Interview with Mellen-Thomas Benedict

Wisdom: How did you perceive life before and after your NDE (Near Death Experience in 1982?

Mellen: I’m someone who really didn’t believe that there was a God and wasn’t interested, frankly. I had no religious foundation, except that I had spent years in a Catholic boarding school. I was a self employed artist, very self centered and I had a very shallow view of life. In fact, I believed that with all the Cold War stuff that was going on at the time, somehow, some way, this world would end in my lifetime. It seemed to be a fact that all the experts were seeking to prove at the time. It was something that was always at the back of my mind. I think a lot of people thought that way. I think the seed of my disease, as I learned later, was in my world view. My world view was crystallized by a photograph that was put out by well meaning ecology groups. It is still floating around in some publications. It was an aerial view of the city of Los Angeles, compared to a micro-photograph of a cancer cell. They were side by side, and were so stunningly similar that you immediately drew the conclusion, at least I did, that nature had somehow created a malignant cancer on Earth and it was humanity. In that moment, it crystallized my world view. Many years later, I developed terminal brain cancer that was incurable and inoperable at the time. People have to be careful about what they believe. I still meet people who believe that the world is going to end in their lifetime. I really try to spend a minute with them and ask "Do you really believe that? Do you want to believe that? Do you know what that is doing to you, believing that?" I don’t think people realize that world view is so crucial to the life they live and to their health.

Wisdom: Did anything prior to 1982 prepare you for what transpired?

Mellen: Not really. I wasn’t that interested until I became terminal and there wasn’t that much information available. I was from a small town and none of my friends were interested in this kind of stuff either. You know, once you look for something, you find a lot of it, but I wasn’t even looking. In my hospice, there was a small library and there was a book on world religions that I looked through. There were also a bunch of Christian books that I didn’t even bother looking at. I wasn’t interested in intellectual things at the time either. Not much preparation.

Wisdom: So did the Light feel like a living energy or entity in and of itself?

Mellen: Yes. I look at things from 3 levels now that I have had 27 years to go back to the Light and get more and more layers. I would say that my first experience was a "wonder child experience". It was wonderful. It was amazing. My first question when I was before the Light was "Are you God?" I didn’t believe in God at all. The Light is really, as I know now, the oversoul matrix of our system and the sum-total of everything we have ever been to this point. It is, itself, evolving as we are evolving, so the Light seems to know you. It knows you individually and discretely because your light is a direct part of it. I call it the Great Self. When I asked the Light "Are You God?" - and the light speaks to you in a way that you will understanding - the Light said to me "Who and what is not God?"

Wisdom: Since you came out of this experience, you have created some beautiful poetry. Were you a poet prior?

Mellen: Yes, I was an artist and a poet. I tell people that my experience is what happens when an artist/poet has a Near Death Experience. I often wonder what happens when a mathematician or an accountant has an NDE. For them, it may all be in the numbers. That’s the uniqueness of it all. Each of us is a different facet of a multi-dimensional experience we are having. There really is only One of us. Once we wake up to this, then we really understand what the ancients were saying "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you." That is yourself. How you treat yourself is how you treat other people.

Wisdom: Have you found that you now have a heightened ability to be a healing presence?

Mellen: I honestly believe and I understand that this is scientific now, that this is a natural ability in all living things to heal ourselves and others through our emissions of energy and thought. This can be explained in physics now, what they call psychic healing work. It can explained spiritually as well. I believe that everything from a grain of sand to a human being, has a frequency at the atomic level that emanatse life and regeneration. That’s why the ancients knew that certain stones when placed on certain organs would tend to bring the organs back up to normal and heal them. Humans can become very fine instruments for this kind of healing, because we have a brain that can focus. If you don’t have emotions, you can’t be a great healer. You have to feel love to create great power and so you find that some of the greatest healers have the greatest of compassion and big hearts and could put off a tremendous amount of energy which can be measured. I do believe that what most people say is a "psychic reading" isn’t really psychic at all, because it is mind reading. That’s of brain activity; like wireless communication. True psychic ability is at the base of our consciousness. Look at mothers and their children. I know when I was a kid, I wondered how my mother always knew what I was doing.

Wisdom: Why do we fear death?

Mellen: It’s what you could call "cultural hypnosis". It’s a function of the upper brain, mostly. It is a natural fear in that it seems to be a discontinuation of your story or path, which it really isn’t because you do continue on in different forms. If you talk to people, the fear of death is the fear of suffering or the fear of being abandoned and being separated by loved ones. The fear of death can be healthy because it helps you survive. It will only come about now, as wisdom rises on the planet, to understand that there is no death, really. Before my NDE, I was a rock climber and sky diver, because it was fun. After my NDE, I saw how valuable life is and how valuable being able to walk and think are. The thought of taking this gift that was given to me, which is life itself and hanging from the edge of a cliff or jumping out of an airplane to see what would happen, became silly. It was not a fear of death, it became a respect for life.

Wisdom: Is your intention to offer comfort for people as they face death - respecting it, but not fearing it?

Mellen: Yes. I have resisted putting out a book these many years. I’ve had offers yearly. My story wasn’t complete until now. I was told that it would be 20-25 years before my sharing would be of value to others and it has come to be that way. I was told never to sell my story. When a publishing company buys your story, you don’t own it anymore. They own the intellectual property. I have an agreement with the publishing company I am working with, that I own my story. I finally have found a publisher who understands my story.

Wisdom: I appreciate that you offer hope for the future that can shine brighter than the fears. That’s quite a gift.

Mellen: I was the last person to want to put up a website about me. From 1995 -2005, I gave up the whole thing and went into research and development. I didn’t answer letters or emails. I didn’t talk about the NDE at all. In that time, the story took on a life of its own. Why I put up my own site in 2005, I was getting letters and emails and by that time, the story had started mutating to all kinds of versions. My first website was called "The Real Mellen" and this is what really happened and that the other things were exaggerations at best. I get emails from people who tell me that the story has helped them or given them hope. That just humbles me. That is incredible and am amazed that the story has that kind of legs.