On Life and Death

There comes a time in many lives when the conversation turns quietly toward death.

Not in the dramatic way novels sometimes imagine it, but in the softer, more ordinary way it actually happens. A client arrives at your office with red eyes and the careful calm of someone holding themselves together. A friend mentions a parent who slipped away in the early morning hours. A neighbor’s house goes dark for a few weeks and then fills again with visitors bringing casseroles and careful condolences.

When several people leave in a short span of time, something inside us begins to listen more closely to the mystery we spend most of our lives avoiding.

What actually happens when a person dies?

In the ancient writing on Death—death is not described as a single moment but as a series of gentle stages, a gradual withdrawing of consciousness from one layer of existence into another. Much like dusk does not arrive instantly but moves slowly across the sky.

The First Stage: The Withdrawal of Vital Energy

According to yogic teachings, the body is animated by a subtle life force often called prana. This energy moves through the body the way wind moves through a forest—unseen but unmistakably present. As death approaches, this life force begins to withdraw. The senses grow dimmer. The body becomes heavy, sometimes cool. Breathing changes its rhythm. Medical science observes this as the shutting down of physical systems, but in yogic philosophy, it is understood as consciousness slowly releasing its hold on the physical instrument.

Many people near death begin drifting in and out of sleep. They may speak to loved ones who have already passed. Sometimes they seem to be watching something just beyond the reach of the room. From a yogic perspective, this is not confusion

It is awareness shifting inward.

The Second Stage: The Moment of Passing

The actual separation between consciousness and the body is often described as surprisingly peaceful. It has been written that many people experience it as a sensation of release or lightness, as if slipping free from something that had grown tight or heavy. The body may appear still, but awareness continues—now no longer limited by the nervous system.

Some individuals report feeling as though they are standing beside the body they just left, observing with calm curiosity. This stage is often accompanied by a brief period of disorientation, not unlike waking from a vivid dream. But that confusion rarely lasts long. Gradually, the soul recognizes that the body was never the true self—only a vehicle used for a particular journey.

The Third Stage: The Period of Rest

Describes what follows as a resting period.

Imagine someone who has worked tirelessly for decades, carrying responsibilities, struggles, worries, and hopes. When that work finally ends, the first thing they do is sit down. The soul does something similar.

There is often a deep sleep or peaceful interval where the individual adjusts to their new condition. The turbulence of physical life fades. Emotional tensions dissolve.

For many people, this stage feels profoundly comforting—like drifting into the calm after a long storm.

The Fourth Stage: Awakening in the Subtle World

After this rest, consciousness gradually awakens in what yogic traditions call the astral plane, a subtle realm shaped more by thought and emotion than by physical matter. Here, individuals often encounter familiar presences—friends, relatives, or guides who help orient them to this new level of existence.

It is said that this world is not distant or alien. It interpenetrates the physical world much like radio waves fill the air around us unseen. The difference is that perception there operates differently. Thought carries power. Intention shapes experience.

And the soul begins to recognize itself again as something far larger than the single lifetime just completed.

The Fifth Stage: The Review of Life

One of the most profound stages described in yogic teachings is the life review.

Rather than judgment imposed from outside, the soul simply becomes aware of the effects of its own actions. Moments appear again—kindness offered, harm caused, opportunities taken or missed. But they are understood now with extraordinary clarity and compassion. You see not only what you did, but how it felt to the people around you. This is not punishment. It is education. 

The soul absorbs the lessons of the life just lived, the way a traveler reflects on a long journey once they finally reach home.

The Sixth Stage: Assimilation and Preparation

After the review, the soul enters a longer period of assimilation. The experiences of that lifetime settle into deeper understanding. Imagine pages of a book slowly being absorbed into memory.

Eventually, when the soul has rested, reflected, and integrated its lessons, another impulse arises—the desire for further growth, further experience.

And so the cycle of birth and death continues.

Not as a punishment.

Not as a trap.

But as a vast school in which consciousness slowly learns compassion, wisdom, and freedom.

Why So Many Departures Touch Us So Deeply

When many people around us pass away in a short period of time, it can feel as though the world is quietly rearranging itself.

But from the yogic perspective, nothing has truly disappeared.

The souls who have left are simply in different stages of the same great journey.

Some may still be resting.

Some may be reflecting.

Some may already be preparing for another chapter of experience.

Meanwhile, those of us still here are living our own stage of the process.

The most important one, perhaps.

Because the quality of our thoughts, our kindness, our patience, our courage—these are the things that shape not only the life we are living now, but the path that unfolds afterward.

And so death, in this tradition, is not meant to terrify us.

It is meant to remind us that life is part of something far larger than the small window of years we spend on this side of the veil.

A journey already underway long before we arrived.

And one that continues long after we appear to leave. 

Hari Om Tat Sat

To learn more about this, please join  Berta on a book series, The  Life Beyond Death.  This Book Series will guide and help us understand the many stages of life, death, and rebirth, and all that takes place in between!  

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