In the Grey: Mandy’s Story

Over the years, my wife and I have had many opportunities to help people who have been stuck in this grey area. Most of the time, we don’t really get a chance to know them on a deeper level. Their life. Interests. Hopes. Dreams.

One of the reason we don’t get to know them well is because of how fast they end up going to paradise. Most of the time, they simply need a few questions answered. “Did I do something wrong?” “Am I being punished?” “What do I do now?” Once they find out we can hear them and answer questions, the domino effect goes surprising quick.

Sometimes, however, the ones we help aren’t interested in going over just yet. They have things to say. Or they only wish to have conversations again. This story below, is from one such conversation. Her name was Mandy, and I asked her a simple question. “What is it like, where you are? In this grey area, as you called it.” And this was her response, which I typed out as she gave it.

Mandy’s Story:

You know, growing up, you never really think about being dead. I mean, we’ve all seen horror movies of ghosts who come back to haunt, of course. We’ve all heard stories. Bumps in the night. The rattling of chains. Possessions. Having your knee grabbed at the same time there is a really loud BOO at a campfire at the tail end of a story about a bloody hand of a murderer creeping and crawling through the woods, looking for more victims. (And yes, I am still mad at that jerk Michael for that one.) Most people have seen blurry pictures of apparitions, faintly shimmering at the top of stair cases in abandoned old houses. Everyone has heard some kind of moan. Everyone has heard some kind of groan. Everyone has some kind of story.

But…have you ever really thought about what it is like to actually be dead? I have to admit, I never did. I was raised to believe that if you die, you go to heaven or you go to hell. That was that. There was no “in between”. If God said you were good, you went up. You got your wings. You got your halo. You got your harp. You spent eternity singing songs and walking on streets of soft gold and swooshing in and out of clouds. If God said you were bad, you went down. The devil throws you in a lake of fire and his demons stand around the edge of it, laughing hysterically while stabbing people with pitchforks whenever they try to get out. You live out eternity hearing screams of pain and torment, including your own.

Well, there is a lot more to it, let me tell you. There is an entire world no one sees. It is hard to explain, but explain, I will try. There is darkness, of course. Dark lights. Like mirages. Moving. Swirling. Touching. Wrapping. Dark colors that became a part of you. A part of who you are.

There is light, too, of course. Different than the light we know when we have eyes to see. Reflections, more than anything. Wisps here and there. Always moving. Wrapping around you. Swirling in front of you and then vanishing. They zoom in. Zoom out. Fade. Brighten.

Frighten. Tighten. Entice.

I don’t feel they are actual colors, though. They are more. Maybe other spirits at times. I can feel the presence of others, but not always. I can hear the whispers. I can hear their sighs. Their pleas. Their wishes.

The lights seem to have emotions, too. Certain lights will swirl by in a heavy swoosh, and sadness will overwhelm me. Other lights will bring me back memories. My memories. You are not in control over your memories in this world. They come as if they have a life of their own. Sometimes I can go forever without them coming to me. Other times, they seem to swallow me whole and play on some kind of continuous reel. Over and over. You lose track of time when these kinds of lights present themselves to you.

Don’t get me wrong, though. There are good lights as well. Some make you happy. And excited. Children seem to bring those, if that makes sense. You can actually feel the innocence of children in here, and at those times, this is a wonderful place! Peace. Harmony. Their laughter.

I love their laughter.

Of course, I do not know where the laughter comes from. It simply exists. Rather it is from those on the outside or others that are here with me, I do not know. I believe there are two sources, however. Two different places where they come from, but I never truly know if it is from a spiritual direction, or human in nature, but I really don’t care either way. I simply love the feeling of warmth they wash over me.

Empathy is extremely strong here, in this place of grey. Like I said, the colors and the sounds all seem to carry with them, emotions. Sadness. Happiness. Excitement. You have no choice but to feel them, either. When they pass by, you feel. When there are no colors or sounds, though, you feel nothing. You have no choice. I have tried to feel my own emotions before, but I don’t seem to have any. I only have what is forced upon me. Forced on me by whatever passes beside me or over me or through me. Even reliving the bad things in life, or reliving my death, or reliving my childhood, or reliving memories of anything for that matter, I don’t always get the choice of what feelings come through. Or, at least, I don’t think I get a choice. It seems whatever images cross through my thoughts, I am only reliving the events, not the feelings. Isn’t that crazy? I can feel all of their emotions, but not my own. (Or, are they all mine? I guess I can’t really answer that one.)

I just know the feelings aren’t the ones I wish to feel, anyway. I cannot block anything. If it is a moment when I was happy, then happy is all I feel. I cannot dwell and change the images, and I cannot dwell to change the emotion. I cannot bring feelings, emotions, or thoughts up on my own when I am deeper into the grey. If I have a memory of my mother, I only remember the emotion from that moment. I cannot dwell as I would if I had control. I can’t remember a birthday or a specific moment in detail, but simply the idea of that moment. The feeling of it I had at the time. I can’t remember where Uncle Bob was sitting or if Aunt Susan drank too much, or which birthday Cousin Louis showed up on an acid trip, or anything like that. I remember things like the cake, but not the color. The flicker of the candles, but not the faces around me. The flash of a camera, but not who was taking the picture.

Oh, and of course, there are different levels of the grey. Oh, my. Talk about something hard to explain. Why is it called grey, anyway? I’m not sure, really. I guess because if you concentrate on the colors, after a while, in the midst of blurs and swirls, the mixture seems grey. But it is never grey for long. It usually goes more yellow during those times where the feelings are good. Darker at the times they are not. Never truly grey, though, and never for long.

At times, I get bits and pieces and flashes of light from the world where I used to live, too. That’s always fascinating. When I focus, and I mean truly focus, I see certain things clear, but not everything. They become memory flashes, in a way. I see a book, and the book becomes a memory and fades. I see a cup, and the cup becomes a memory before it fades. And then after a while, I will not remember the memories of them, but I know they were there. I can sense them. I know the area they were sitting, but not what was around them. It is as if I have a very narrow state of view. Horse blinders.

Oh. And I can hear memories, too, even if I don’t always see them. I hear a voice that sounds like my mother, or my second grade teacher. My dog. The laughter of the guys who killed me. Things like that. They all blend together.

Time is strange here, too. No minutes. No seconds. No hours or days. No weeks. Just a continuous stream of nothing at times, followed by long moments of everything. Consciousness. Then unconsciousness. Fade in. Fade out. More noises. More blurs. More lights. More feelings. More nothing.

Silence.

Empty.

Chaos.

Laughter

Nothing.

It is better than being in hell, though. You can hear and sense that at times, too. Screams that fade. Terror that rises inside of an emotion of light passing by before fading, because something grabbed it and yanked it away. Those are the ones I do not like. Those are the ones that leave the most emotion. They impact me. Cover me in some kind of weird residue, like fireplace soot or something like that. It clings to you.

There is no loneliness, though. You would think it would be lonely, but it is not. It is as if you don’t have that choice. You can’t choose to be lonely. You can’t choose this emotion, the same way you can’t choose the others. If a light passes by with a lonely feeling, I can feel that. But I cannot just feel lonely. I did not realize this, though, until someone heard me. Only then did I realize, I had not talked with anyone in forever! I wonder how I never felt lonely up to that point? I guess because I do not have a choice, as I said, with emotions.

I’m not explaining this right, of course. If you think it is confusing out there, try living in here. I didn’t even explain the emotions or the memories correctly. Only pieces of them. It is one big endless ball of yarn. A thousand pieces all tangled together. But I do know the older pieces seem to fade quicker. The older memories. They come slower. Stay for less amounts of time. After a while, they simply go away. Less and less memories to share. I can’t remember hardly anything of childhood. I remember barely anything of school, either. Of growing up. Playing. Falling in love, if I ever truly did.

I still have many memories from high school, though. From college. They come more often because the old memories have faded with time. I wonder if one day, the only memories I will have is going to be of my last day. I wonder if one day, I’ll remember nothing at all. I wonder if one day, I’ll cease to exist at all.