Dr. Neil's Spiritual Awakening to Non-Duality
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You may have heard about spiritual awakening. Do you know someone who is living it? Join us as Dr. Neil Schuitevoerder describes the lived experience of an advanced stage of human consciousness and shares insight for seekers of all traditions. Dr. Neil will speak from the direct experience of Being, Brahman, Sunyata, or Pure Consciousness as he transmits Non-dual Reality to you -- non-dual space/time, non-dual thinking, non-dual love, the non-dual body, and his yogic abilities to travel the cosmos, move through the bardos and, at the same time, live as a psychologist, husband, father, and grandfather. His experience dispels many myths about awakening. He will be interviewed by his partner, Dr. Connie Zweig, author of Meeting the Shadow, Romancing the Shadow, Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path, and the award-winning book The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul.
Dr. Neil's Spiritual Awakening to Non-Duality
Into the Astral Plane
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Based on his direct experience, Dr. Neil explores life in the first plane beyond death, where some people travel after dropping their bodies. He describes several friends who recently died and their experiences of traveling through the bardos or planes beyond physical death, revealing common misunderstandings about the astral plane.
Greetings. Welcome back to the podcast. Today we're going to talk about moving into the astral plane following death. And Dr. Neil is going to describe his experience of the astral plane and also follow a friend of ours who recently died. Okay.
SPEAKER_00All right, here we go. My consciousness is on every plane. So it's not difficult for me to experience things that people have after they die. Bill was a good friend of ours, and uh his death was kind of sudden. He was not expecting it. He went in for some surgery with a scene kind of minor and ended up dying. I watched Bill move into what we call the hospital zone on the asper plane. It's kind of like the zombie state in which angels and uh and devas and different beings heal the body of those that have been sick for a while. Uh, and then there's a movement into the astral plane for him. Some people go to the etheric plane. Actually, let me explain that first. Etheric plane is uh the physical plane that's not gross, it's the body that is made up of energy, chakras, nadis, uh, and can experience the world but cannot do anything in it. So often when people leave their physical bodies, they hang around for a short while and people notice that their existence. A friend of ours said that she felt connected to Bill in certain places, and that's because Bill is like a ghost roaming around uh for a short while. His energy is felt by those who are sensitive, and most people have had some experience of this. Um so for me, Bill moved fairly quickly onto the astral plane. The astral plane is the next plane up. Uh, it's where things work based on feelings and thoughts. So if one goes to visit a friend, all one has to do is think of the friend and feel the friend. Feeling is primary, it's the smell, the vitality, the energy, the sense of being there. And beings on the astral planes collect together. So when I went to see Bill, he was actually asleep on the astral plane. And I said to him, Bill, do you know that you're dead? He said, No. I said, look down and see your body. So he looked down and he could see his body, and he realized that he was somewhere else on another plane. I said, look around you and see if there's anybody you know. And he found a massive group of people all cohabitating together. They were building houses, uh, an astral plane, building uh groups and connections. Uh, and he was very happy because Bill was a psychotherapist that works with families. And this was the ultimate family for him. This was a huge number of people that he could do therapy with because they were the astral plane, especially the lower astral plane. People tend to have a fair amount of problems. It's not an unhappy place, but it's not a place of um the higher ecstatic, love, bliss, joy, consciousness.
SPEAKER_01Like what kind of problems on the astral?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's an emotional world. So problems would be the kind of problems that we see in psychotherapy: depression, anxiety, compulsiveness, hunger, anger. So those those types of things, and they sustain themselves for a long time. So people can stay on this plane for a long time, and uh before they're reborn or move to higher planes, if they've actually spent time in their life developing higher planes.
SPEAKER_01A long time means what, Neil?
SPEAKER_00It's such a variety. For example, my grandfather, Joseph, is still, it's uh 30 years, he's still uh functioning on that, on one actually a higher plane than the astral plane, but you know, he's still functioning. He's looking for truths and he's overjoyed when he discovers them. And that's sustaining him because that's a very subtle plane. So he's still there, but he's starting to fade, and when people fade, they um they sort of go to sleep and they're washed directly away into another physical body, and that uh that that happens for um most people. Some people are more involved and don't have to do that.
SPEAKER_01So let's stay with what it's like on the astral plane after we die.
SPEAKER_00Astral plane is as complex as the physical world. There are angels, demons, there are uh planned type of life, it's really an energetic more than more than uh physical the way we see it. People on the astral plane do not have physical sight, so they can't see what we see, uh, but they can feel and they can think, and they have um a sense sense of people coming closer and going further away. They have a sense of um observing the energy of people and things.
SPEAKER_01So we bring our emotional problems with us to the astral plane.
SPEAKER_00Well, we have them before. So, in other words, uh when you're coming into a body, you usually bring the problems from your last lifetime or lifetimes that have not been resolved. And if you uh don't clear them in the physical body in this lifetime that you have, you don't clear them, then you're gonna clear them somewhere, you're gonna be working on them on the astral plane.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so Bill.
unknownUh-huh.
SPEAKER_01So can so Bill, who we've known for 10 or 12 years. Yes. How is he experiencing life on the astral now? Is he suffering? He's delighted happy.
SPEAKER_00He's delighted. He has gonna continue his work as a psychotherapist for families and groups and systems. They're far more complex than what he did when he was in a body, physical body. And he's delighted. He's got his work, his heart is full because this is not an end for him. This is the beginning of something that's quite exciting. He's not the only one who found work on the astral plane. He was a fairly evolved person. You know, he will go further than an astral plane. But um, we had a spiritual teacher, Swamiji, uh, who was very enlightened, uh, very evolved, and capable of being on any plane. And he also is now on an astral plane. In fact, he's in an astral world doing work there because he didn't quite finish his emotional work. He was uh rather angry and vindictive. He had a kind of dark side to him that needed to be worked out.
SPEAKER_01He did emotional spiritual bypass because he was a monk and a sannyasi.
SPEAKER_00Correct.
SPEAKER_01And you can't bypass anything, and so he's gone from the higher plane now to the astral, correct? So there isn't the one direction here you can move around.
SPEAKER_00Only for people who are highly evolved, they can choose where to work, where to do their work, or to return to a physical body. They have the choice. So most people don't have the choice. Okay, they may choose their parents uh if they're incarnating again, or they may choose um communities or groups of people that soul groups, soul groups. Well, not soul groups. Uh people have the same work, same things to work on.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so for me, when I hear that he's not suffering, that's really helpful. So now he knows his body is gone, and he's aware of other deceased people on the astral plane, and he's aware that he can serve them and help them, and what else?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so his uh joy is because his work that he had on this physical plane continues. And the last 30 years, nothing was wasted. It's going to be continued. And he's aware of his relatives now and friends and his clients. And interestingly enough, not just his clients, but those people that his clients spoke about who are uh who are there, um that he can check in with them and see them in reality.
SPEAKER_01Ah his clients, family members who had passed.
SPEAKER_00Family members, friends, or even people who they had contact with. He had contact with.
SPEAKER_01So what is it like to experience all this without a body?
SPEAKER_00Well, he does have a body, it's an astral body. So, you know, we think of physical body as this is my body, but that's not the only body we have. You know, we have a lithium body, we have an astral body, we have a mental body, we have a body that's related to the heart, the throat, and celestial realms, and enlightened realms. So there's many sheets and vehicles. I think the Indians call them koshas.
SPEAKER_01And so, what's the experience then of having an astral body?
SPEAKER_00It's a body of uh emotion and thought. So if one wants to create a house, one just has to take a house and feel the kind of house that one is creating. Is it a large house? Is it a small house? One can create this whole world that are created, and groups of people or souls get together and create cities together and planets.
SPEAKER_01But why would they need houses and cities when they don't have bodies?
SPEAKER_00Just habits.
SPEAKER_01Oh.
SPEAKER_00So this uh the only time they're asleep is when they enter into the astral plane or when they're coming down through the astral plane into a body. So the astral plane is not just a plane to evolve from, it's also a plane that uh I watch people coming into their bodies. You have to go through the astral body, astral plane, and pick up an astral body, like you have an astral body right now, and I have an astral body right now. So it's not like it we don't have that. We just oh so we're just not consciously functioning on that level.
SPEAKER_01So it's involutionary and evolutionary, it's both.
SPEAKER_00So one picks up one when comes into a body evolution, and one lets it one goes to it when one dies. And if you're evolved, like bird was evolved, at some point you'll let go of his astral body and move into the mental body.
SPEAKER_01So you said they don't sleep there, yes. So is it only humans in waking state that need to go unconscious?
SPEAKER_00No, most things have cycles, so they go slower into a sleepy state and wake up into a more conscious alert state. So it's not necessarily unconscious or conscious, it's often in the middle, like a hypnagogic state, like a dream state. You know, you you you go to sleep at nighttime, and are you aware of your sleep? Well, if you're dreaming, you are aware of your sleep, you're aware of something happening. Uh, and some people have conscious dreams, a lot of conscious dreams, and some people have very very little, but something is happening, and the same thing happens in the astral, same thing happens on the astral.
SPEAKER_01So there's internal processing that's going on, so evolution and development is continuing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, people work on the astral plane. Uh a teacher of ours, Arnie Mandel, passed away recently. Uh, and uh he's another one that is still working on the astral plane. He's much more evolved and he will let go of it at some point. But he's got great gifts and he can help many people develop them during his lifetime.
SPEAKER_01So Arnie went to the astral?
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_00Most people go to the astral or through the astral. Like my mother went, died actually. Saturday will be a year. And uh, so she didn't spend much time in the astral plane or the mental plane. She went to the next one, the Buddhic, the heart plane. Uh very spiritual, spiritually enlightened being not greatly enlightened, but in the top five percent of humanity when it looks at the bit statistically.
SPEAKER_01Your mom. My mom didn't appear that way.
SPEAKER_00No, which was surprising for me when I actually watched her go. And she didn't spend much time in the astral or mental plane. She rarely went there. She was she spent a lot of time in the last five years in bed, sleeping and dreaming. So a lot of the work was done before she got to the astral plane. Ah, because when we dream, uh when we sleep, we often go to the astral plane.
SPEAKER_01So Arnold Mandel was a real consciousness explorer.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01He explored altered states and coma states and so on.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So even with that, he went to the astral, the lower level.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, he just had some work to do. That doesn't mean that he'll be there for long, and that doesn't mean that that's his destination. Um, but it's common to go there first and uh experience that level first, especially if you've done work on the emotional body or emotions. So someone who's a therapist or who's been in therapy or has a lot of conscious done conscious work, um, it's common to go there first, but not inevitable.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00So how do I know all of this? Yeah, uh, I know it because I am there. This moment I can follow these beings, and in fact, I'm not only there, but that is me. Those planes of consciousness are part of my being, uh, and those people are inside of me.
SPEAKER_01So you don't experience a separation from the astral plane or the people who die who go to the astral plane. You're not separate from them.
SPEAKER_00I'm not separate at all from them. In fact, I'm closer to them than I am to most human beings on this planet because they're always there in my sleep, in my dreams, in my consciousness. There's no my mother's there. I can talk to her, and she can talk to me. Just like Bill, you know, when I told Bill to look down, he did, and he was surprised, then he communicated it. Um yeah, on the astral mental plane, um communication happens with feelings and thoughts. There's no uh senses the way we have senses, but there are there are senses, there's sight and hearing, and so these things do exist, but on a different vibratory level.
SPEAKER_01So, how do you emotionally experience these losses if you're not separate from them? You're not um experiencing death the way most people are.
SPEAKER_00Well, death for most people is real, for me it's an illusion because death doesn't happen, one leaves the body and identifies with a more subtle body, all the way through to the soul, all the way through the spirit. So um, so death is um part of life. Do I experience loss? Yes, because I am human too. Do I experience grief? Not really, more some sadness. Uh am I sad for Bill? No, he's happy. I'm not sad for him, he's happy. Uh I'm sad for the people who are left behind. You know, his wife and uh the friends that we have don't have awareness.
SPEAKER_01And so is there any message you want to leave for them in closing for people who lose loved ones?
SPEAKER_00You will meet them again.
SPEAKER_01That sounds so cliche.
SPEAKER_00It's so cliche, but it's so true. And they're not far from you, they can hear you if you speak to them, they can feel you if you love them, they can uh they can grieve with you if you grieve for them. So they are not gone, they're already very present, except they have no ability um to um act on a physical level, they can experience it but not act, so nobody gets lost. There's no energy that is not conserved in this cosmos, and there's no end to evolution. So we didn't talk much about involution.
SPEAKER_01You said there's no end to evolution. So this gives us a sense of life continuing and evolution continuing after losing the body at death, and the sense in your experience of no separation from those we've loved and lost. Is there anything you want to say about what you're experiencing right now in this present moment?
SPEAKER_00Well, my mind uh went back to a friend of ours, Sherry, who died uh a few years ago. Uh and uh she's shouting at me and telling me, tell them all it's not real. We're all alive here in this other world, and there's a radiance of love coming from her.
SPEAKER_01That's beautiful. Okay, thank you.