Death and the Journey Between Lives

What Happens Upon Dying

Death is not what you have been taught. It is not an ending. It is not a wall. It is a door -- one you have walked through many times before, though you do not remember.

When the physical body can no longer sustain the indwelling consciousness, a transition begins. The yellow-ray body, the physical vehicle that has been home for an entire lifetime, is no longer activated. The mind and spirit were never truly confined to flesh: you have all your bodies in potentiation, and the body you took for yourself was only the manifestation of a denser, more intelligent one.

The first movement is toward the Form-Maker Body -- the indigo-ray body, the etheric vehicle that has existed in potentiation throughout the incarnation. This body activates itself upon death. It is the architect of form, the template from which physical expression was originally drawn. It is not a ghostly remnant. It is the deeper body -- more dense with intelligent energy, more powerful than the physical shell it once inhabited.

In this body, the newly transitioned entity rests. It is given perspective. It is offered a place from which to view the experience most recently lived. The indigo body, being intelligent energy, serves as both vessel and vantage point.

This is the normal process, given a harmonious passage. But not all passages are harmonious.

There are those whose will is so concentrated upon the physical experience that the progressive movement toward the indigo body is resisted. The yellow-ray shell, though no longer activated, cannot be completely deactivated. The entity becomes caught between states. In the case of sudden death, or extreme concern for something left behind, this entrapment can persist until the will is released. These are the entities that many cultures have called ghosts -- not evil, not punished, but simply unwilling or unable to let go of what was.

This is the exception, not the rule. For the vast majority, the transition is seamless. The body falls away. The deeper body awakens. And the journey between lives begins.

The Subtle Bodies

To understand what survives death, one must understand what you are while alive.

You are not a single body. You are seven. Each corresponds to one of the seven Densities of experience, and each exists within you now -- most in potentiation, waiting. The physical body you inhabit is the yellow-ray body, the vehicle of third density. But beneath it, above it, woven through it, lie the other six.

The red-ray body is the most basic -- the unconstructed material, the elemental body without form. It is the chemical body before it is formed, the building blocks before architecture.

The orange-ray body is the physical body formed without self-awareness -- the body as it exists in the womb before spirit enters. It can sustain life without mind or spirit, though it seldom does. When another entity desires the presence of one who has died strongly enough, this body can sometimes produce a faint semblance -- a manifestation without will.

The green-ray body is lighter, packed more densely with life. It is the body some have called astral. In certain conditions it can be perceived -- in the phenomenon called the seance, for example, when what is known as ectoplasm provides the medium for its visibility.

The blue-ray body is the body of light. It has been called the devachanic body, and there are many, many types of it, as there are of every body in each density.

The indigo-ray body -- the etheric body, the form-maker -- is the gateway body. In this body, form is substance. It can mold itself as it desires. It is this body that carries the entity through the space between incarnations, and that serves as the template from which the next physical form will be drawn.

The violet-ray body may be understood as what might be called the Buddha body -- the body that is complete. Within it lies a sense of wholeness extremely close to unity with all that there is. It is not activated in ordinary experience, though the adept may learn to use it.

Each of these bodies has an effect upon you while you live, and the ways they interrelate are many and complex. Each density, too, contains seven energy centers, and every entity carries all of it in potentiation. What matters here is this: when the yellow-ray body dies, you do not become less. The denser vehicle falls away; the bodies that were always present in potentiation remain, and the first to activate is the indigo.

The Incarnation Review

When the transition is complete and the entity rests in the indigo body, the review begins.

This is not a trial. There is no judge, no jury, no sentencing. There is only seeing -- full, complete, and unflinching. The entity, aided by those who serve this purpose, looks upon the life just lived with a clarity that was never available during the incarnation itself.

In Time/Space -- the metaphysical counterpart of the physical realm -- time operates differently. It is not the rigid forward march you experience now. The self can observe the entire incarnation as a whole, examining each choice, each turning point, each moment of catalyst offered and either accepted or refused.

The process involves seeing the experience in full, viewing it against the backdrop of the total experience of the entity across all incarnations. Then comes forgiveness -- forgiveness of the self for all missteps, for the missed guideposts, for the lessons offered but not learned. Far from a formality, it is a genuine act of compassion directed inward.

Much of what occupied the waking mind during the incarnation turns out, once the body is gone, to have been surface illusion. The mental chatter, the social performances, the anxieties about status and survival -- these fall away. What remains is the pure distillation of emotions, biases, wisdoms, and distortions. The character of the entity stands revealed, stripped of the personality's costumes.

In your terms, there is a great loss of the mind's surface activity. In deeper terms, nothing of importance is lost. The spiritual channel opens wide -- for the forgetting characteristic of third density is no longer necessary.

This review is not conducted by an external authority. Until an entity has become consciously aware of the process of spiritual evolution, the Higher Self guides the review entirely. It is this deeper aspect of the self -- the self that exists in mid-sixth density with full understanding of all accumulated experiences -- that assists in examining what was learned and what remains to be learned.

For the more advanced entity, one who has awakened to the mechanics of evolution during incarnation, the review becomes a conscious collaboration. The entity itself takes part in all decisions. The assessment shifts from guided to participatory.

In either case, the purpose is the same: to understand, to forgive, and to prepare.

The Healing Between Lives

The review is already the beginning of healing, and the healing goes on beyond it.

The regions of time-space through which the entity moves are extraordinarily permeable. Much can be penetrated, absorbed, and integrated that could not be processed during the intensity of physical incarnation. The entity, placed in the proper configuration by the form-maker and the higher self, rests in a state suited to its particular needs.

Depending upon the entity's location in time-space, certain helpers are available. These are not abstract presences. They are beings who serve the function of assisting the newly transitioned entity in understanding and integrating the incarnation just completed.

The healing is not passive. It is a process of seeing and accepting. What was ignored or underestimated during the incarnation becomes obvious for the first time, and must now be seen in full, against the backdrop of everything the entity has lived. With the forgetting no longer needed, it can see with a breadth that was simply impossible during physical life.

This period of rest and healing serves a dual purpose. It prepares the entity for the choices that come next -- the planning of the next incarnation. And it integrates the lessons of the life just lived into the deeper structure of the self, so that they are not merely experienced but understood.

The duration of this healing varies enormously. In the early stretches of third density, incarnation follows almost at once and there is little to review. As more of the content of experience has to do with the lessons of love, the time between lives lengthens, to give the review and the healing the attention they require. And for all, the healing is completed before the needs of the next incarnation are determined.

Planning the Next Life

When healing is complete, the entity turns toward the future.

The next incarnation is not simply assigned. For the entity that has become aware of the process of spiritual evolution, it is designed -- carefully, deliberately, with the help of the higher self and the entity's own conscious participation. Those who are not yet aware of the process receive their incarnation patterns from others, as will be seen below. The purpose of incarnation is evolution of mind, body, and spirit. Without Catalyst, the desire to evolve and the faith in the process do not normally manifest. Therefore, catalyst is programmed.

The programming is precise. The entity that has become conscious of the process, in consultation with its higher self, chooses how much catalyst to take on -- how many lessons it will undertake in one incarnation. It chooses the relationships that will provide the friction necessary for growth, beginning with those closest to it. The setting -- the culture, the standard of living, the social climate -- is not chosen lesson by lesson; it comes as probabilities and possibilities, givens shared by millions. None of this means that all is predestined. The guideposts are invisible, but they are persistent. If one opportunity is missed, another will appear, until the student of life grasps that a lesson is being offered.

Notice how this works. Take one example. Before incarnation, an entity that knows the process identifies the experiences it desires most deeply -- perhaps to offer love and light without expecting any return, and to do spiritual work in good company. Agreements are made with other entities -- those who will serve as parents and siblings, and those who will be companions in the work. Each agreement provides the catalyst needed for growth. The lessons always have to do with other selves, not with events. They have to do with giving, not receiving.

The higher self operates not as a puppet master but as a resource. It examines the distillations of all previous experience. It grasps firmly the lessons that remain to be learned. It uses the projected probability and possibility vortices -- the shifting collection of parallel developments of the entity itself -- to construct a plan that offers the best chance for growth.

There are entities who serve directly under the Guardians -- beings you may call angelic -- who are responsible for the incarnation patterns of those who incarnate without conscious awareness of the evolutionary process. For these entities, the programming is arranged by others, with care and precision. But for those who have awakened to the mechanism of spiritual evolution, the entity itself will arrange and place the lessons needed for maximum growth.

There is a risk in this freedom. Some entities, in their eagerness to grow, program more catalyst than they can absorb. They attempt to learn too much in a single incarnation, and the intensity of catalyst disarranges them, so that the experience is not as useful as intended. It is as though a student signed up for more courses than could possibly be completed in a single term. The intention is noble. The result is sometimes overwhelming.

And yet, the system allows for this. If one opportunity is missed, another will appear. What is not learned in one incarnation is offered again, in another form. The process is patient.

Karma and Its Function

There is a word long associated with the journey between lives: Karma. It is widely misunderstood.

Karma is not punishment. It is not cosmic justice dispensed by an authority. It is inertia. Those actions which are set in motion will continue, using the ways of balancing, until something stops them. The stopping is called forgiveness. These two concepts -- inertia and forgiveness -- are inseparable.

Consider a stone set rolling down a slope. It does not stop because someone decrees it should. It goes on until something stops it. Karma operates by the same principle. Actions put in motion create patterns that continue, across incarnations if need be, until the brake is applied. Nothing wears them out on its own.

The mechanism of resolution is not complex. At any point, in any incarnation, the entity -- and any other-self involved -- may through understanding, acceptance, and forgiveness bring these patterns to rest. One who has set an action in motion may forgive the self and never again make that error. This brakes the inertia. This releases the karma.

This is why forgiveness is not merely a virtue but a mechanism. It is the brake applied to the wheel of repetition. Without forgiveness, the patterns continue -- not as punishment from above, but as the simple consequence of unresolved momentum.

In the planning of the next life, karma is taken into account. If patterns remain unresolved, situations are designed that offer the entity an opportunity to confront them. The same lesson, offered in different form, until it is finally learned.

But karma is not imposed from outside, and no one is forced to resolve it. Free will remains paramount. The patterns will continue as long as they continue. Forgiveness is available at any point in the pattern, for the self and for any other-self involved. And when forgiveness comes, it brakes what was in motion.

Guides and Helpers

The entity between lives is not alone.

The primary guide in this process is the Higher Self -- the entity's own self as it exists in mid-sixth density, offering its accumulated wisdom across what you would call time. Its nature and function are explored more fully in a later chapter. What matters here is that this guidance is never imposed: the higher self does not manipulate its past selves. It protects when possible and guides when asked.

The relationship between self and Higher Self is paradoxical in the way that time itself is paradoxical. The higher self is the end result of all development that the entity will experience, yet it exists simultaneously with the entity it guides. In the realm where Time/Space holds sway, all times are simultaneous, as the cities and villages of a map are all alive at once -- the seeker and the completed self coexist.

Beyond the higher self, there are other helpers. For those entities who incarnate without conscious awareness of the evolutionary process, beings directly under the planetary Guardians attend to the incarnation patterns. You may call them angelic. Their function is to ensure that even the most unconscious entity receives guidance and protection. There is no entity without help.

There are other helpers as well, whose function depends on where the entity stands in Time/Space. Their role is not to decide for the entity but to assist the healing: to help it see in full, and to forgive its missteps.

What is essential to understand is this: the process is never solitary. Even in the depths of the incarnation, when the veil is thickest and the entity feels most alone, help is available. It must be sought. It must be invited. But it is never absent.

Why We Do Not Remember

And so we return to the question that began the previous chapter: why do we forget?

Now, having traced the full arc of the journey between lives -- the transition, the review, the healing, the careful planning -- the answer takes on new depth. You forget because forgetting is the mechanism that makes the entire process effective.

Think of what you now know. Before the forgetting, the entity that has become aware of the mechanism of evolution -- in full consultation with its deeper self -- arranges the lessons it will learn. It selects the relationships and the catalyst. It knows what it is walking into.

And then the veil descends. All of this knowledge is hidden. The being enters the incarnation ordinarily with no memory of the planning, no awareness of the agreements, no direct access to the accumulated wisdom of its past. It arrives naked -- carrying only the pure distillation of its character, the biases and tendencies shaped by all that came before, but none of the explicit knowledge.

This is not cruelty. It is engineering. The forgetting is necessary so that free will can operate. Where every hand is open to the eye, much can be accomplished in harmony, but little polarity is gained. The choice would carry no weight if you knew, with certainty, which option led to growth.

The forgetting gives your choices their weight. Catalyst gives them something to work on: without it, the desire to evolve and the faith in the process do not normally manifest, and evolution does not occur. Together they give the seeker a mechanism to grow beyond what is already known.

For the entity that has become aware of the process, the pattern runs like this. The self plans before the forgetting. The veil descends. The incarnate being lives, struggles, chooses, loves, fails, learns. The body dies. The forgetting is no longer necessary, and the self sees, once again, the full picture. It heals, it integrates, it plans anew. For the entity that is not yet aware, the journey is the same, but the review is carried out for it by the higher self, and the planning is arranged by those who watch over the incarnation patterns; in the earliest stretches of third density, the return to incarnation is nearly automatic, with little to review. And the cycle continues, each incarnation building upon the last.

This is also why death is not a loss of what you are. When the body falls away, the forgetting characteristic of third density is no longer necessary, and the spiritual channel opens. Nothing of importance is lost; what the veil hid is no longer hidden.

The tools you will carry into your next incarnation -- the energy centers through which all experience flows, the patterns of activation that determine how you meet the world -- these are the subject of what follows. For the life you planned is not lived in abstraction. It is lived through the body, through the centers of energy that translate the infinite into the daily, the particular, the real.