A Conversation with Kimberly Clark Sharp

Kimberly shares some of the insights that have transformed "everyday" life since her return from two near death experiences. The author of After the Light, she has brought back perspectives that can change your world.

The Monthly Aspectarian: Kim, so many people have read your book, After the Light, about the beautiful, and the harrowing, aftereffects you've lived through since your near death experiences. What's important in your message at this point?

Kimberly Clark Sharp: The bottom line is that the whole point of us being alive at this time can be summarized as a matter of faith. That faith would be that each of us has a purpose very specifically designed for us. That one does not weigh in more than another in God's eyes. Faith that we are never alone. We're surrounded at all times by invisibilities, some of whom help us, some of whom trip us up so that we know how it feels to fall -- and some of whom help us to get back up again. And faith that our souls are eternal.

When we die, we take three very important aspects of our lives on earth with us . . . and this goes on eternally; that is, we take our personalities. In my near death experience, the "I" that was "me" was not what was in my body but what was outside, observing. The scariest part for most people afraid of death is that afterward, we are not going to exist anymore as separate personalities. But indeed, we do. Along with our personalities, we take cognition along with us as well . . . and that involves memory. So -- we take our memory with us, and that helps us in our life review, which in turn helps us understand what our purpose on earth has been -- or, in the case of people who are going back, what the purpose will be hereafter. Thirdly, and most importantly, I might add, we take along the love that we've been given and that we have given to others who have been with us. It weighs in like currency. So my advice to people would be to be nice to everybody because that is our goal. That's our credit when our lives are over.

TMA: Isn't it funny how some of those old sayings that got rejected in the past decades, like "Virtue is its own reward," turns out to be true?

KCS: Yeah! I also want readers to know something about me, Guy. That I come from the midwest, although I've lived in Seattle since my near death experience. I'm from Johnson County, Kansas, outside of Kansas City, the third highest income per capita in the country . . . I grew up with the proverbial "silver spoon" and had no intention of altering my lifestyle until after my near death experience. I was one of those people who not only was pronounced dead and down for an hour and a half, which is an extraordinarily, miraculously long period of time, but also I'm one of those people who did a one-eighty in changing from materialistic, selfish -- well, let's put it this way: I thought service came in two forms, sterling and uniformed. I also want readers to know that since my near death experience, I've gotten my Master's in social work, I've become a clinical assistant professor at the University of Washington, I teach in the School of Medicine at the University of Washington. My work with dying people has received a lot of honors. For instance, in 1987 I was named one of the forty most influential people in the Pacific Northwest for my work with death and dying. And I'm currently running the world's oldest and largest group for near death experiencers, the Seattle International Association for Near Death Study. I want readers to know about my credibility but at the same time, I also want readers to know that I'm called the Erma Bombeck of the near death movement -- and that was bestowed upon me by Erma Bombeck herself.

TMA: How did that come about?

KCS: After the Light is a funny book in the Erma Bombeck sense, and any speech I give literally leaves people in tears from laughter and poignancy. I'm not a very serious person when it comes to this subject, and I have a lot of funny stories to tell.

Last February I was in Phoenix doing book signings and lectures and Erma heard a radio spot I did. She called the radio station and said, "By golly, you're the Erma Bombeck of the Near Death Movement." Then called me in Seattle and asked me for a personally inscribed copy of the book. She loved it, and took it with her to California where she went for a liver transplant, and she died there. One of her representatives called and told me how much the book meant to her -- and it would, because it's funny.

TMA: I know you've had two near death experiences.

KCS: I've had two experiences in the Light.

TMA: The first one was interesting to me because you didn't know you were having a near death experience. Most of the experiences you read about are people who know they've been blown out of their body. But you didn't even know you were having an NDE until you were being sent back and you realized something was wrong.

KCS: Yes; until that time, it felt more real, more normal and more sensible to be with God in the form of a magnificent Light than it was to be in my body. This was what was real. Everything else paled in comparison. It was like I was awakening from a dream and remembering where I had come from.

TMA: And in this first experience you didn't do a life review -- and you didn't have the tunnel that others who've experienced NDEs have written about.

KCS: Right. I pretty much went straight to "the big G," and actually God -- I call my Creator -- I was with that which made me, and this light that I was in was so loving . . . and it was personal love; it was directed absolutely at me. Also, communication between us was so easy, so much better than communication on earth although it wasn't English or any kind of spoken language; a combination of math and music is how we both communicated. I asked a lot of questions. The answers I got back were very simple . . . we don't have time for me to go into all the aspects of everything I learned -- that's why I wrote a book. But it was fantastic because the answers were so simple that if I'd had a head, I would have smacked it -- in the sense of "Gee, I should of had a V-8." It wasn't until I was sent back that I remembered there was another existence. But "death" did not occur to me because I basically don't understand death. Death, to me, even to this day, is not an end; it's a transition.

TMA: In your second experience, you must have gone A-ha! I know what this is!

KCS: I did. I did. In my second experience -- it was a spontaneous one eleven years later while I was driving my car . . . I had just had a woo-woo, which is my scientific term for all the spiritual weirdness that happens. And that had just happened, a woo-woo. I was zipping along in my car when the dashboard faded, everything faded, and again I had cognition -- and my joy at being reunited with this light was . . . it's incomprehensible to others how happy I was. To my amazement, I found myself at a curb in my car, three hours later. My experience this time was more like a romance, it was so heartfelt. I again was given affirmation that yes, the light is always there for all of us. It was incredible.

I came out of that experience in an accelerated form of spirituality that lasted for many years . . . and then eventually credit cards and car pools and paint peeling on the house -- the projects of life -- began to take over again and I realized how important it was to keep a balance between that which would enchant all of us, which would distract all of us from our life's work: the full-blown knowledge of how much is out there to help us through our life. Balancing that with child care and home care and job care and the mundane-ness of our lives . . . which is just as important, because we need to function where we've been sent! And we've been sent here, to the land of checkbooks. My favorite saying is an old one: "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water." Truer words were never spoken. I encourage people on spiritual paths [to stay connected with their physical lives], to remember their zip codes.

TMA: Yeah, I agree. The world is a theme park and I'm on the Guy ride.

KCS: I'm on the roller coaster; I've had two experiences. However, I have had so many other experiences in "regular" life with angels, with demons, with a whole lot of dead people. I've crammed all of that into the book.

I have one leg in this reality, the chop wood reality. I have another leg in the full-blown spiritual awareness. I don't even know what to call it: realm, I guess, or realms. It makes for a very interesting life because I've achieved that balance, but it can be crazy-making at times. Five years ago, I was told I had eight to ten months to live, and it was through my faith that all would be well that I survived. Also the fact that I'm not afraid of death . . . and I had all that energy, the energy that I would have spent being terrified, left over to apply to my healing. The spiritual door to healing opened to me at that time. That seemed to be the lesson of that experience. There was that and lots of other lessons.

There are not many people who could look me in the eye and tell me their stories, to whom I could not say, "I know how you feel." The balance of the richness of my spiritual life has been in suffering. I've lost a baby. I've lost a fiancé. I lost my health. But also, I've been committed to the tender loving care of other people, particularly those who are dying and are utterly terrified. So I've paid my dues -- let's put it that way. Now, I feel like I'm here simply to enjoy "the amusement park of life," to use your metaphor. Right now, my life is one of getting a lot of rewards. I mean, the book has been a pinch-me kind of experience.

TMA: It seems right that you should have a book, too.

KCS: Well, I wrote it to help people. The pinch-me part has been the awesomeness of the degree of that help. I mean, people who have called me who have been on the brink of suicide and who have gotten help instead because they were given hope by reading the book. People who were dying, who were afraid. Whose children are dying, and they had no hope.

For the last fourteen and a half years, Kimberly has directed the world's oldest and largest group for near death experiencers, the Seattle International Association for Near Death Study. She is the author of After the Light: What I Discovered on the Other Side of Life That Can Change Your World (Avon Books, 1996; William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1995), and was named one of the forty most influential people in the Pacific Northwest for her work with death and dying.