MarioWorldGamer

I also want to know this very important question as well. Is it worse to experience an intense negative emotion in a nightmare or a negative emotion just as intense while fully awake? Or is it just as bad?

The possibility that I could experience that level of depression I did during my nightmares in a near death experience is something that constantly troubles me since it was an indescribably horrible experience. I don't ever wish to experience that again fully conscious during a near death experience. I find my life not worth living with this constant obsessive thought (worry). It does not go away since it is just too much of an overwhelming realization.

I also have another question. When I experience negative emotions such as depression in my fully conscious (awake) state, they are nowhere as bad as they would be in my nightmares. I know you said ndes are different than nightmares, but let me ask this question anyway. People are said to be more conscious than waking conscious. So would this mean that any depressive experience I would have during an nde also not be as bad as they would be in my nightmares? Is it only the dream state where negative emotions are extremely powerful? Or can they also be just as or even more powerful as they are in dreams/nightmares during ndes? I was thinking that since people who have ndes are fully conscious and since it is only the dream state where negative emotions are extremely powerful, that negative emotions won't be that powerful during an nde since an nde is not a dream state.

If you ever had a nightmare out of the blue when you were having no stress in your life, then perhaps it was because you ate something or perhaps some other physical process in the brain happened that caused that nightmare. The nightmare, in this case, was not a means to ensure your survival due to some situation in your life. Rather, this nightmare was caused by what was going on in the brain during your sleep. So in that same sense, can the depressing scenarios people experience in a distressing nde just be the result of the physical processes in the brain that happen during near death? Maybe perhaps in addition to releasing endorphins near death, the brain also sometimes releases a bunch of stress hormones and does other things to try to revive the person. So maybe that is the cause of those depressing and distressing moments during their ndes. Maybe it has nothing to do with the person perceiving his/herself in a dangerous situation and the brain creating those stress responses to warn that person to get out of that situation. Maybe it is instead a matter of the physiological processes that go on in the brain during near death such as the release of stress hormones in addition to endorpins, etc.

An example would be them being in an empty void in which they feel hopeless or them encountering hellish imagery/beings that results in them feeling hopeless. Also, you say that hopelessness should not be experienced since the brain is trying to ensure survival and that the only way it should be experienced is if there is some unresolved issue in this person's life. But the brain is doing all sorts of crazy things during an nde. It is messing with your perception in so many different ways. So a depressing experience during an nde could just simply be a result of the brain doing all sorts of things. Maybe depression during an nde doesn't have to only be the result of an unresolved issue in the person's life. The brain is reconstructing all sorts of experiences and perhaps depression is one of them for some people.

There are reports of people who have had distressing ndes in which they felt hopelessness (depression). So it's not just fear and blissful emotions that are experienced here. Depression is also experienced as well. As for the life reviews, people say that it is stimulation of the temporal lobe that causes flashbacks of all those memories and associated emotions with them. For example, people with temporal lobe epilepsy say that they experienced something similar to a life review in which they had a flashback of their memories and emotions. So the recall of negative life experiences seem to be flashbacks.

But I've heard that emotions are greatly intensified during ndes. That goes for both positive and negative emotions. There are what is known as hellish (distressing) ndes. Although they are not as numerous as the heavenly blissful ndes, there are a number of them. So if I have a hellish nde, then I am very troubled that I will experience depression as intense as I did in those nightmares I had. People who have distressing ndes are said to experience intense negative emotions and I worry that they are as bad and intense as they are in nightmares. I am hoping they are not as bad as they are in nightmares since this would mean that any depression I experience in a hellish nde or even depression from one of my own nightmares in a life review won't be as bad and intense as the depression I actually experienced in my nightmares.

I have experienced intense hopelessness (depression) in my nightmares. It was a completely abnormal experience. It is nothing that I would experience here in the waking world. There is no words to describe how much hell it was. If I ever have a hellish near death experience or a life review, then can those same exact experiences be experienced again even though I am completely over them? Knowing this possibility has taken my life away and has made me suicidal. You don't realize just how horrible that depression was that I experienced in my nightmares. Knowing that I could experience it all over again during a near death experience has completely troubled and traumatized me. I am not at peace. I am ok with reexperiencing the moments of depression I had in my waking life, but not the ones during my nightmares as those are the absolute worst ones. So my vital question here is, are the negative emotions experienced during an nde just as bad as they are in nightmares? Or are they only just as bad as they are in the waking world? I am hoping that they are only as bad as they are in the waking world because this would mean that I would not be able to experience the level of depression I experienced in my nightmares.

I am also going to ask something else here. Think of the most horrifying dream you had and how horrible that felt. The negative feelings/emotions in our nightmares tend to be far more worse than the ones we have when we are awake. The ones we have in our nightmares are like abnormal mental states that we just simply don't experience in our waking lives. Now during ndes, people say they are conscious. That it is more real than real. So does the fact that they are conscious make the negative feelings/emotions they experience during their ndes not as bad? Or are they just as bad as they are in our nightmares? Are they experiencing their negative feelings/emotions just as they would in their nightmares, or are they experiencing them normally like when we are awake?

I'm not talking about remembering what something felt like. I am talking about the feelings themselves coming back. When someone has a depressive moment in their lives, something was there in the brain that was necessary to trigger those depressive feelings. But that something is gone when those depressive feelings go away and can no longer be triggered anymore. You are now able to look back on those depressive moments you had in the past, but this time without feeling depressed anymore from that. Therefore, those depressive feelings from the past should not be experienced all over again during a life review or a hellish nde since that "something" that was there to trigger your depressive feelings from the past is no longer there anymore. At least, that is what I am thinking.

Now in order to recall certain feelings/emotions, the brain would have to have an emotional memory. For example, when I listen to a certain song, that triggers feelings from the past. This is because my brain has that emotional memory. But if someone has struggled with depression and has gotten over it completely and that feeling can no longer be triggered anymore, then there is no more emotional memory of that experience which means it shouldn't be experienced ever again. If it is experienced again for some brief moment, then that emotional memory is still there. But not to the degree that it was when the person first struggled with his/her depressive life crisis. Over time as the depression passes, that emotional memory goes away. If there are no more emotional memories of depression in your life, then there is no reason why those moments of depression you had in the past should be experienced all over again during a hellish nde or a life review. In regards to flashbacks such as what people with temporal lobe epilepsy experience, wouldn't that also require an emotional memory to bring back that feeling? If there is no more emotional memory, then all that should be experienced from that flashback is just the familiar sensations (sights and sounds) from that moment, but not the emotions from that given moment such as despair, sadness, rage, etc.

There is an explanation offered by Susan Blackmore under the section titled "Life Reviews" which has something to do with the temporal lobes: http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/Articles/si91nde.html So if it really does have something to do with this, then how can those depressive feelings be experienced again if the person is completely over his/her depression? Let me ask you this. When a person has had a moment of depression in his/her life and has completely gotten over it to the point it is impossible for him/her to experience it again, but this person then develops temporal lobe epilepsy, then can those depressive feelings come back all over again somehow? If so, then how is this possible considering that he/she was completely over his/her depression?

People who have had ndes are said to have life reviews in which they see and feel every moment of their lives. Now I am going to ask a question here. If, for example, someone has struggled with depression in his/her life, but has completely gotten over it in which he/she can no longer experience it anymore no matter how hard he/she tries to, then how can it be experienced again during a life review? If he/she has completely gotten over his/her depression and can't ever experience it again, then how can those depressive feelings be experienced all over again in a life review?