497. Peter Panagore

The Hell of My Own Making and the Oneness of Being

Summary: Two near-death experiences opened into a wide-ranging conversation about consciousness, shame, forgiveness, and the overwhelming presence of divine love. The discussion also explores lifelong mysticism, encounters with deceased loved ones and elephants, and how spiritual transformation can become a public and shared movement.

Questions This Interview Explores

• What do near-death experiences reveal about consciousness, death, and what continues after the body dies?
• How can intense shame, forgiveness, and love coexist in a transformative spiritual experience?
• Why do some people have mystical experiences from childhood, and how do they shape a life?
• How can unusual experiences with deceased loved ones, visions, or telepathy be understood without dismissing them?
• What does it mean to live as part of a growing global movement of spiritually transformed people?

Rev. Peter Panagore, M.Div (Yale) has had two near-death experiences, the first while ice climbing in 1980 and the second in 2015 due to a heart attack. He recounts these in his book Heaven Is Beautiful: How Dying Taught Me That Death Is Just the Beginning, an Audible Best Seller available globally in nine editions. His best-selling second book, Two Minutes for God: Quick Fixes for the Spirit, is a collection of original inspirational devotional stories, many of which he told for 15 years on a daily TV show reaching 30 million viewers annually in Maine and New Hampshire. Previously, he served as a United Church of Christ minister and pastor in Maine and Connecticut. He published 150 sermons and many prayers in Homiletics, a leading clergy journal. He now runs a global spiritual counseling service for “closet mystics” and travels nationally as a public and inspirational speaker and teacher. He has been practicing Zazen/Centering Prayer and Kundalini/KriyaYoga for forty years.

Website: peterpanagore.love

Discussion of this interview in the BatGap Community Facebook Group.

Transcript, summary, and key takeaways from this interview

Interview recorded April 6, 2019.

YouTube Video Chapters:

• 00:00:00 – Introduction to Buddha at the Gas Pump
• 00:04:31 – Communicating with Deceased Loved Ones
• 00:09:07 – Meeting the Telepathic Elephant
• 00:13:54 – Meeting the Little Elephant and Journeying through the Night Sky
• 00:18:40 – Born with a Mystic Talent
• 00:23:21 – A Spiritual Experience on the Appalachian Trail
• 00:28:38 – Near-death experiences and the monastery’s fire vision
• 00:33:00 – Angels, Elephants, and Divine Experiences
• 00:37:48 – Connecting to the Divine and Mysticism
• 00:42:22 – Ice Climbing Mishap
• 00:46:34 – A Desperate Descent
• 00:51:04 – The Ascenders Hitch and a Close Call
• 00:55:16 – Facing Death on the Edge
• 01:00:02 – The Infinite Darkness and Consciousness
• 01:04:47 – A Glimpse of the Infinite
• 01:09:37 – The Shame and Love in My Experience
• 01:14:24 – A Moment of Oneness and Absorption
• 01:19:43 – Coming Back to Life
• 01:24:17 – A Near-Death Experience and Its Aftermath
• 01:29:01 – Discovering Kindness
• 01:34:09 – Living in a Duality
• 01:39:03 – Seeking the Oneness Inside Myself
• 01:44:20 – Divine Experiences and the Oneness of Being
• 01:49:01 – The Perfection and Imperfection of Existence
• 01:54:16 – Seeing the Divine Presence in Everyday Life
• 01:58:42 – The Journey Within Multiple Levels of Heaven
• 02:03:10 – The Choice to Incarnate on Earth
• 02:08:17 – The Treasure of Love as the Reason
• 02:12:33 – The Role of Love in the Divine Experience
• 02:17:12 – Love as a Path to the Divine
• 02:21:12 – The Global Movement of Spiritually Transformed People