Welcome to Otherworld. I'm your host, Jack Wagner.

This episode features a story that is, honestly, a bit hard to describe.

It comes from a man named Michael, who is currently a minister living in Washington.

But when this story takes place, he was a Tibetan Buddhist novice monk living in New York.

As you might imagine, being a Buddhist monk involves a great deal

of intense meditation. And in meditation, people often have very profound experiences. These are

the types of things that Michael had become very familiar with during his meditation practice and life as a monk.

But one day, during one of his meditations,

Michael experienced something far more intense

and unexpected than he could have ever imagined.

Something that I'm not quite sure how to categorize.

This episode is called,

From Now On, and you're listening to Otherworld.

Hello? Is this Bobby?

Yes, it is.

At its core, the science, you can't argue. It's not only......up in the sky. It's almost frustrating that it's happening. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. It's like, it's limbs were just like wrong. Everybody moves back into the light, even if it takes them in. My name is Michael Ellick.

I currently live in Bainbridge Island, Washington.

I work in Seattle.

I am a minister, but was at the time I'd served as a Tibetan Buddhist,

novice monk and attendant to a teacher for years that sort of led up to this experience, maybe, in part.

I was raised inside of an evangelical Christian context, and like a lot of people raised in the

evangelical Christian context, I totally abandoned it at some point in high school and thought it was all nonsense.

...