Bridging Worlds: NDEs and Spiritual Practices

The common ground between near-death experiences and ancient wisdom

Photo by Peter Hammer

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In this essay, you will read about:

• How ancient spiritual traditions developed practices that create experiences similar to NDEs

• The techniques used across these traditions to induce altered states of consciousness

• The methods of the Indian yogic tradition, particularly as taught by Paramahansa Yogananda

• The parallels between NDEs and these spiritual practices

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What if there were a way to recreate a near-death experience at will? 

What if a person were able to slow and ultimately stop their heart rate as well as their respiration in order for their consciousness to travel freely out of the body and into a transcendent realm, as people report they do during classic NDEs? 

It turns out that there are many traditions that have known about and cultivated such physiologically sophisticated techniques, often refining the practices throughout centuries. They weren’t taught to everyone, however, but only to highly trained monks and mystics from various traditions. This secrecy was employed because these practices were seen as both difficult and dangerous. Reaching deep states of meditation or prayer where your heart rate slows down dramatically or even stops, along with your breathing, is not for the faint of heart! (Pun very much intended.)

I’m not claiming these practices are identical to one another, or to NDEs themselves. Rather, I see a fascinating convergence across human spiritual experiences. In other words, these diverse practice traditions, alongside near-death experiences, hint at a common thread in our capacity for transformation and transcendence. 

What I want to show in this essay is how these varying paths might all lead to the same profound expansion of consciousness, showing how spiritual practices and NDEs may point towards, and give us access to, the same larger reality.

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Stilling the Body, Freeing the Mind

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While it may seem difficult to believe, there is evidence that shows humans can indeed manipulate autonomic bodily processes like heart rate and breathing—body functions that are often thought to be beyond human control. People like Swami Rama and Wim Hof have done studies with doctors and scientists to demonstrate that we have much more control over our bodies than was formerly believed.

One example comes from the Taoist tradition. This is from the Secret of the Golden Flower, a famous and foundational Taoist text from the late Ming or early Qing dynasty (likely the fifteenth or sixteenth century), where we find the following:

“In the practice of the circulation of the light, the breath naturally becomes subtle and stops. This breathlessness is not forced but is a natural consequence of deep meditation. When the breath ceases, the spirit is freed from its earthly tether and can ascend to higher realms of consciousness.” 

Another example comes from the Christian tradition, by St. John Climacus in his text The Ladder of Divine Ascent. He writes:

“When the mind is perfectly united with God, the body becomes still and breath seems to cease. In this divine stillness, the soul communes directly with the Almighty.”

We can debate whether such breath and heart rate cessation are results of conscious practice or are actually side effects that happen naturally during deep states of meditation and prayer. It appears that both can work: People can use deliberate methods to attain a deathlike state without breath or heartbeat, but it can also happen spontaneously and without intention while in a deeply altered state of spiritual communion. Either way, it can give us a sense of the power of spiritual freedom the soul may experience during times of bodily shutdown.

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These practice traditions, alongside NDEs, hint at a common thread in our capacity for transformation and transcendence.

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Black Elk, the Native American shaman from the famous text Black Elk Speaks, reported going into an unconscious state for hours or days at a time. Socrates was said to have stood as still as a statue—even in the winter snow!—gazing out into space in some form of a trance. And Sri Ramakrishna from India went into spontaneous states of ecstasy in which he stopped breathing, either while sitting or standing up.

A few more examples from different religious and mystical traditions might help shed some more light on what these ancient practitioners were experiencing.

This quote is from The Philokalia—a collection of writings by Eastern Orthodox Christian hesychasts (the monks of this tradition)—describes this kind of state:

“The hesychast sits alone in his cell, bringing his mind within himself, shutting out the breath of distraction. In the stillness of his breath, he finds the unceasing prayer of the heart.”

Another passage comes from the Zhuangzi (attributed to the Taoist teacher Chuang Tzu):

“When the sage is in deep meditation, his breath becomes so slight that it seems to stop. In this breathless state, the sage is in perfect harmony with the Tao, experiencing the oneness of all existence. The spirit roams freely in the boundless void.”

And finally from The Book of Balance and Harmony by Taoist Master Li Daochun we have this quote:

“Through prolonged practice of stillness and breath control, the practitioner can reach a state where the breath becomes extremely fine and eventually ceases. This is not a state of suffocation but one of great spiritual awakening, where the practitioner’s essence is aligned with the infinite.”

These teachings in Buddhism and Taoism especially—coming from across the centuries in ancient China—indicate that there was a focus on the breath, and in particular on attaining the state of stopping or ceasing the moving of the breath in order to attain a profound spiritual state of attunement to the source of life. 

Photo by RKTKN

This source, while called God in the West, was referred to as the Tao, the void, emptiness, or the infinite in the Taoist traditions. And there are many texts in these traditions revealing clear methodologies with detailed instructions on how to attain these breathless states in order to commune with the infinite.

The tradition, however, that seems to have the most sophisticated and developed teachings around these practices of body control would be that of the Indian yoga tradition. The yogic tradition arose primarily in India, although it can be found within both the Buddhist as well as Hindu cultures, across many countries in Asia.

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Yogananda and Deep Meditation

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The purpose of yoga was to decouple the identity of the person from their ego as well as their body, and instead center it on the Atman or soul. These yogis would go on to develop highly sophisticated practices centered on shutting down the autonomic nervous system and its attendant functions, such as respiration and heartbeat, for the purpose of spiritual communion.

A great example of these teachings comes from the well-known spiritual teacher and yogi Paramahansa Yogananda, a mystic from the turn of the twentieth century who came to America from India in 1920. His mission was to show the similarities and overlap between the Christian and Hindu religions. Not only did he end up being invited to the White House to meet President Coolidge and speak to sold-out lecture halls around the country, but he became a world-famous teacher of the ancient spiritual teachings of yoga. He explains:

“Through the regular practice of Kriya Yoga and meditation, the breath naturally becomes more and more calm. As the breath slows down, the heart rate also decreases. This is a natural progression that leads to deeper meditation states. With consistent practice, the yogi can achieve breathlessness and heart stillness, entering the state of samadhi where the soul communes with God.”

Known as samadhi, this deep state of meditation in which the mind is so absorbed in concentration (usually at the point between the eyebrows or at the top of the head) that breathing and heart rate slow down and eventually stop. This was practiced with steadfast commitment, as it was believed that when all the senses of the body were “shut down” (the senses of hearing, smell, vision, taste, and touch), as well as the thinking mind, then one’s soul can achieve the deepest states of communion with God.

Sharing one of his many personal experiences, Yogananda told this story:

“One day, while I was meditating with an intense desire for union with God, my breath completely stopped. My heartbeat also stopped. My consciousness expanded beyond my body and the confines of the earth. I realized the infinite expanses of the cosmos, feeling the presence of God everywhere. This experience reinforced my understanding that breath and heartbeat can be controlled to experience the divine.”

Yogananda taught his students the various methods for attaining these heightened states of communion. He says:

“The yogi learns to withdraw life force from the sensory nerves, thereby achieving pratyahara (interiorization). The advanced yogi, through a specific technique of breath control, known as Kriya Yoga, can withdraw the life force from the heart and lungs, momentarily stopping their functions. This cessation is not harmful, but a controlled state achieved through mastery over the prana (vital energy). In this state, the soul is freed from bodily limitations and merges into the blissful experience of samadhi.”

Yoga itself is based on a science of the body and its subtle spiritual energy system. While many people in the West do not understand yoga—and some people even consider it a dark, occult system that is dangerous or demonic in nature—it would behoove these folks to study it with more discernment and an open mind. It appears that these physiological practices have been used across cultures and throughout history by various cultures and religions. Even ancient Christians were aware of the mystical components of “dying before one dies” and how the human body is correlated with spiritual practice. A well-known quote from the Bible is “when thy eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light” (Matthew 6:22–29), a striking reference to the white light that can be seen in the third eye between the eyebrows.

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NDEs and Spiritual Practices: Parallel Paths?

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Humans throughout history have found ways to mimic death, inducing a cessation of pulse and breath, which correlates with profound spiritual experiences. Is it possible that these spiritual experiences—of the soul soaring free of its bodily cage—are the same as those encountered by near-death experiencers? Can we compare side by side the stories of the Other Side by people who self-induce these states intentionally, with those who die accidentally, often in sudden and traumatic ways?

I think the answer is yes—NDEs and the spiritual practices discussed here share remarkable parallels.

For example, both involve a sense of detachment from the physical body, encounters with a brilliant light often interpreted as divine, and feelings of profound peace and interconnectedness. Physiologically, both can involve dramatically slowed or ceased breathing and heartbeat. Participants in both experiences often report accessing higher knowledge and losing their fear of death. Importantly, both tend to produce lasting changes in perspective, leading to increased compassion and a stronger sense of life’s purpose. These shared characteristics suggest that NDEs and certain spiritual practices may be accessing the same aspect of human consciousness, offering different paths to a similar transcendent state.

Photo by Joshua Earle

I think there are important parallels here, but it’s important to note that while we’ve explored various practices and experiences across different traditions, this isn’t to say that all of these practices are the same or that the NDE phenomenon is identical to them. Instead, this exploration points to an underlying unity in the human spiritual experience, where NDEs and intentional spiritual exercises seem to converge on the same transformational potential of human consciousness. 

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By recognizing this common ground, we open up new avenues for understanding the nature of consciousness.

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Whether occurring spontaneously in near-death situations or cultivated through years of disciplined practice, these experiences suggest a common thread in the human capability for transcendence. They hint at a deeper reality of consciousness that extends beyond our ordinary, everyday awareness. This convergence invites us to consider that perhaps these diverse traditions and experiences are different pathways leading to a similar destination—a profound shift in perspective, a dissolution of the ego, or a connection to something greater than ourselves. By recognizing this common ground, we open up new avenues for understanding the nature of consciousness, the potential of the human mind, and our relationship to the cosmos, regardless of cultural or religious background.

It may just be that there are many different methods for experiencing profound spiritual states and for accessing the Other Side. Understanding the role the human body has in mystical experiences is a fascinating inquiry. It has often been said that the body, the mind, and the spirit are all closely connected. We can influence the body through our thoughts or the spirit, and likely vice versa. Indeed this idea of the body–mind–spirit relationship opens up fascinating lines of inquiry to explore, and I hope more research and scholarship is done on this topic.

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