I’m interested to hear the story.
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Given the scope of the universe, it’s 13-billion-year stretch into the void, and our embarrassingly brief life span we are all born near death.
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Yes, please. Sounds fascinating.
So, two votes.
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Three.
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This is about my dad so please tread softly with any criticism you may have.
Growing up, my dad used to wake us kids up saying “another day to excel!” It used to drive us crazy. But looking back on this now, it is a fond memory and a good reminder of my dad’s humor and optimism.
Not long ago, I watched a Netflix series about near-death experiences, people experiencing signs from loved ones who passed away, and some other related topics. In one episode, a lady asks her mother who passed away not long ago for a sign that her mother can see her on earth. See asks for a very specific sign- that a cardinal comes to visit her. It is all recorded on video, and what happened was that a red cardinal one day flies onto her shoulder. She was very happy when this occurs and after a few minutes, tries to put the cardinal on the branch of a tree, but the bird flies back to her again and again, finally flying away after several minutes of this exchange.
I decided to try something similar. I asked my dad for a sign that he is around and able to see me here on earth. I asked very specifically that the sign be by way of “another day to excel.” I would need to hear someone saying this, read it somewhere, etc. I though that living in Asia, if I did hear this, read this, etc., I would know. In a country where not much English is spoken, I thought that it would be a certainty if I got the sign.
About a week later I got a sign from my dad.
My dad’s former business partner (let’s call him Pat) is retired the city in Asia where I reside. We exchange messages often and meet every once in a while for dinner.
One day I get a message from Pat asking, “Do you know what today is?” I replied that I didn’t. He then calls me and declares “another day to excel!”
Pat explained that when he took his kids to school years ago, he would ask this question to his two daughters and the two other kids he took to school, and then provide his own reply of “another day to excel” when they answered “Wednesday” or whatever.
All during the above explanation from Pat, I was just amazed at what I was hearing. When Pat finished talking, I told him what just transpired.
So that is my story. I’m sure I heard from my dad and am happy that he provided me a sign. I am happy to know he is okay, and that he can see what I’m doing. Finally, I’m happy to know that I’ll see him again someday.
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I don’t have any criticism, and thank you for the wonderful story, BUT, for me, the math of reality, the part that we know is very much limited by our brain function. The math you’re talking about, the splendid happenstance stuff that goes on all the time, in my life as well, is just higher math, TO ME. It’s stuff I can’t comprehend but can observe.
I saw a live Grateful Dead cover band once a few years ago. They played an actual show the real Dead did in 1969. They did not and do not announce which selection they will play in advance. When my wife and I got back into the car, I popped out the CD bootleg of a show I’d been listening to for the previous two weeks or so. Same show. What are the odds?
Meaning? For me: nothing. nada. It’s cool but it’s cool in the way a magic trick is cool. You know there’s more to it. For me, it’s just more math. I don’t think Jerry is waiting for me to play this when I die or that in an alternate universe, the 1969 show is chugging along and I, theoretically, have a shot at attending.
Great story though. Excel!
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Here’s a clip of the cardinal story.
@marasan Thank you for finally sharing. Glad I caught this thread again. I am also convinced that your father was giving you a shout out. From both personal and trusted 2nd hand experience with this type of communication, there is life after death, without a doubt in my mind. 
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Thanks for that! I almost decided against sharing my experience. I guess many who experienced near-death experiences before around 2000 kept it a secret for fear of being labeled crazy. That’s why you have many telling their decade-old stories only just now.
I would be interested in hearing your story.
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As you decided earlier, let me mill the idea for a day before sharing. I don’t have enough to write a book, but perhaps an essay. I would choose to share experiences in order to help and encourage, rather than draw scrutiny and skepticism. Again, thank you! 
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Yeah, don’t worry about it if you decide not to share. I can totally understand.
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This post attempts to explore some possible explanations for such synchronicities. I don’t mean to dismiss spiritual explanations, but hope to touch upon an additional “complex-systems” perspective. I hope my comments can provide additional food for thought and that my comments will be received in the positive tone in which they are intended.
I’ve had a number of weird coincidences in my life, and the rational mind in me might be able to explain such weird coincidences as a manifestation of the propagation of ideas throughout society on a world-wide scale. I think the idea is simple, but I’m not sure if I can explain it simply, so let me use an example from the movie Twelve Monkeys. In that movie, the protagonist is a confused time traveler who is forced to travel backwards through time to gather information about the past. He encounters a professor and stays with her, and the professor insists that the confused time traveler is mentally ill and is only imagining his time travel. Then they see a news program on TV about some kid who has gone missing. The protagonist firmly and confidently says, “the kid is playing a practical joke and is hiding out in a barn. He’ll be found in a few days”. That in fact turns out to be the case, and the professor comes to believe that the protagonist is indeed a time traveler, because he correctly predicted the future and thus must have knowledge of the future. But in the meantime, the confused protagonist has become convinced that he is in fact mentally ill, and describes his apparent ability to predict the future as follows: “Maybe there was some movie. Maybe in the movie a kid hid in a barn. Maybe that missing kid saw the movie. Maybe I also saw the movie. Maybe that’s how I guessed that the missing kid was hiding in the barn.”
So in this example, one way of explaining an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon is to say that there was some larger influencing force (the movie) that planted the same idea both in the mind of the missing kid and in the mind of the confused protagonist.
As a more specific example, I went to university in a small town, call it A. Then, I then moved to different countries a couple of times and finally ended up on the opposite side of the world, in another small town, call it B. I then found out that this small town B, halfway across the world, was the sister city of my original university town A.
Coincidence? Destiny? Some higher-level, worldwide trend (manifesting itself slowly, over a number of years) that somehow caused people from town A to want to go to town B, which was responsible for both my moving there and for someone else deciding to make the towns sister cities? Or something else altogether? You decide.
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Why does it matter ? If something works for you then use it.
As far as the bible well you’re basically not meant to dabble in non Jewish magic. The bible is full of magic esoecially Moses, King Solomon etc.
There are many different opinions on mixing Christianity with the occult. Some Christians believe Catholics worship the virgin Mary, some think it’s ok to worship Santa Muerta, some use Holy water, speak in tongues…Then you have to figure out the most likely things Jesus actually said , as he didn’t write it himself.
Most of the condemnation of necromancy, demon worship etc in the bible is to do with countering the worship of Babylonian (And other) competing religions of that time.
Did you every try feeding a ghost pet?
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I didn’t realize this was a thing. I’ve been hearing stories about NDEs since the 1970s.
That’s what some of the people are saying in the NDE videos I’ve been watching lately. I haven’t had an NDE so I don’t know how people react to such stories/accounts. I guess the term near-death experience dates to the 70s:
The term “near-death experience” was used by John C. Lilly in 1972.[17] The term was popularized in 1975 by the work of psychiatrist Raymond Moody, who used it as an umbrella term for the different elements (out of body experiences, the “panoramic life review”, the Light, the tunnel, or the border).[14]
While I’m at it:
Common traits that have been reported by NDErs are:
- A sense/awareness of being dead.[6]
- A sense of peace, well-being, painlessness and other positive emotions. A sense of removal from the world.[6] An intense feeling of unconditional love and acceptance.[21] Experiencing euphoric environments.[22]
- An out-of-body experience (OBE). A perception of one’s body from an outside position, sometimes observing medical professionals performing resuscitation efforts.[6][23]
- A “tunnel experience” or entering a darkness. A sense of moving up, or through, a passageway or staircase.[6][23]
- A rapid movement toward and/or sudden immersion in a powerful light (or “Being(s) of Light” or “Being(s) dressed in white”) which communicate telepathically with the person.[24][6]
- Being reunited with deceased loved ones.[23]
- Receiving a life review, commonly referred to as “seeing one’s life flash before one’s eyes”.[6]
- Approaching a border or a decision by oneself or others to return to one’s body, often accompanied by a reluctance to return.[6][23]
- Suddenly finding oneself back inside one’s body.[25]
- Connection to the cultural beliefs held by the individual, which seem to dictate some of the phenomena experienced in the NDE, but more so affects the later interpretation thereof.[19][page needed]
Note that an OBE may be part of an NDE, but can happen in other instances than when a person is about to die, such as fainting, deep sleep, and alcohol or drug use.[26]
Stages
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“another day to excel”
So, your dad said that to you almost every day while you were growing up. Pat also recalled saying the same thing very frequently to his children.
Is it possible that this was a saying they shared in their business partnership- maybe even a motto- and they frequently said it to each other as well as others, and Pat has continued to do so? He might even have remembered your father saying it was something he told his own kids, just as Pat did, and he might have consciously or subconsciously repeated this after hearing a familiar voice.
I feel this should be considered as a possible reasonable
alternative explanation to a message from beyond the grave.
As for the cardinal, it doesn’t look life California, but I suppose it could be in the mountains or the north. There is no confirmation of the grandmother ever saying any such thing; just the testimony of some already believing Christians. What we have is a video of a bird, having flown into a window, being stunned for a few minutes, and then flying away. I think I would require stronger proof for evidence of life after death.
Valid points. A more strict experiment would have been to ask for a sign from beyond like a random series of letters in sequence.
But conducting a strict experiment – and trying objectively to prove or disprove some hypothesis – is not really the point of this exercise, I think. I think that the point is more for the living to find comfort in the knowledge that those who have passed are at peace and are, somehow, still with us. Going too far down the hard scientific investigative route strips any emotional comfort from the exercise. A cold scientific viewpoint might say that you’re taking comfort in some unprovable fantasy. But a spiritual viewpoint might say that, as long as it does in fact bring you comfort and improves your life, does the provability matter? Everyone has to decide for themselves. (And I’ve found my viewpoint shifting as I grow older.)
Going slightly off-topic here, but I feel it’s relevant. Philosophically, AI raises a whole new series of questions about the meaning of death and life after death. You could create a digital clone of a deceased loved one that looks, acts, sounds, and speaks just as the original person would have, based on a lifetime of data gathered from the entirety of that person’s digital communications. You could have interactive 3D conversations with that digital clone in VR. If the conversation becomes unpleasant, you could wipe the clone’s memory, rewind, and start again. It would probably cost a lot of money to create such a digital clone, so there might emerge a new market for this kind of “digital resurrection” service. The future will be interesting.
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I’ve known Pat here in Taiwan for about 6 years. I’ve gotten quite close to him, actually. For the last few years, he has been my counselor and we have messaged (mostly) and talked several times every week. Why did he suddenly recall that and decide that he needed to call me (instead of message me like he normally does because he knew I was on my way to work)? And why did he do this just a few days after I asked my dad for this confirmation? I asked Pat about this and he said he doesn’t know why, but he felt that he had to call me and tell me this.
Yes, it’s possible that this is all coincidence. I’m certainly not here to convince anyone. I’ll leave that up to someone else.
At the end of the day, I’m far more interested in the subject of NDEs.
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It sounds like this…
In case you don’t know in cyberpunk 2077 there is a product where they brain scan some rich guy so their loved one can interact with a digital copy of the person after he died.
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