Spinning Toward the Great Beyond, Unafraid. But Then....

Have you seen the movie, Sully, yet? Here's the trailer:
https://youtu.be/mjKEXxO2KNE
It deals with the pilot who landed his passenger jet on the Hudson River after hitting a flock of geese. Nobody wants to go down in a plane crash because you have to face your terror on the way to the ground. But I've also talked with people who have been in life-threatening situations who weren't frightened at all...while it was happening.

In fact, it happened to me. I remember as a young woman I was riding as a passenger in the front seat of a hot little sports car. The car was mine, actually, and normally I would have been driving it but I had a headache and so my companion volunteered to take the wheel. It was a snowy day and the road was covered in slush -- not an unusual scenario in a North Dakota winter. I hunkered down in my seat and closed my eyes. I opened them again when my friend started to panic. We were passing a semi and it was throwing slush onto our windshield. She thought the truck was drifting into our lane so she slammed on the brakes. We started to spin, fortunately away from the truck, but into the ditch.

And it was at that moment that I realized I was not wearing my seatbelt. I remember clearly thinking, "Great, the one time in my adult life when I forget to buckle up, and this happens. I'm going to die." The spin went on for only seconds. The car had a low center of gravity, and didn't flip. Add to that the fact that the ditch had two feet of snow in it, and we came to a fairly sudden stop. And THEN, I got scared. But during the spin I was not frightened at all. My thoughts were clear. So is it death itself that's scary, or the lingering thought of it that frightens people so much?

I think it's the thought. Because I've heard over and over again from people who are nearing death, and those who have been with people facing death, that in the final moments that fear goes away and peace takes over. You'll meet some of them in my new book.

Gift of Death -- A Message of Comfort and Hope