'll volunteer, as did her sister. And then she knew that she had chosen to be the victim so that her father could be the abuser and go through the shame and the guilt and the punishment and all those painful things that an abuser does. For what? For the experience of the father to go through that, to understand how terribly bad that was. But when the little girl woke up in the morning from this visitation of the angel, she told her sister and she said this is why it's happening to us. And then the angel said by the way, you're going to be okay, this is going to stop soon. And sure enough, the father was arrested and the story goes on. When I heard that story, like everybody hearing my words now are saying how could that be? How could somebody volunteer to be in a situation like that?

Douglas James Cottrell:

People choose the body, the experience, the family, because up there in that celestial planning room they make out their life path. All the experiences in the world have to be experienced by each and every one of us at some time. It's kind of like you go to university or you know you go through primary school, high school, university. You have all the courses and you have to graduate. And when you graduate at university you've done everything. Sure, you're graduated. You've made it Well in a parallel. That's what we do as we go through life Lives one after the other.

Douglas James Cottrell:

Now, I'm not a proponent that reincarnation is a belief system. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about a soul choosing to come into the world at a specific time to carry on a specific chore or gain specific knowledge that it chooses. And, as I said at some other previous podcast, the soul has no emotional attachment. It is conscious, it's aware and it is soaking up the experience. It's the knowledge it wishes to gain, without emotion, without values. And so, if we understand that, lass, it's kind of like okay, now it makes sense. We're going back to the post-existence and we're going to go there, to what I would call the different dimensions of going to a soul hospital, a hospices, where you're nurtured and they say there, there, that was terrible, but come here, we're going to wrap arms around you, we're going to love you, it's okay. And you're going to go now to another dimension where you have earned the right to be, and earning the right means the consciousness, and as the higher your consciousness goes, the higher up you go to the higher realms. But over there there's places of comfort, there's people welcoming you their family who loves you. They show up because they're in spirit themselves. So they come by and they say come on.

Douglas James Cottrell:

I've had older people tell me who were nearing their point of death. They said I had the strangest dream last night. There was my brothers and sisters, my husband, and they were all there saying come on, come on. What does that mean? You tell me there was a welcoming committee. Now, on the other side of that, if you're a real bad person and you're hateful and you're mean and you're nasty, guess who's waiting on the other side for you too. Well, you're mean and you're nasty, guess who's waiting, you on the other side, for you too. Well, you're mean and nasty too. Oh, yikes. And then you might go, you know, take a trip to the basement to find a way in that deep, dark, bad place.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So there is this continuation, there's a memory, there is a time of reconciliation, a hospital time, a treatment time, a therapy time, so that you get rid of the emotional pain that you're still attached to for a while after death. And then you become more spiritual, more enlightened, and you lose the value. You lose all the emotions except one, that's love. All the rest belong down here in the classroom, the love you have. This is what you get to the higher levels. You shed all the hatred and the fear and all that. That's all left down here. This is the only place in the universe I've been led to believe that has experiences in emotion, no place else. Maybe that's why those off-world beings, when they show up, don't seem to be so loving. They just are creatures of thought. I don't know Something to think of, for a future show.

Les Hubert:

I've seen things where loved ones have appeared to me and I'm a little confused here, and I'm sure people listening to the audience might have this question as well when we leave this body, do we have another body? I've heard of an astral body or a spiritual body, and why would we even need that on the other side or in the spirit realm?

Douglas James Cottrell:

Well, we're a soul, and a soul has a consciousness and a soul has a, because we need to explain it to ourselves. We have a light body. How many times have you seen an orb or a little dot? See those little things right here, that little spot there? I've seen that floating across the ceiling of them, and I asked my teacher, ross peterson, about that and he said well, just remember when you go to bed.

Douglas James Cottrell:

You got company you're picking up and you're seeing these consciousness. But also I've seen these things like, like, uh, parentheses going across. They're blue in nature and they look parentheses. Yeah, that is a uh, let's say a special being, uh, instead of a little star-like being. This one's really close. And then I have seen orbs and I've taken pictures of them. One time orbs were in the in the news all the time we're taking pictures with our cameras to show where they go. Where'd they go? Now? I don't see one.

Les Hubert:

I remember that yeah.

Douglas James Cottrell:

They were visiting us while we were probably going through space. You know, I was one of the first people to say our solar system doesn't go horizontal, it's vertical and it progresses through space. Years ago I said that and I find it not to take any you know, I said it first credit. But I now see that scientists are saying by the way, that's how we go, as our solar system progresses this way, the planets are going in circles, which means they're spiraling through space. They're not just going like a, you know, straight road, they're spiraling. So we have these tails, if you will, of the spiral of the nine planets or more that we have. So as we move forward in space, we're leaving behind the pattern.

Douglas James Cottrell:

So the answer to the question is why do we have a soul body or a mind body or something? Because we have consciousness, and I like to say that souls were all created at once in the Godhead of the Christos, and at that moment we call it the Big Bang, if you will. We spread out across the universe because we were given at that moment free will and free choice. And so we said okay, thanks for the keys, dad, I'm taking the car and I'm out of here. And we took off. Have you ever done that? You've been somewhere and you drove away. And then you think I'm lost, how do I get back here? We are lost, trying to find our way back. So we have a mind body, a thought body, an essence of light, and that's what we are, are, and you can see it around you.

Douglas James Cottrell:

And by observing these other orbs, lights and indicators that, hey, if I can see them, that is what I must be.

Les Hubert:

Well, thank you for tuning in for another great podcast with myself and Douglas James Cottrell. If you like what you hear, please consider subscribing. You can support us with either a donation of $3 to $20 per month. Go to douglasjamescottrellcom and you can click on that big blue banner and a shout out to Malutin, larry and Jack for your help with the podcast. Thank you very much for your efforts. We deeply appreciate it and we shall see you soon.

Douglas James Cottrell:

More exciting things to come. Les Take care, my friends.

Announcer:

Thank you very much for listening to Wake Up. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you'll be notified when a new episode is posted, and we'd greatly appreciate your review of our show on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts to let others know about the great content we're producing. For more about Dr Douglas's self-development classes, books and other related products, please visit his website douglasjamescottrell. com. Until next time, we wish you all of God's blessings health, wealth and peace of mind.