But the professors were telling me, “This is
who we are.” It was a very odd, and somewhat disconcerting,
experience . . . And it certainly  caused me to have a second thought—to do a
double take—on what was really going on here. NEALE: Interesting. How interesting. How does the body remain pliable enough to dissect it? I mean,
wouldn’t it just get, like, rigor mortis? DR. COOPER: They do preserve it in some way that makes it easy
to disse ct, although I’m not sure the exact chemicals they use, or
how they specifically go about the embalming process. I do know, from experience, that they drain the blood out of the
body and repla ce it with something that hardens, like plastic, so it is
much easier to dissect that way . NEALE: I’m almost sorry I asked that! How did you remove such
memories from your mind, and allow your mind to get back to, you
know , seeing people in their real form, without imagining all of those
memories? I mean, I’m too sensitive; I wouldn’t be able to deal with that for
five minutes. DR. COOPER: Well, the professor did ask me in the first session,
“Are you going  to pass out? Do you need to sit down?” It is quite a
shock to be exposed to this sort of thing! And it’s true that I would go through my life after a lab session
—say we just looked at the lungs—and I would be thinking so much
about people’ s lungs. I guess that’s a weird way to walk through the
world, but I’d be thinking and imagining people’ s lungs  as I was
talking to them, because it was such a strong memory in my mind. But overall, I really just didn’t believe  what they were teaching
me in that lab—in the spiritu al sense—so I don’t think I took it too
seriously . To me, it simply illustrated that I was connecting with my
family , my loved ones, and every single person whose path I
crossed, at the level of energy . It confirmed the existence of
something beyond the physical . To me, it made that crystal clear . NEALE: The body is not by any means the sum total of Who W e Are . You are very lucky to have gained that insight at such a young age. There are a great many people who don’t ever get that
“knowing,” that deep unders tanding, in their entire lifetime on the
planet. DR. COOPER : This was the first occurrence in my life that really
placed the question in front of me: If we are not our bodies, then who
are we? It was, in effect, the beginning of an exploration of exactly what
we talked about earlier— the intersection of physicality and spirituality
—and understanding the link between the body and the soul.And Neale, I would like to share one more story that adds to
this one, which made my understanding even deeper . It was the first
open-heart surgery that I attended—a coronary artery bypass
surgery—which is when someone needs the arteries fixed around
their heart. What caught my attention with this surgery is that it’s an
operation on the heart— one of the most vital organs in the body . It’s
not like the patient has just broken a leg or something, and we have
to fix it. The heart is one of the things that we would view as most
crucial to keeping us alive. I mean, without a beating heart, who are
we? So I was intrigued about this surgery from the moment I walked
into the room. I vividly  remember standing in the operating room and helping
out the anesthetist, who was putting the patient “to sleep” for the
operation. And one thing that struck me in this moment  is that, in
order to put a patient “to sleep”—most people don’t know this, but we
have to paralyze their muscles. Because if we’re going to put a
breathing tube in, and their muscles are not paralyzed, they will
reject the breathing tube. That is, they won’t relax enough to let it in. We also don’t want the patient to reject the surgery , or to “fight back”
(as their muscular reflexes will counteract what the surgeon is trying
to do), so this is another reason that temporary paralysis  is needed
before making the first incision. We then bring the patient’ s state of consciousness all the way
down to what one might call a “drug-induced coma.” What this
means is that when the patie nt is undergoing surgery , they are not
actually in the state of “sleep,” where one might have dreams orother relatively  active patterns of brain activity . Rather , if we were to
measure the patient’ s brain activity on an EEG (an
electroencephalogram), it would show a pattern equivalent to being
completely unconscious and comatose.2
Also, when the patient “wakes up” from the surgery , assuming
that the anesthetic was administered correctly , they will have total
amnesia around it; that is, they will have no recollection  that the
surgery ever took place, save the remnant wounds of the operation. If this all soun ds kind of like “science fiction,” don’t feel alone. This is exactly how I felt when I was present in the room, observing,
as a young medical student. But it is real. And it is remarkable . Getting back to this patient, he also could not breathe for
himself (since his muscles were paralyzed), so we had to “breathe”
for him using ventilation techniques. And furthermore, because this
particular surgery involved the heart, his heart was no longer beating
while we worked on it. Instead, he was attached to a
“cardiopulmonary bypass machine”—tubing that carried his blood
and circulated it around and oxygenated it, performing the functions
that the heart and lungs normally do.3
So here I was, standing in the operating room, with the patient’ s
blood being pumped in tubes that stretched around the room—no
beating heart,  no functional lungs, no active memory , his brain
activity depres sed to the level of someone who is comato se, and his
muscles paralyzed. I remember thinking to myself in that moment,
“Oh, my gosh,  if this doesn’t cause us to question Who We Are?”; if
this doesn’t cause us to take a double take on “What is life?”, then
what would?Take away our heart, our brain function, our lungs, our muscles,
and Who Are W e? So the biggest thing I learned from these experiences in
medical school is that physicality and spirituality are not separate. Our physical selves, clearly , to me, are nothing  without that constant
and eternal link to the spirit ual energy , and this became evidently
clear to me in those moments. NEALE: So what you’re saying is that there is an energetic
component to life that animates all of physic ality. An Essential
Essence. And, thinking through what I’ve just heard you say, obviously
what they’re doing in the operating room is . . . they’re applying
substitutes for the mechanisms of the body . And they have a
substitute for the heart, which  substitutes for the heart’ s mechanism,
a subst itute for the lungs, and so forth. But the Essential Essence
must be remaining with that body—otherwise it would be a cadaver . Because there is no substitute for the fundamental energy of life
when that energy of life is no longer flowing to the body , and that
fundamental energy is not flowing from any machine. DR. COOPER: That’ s a good way of looking at it! NEALE: So how does this relate to a person who is not under
sedation, and walking around living a normal life? DR. COOPER:  Well, to me, how I took that and applied it to my own
everyday life—obviously not under sedation—is I thought to myself:It is clear , without a doubt, that there is this spiritual energy that
animates our physical presence, which can’t be substituted for . It is also clear  that we don’t see it as such, generally . Most of
humankind does not see this remarkable tool that we have! Conversations with God talks about the eternal link we have to
God, and with this comes the idea that spirituality can help us in
times of challenge or hardsh ip or struggle. And yet ironic ally, when
we find ourselves in times of challenge, hardship, or strug gle, I have
observed that much of huma nkind will resort to “physical” solutions
to the problem and not even consider a spiritual point of view . For me, when I started to see before my very own eyes that this
spiritual presence always accompanies us, it made it less of an
esoteric concept and more of a real down-to-Earth thing. I began to
embrace the idea that not only is this “spiritual presence” with me in
every moment of every day , it actually is Who I Am. And if it is Who I Am, then it must be able to be used as a
wonderfully assistive tool in my toolbox of how to walk through my
life. NEALE: So if this Spiritual Energy is Who We Are—if that is what
you’re telling me—then how come it automatically leaves the body if
the heart stops functioning? What is the reason—what is the connection—when the heart
stops functioning? If there is no substitute mechanism, no machine in
an operating room keeping things going . . . you’re on the street hit by
a car and you can’t get to the hospital fast enough, and there is no
substitute functioning for the heart—the heart just stops beating—it’s
over. Then this “presence” you are talking about, this life force,leaves you, presumably. So the spiritual aspect of Who You Are
appears to be dependent on the physical mechanism of the body in
order to remain with the body. And when the physical mechanism fails—that is, when the
heart stops beating—then the spiritual essence apparently has no
choice but to say: “W ell, take care of yourself, we’re out of here. Bye-
bye!” And the Spiritual Essence leaves. So the question becomes, “What comes first, the chicken or the
egg?”
Does the spiritual essence make a decision to leave, at some
level of spiritual functioning, and is that what causes the heart to stop
beating if it doesn’t have a substitute mechanism? Or, does the heart
stop beating first, and then the spiritual mechanism says: “Well, if
you’re not going to keep beating, I’m out of here!”
And what comes first, the chicken or the egg? And the questi on is posed in reverse, or course, at birth. In the
first moments of life. And by the way, this is a question that doctors
have been debating and society has been debating for several
thousand years: When does physical life begin? Does life as we have defined it begin at the first beat of the
heart in utero; when the fetus  is in the mother ’s womb and it’s just an
inert mass of cells, until the first heartbeat and then suddenly , one
presumes, we say it’s alive!? Or, do we say it’s not alive until it’s
actually been given birth, until it actually exits the mother ’s body? So the Intersection between physicality and spirituality seems
to me to be where it’s at. And we have to pose the question: where
do the physical and the spirit ual energy intersect . . . and in a sense
collide.I once wrote a little booklet called Heart Start, Love Start  with a
maternity ward  nurse who wanted to address the question, When
does life begin ? At the moment of birth, or at the moment that the
heart starts in utero? Or, even before then? Medical science now says it’s when the embryo becomes
“viable.” And “viable” is unde rstood to mean that the embryo is able
to live by itself outside the womb. But, spiritually speaking, one could, and many have, argued
that this is not true; that life does not start when the embryo
becomes viable and is able to live outside the womb. Life begins
when a body exists inside  the womb, at the moment the heart has
started beating. “Oh, oh,” the doctor says. “Oh, oh, I hear a heartbeat!” You
know , the baby’ s heart has started beating. And somewhere
between four and six weeks of gestation, one suspects, the heart
starts beating. And I have been intrigued for fifty years by the
question: Why does the heart suddenly start beating? Who turned
the switch? And, for that matter , who turns the switch off? DR. COOPER: Yeah, it’s a fascinating question, the age-old question
of when does life begin, as well as the question you asked before
that: is spirituality in fact dependent on physicality for its expression in
this world? I want to divert for a minute here, Neale, and then get back to
your question. What I’d like to chat about for just a moment is genetics . . . branching into some new scientific discoveries around somethingcalled epigenetics  (which is basically the expression of our genes . . . and we’ll get to that in a minute). Anyway , basically we have an entire genetic code, and every
single cell in our body has the encoding for the entire body held
within it. That is, the DNA of each cell is identical, and the only
difference between different types of cells is which part of the genetic
code is “active” (or “turned on”) and which part is “inactive” (or
“turned of f”). The DNA (or genetic code) of a hair cell, to give an example, is
the same as the DNA of a heart cell, a liver cell, or any other cell in
the body . But each of these cells has “chosen” (early on in
embryonic development) to express itself in a certain way, which
results in the unique characteristics of each of them. This process is called “stem cell differentiation”—which you
explained very well at your last retreat. NEALE: Thank you, doctor . I was trying to impress you. (Laughs.) DR. COOPER: What I really want to focus on here is epigenetics —
which is essentially the ability of any individual cell to modify its
expression in subtle ways over the course of a person’ s life. Cells no longer undergo major changes after the initial
embryonic developmental stages are over—in other words, a heart
cell is not suddenly going to become a liver cell—but they do
continue to undergo minor changes all throughout our lives. In fact,
our cells are continually modifying their genetic expression every
hour!So the genetic  expression within any given cell at any given
time is not “fixed,” as many people think it is. It is not a static thing . Rather , it is continually adapting to both external and internal stimuli
—meaning that it adjusts to the environment and to any changes in
the surroundings, as well as to any changes within the body itself. What’ s interesting about this is that there was a groundbre aking
study released by Dr. Richard J. Davidson in 2013 in the Journal of
Psychoneuroendocrinology  talking about the “epigenetic effects of
meditation” on the body—me aning that actual changes can occur  in
our genes  as a result of mindfulness and meditation activities! 4
When I read this study it immediately grabbed my attention , as I
thought:  Here is real live proof that spirituality can impact our day-to-
day on-the-ground physical lives! There was evidence right there on the page of this Intersection
between physicality and spirituality that we have been talking about. The study compared a control group of non-meditators to a
group of exper ienced medita tors who were instructed to engage in
eight hours of “mindfulness activities” and, after only eight hours,
there were already measurable genetic changes! These changes
included reduc ed expression  of inflammatory and pro-inflammatory
genes, and reduced production of stress hormones such as cortisol
as a result of altered genetic pathways. The other interesting thing is that, prior to the eight-hour
experiment, the genes of both the control group and the meditation
group were evaluated and found to be equivalen t. That is, the
meditation group did not start out with an “advantage”; rather , the
benefits of meditation came from doing the activity itself.Anyway , it illustrates the profound link between our spiritual
selves and our physical selves, for if our genetic expression can be
changed in eight hours by a meditative/mindfulness experience,
imagine the impact our “spiritual energy” can have on the body over
an entire lifetime. So returning to your questio n, Neale: if a person dies of their
heart attack, is this just too bad for their soul, so to speak ? Do they
just have to move on and their body is “giving up on them”? I don’t think so. Extrapolating from studies such as this one, I
would suggest  that the body “giving up” is not done without the
spiritual part interacting and contributing in some way to that
process. It may not be done at a conscious level, but I think the soul
is involved at some level , whether the person is consciously aware of
it or not. I think the body and the soul are intimately linked to one
another , and that such incidents would occur in concert with the
agenda of both. NEALE: Interesting thought. And it reflects, absolutely , the
information we were given in HOME WITH GOD in a Life That Never
Ends. In that final book of the CwG  nine-book dialogue series, we
are told that no one dies at a time or in a way that is not of their
choosing. Difficult as this is to believe at a purely physical, human
level, we are invited in CwG  to consider the possibility that nothing
can happen to us—that is, to our body or mind—that is not done in
accordance with the soul. If we are truly Individuations of Divinity , this would have to be
true, unless we concede that something can happen to God, or toany of God’ s Expressions, that is not Divine. There are only two conclusi ons we can reach about Divinity
and Humanity: that the two are intrinsically separate, or intrinsically
united; that Divinity and Hum anity are One Thing, or that Divinity and
Humanity are two things—a nd that all of life, for that matter , is
comprised of physical manifestations quite apart and separate from
God. Conversations with God tells us: “All things are One Thing. There is only One Thing, and all things are part of the One Thing
there is.”
It is that basis  upon which all else that is contained in the
3,000+ pages of the CwG  nine–book dialogue is based. But let’s get back to your discussion of stem cells. You appear
to be suggesting, as a doctor, that stem cells differentiate at the
behest of the Spirit. As you said, the mind—or the person ’s state of
being , as you desc ribed in the meditation process—can have an
influence on one’ s genetic and cellular expression. So it seems to me the same  thing could be happening in an
embryo whose stem cells are in the process of differentiating. The
embryo’ s energy , which could loosely be defined from a spiritual
point of view to be its Essenti al Essence, may also be demonstrating
its choices genetically and cellularly , and that this could happen prior
to the first heartbeat. If those embryonic cells are moving and
combining and forming and differentiating, then life does, in fact,
happen prior to the first heart beat. Because before the first heartbeat
—in the first three to four to five weeks of the embryon ic tissue’ s
existence in the womb of the mother—bodily parts are being formed.Indeed, the heart itself is being  formed! It doesn’t beat before it’s
been formed. Which means that there is decision-making activity at some
level—that cells are differentiated by some process that begins
before the heart starts beating. Which invites an extraordinarily fascinating question: When
does life actually  begin? Is Life Itself, in fact, part of the cellular activity of the sperm  and
the egg when they join together from the father and the mother , and
is it, therefore, a fact that there’ s not an end or a beginning to life, but
just a transfer  of it? Could it be that life (the movement and decision-
making of cells) simply transfers its intelligence from one life form to
another? Is it possible that the tissue—the cellular mass— created by
the mother ’s egg and the father’s sperm joining togeth er to form
embryonic cellular existence , is not the beginning of “new” life, but
simply a continuation  of life, in yet another form, with no “break” in
the line of energy of Essential Essence? Is it possible that life doesn’t really ever begin, but that it merely
continues? And isn’t it interesting to think in those terms that we are,
as we’re sitting here on this telephone talking, the continuation of life
from the very, very beginning of physical expression, thousands and
thousands and thousands of years ago!? DR. COOPER: That is an incredible thought. I think you could be on
to something here, Neale. I wouldn’t be shocked if that’s what
science ends up proving a few years from now . I think it’ s a remarkable thought . NEALE: It requires life to be “pass-on-able”—but then, obviously , it is
pass-on-able, because here we are, the descendants, if you please,
of the very first human beings. Life, through the process of evolution,
has created human beings, and we are the descendants of a never-
ending transfer of Essential Essence, Divine Intelligence, that has
always existed, and always will exist, in physicality . But what about the cadaver? Well, if life is defined as motion , and if you were to slice open a
cadaver and examine it at the cellular level, even though the body is
presumably dead you would still see motion  at the sub-molecular
level. This means that life never ends, but merely changes form. Put under super ultra high microscopic examination, subject to
the most powerful magnificat ion, you would not see inert cells, their
atoms and submolecular particles simply standing still. The energy
that is animat ing the individual cells in the cadaver will still be
moving. That energy , that Essential Essence, not just frozen . Life as we know it may have ended, but Life Itself will have not. DR. COOPER: I agree. And I think it would be even easier to
understand if we imagined what would happen to a body in the
natural world, rather than the artificial environment of a cadaver
being dissected on a laboratory table in medical school. If a human being passed away and the body was left in a forest
or in the wood s, and it disintegrated, then presumably its process of
disintegration would fuel the growth of other things. As
Conversations with God says, all life sustains life through the
process of Life Itself.So thing s that are so-called “dead organic material” are in fact
growth factors, or substrates, for new life. And if one were to look through a high-resolution electron
microscope, one would indeed see movement , as you said—but this
movement would serve a highly specific and valuable purpose,
which is to fuel the emergence of other life forms . NEALE: So it’s not really a process of disintegration, it’s a process of
integration. DR. COOPER: Y es! NEALE: The corpse that lies in the woods, in the forest, and
ultimately “disintegrates” doesn’t really “disintegrate” at all—it
actually integrates . Or, if you please, re-integrates, and becomes an
integral part of the never -ending process and express ion of life,
simply in a different form. DR. COOPER: Exactly! I would agree. That is a beautiful way to put
it—it feels so complete. And wonderful, really . Like “death” is not so much of a death, but more of a never-
ending cycle of existence furthering the propagation of life in a brand
new way. And perhaps our understanding that life never ends can
facilitate a much fuller , richer  life, because it has been said that our
fear of death is directly proportional to our fear of life—of living fully . NEALE: Yes, and I think our fear of death is really a fear of losing our
sense of Self, of losing the present form in which our life is
expressing. In HOME WITH God in a Life That Never Ends I asked God,
“What is death?”, and God replied: “There’ s no such thing as death
as you have imagined it. What you call death is merely a process of
re-identification.”
So it turns out that life never , ever ends, but merely changes
the form of its expression. DR. COOPER: I like that idea. NEALE: And the smallest part of you re-identifies in certain ways. In
the analogy of the burning log in the fireplace, God asks, “Has the
log disappeared, or has it merely changed the form in which it
expresses, from wood, to flame, to heat, to smoke, and light?” The
log has not disappeared, and the ashes in the fireplace are but the
tiniest percentage, just as the cadaver is but the tiniest percentage,
of the original physical expre ssion. The cadaver is analogous to the
ashes of the log in the fireplace. It is 0.05 percent of the life
expression called a “human” that we can still see. DR. COOPER: That’ s such a perfect comparison. NEALE: Y es, it is for me. Like the log’s energy , which leaves its ashes behind—“ashes to
ashes, dust to dust”—the human being leaves behind the tiniest
percentage of what it was, and the grandest percentage goes on asother forms of energy . It simply expresses in different ways in the
ultimate universe of physicality . Interesting. Interesting. We need to explore this further and see where it takes us.Chapter Three
 
BEYOND THE BODY:
The Process of Creation
 
 
DR. COOPER: Y ou know what I couldn’t stop thinking about this past
week, Neale? NEALE: What’ s that? DR. COOPER: The Intersecti on of physicality and spirituality . It’s just
so fascinating to think about. I would like to start by saying that there was a very specific
reason I brought up those medical examples last week—everything
from dissecting the cadavers  to the open heart surgery to the idea
that we can “change our genes” with such simple things as changing
our thoughts and our perceptions. I mean, they are remarkable
stories, but on top of that there is a much more importan t reason I
brought them up. And this is because, to me, they are a powerful
illustration of this Intersection between physicality and spirituality that
we are talking about here. Conversations with God talks about the “three levels of
awareness”: hope, faith, and knowing. I would say that many people
hope that they are more than their bodies—more than their physical
existence here on the planet. And many people hope that thespiritual messages delivered by countless teachers across the globe
can be true in their lives. But many people do not necessarily
experience this. That is, they may say their “positive affirmations”
and try to believe that things will work out in their favor , but the
events and outcomes in their lives may not seem to confirm that this
is true for them. What I learned through my experiences in medicine—and
perhaps most powerfully of all, in seeing the dead cadavers—was
that I came to the knowing (not the hoping, but the knowing), that this
“spiritual presence” is, in fact, Who I Am. And as I said previously, if it
is Who I Am, then it must be able to be used as an integral part of my
day-to-day experience—a fundamental tool in the process of creating
my life. So this experience allowed me to move from hope  to faith to
knowing about the fact that my reason for coming to the planet is in
fact a spiritual one —and that every single thing that occurs in my life
can be used to serve the Agenda of my Soul. And I think that the
point of intersection  is when the day-to-day living of our lives
becomes a down-to-Earth physical expression of the spiritual beings
that we are. In other words, when the body  becomes a vehicle for
the soul, just as the soul uses the body as a means to express and
to demonstrate who and what it really is. Is this correct? What are your thoughts, Neale? I really have not been able to stop thinking about this. I mean,
it’s exciting. And empowering. And it just makes so much sense . NEALE: Let’ s talk about two things.First of all, yes, that is true—we are larger than our physical
bodies. This is why the word  metaphysical is used. Meta, meaning
“larger than,” or “greater than.” So we are, in fact, meta- physical
creatures. And nothing, I’m sure, would bring that more dramatically
to one’s consciousness than seeing a cadaver , or, for that matter ,
seeing a person on an operating table undergoing open heart
surgery . So I can see how that would be very striking and very
dramatic and very clear and present evidence that we are meta -
physical and not just physical. But let’s get back to hope , faith, and knowing . The question that
comes before anyone who’s having a difficult time moving from hope
to faith to knowing is, “What are we hoping? What are we having
faith in? And what are we knowing?”
It’s difficult for people to move to a place of knowing if what they
are trying to know is that everything that they are desiring to
experience in their life is going to happen. And that it’s going to
happen, furthermore, in precisely the way that they have thought to
make it manifest. I think there’ s a danger in the New Thought Commun ity of
believing in the Power of Personal Creation to the degree that we
begin to feel that if something has not been made manifest in our
reality , as we have sought to cause it to be, that we have somehow
failed, that we have become “Spiritual Failures.” That we’re not
“doing it right.”
It would be a mistake, I think, for us to assume—for people to
assume, much  less to actually believe—that what they wish to see
manifest in their lives, what they fervently desire to produce as
outcomes in their physical reality , will occur without a doubt.If people believe that it will occur without a doubt, should it not
occur , they will then begin searching deeply for the reason. Why
didn’t it occur? And again, to repeat myself, they will no doubt make
themselves wrong—I’ve seen  metaphysical students do this—they’ll
make themsel ves wrong. “Well, I must not be doing it right.” Or,
worse, they’ll go to a place of “This is all hogwash. I should have
known from the beginning it was too good to be true!” So they’ll
throw the baby out with the bathwater . Because they don’t fully
understand the process of manifestation, and what it is that we are
trying to know . Through my 71 years on this planet I have come to under stand
that what we are well-advised to seek to know is not that whatever
we call forth and whatever we command of the Universe will
magically show up in our lives, whether it’s that new red convertible,
or the perfect life mate, or the exact income that we need, or any
other occurrence or miracle that we are seeking to creat e. Not that
that outcome will occur without fail in our lives, but rather , what we
are well-advised to know is that the right and perfect outcome —
whatever it is— will occur . Those are two entirely different things. And most of the New Thought Teachers do not teach what I’ve
just said. Rath er, they try to convince people that if they can move
from hoping that something will be made manifest, to having faith
that something will be made manifest, to knowing  that something will
be made manifest, then it will be  made manifest. Even if it should be
not in harmony with the Agenda of your Soul. To use my own life as a partic ular example, a couple of times in
my life—three or four times, actually—I have earnestly wantedparticular things to occur . I think two or three of those four times had
to do with my career . I absolutely had the talent to become a nationally syndicated
newspaper writer. And when I was working for a local newspaper in
Annapolis, Maryland, I watched people in the newsroom being
offered jobs at larger newspapers—at the Baltimore and Washington
major metropolitan newspapers—and one person was even offered
a job at the New York Times. He went right from our small paper
straight to the big time. And I couldn’t believe—not that these others
had gotten the offer—I mean fair enough, God Bless ‘em— but that I
hadn’t . And that they were, in a sense, passing me by. Especially
since I had fervently hoped that I would one day get to be a reporter
for the New York Times . I was a young man then, in my twenties,
and I thought I deserved to have that kind of a break. It didn’t
happen . The second time that I had that experience was when I was a
talk show host on the radio and, likewise, I felt that I should be able
to rise to the ranks of the best and highest paid and most widely
known radio talk show hosts in America. The left wing version of the
right wing guy, Rush Limbaugh, and I could be, you know , his left
wing counterpoint. But I never got that opportunity , either . And I could speak of other opportunities that didn’t come to
fruition in my life. But the point I’m making now is this: at 71, I
realized that if any of those  things had occurred, I wouldn’t be here
now. So what I’m clear about is that my soul takes a very clear-eyed
look, if I could put it in human terms, at what it is that my mind is trying
to manifest. And if it’s not in harmony with what my soul is awarewould be a perfect physical manifestation, given my soul’s
individualized expression—given the possibilities, I should say, for the
most dramatic and powerful individual expression of my soul’s
agenda (which has nothing to with a specific occupation, but with a
state or states of Being)—if it’s not in harmony with that, the energies
in my life will work against that occurring. But I noticed that as soon as I began doing things, and even
hoping for things, that served  the highest expression of the state of
being that reflected my soul’s agenda—that is, as soon as what my
mind and heart wished for and sought to make manife st fell into
energetic harmony  with my soul’s knowing of the highest possibility
—everything fell into place. I mean, literally , everything fell into place! I sent a book to a publisher , and the odds of a totally
unpublished, unheard of author sending a book to a publisher with
the unbelievable title of Conversations with God— talk about
pretentious!—the odds of a publisher saying, you know , “We gotta
get this thing out, this guy’s talking to God!”. . . you’ve heard me say
this in my speeches before, but the odds are one in a million—much
less that the book would be published and begin selling so quickly ,
so rapidly , that within weeks of its publication it was on the New York
Times  Bestseller List, and stayed there for two and a half years . So
everything began falling into place, and it’s been falling into place
ever since. DR. COOPER: Yes, I know. So, Neale, I have a question about this . . .You talk about your soul taking a very “clear-eyed look” at the
circumstances in front of you to determine how it could best serve its
agenda moving forward. Many spiritual people would pose the question, “Is there a
larger plan in place for us before we get to the planet? And, in
moments such  as these, is our soul ‘redirecting us’ toward  some sort
of ‘larger plan’?”
 
NEALE: My understanding is that the answer is no. There’ s no
“larger plan,” in terms of an occupation or career . No larger plan
that’s been put into place for us, in the sense of: butcher, baker ,
candlestick maker. Our souls do not say, “You will be first baseman
for the New York Yankees, you’re going be a civil rights attorney in
Alabama, and you’re going be a doctor in Canada.”
No. That kind of a plan does not exist, in my understanding. The metaphor that I was given in Conversations with God is
that we are given the paints on the palette that we choose from
lifetime to lifetime. That is, aspects of Divinity that we wish to
express , if you please . Purple, green, yellow , blue, red. But we are
not told how to paint the picture of our lives. So the canvas  is ours, on which to paint the picture that we
choose to paint. We have Free Will in that regard. But we are given
the paints. So in this particular lifetime, it’s pretty clear the gifts I’ve
been given—what’ s been “put on my palette”—and also the
challenges that have been placed before me. Patience, and so forth. So all the colors were put on my palette, but God does not say,
“This is what you shall paint, and you will paint it. It has to be a
meadow , with the sun in the upper right corner , an orange flower inthe lower left, and a tiny child off in the grass in the distance.” So no,
there is no plan. DR. COOPER: I get it. So, when your soul “corrects course,” so to
speak—because you mentioned opportunities that you felt you
should have had, based on your skill level, in writing and in radio talk
show hosting that did not pan out—are you saying that you can see
now, in retrospect, how perhaps this diversion was serving the truest
expression of your soul’ s agenda? NEALE: Not necessarily the truest expression of my soul’s agenda,
Everyone’ s soul agenda is identical. It wasn’t my soul’s agenda that I would be the writer of a
bestselling series of spiritual books. Everyone’s soul agenda is
identical, that’s made very clear in The Only Thing That Matters. So
it’s not my soul’s agenda that we’re talking about here, but the best
qualities, the energetic expression, that would most easily and rapidly
and most powerfully facilitate the placing into the world of my soul’s
agenda through a particular avenue that would allow me to
experience certain aspects—certain colors on my palette—that I
came here to experience. To explain this more fully . . . I’m sure that
two of the colors on my palette that I wanted to experience are
wisdom and clarity. I’ve talked about this often. DR. COOPER: Yes, I get that  . . . But Neale, I’m still stuck on one
point. You mention that those paths you were interested in pursuing,
be it in writing or in radio talk show hosting, did not pan out as you’dhoped, and that—if I heard you correctly—that this relate s to it not
being the optimum avenue to express those qualities (of wisdom and
clarity , among other things) that your soul has come here to express
in this lifetime. So how does your soul know that that’s not what you should be
doing? How is it that those opportunities—you know , one might say
they “failed to come to fruition,” in the way you initially hoped they
would—how does that relate to your soul “knowing” what you should
be doing? NEALE: Oh! Not what I “should” be doing, but what I have an
opportunity to do—“this” as opposed to “that.” How does the soul
know anything? The soul knows everything. How do you know when you meet a person, that this person
would be good  for you? How is “love at first sight” possible? How
does the soul know anything? How do the mind and the soul
combine and work together to come to an intuitive unders tanding of
anything at all? The question is larger than, “How does your soul know that a
career choice may not be the best?” How does your soul know , “No,
no, no—don’t turn left, turn right here. I promis e you, just turn right. ”
So you make the right turn, in a strange city that you have no
knowledge of, but you just have a hunch, and sure enough, that gets
you exactly where you wanted to go. And everybody in the car
applauds and says, “How did you know that?” And you say, “I have
no idea how I knew that. I just felt like I needed to turn right and not
left at that last corner .”How does the soul know anything? Big or small. Important or
not important. And the answer is the soul, of course, knows
everything. There’s nothing that’s unclear to the soul. So when the
soul became aware of the mind’s choice to become a syndicated
radio talk show host, the soul said, “You know what, you can do what
you want! Be a syndicated radio talk show host if you want to. I’m not
going to stop you.”
So the soul doesn’t get in there and intervene and stop things
from happening. It’s not like the soul directs the activi ties or the
outcomes of your life. But the energies that the soul transmits move
through the body and the being—the three-part being that we are—
in such a way that they are not the most harmonious with the
energies that are incoming that offer us opportunities to step into a
particular relationship, or occupation, or even live in a certain part of
town, or in a certain house. Things just don’t “feel” right. Things don’t
“fall into place” easily . How many people have been house hunting and they walk into
a house that they have found that is available and they walk in and
they just turn around and they walk right out? And the real estate
agent they’re with says, “Whoa, whoa . . . you didn’t even look at the
—”
“I don’t need to. I got as far as the living room and that’s as far
as I needed to go.”
How many people—let’ s get even more miniscule in our
examples—how many people go into their closet to pick out the
perfect outfit for this important dinner , and they put it on, and they get
as far as the front door , and they put their hand on the doorknob, andthey say, “You know what? I can’t do it!”? And they go back upstairs
and completely change their outfit! DR. COOPER: So it’s about the energetic harmony . Is that what
you’re saying? NEALE: Yes, that’s a wond erful term. It is about the energetic
harmony . It’s about the energetic signature that feels to be more “in
harmony” with the highest expression that the moment allows,
making possible the completi on of that portion of the Agenda of your
Soul that is presenting itself right now . DR. COOPER:  How would one know that they are using the moment
in a way that optimally serves the Agenda of the Soul? NEALE: The answer to your question is that they would know by the
relative ease with which things are occurring. DR. COOPER: Hmmm. NEALE: That’s why most spiritual philosophers say, “Don’t push the
river.”
 
DR. COOPER: Yes. “Row, row, row your boat, gently down the
stream.”
 
NEALE: Do not get out of the boat and start pushing the river! When
things are not “in the flow,” pay attention to that. And don’t insist onhaving “your way.” Rather, watch life resolve itself in the process of
Life Itself. The soul does not, and never will, stand in the way of any
choice your mind wishes to make. But the soul can, and does, pave
the way for that which is more in harmony with the agenda that you,
yourself, set when you came into this lifetime. To use our “palette” metaphor . . . let us say that the soul put a
lot more green paint on your palette—tons of it—and very little beige
or red or yellow. There’s some there, but not a bunch. That’s because
the soul’s agenda is for you to use green this lifetime more than any
other color. (Again, this is a metaphor. In my case, in terms of Qualities of
Divinity—the “colors” of God—I am clear now that I had decided, at a
soul level, to experience and express Wisdom and Clarity at a high
level in this lifetime. That’s a brave thing for me to say here, because
it’s very personal to my experience, and may sound even a bit
arrogant to someone hearing it outside of the context of this
conversation, but I’m going to say it out loud anyway, in order to
clarify the point I’ve been making here.) So now, using the framework of the above metaphor , you can
see that I would not be prohibited  from using my colors to paint a
canvas with a cityscape full of buildings and skyscrapers, but that it
would be a lot easier  for me to paint a picture of an open grassy field
leading into a forest. Given the “paints” on my palette, my soul could see that radio
talk show host, or New York newspaper writer , was not what I had
the most harm onious energy  for. My soul did not stop me from, orget in the way of, these career opportunities. It was just a matter of
what was more in the Energy Flow . What was easier for me to do. Life will always  “go with the flow.” What comes easiest  to us is
sometimes what we call our “natural talents.” I had a talent for radio,
yes, and a talent for journalism, too. But the biggest color on my
palette made it easier for me to paint a dif ferent picture of my life. And so our mind’ s opportunit y in life is to, in a sense, get out of
the way! Get our miniscule mental desires to be a famous talk show
host, or a big city newspaper writer , off the table. DR. COOPER: Got it! NEALE: And sometimes we can’t get it off the table until we notice
that it’ s not easily happening. Or, that it’ s not happening at all. So, the Spiritual Master is the one who notices what’s
happening and what’ s not happening. And agrees with it all. That’ s
what caused Byron Katie to give us all the advice she offered in her
fabulous book, Loving What Is. DR. COOPER: I read that book. It’ s wonderful. NEALE: That’ s the whole point of the book! The whole point of the
book is to watch what’ s happening, and to stop arguing with life. DR. COOPER: You honestly make things sound so beautiful, so
simple, so perfect. As does Byron Katie! I would like to touch briefly on a video interview of yours that I
watched, Neale . . . one that addresses the Process of PersonalCreation and the Law of Attraction. You talk about how so many of us seek to manifest external
things —and you reference the New Age movie The Secret, which
shows people trying to “attra ct” the new sports car in the driveway ,
the new bicycle for the child, or the diamond necklace for the bodice. And the focus of almost the entire movie is on external materialistic
things! I love how you say, “If we supposedly hold this incredible power
to attract anything into our lives, why wasn’t even one minute—not
one minute—of a nearly ninety-minute movie spent on attracting the
things that really matter? Like world peace? An end to suffering? A
better me?”
You point out in the video that there are plenty of people who
have the external manifestations—be it the perfect job, the perfect
mate, or the perfect house— and who are still sad as hell. And you
go on to say that “there aren’t many unhappy people walking around
who are demonstrating patience, compassion, wisdom,
understanding and love.” It just doesn’t happen. So the most powerful message I took away from this video—if I
understood it correctly—is that the Law of Attraction  is not so much
about manifes ting things exterior  to ourselves, but rather about
demonstrating qualities interior  to ourselves. In other words, it is
about showing  up in the world in such a way that who we are being
becomes the richness and the treasure that we previously sought to
experience through material possessions and accomplishments. NEALE: I agree with all of that, and I would add, however , as a post-
script to that, that the two are not mutually exclusive.That is, one does not have to eschew , or step away from, or
abandon, any of one’s exterior physical world ambitions, hopes,
wishes, or dreams. I believe that the approach that will make us
profoundly happy is the one that you’ve just described,  where we
seek to demonstrate the highest and best within us with regard to
how we express our humanity in the world at large, and our State of
Being through that process. But I don’t think that the two manifestation technique s are
mutually exclusive. That is, I think it’s perfectly okay to visualize and
seek to create, as well, certain physical world outcomes. But the
Master is the one who does it without attachment to results, who
doesn’t require particular desires to be made manifest in the
particular form or shape that has been visualized or envisioned—or
for them to be made manifes t at all—in order to be happy , joyful, and
content in life. The Master is the one who says, “This, or something better .”
 
DR. COOPER: What a way to live! And in a sense who you are
being  actually magnetizes certain exterior-world outcomes in your
life, doesn’t it? Yet my understanding is that the internal must precede the
external . . . NEALE: “Seek  ye first the Kingdom of God, and all else shall be
added unto you.”
 
DR. COOPER: And as you said, Masters, it seems, are able to move
through the world in a way that maintains detachment from results ,such that whatever happens they understand is not only okay, but
actually in their best interest. NEALE: Precis ely. And that is why I said, several minute s ago, that
hope shifts to faith, and faith leaps to knowing, when what we have
come to know is that every outcome is perfect; that perfection is
being made manifest in and through our lives in every moment,
however it is appearing . And that, given Who We Are as Spiritual
Entities, anything other  than perfection would be impossible. Nothing
that happens to us is imperfect in any way. Peace arises out of
seeing and embracing this immutable truth. I notice that was one of the major spiritual principles in the very
first book, in the very first couple hundred pages of the 3,000 pages
of the Conversations with God dialogues. Book One offered us three
words that I will never forget. They struck me when I saw them the
first time. “See the perfection.”
Peace comes from seeing the perfection. DR. COOPER: That’ s beautiful. Those three words. NEALE: W ell, they changed my life. And not that I practice it all the time, because there are times
when I simply get into my “local self,” my “smaller self,” and I don’t
see the perfection of what’ s going on right now. I can’t figure it out. But there are also times when I do—or rather , when I stop trying  to
“figure it out” and just accept it as true—and those times are
increasing, experienced by me more often these days than not.Interestingly enough, some people think of me now as
sometimes being detached and dissociated from what’ s going on
around me, because I don’t get into the “dramas” of life nearly as
much as I used to. I still do now and then, but not nearly as much as
I used to. So people say, “Well, he’s getting older , and he’s become
more ‘detached’.”
Well, it’s not my age, I don’t think. It’s just that I’ve finally come
to clarity—I could have come to this clarity when I was 33 as well. You don’t have to be 71 to get here, it just took me that long—but I
have come to the clarity that seeing the perfection  of whatever is
occurring is a profound pathway to peace. But even more  than that, even more than a pathway to peace, it
is as well an extraordinarily effective tool in manifesting the next best
physical expre ssion in my exterior world. Because then I do not
become one who is resisting  what is occurring. You see, “What you resist persists, and what you look at
disappears. That is, it ceases to have its illusory form, and we see it
for what it really is.” Ah! The perfect opportunity for me to announce
and declare, to express and fulfill, to become and to experience Who
I Really Am. So I say , Thank Y ou, God. And I move from anger and frustration and resentmen t and
resistance to gratitude . Actually , to gratitude. DR. COOPER : You often say the best prayer is one of gratitude in
advance that the perfect solution is already on its way . NEALE: Yes. My favorite prayer is: Thank you, God, for helping me
to understand that this problem has already been solved for me. I
have used that little prayer many times in my life. But it always doubles back to: What am I doing here? What is
my purpose for even being alive? So what we hope  for, and what we have faith about, and what
we come to know , is that each moment of our life is co-created by
the lot of us, and placed before each of us individually in the perfect
way, allowing Divinity itself to be made manifest through us, and to
be observed through the singular and collective experience of
humanity . So when we talk about the connection between physicality and
spirituality , we notice that the point of connection between them is
the point where  the agenda of both is identical. That’ s when we know that the “physical” us and the “spiritual”
us have made a connectio n. It’s when the agenda of both is
identical. DR. COOPER: Thank you for that, Neale. Earlier you were talking abou t how we will “know we are on the
right track” when we feel that sense of energetic harmony . That is,
when the path we are on seems to flow a little more easily, if I could
put it that way . So just to make this applicable to us in a day-to-day , on-the-
ground kind of way, are you saying that we will know we have
reached the “point of intersec tion” when we begin to feel that sense
of ease  in our lives—as oppo sed to a sense of anxiety , or stress, or
the subtle feeling that something is a little “of f”?Are you saying that when we hit this point we will exper ience
smooth sailing? For the most part, anyway . That perhaps, at last, we
will begin to truly see the perfection? Is this how we will know? NEALE: That’ s one sure way to know . Another way that we know ,
that I know , is when I feel selfless . That is, when I take myself out of
the picture. And I move towar d, and invite the Universe to provide for
me, the highes t and best good for all concerned. And when I remove
myself from the scenario, and wish for, or pray for, or hope for, or
have faith in, or know  that the highe st and best good for all will be
served. That’ s the second way that I can find inner peace within me. I simply take my personal desires, my personal hopes, wishes,
and dreams, off the table, except to the degree that they serve the
highest good for all concerned. And I’ve done  that a numbe r of times in my life. I’ve actually
made the prayer , I’ve actually said to God, “If it serves the highest
good for all concerned, may this happen.” Whatever the particular
thing was. And you know , I can recall a number of key points in my life
when I invoked that prayer , and suddenly all the tension, all the
stress, around  the particular circumstance that I was involved in
melted away . It just melted away as soon as I took myself and my
own personal desires out of the picture. And I am reminded of—not that I am a saint about it—but I am
reminded of the words, which I thought of later . . . not before, but later
. . . I’ve realized, Oh my gosh, that’s exactly what Christ said! In thegarden of Gethsemane he said: “Father , would that this cup pass
from my lips. Y et not my will, but Thine.”
And in that moment he released all opposition to anything that
was happening, and found a place of peace within once again. DR. COOPER:  What powerful words! It reminds me of the book The
Only Thing That Matters, which comes to the simple, yet profound,
conclusion that the only thing that matters is what one desires. Yet
this comment must be interpreted with careful attent ion to the
spiritual nuance, for worry it may be misunderstood. This is because
it is not referrin g to the small  personal desires of any individual ego,
but rather to the larger One. It is in this sense that the only thing that
matters is what One desires. NEALE: That is, what God desires. God being the “One” that we are
talking about. DR. COOPER: And in truth, We Are All One. This is, in fact, the most
fundamental message that the New Spirituality is seeking to convey
to today’ s people. That everything is One Thing . And that we are all
part of the One Thing That Is. In considering the words “what one
desires,” we are, in fact, considering the sum total wishes and
desires of All of Humanity and, more broadly , of All of Life. So it seems to me that we can cease opposing the moment
when we understand that whatever is occurring is occurring precisely
because it serves the Larger  Agenda of Life. That is, all things align
with “what one desires,” and it is simply a matter of shifting oursmaller person al desires to be in alignment with the larger desires of
All of Life. NEALE: Capital O on the “one” . . . what One desires . DR. COOPER:  Absolutely! And the more years I spend immersed in
your work, Neale, the more I have started to know and to deeply
understand that what serves me is what serves others. That is, my
personal fulfillment has beco me less and less about my individual
story , and more and more about how it serves the larger  agenda of
people, in alignment with the concept We Are All One. This is why I seek to no longer work solely as a phys ician,
despite the fact that many people would view that as a “successful
career path,” with nothing to question or change. But I am compelled
to do something different . . . Something that, for me, resonates
more fully with what I want to contribute to the planet. And that is to of fer healing not just physically , but spiritually . . . To be a doctor not just of the body , but of the soul . . . And to care not only about my individual soul, but abou t the
soul of all of humanity . The soul of the planet. And the soul of life—
which is essentially facilitating the expression of God through every
one of us. I mean, with the degree to which you have changed my life,
Neale, how could I not deeply desire to do the same for others? NEALE: That is excellent. But let me add something here, if I may. I
know what you mean, I have a sense of where you are coming from,
when you say that you seek to be a doctor not just of the body , but ofthe soul. But just so that readers don’t become confus ed, let me
make it clear to everyone what I know is clear to you—that the
human soul does not now , and will never , require “healing.”
A “doctor of the soul” would not, therefore, care for the soul, but
would care about the soul, just as you have said. I think it’s important
to make that distinction. Because you care about the soul—not just
the soul of individuals, but as you’ve expressed it, the soul of the
planet, and of life—I see you doing things in the future that offer an
individual’s body and the mind, our planet, and life itself, what one
might call “Soul Medicine.”
A Phys ician of the Soul can be a brand new category of
humans who create a whole new level of well-being. Your job will be
to bring  the consciousness and the awareness of the soul to the
whole human being. It will be to not only describe  where spirituality
and physicality  meet (which many members of the traditional clergy
attempt to do), but to produce that outcome, to generate that result,
metaphysically , as an experie nce and not merely a theory , in Life as
lived by members of our species. And so, doctor, as a Physician of the Soul, bring to everyone
whose life you touch the wonderful words of Rumi, the 13th century
Sufi mystic:
 
Wherever you stand, bring the soul to that place.Chapter Four
 
DOCTORS AND DEATH:
When to Resuscitate? DR. COOPER: As someone also in the traditional medical
profession, there is something that I think is key for us to address in
this book: our fear of death. We just finished talking about the Process of Personal Creation
and getting “in the flow of life” in terms of being on a path that is both
more peaceful and more in alignment with the life we are seeking to
create. Yet I think one of the biggest things that can hold us back in
the process of creation is our fear of death, and our general
unwillingness to address and explore it as a culture. This is why I found it so empowering and so freeing to have
had that experience in the cadaver lab. Because I had the
opportunity to see, before my very own eyes, that we are so much
more than our bodies. And this knowing  enabled me to truly live in a
more spiritual way. For when we are afraid to die, I believe  we are, at
some psychological level, equally afraid to live . NEALE: There is no doubt about that . DR. COOPER:  So what I would like to ask you about, and talk about
here, is: How can we effectively move past our fear of death? Arethere some practical suggestions for people around this? Having witnessed so much around life and death in my work in
the hospital, one of the gifts I received is that I have almost ceased to
doubt that something wonderful—the next grand and glorious
opportunity—will present itself at the time of our “passing.” I just have
an intuitive trust that there is so much more going on here than what
meets the eye. Imagine someone who is blind, and has been blind since birth. If we did not tell them about all the things they were missing out on
seeing, they would have no idea such things even existed! Similarly ,
if someone were born deaf, and we didn’t describe to them the
beautiful sound  of an orchest ra, or the melodious trickle of a stream,
or the majestic  crash of ocean waves, or the sweet sound of their
loved one’s voice, they, too, would have no idea what they were
missing. Scientifically , we believe that we have five senses, and we
assume that these five sense s encompass all there is to experience
about life. Yet when one of these senses is missing, we miss out on
a whole world of experienc e. And we would not know we were
missing out on it unless others told us about it. So to me it is clear that there is more to life than meets the eye. And I believe that death does not by any means imply an ending, in
the strict sense  of the word, but rather a new beginning upon which
we have chosen to embark as the next phase of our Soul’ s Journey . My “academic upbringing,” however—having been “raised” by
the medical profession, so to speak—has surrounded me with the
viewpoint that death is the worst outcome; that we are to seek to
avoid death at all costs. And that, in the absence of an AdvanceDirective, we would rather keep people alive well past the point
where their body is “functio nal.” That is, their quality of life may
arguably be not worth living for, but we would rather keep them alive
than accept death as the outcome. And something just seems so
wrong to me about this. NEALE: Brit, I know I’m not answering your main question, but I
have something important I want to say here. The doctor should not be the one to make that decision. So what I want you to know is that the medical profes sion’s
insistence that, in the absence of an Advance Directive, life shall be
the primary priority is exactly correct. No doctor in any operating room, or in any procedure
whatsoever , should have the moral authority , or the spiritual
authority , to say, “Well, you know what, death is just as good as life
in this case, and their quality of life may not be hardly any good at all
if we resuscitate this person,  or find some miracle way to keep him
alive. So let’s just let him die. Because, in my judgment, I’ve made
an assessmen t that he’d be better off dead.” That should  not be an
assessment made by a physician, or someone other than the person
or his or her representative. So the problem is not that the doctors and the medical
profession are biased in favor of continuing life. The problem is that
when the person is alive and aware enough to make their own
decision that they no longer choose to continue living in a certain
way (having had their lives saved by a doctor), they are not given the
authority over their own life that the doctor  would have over their life. That is, they are given less authority once they get out of theoperating room  and decide, “You know what, thanks for saving my
life, but I don’t want to live this way for the rest of my life. I want to
die.” They have less authority than the doctor had! Doctors get to make life or death choices in those moments,
but the patient does not. So the problem is not that the doctor is choosing life, and doing
everything the medical profession can bring to bear in order to
continue a person’ s life. That isn’t the issue! They should , rightly ,
continue a person’ s life in the absence of an Advance Directive,
precisely so that the person involved could make their own decision
about whether they want to live or die with a reduced quality of life—
or at least have their medical or health care representative,
presumably someone close to them, make that decision. After doctors do the best they can to keep the person alive (and
supposing they’re successful and the person survives, even though
their quality of life is greatly reduced), then they can say to that
person, “Do you choose to continue living this way? Or, do you
choose to do the thing that we call on this Earth ‘die’? Do you
choose to end this particular physical life?”
And if that person says “yes,” then doctor-assisted suicide
should be permitted. And the very same medical profession that
saved that person’s life should be able to permit the person or his or
her representative to choose death. Because the reason we’re saving
the person’s life in such critical moments is to give them a choice! Not
that we, as doctors, or more broadly as a society, are going to make
the choice for them. So we rightly should  keep them alive, to preserve the choice for
them , to let them  decide  what “quality of life” they feel is sufficient.Once they’re fully revived and fully thought-functional (or have
representatives who are), then we should say, “Do you want to live in
this iron lung for the rest of your life? Do you want to live paralyzed
from the neck down for the rest of your life? Do you want to live with
a feeding tube? Do you want to live with a colostomy bag? I mean,
how do you want to . . .” And if the person says, “You know what, I
don’t want to do this, I’m out!”, then the same medical profession
should say, “Fair enough. Can’t blame you a bit. And here, take
these pills and fall into a gentle sleep tonight, and we’ll remove your
body in the morning.”
So that’s where the problem is. We don’t give people—
individual human beings—the authority over their own lives that we
actually give doctors over those lives. But if I’m in an operating room and I don’t have an Advance
Directive that says, you know, “No unusual efforts should be made to
keep me alive”—if I don’t have an Advance Directive . . . you’re
doggone right, I want the doctor to do what he can to save my life! I
don’t want him or her to assume that I would rather die. It’s not her
choice to make. It’s mine! So I want the medical profession to bring all the mirac les of
modern medic ine to bear to keep me alive. Then I get to say, “You
know what,” to my family and my loved ones, and to my doctor , “I’m
going to choose to die now .”
Like that lady in the news recently . I forgot who she was, but
she actually announced publicly—she told the papers and the news
media—the day of her death. She chose the day and the time, and
she and her family had their celebration, and she said goodbye to
her loved ones, then took the medication and slept into her death. DR. COOPER : Yes, I know the story .
Where_God_and_Medicine_Meet-_Neale_Donald_Walsch.txt
Summarize the following text section accurately and concisely. Maintain specific details and numerical information, and use anti-repetition mechanisms:

        But the professors were telling me, “This is
who we are. ” It was a very odd, and somewhat disconcerting,
experience. And it certainly  caused me to have a second thought—to do a
double take—on what was really going on here. NEALE: Interesting. How interesting. How does the body remain pliable enough to dissect it. I mean,
wouldn’t it just get, like, rigor mortis. DR. COOPER: They do preserve it in some way that makes it easy
to disse ct, although I’m not sure the exact chemicals they use, or
how they specifically go about the embalming process. I do know, from experience, that they drain the blood out of the
body and repla ce it with something that hardens, like plastic, so it is
much easier to dissect that way. NEALE: I’m almost sorry I asked that. How did you remove such
memories from your mind, and allow your mind to get back to, you
know, seeing people in their real form, without imagining all of those
memories. I mean, I’m too sensitive; I wouldn’t be able to deal with that for
five minutes.
The examples illustrate the intersection of physicality and spirituality, showing that life is not limited to the physical body.
What is the significance of the medical examples Dr. Cooper shared?
Dr. Cooper emphasizes the importance of understanding that life is not limited to the physical body, and that we are more than our physical selves.
What is the main point of Dr. Cooper's discussion on the connection between physicality and spirituality?
Dr. Cooper suggests that one must shift from hoping to faith, and then to knowing, and that this is crucial for understanding the true nature of life and one's purpose.
What is the key to moving from hope to faith and then to knowing, according to Dr. Cooper?
Dr. Cooper and Neale discuss the concept of a "Physician of the Soul," who would not only heal the physical body but also guide the soul to make choices that align with the larger agenda of life.
What is the main idea behind the concept of "Physician of the Soul"?
The author believes that death is not the end, but rather a new beginning, and that the soul does not "stop" when the body dies, but continues to evolve and grow.
What is the author's view on the concept of death?