Consciousness Crossing Realms: A Tingling Sensation Leads to a Profound Experience

It began with a tingling sensation and ended with a profound message that could stop crime and end wars.

Comfort your grief and nourish your soul on Bob Olson Connect. Bob is the host of Afterlife TV, the author of Answers About The Afterlife, Insight from Hindsight, and The Magic Mala, and the founder of BestPsychicDirectory.com.

Photo by Trophim Lapteff on Unsplash

Today’s story came from an Afterlife TV listener named Robert. He was eighty-three when he shared it with me. It’s an incredible story that I’m excited to share with you. What I love about it is that it doesn’t fit the typical definition of any single spiritual experience.

Robert had a unique experience that included aspects of both the out-of-body experience (OBE) and the near-death experience (NDE). His story is a valuable example that our otherworldly experiences don’t have to fit into specific categories.

Note: Because Robert’s story arrived as an audio recording with technical issues, I’ve edited it for clarity and brevity.

Robert’s Story

My name is Robert, and I think I had an outer-body or near-death experience about forty years ago. I should mention that I wasn’t ill or taking any medications when this happened. Our oldest son was just a baby at the time, and he began crying in the early morning hours. Typically, his mother would wake up when he cried. She has a built-in sensor. In this case, she didn’t wake up—I did.

I got up, settled my son in his room, and returned to bed. As I started to fall asleep, I was lying on my left side, as I recall. That’s when the strangest sensation overcame me—the oddest sensation of my life.

It was like a tingling sensation from the top of my head to the tip of my toe. I wondered to myself, What the heck’s going on? It was so strange. Then I began to feel my—it’s hard to explain if you never experienced this—but I began to feel my consciousness drift away, for lack of a better way to describe it. I felt a separation taking place. I began to get scared. I thought, My God, I must be dying. Yet, I felt okay. I didn’t feel bad or ill or anything like that.

The next thing I knew, I was in a tunnel—or what felt like a tunnel. It was just black and dark, but I was traveling. I felt as if I were physically traveling at a high rate of speed through this tunnel.

Then, suddenly, there was a tremendously bright light. And I heard this most incredible music. I can’t recapture it. I can’t tell if it was orchestral, choral, or a combination. All I can say is that it was literally out of this world.

Then, I saw a figure in the light (or the outline of a figure). I felt as if I knew him. As I got closer, I saw he was dressed in biblical attire, such as long hair, a robe, and sandals. That kind of description would make you think, Oh, this must be Jesus. Somehow, I knew it wasn’t him.

This spiritual being and I engaged in conversation. As we spoke, I thought, If the people of Earth could see this and experience what I’m experiencing right now, all the bad stuff going on in the world would stop immediately. All the war and crime would just come to a screeching halt.

It seemed like we spoke for hours. I wish I had looked at the clock before all this happened to know how much time had elapsed, but I’m guessing not that long.

I came back into my body and was back to the way I was before, still leaning on my left side, still tingling, but the tingling or vibrations gradually subsided. I just lay there wide-eyed and astonished. I thought, I have to wake my wife up and tell her about this amazing experience. But then I thought, Well, she’ll probably think I was just dreaming.

Still, I knew this was not a dream. It started while I was awake and ended when I was awake. Although dreams can be very vivid, this was absolute reality, although much more intense.

Bob Olson’s Response to Robert

Thank you, Robert, for sharing your fascinating story. I understand why you described it as an out-of-body (OBE) or near-death experience (NDE). Your story includes aspects of both. I’m sharing it here on Bob Olson Connect because it illustrates that spiritual experiences don’t always fit neatly into a particular category.

OUT-OF-BODY EXPERIENCE (OBE)

During an out-of-body experience, people typically leave their bodies and see themselves lying on the bed. For people who have never had this experience, the experience usually ends there because they see their bodies and get scared. The next thing they know, they’re back in their bodies.

The Tingling

This was an out-of-body experience (in the way that it started) because of the tingling sensation that traveled throughout your body. This is a sensation that people who have had several out-of-body experiences have described. It’s often how they know another OBE is coming on—they recognize the tingling.

The Drifting Consciousness

I’m fascinated with what you described as your consciousness drifting away. It’s not surprising that you wondered if you were dying. Yet, since you didn’t feel ill or bad in any way, you seemed to have some peace or surrender around it.

I want to point out that what you’ve described here is quite mindful. On the one hand, you’re having sensations and experiences while, on the other hand, your conscious mind is evaluating them. What is this? Am I dying? I don’t think I’m dying because I don’t feel ill.

I would describe the aspect of ourselves that leaves the body at death as consciousness, or one might call it awareness. Your story shows us that we do not necessarily die when our consciousness leaves our body. This is why people can have out-of-body experiences and live to tell us about them. As mentioned, some folks have had dozens of them. If you haven’t seen my interview with William Buhlman, it’s worth watching. I will embed it below this article.

Thus far, all of this fits within the parameters of an OBE—until the next stage.

NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE (NDE)

The Tunnel

The next thing you know, you’re traveling through a tunnel. I like that you added, “What felt like a tunnel,” because we only use that term because it’s the best word we have for an experience that is otherworldly and beyond our human ability to describe in words.

I remember NDE researcher PMH Atwater writing years ago that people didn’t call the experience a tunnel until Raymond Moody’s 1975 book Life After Life described it as one. Moody’s book gave people the word “tunnel” to describe their otherworldly experience of traveling at a high rate of speed through a wormhole-like space.

The tunnel experience is where your story begins to sound like an NDE. What sets your experience apart is that you jump from leaving your body to traveling in the tunnel. It’s not the typical chain of events, which (as mentioned) is what I like about your story. Too many people think their spiritual event must fit within the definition of other people’s experiences. Many experiences do not fit so conveniently into our classifications.

The Blackness

You mention that the tunnel was black and dark. Many people would read this and find it scary. We humans don’t like darkness, and we’ve grown up believing the boogieman lives there. Yet, if I had the opportunity to ask you more about this black darkness, my experience interviewing many people with similar experiences leads me to suspect that you might describe this as a friendly darkness or a nonthreatening blackness. One near-death experiencer told me it was a “velvety darkness.”

The Bright Light

Next, you see the bright light we’ve heard so much about. Again, I wish I could ask you more about your experience. Nonetheless, you’ve now entered further down the near-death experience aspect of your story. Many people who have an NDE see a bright light. They often say it’s at the end of the tunnel. Most believe this is the light of home, which some call Heaven.

You quickly brush by the bright light to focus more on the music you heard.

The Music

I was excited to hear about the music. The NDE is a multisensory experience, and I’ve heard a lot about this music from other near-death experiencers. You could not pinpoint the type of music, saying you were unsure if it was “orchestral, choral, or a combination.” So many people have told me it’s impossible to put into words, yet they add that it is the most beautiful music they’ve ever heard. You say that it’s “out of this world.”

The Greeter

Next, you see a figure in the light. I love that you said you felt as though you knew him. Once again, in this story, we are reminded that you are having the experience while also contemplating it in real time. Because this figure was dressed the way you think of Jesus, you seem almost surprised to know it wasn’t him. This illustrates your ability to reason while in this experience. It’s as if you are separate from the experience, almost observing yourself as you have it. So cool!

Interestingly, you knew you should have thought this figure was Jesus, yet you knew it wasn’t.

NDE researchers have labeled this figure you saw as a “greeter.” It’s a spiritual figure who greets people having an NDE during their spiritual journey. You go on to have an interesting dialogue with your greeter.

The Dialogue

Your interaction with your greeter presents such an eye-opening discussion that you have the presence of mind to think: If people on Earth could witness this discussion, all the bad stuff would stop immediately. War and crime would come to a screeching halt.

That’s an interesting and selfless thought to have during this NDE-like experience, and I love it. I find it noteworthy, too, that you refer to the people on Earth as if, at this moment, you aren’t one of them—you’re in some other place.

My readers and I envy your dialogue and wish we knew more about it. Yet, if there’s one lesson I’ve learned from experiencing decades of spiritual experiences, it’s that transformation doesn’t come from hearing about someone else’s experience. It comes from our own. Your story provides the awareness and open-mindedness that we can also have profound experiences.

The Assumption

You end your story thinking you should wake your wife and tell her about your experience, only to talk yourself out of it by assuming she’ll think it was just a dream. This is a common assumption after having a sacred, spiritual experience.

Too often, we assume people will be skeptical about our spiritual experiences. We believe they’ll tell us our minds are playing tricks on us or think we’re naive. Some will respond this way, but others are open to these experiences and want to hear about them.

I've learned that some people never tell their friends and family about their spiritual experiences, including near-death experiences, out-of-body experiences, dream visitations, after-death communications, and spirit visions. Ironically, many of these same friends and family members have had their own spiritual experiences that they are keeping a secret. Because we assume our loved ones will be skeptical or even cynical, we rob ourselves (and them) of sharing our experiences with like-minded people.

Having said that, I understand the other side of it. Too often, other people’s skepticism diminishes our sacred experiences after we share them. I created a recent Afterlife TV episode about it, which you can watch here.

The Clarity Beyond Time

This story illuminates the fascinating phenomenon that spiritual experiences like NDEs, OBEs, and dream visitations stay in our memories with impeccable clarity, even decades later. In Robert’s case, he was retelling this story after forty years. This can serve as a litmus test to determine if it was a dream (hallucination) or a genuine spiritual experience.

The Gratitude

We can learn so much from your experience, Robert. I’m grateful you shared it with us, and I know many people reading this will also be thankful to you.

I hope Robert’s story and my breakdown of it have benefited you. If you have an experience you’d like to share, please do so in the comments.

With love,
Bob Olson

PS, Here’s my interview with William Buhlman about his numerous OBEs.

Bob Olson is the host of Afterlife TV, the author of Answers about the Afterlife, Insight from Hindsight, and The Magic Mala, and the creator of the most trusted directory of psychics, mediums, animal communicators, and energy healers, BestPsychicDirectory.com.