03/09/2025
Brianna Lafferty, a 33-year-old woman from Colorado, lived with a rare neurological disorder called myoclonus dystonia, which causes sudden and uncontrollable muscle contractions. One day, her condition caused her heart to stop. While in hospital, doctors declared her clinically dead for eight full minutes. This means no heartbeat, no breathing, and no brain activity.
But Brianna, like many other people who've experienced 'death' and came back, says she never truly left her awareness behind. Instead, she describes gently stepping out of her body, as if shrugging off a heavy coat, and entering a place outside of time. She recalls feeling more alive and whole than ever before, with no pain or fear - just a serene, clear presence. This is another commonly described experience.
In this state of consciousness, she found that her thoughts seemed to shape her experience. Negative thoughts could be shifted before they appeared, and peaceful ones manifested gently around her. While eight minutes passed in the physical world, for her, it felt like months as she explored, reflected, and encountered beings of pure awareness - beings that radiated unconditional love and wisdom. Yet another common experience of near death.
When she returned to life, she had to relearn basic functions and underwent brain surgery for damage to her pituitary gland. Yet fundamentally, she felt renewed. She’s now less afraid of death, more intentional in how she lives, and deeply aware of how thought shapes experience.
Brianna frames death not as an endpoint, but as a “change of address,” a shift in form, not finality.
