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returned. With the change Max had a sense of beings he had known long ago, who surrounded him with love and greeted him as if he were a dear friend or a relative now returned home.
    It was a state of quiet calm, euphoric yet still, gentle yet pulsating with joy—active and effortless movement without constriction of any kind—a sense of self, but without a physical body.
    And thus Max died.



Chapter Three
    Max Lives
    1965
    M AX DOFF MOVED ENTHUSIASTICALLY TOWARD THE TUNNEL of light.
    As he did, his floating consciousness was distracted by a series of loud noises, and his attention was drawn to a man flushed with emotion and fear. The man was speaking loudly.
    He was on his knees with his hands pressed against a body that lay on the floor of a small room. Max wondered why the man was so upset, then realized that the man was a doctor, and he was distressed because the body wasn’t responding to his words or attempts to resuscitate.
    Then Max saw that it was his own body that lay there. Disturbed by the doctor’s anxious state, he made a conscious decision to return.
    So, in a courageous act of selflessness, he turned away from the tunnel of light that offered what seemed a familiar and comfortable world and returned to the human drama of being Max.
    As he reentered his corporeal form, he opened his eyes, and the fear and panic subsided in Dr. Gray’s face.
    â€œI thought we had lost you,” Dr. Gray said, and he had no idea of the sacrifice Max had made out of compassion for the doctor.
    Yet the doctor’s pain wasn’t the only thing that had motivated Max. More than ever, he was propelled by something even bigger—by a mission of greater importance . . . and one that required him to live.
    Max still felt sick and was somewhat dazed from the experience of dying. He remained in the medical center another two hours under observation, and Jane stayed with him.
    â€œMom, you have no idea how beautiful it was to be out of my body,” he told her. “There were these light-beings, and they were full of love.”
    â€œI can only imagine what you experienced,” Jane replied, and she hugged him close. “It sounds a little like what I feel when I gaze at ocean waves, where I imagine each wave as a force of love and life.
    â€œBut tell me more about these twelve names you saw,” she asked.
    â€œWell, they were names I had never seen before, and some seemed to be in foreign languages. The only name I remember is the last one, which was a strange one—Running Bear.
    â€œEach name had its own specific color and vibration,” he continued. “And when they combined there was a full rainbow of colors and a symphony of vibrations. It was all so magical and wonderful.
    â€œDo you think I was supposed to remember the names ? ” Max asked, suddenly concerned that he may have missed a grand opportunity for knowledge.
    Jane reassured him.
    â€œThey may have no importance whatsoever, and even if they do, there’s no sense in allowing it to cause you pain. Just live your life, and see what unfolds.” She paused and looked into his eyes. “The world is wide and vast and strange, and you will never understand all that occurs.”
    With that she gave Max a kiss on the forehead, then a hug, and waited until Dr. Gray felt it safe for him to return home.
    ***
    Once the doctor was convinced that there wouldn’t be a repeat of his untimely demise, Max was released from the clinic.
    He took his mother’s advice to heart and got on with his life, continuing to shine in sports at school, gaining outstanding leadership skills in all activities and excelling academically, particularly in mathematics.
    However, his achievements came so effortlessly that he began to look for additional challenges, and with this in mind he applied for the School Year Abroad program to study in Spain. That country had long fascinated him, in part due to the influence of his