Divine Encounters Episode 054 | Near-Death Experience Story
Ruth Rousseau Clothier was 20 years old and seven months pregnant when, she says, she went into cardiac arrest on a cardiologist’s table and felt “love beyond anything.” In this Divine Encounters episode she tells Alex Ferrari about the one word she says she was given to carry her through the night, the sound and heart-centered teachings that followed, and what she says she has been shown about love and humanity’s future.
Key Takeaways
- Ruth says she had a cardiac arrest at age 20 while seven months pregnant, and that she felt love beyond anything and greeted her son’s spirit.
- She says she was told she could go back, but would need to repeat the word love and breathe, and that doing so would carry her and her baby through.
- She says she repeated the word love all night, even as her family and the medical team feared the worst, and that her son was born two months later.
- Ruth describes a later experience in which sound filled the whole universe, and she was greeted by the masters she now channels.
- She says she was told, “you will bring the human heart, the Sacred Heart, into humanity.”
- Ruth says the masters told her everyone is equal, and that humanity is returning to an innocence it has forgotten.
- Her practical message: “Love is a fluent movement,” and if each person says love six times an hour, you would be amazed.
| Guest | Ruth Rousseau Clothier |
| Episode | Divine Encounters 054 |
| Age at the time | 20, seven months pregnant |
| What Ruth says happened | A cardiac arrest on the table at a cardiologist’s office |
| What she felt | Love beyond anything, and the spirit of her unborn son |
| The word she was given | Love, repeated with breath work, all night long |
| Later experiences | A vision of sound filling the universe, a visit from a presence she felt was Jesus, and more |
| The message | Exercise your heart, practice love, and know that nothing is holding you back |
Before: Seven Months Pregnant at Twenty
Alex asks the opening question, and Ruth answers with a single moment. When she was 20 years old, she says, she was seven months pregnant with her son and went to a cardiologist’s office for an electrocardiogram. She had a cardiac arrest on the table.
The gynecologist, she says, felt the baby may have been cutting off the main artery. Because of her heart history, she says, there were five cardiologists in the hospital to greet her. They put her through every x ray. They thought she was going to die.
That night, she says, a priest came to give her last rites. The whole operating room was ready to take the baby. Ruth is clear that she shares this as her own memory of a frightening night.
Love Beyond Anything
Then, she says, she went over. At that point she felt “love beyond anything.” She says she even greeted her son’s spirit.
She was told she could go back. But there was a condition. If she went back, she would have to recite the word love, because she had touched love beyond anything and had never forgotten it. If she repeated just that one word and did breath work, she says, she was shown where it would lead. The baby would be born and everything would be fine.
The alternative, she says, was fear, which was very easy for her to fall into, because the operating room was ready.
If you are curious about how others describe this kind of encounter, our glossary entry on near-death experience is a gentle starting point.
All Night Long: One Word and a Breath
Ruth’s parents came in, thinking she was going to die, because the priest had just arrived. She asked the priest to leave. She wasn’t planning on dying, she says.
Then she did what she was told. She says she said the word love fifty million times all night long, and she just breathed. The staff rolled her over every fifteen minutes because the gynecologist wanted to be sure the baby was all right. She was on monitors and an IV for five days and in the hospital for seven.
She says everyone was convinced it was not going to work. She could hear them talking at their desk. She won’t make it through the night, she heard. And still, she says, she held to the word.
One part of her stayed with the baby, she says. She would not leave. But there was another consciousness that went over, and she met some of the beings she channels today. They gave her information so that, when she came back, she could use it.
It was, she says, a lot like what we learn in meditation. Breath work and quietness, without feeding the fear. Two months later, her son was born, and he was perfectly fine.
The Mother Aspect and Jesus
Ruth says that during that first experience she recognized Jesus on what she calls the mother aspect, in a couple of different ways. One was Mother Mary, and there were other energies she did not recognize at all. She says she knew nothing then, because she was a Catholic.
For her, the main lesson was the power of that one word, and it never left. She says love and the human heart are still the main part of the book she and her co-author have written.
Readers who want to explore the figures she mentions may enjoy our entry on Mother Mary.
A Song in the Car and a Walk Without Pain
Ruth says her relationship with sound began years later. She had many problems and was in a wheelchair. One day her son asked her to go to a potluck and asked her to sing a chant with him. She did not know what it was. He told her, Mom, it’s God within, and said she would love it.
They sang, harmonizing the whole way, forty-five minutes to get there. Ruth says that when she got out of the car she had no pain, and her legs walked perfectly. That set her on a path to find out what sound was, and she says no one around her knew.
She tells this as her own account. We share it that way, with no medical claim of our own.
She says it has been a journey ever since with sound, the human heart and breath work. She was part of a center called the Human Heart Institute, where she led the meditations and channeled. She says she was already verbally channeling in 1991.
A Second Crossing: Sound Fills the Universe
Ruth describes another experience in which she says she had taken an antibiotic and had a terrible allergic reaction. She went over again, and as she did, she heard sound. It filled the whole universe, she says, then came back with all harmonics, embraced the Earth, and went back up. She says she thought, wow.
She says she was greeted by all the masters she channels today, and by many more in the group. They showed her what is happening now, she says, and she was stunned. She recalls asking why she was singing this. She says she did not retain everything when she came back, and that learning it has been a process.
She places that experience in 1993. Then, in December 2020, she was sitting in meditation, and she says she saw and felt everything from that experience again, in detail. She asked why she was seeing it now, and she says the answer was: because this is now.
For background on the figures she says she works with, see our entry on ascended masters and the glossary page on channeling.
Chaos, Hope and a Rising Consciousness
From that day forward, Ruth says, they have been doing advanced meditations and writing more. She says she saw hospitals, fires, floods, earthquakes, tornadoes and arguments. She is not someone who follows the news closely, she says, and the chaos frightened her.
She says she asked why they were showing her this, and the answer was that there is hope and that beauty is coming. She says she was told that while we go through this time, an energy is also coming off the Earth, blessing it. We are meant to be rising in consciousness, she was told, and it is a mass event.
She says the masters told her, “no matter who you are, no matter what past lives you’ve had,” everyone is equal, and that she is exactly what they are. She just does not know it yet.
They have all lived on Earth, she says. They have taught in ashrams, walked as regular people and come back many times to see the human race in third dimensional reality.
The Innocence We Forgot
Ruth says they showed her that we are going back to something we had forgotten. At one time, she says, the Earth was balanced and free of negative emotion. She compares it to a newborn whose eyes sparkle and who sees everything as beauty.
“We are that innocence,” she says. Our whole essence remembers it. She describes it as another vibrational frequency, higher than now, and says we have drifted down into third dimensional reality. Our soul and spirit, she says, are gradually moving between this reality and higher ones. That is why people sometimes say they have lost a couple of hours.
She adds that this is not about putting blinders on. People who have embodied higher awareness still feel sorrow, she says, and she mentions that Paramahansa Yogananda wrote of his own grief. The practice is to hold both together.
Our glossary entry on Paramahansa Yogananda offers more background.
Exercising the Heart
The most practical part of Ruth’s message is about the heart. “You have to exercise your heart,” she says. Breath work is not sitting there. It is exercise. Sound with vibrational frequency exercises the part of you that moves, she says, and you begin to enjoy the growth.
She says it isn’t enough to learn to meditate. You have to learn to walk it into life, “to bring it into every step of your life,” so you are looking through a centered reality, not through the chaos.
Then comes the simplest instruction. “If each person would give out and say love six times in every hour, you would be amazed,” she says. “Love is not a definition. Love is a fluent movement.” If everything around you seems crazy, use your breath, a positive affirmation or the word love. Our guide to affirmations offers a few places to begin.
Meeting P.M.H. Atwater and the Roof Coming Off
Ruth traveled widely in those years, working with sound in physical therapy offices as far as Alaska and then channeling. She met P.M.H. Atwater at a science symposium, after someone told her she had to call her. Ruth says she had never admitted she had been through other experiences. Atwater put her arms around her, Ruth says, and told her she had had multiple death experiences and had better sit down and meditate.
Ruth then describes an experience between her death experiences. She was nursing one of her daughters in bed when, she says, it was like someone took the roof off the house. She was completely alive and did not leave the room. A phenomenal energy came and said, “you will bring the human heart, the Sacred Heart, into humanity.”
She says she asked who they thought they were talking to. She had never studied anywhere. She says one of the presences in the room was, she believes, Jesus, sitting on the bed, and a glorious voice said, my dear. Her whole body, she says, was radiating.
It was to bring the Christ energy, the heart energy, into the world, she says. She hopes people will come to understand it in time. She also says there is no perfect foundation of spirituality. You can bring your own, she says, and keep moving with it.
Nothing Holding Anyone Back
Ruth closes with a hopeful note. She says Jesus is on Earth a lot and nobody is aware of it. People in the Himalayas, she says, would notice the essence. In the regular world, they might not.
Her message to listeners is plain: “You can do this.” And, in her words, “There is nothing holding anyone back.”
For the broader picture, read our complete guide to near-death experiences.
Questions to Sit With
- Ruth says she was given one word to hold onto in the hardest night of her life. What single word would you want to hold on to?
- She says exercising the heart is like exercise for the body. What does your heart practice look like right now?
- Where could you bring a moment of stillness into the middle of the chaos around you?
This week, choose three moments in your day and quietly say the word love, with one slow breath each time. Notice what shifts.
Spiritual Takeaways
- Ruth says love is something you touch, not just something you think about.
- She says breath and one repeated word kept her out of fear during the hardest night.
- She describes sound as a doorway to the heart and a source of healing.
- She says everyone is equal, and that we are returning to an innocence we forgot.
- She says meditation must be walked into daily life, one breath at a time.
Please enjoy my conversation with Ruth Rousseau Clothier.
Guest Links: Connect With Ruth Rousseau Clothier
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Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Ruth Rousseau Clothier?
Ruth Rousseau Clothier is the guest of this Divine Encounters episode. She is a channeler who says she has had multiple death experiences, beginning at age 20 while she was seven months pregnant.
What happened to Ruth at age 20?
She says she had a cardiac arrest on a table at a cardiologist’s office while seven months pregnant, felt love beyond anything and greeted her son’s spirit.
What was Ruth told to do if she came back?
She says she was told to repeat the word love and do breath work, and that if she did, her baby would be born and everything would be fine.
How long did Ruth repeat the word love?
She says she said it fifty million times all night long while doctors and family feared she would not make it. She was in the hospital for seven days, and her son was born two months later.
Who did Ruth meet in the afterlife?
She says she met some of the beings she now channels, recognized Jesus on the mother aspect and Mother Mary, and greeted her unborn son’s spirit.
What happened with sound in Ruth’s life?
She says that after singing a chant with her son in the car, she had no pain and her legs walked perfectly. Later she says sound filled the whole universe during another experience.
What did Ruth see in December 2020?
She says she sat in meditation and re-experienced the details of a death experience from 1993, and that she was shown hospitals, fires, floods, earthquakes and arguments, along with a message of hope.
What does Ruth say the masters told her?
She says they told her everyone is equal no matter their past lives, that they have all lived on Earth, and that we are returning to an innocence we forgot.
What is Ruth’s simplest practice?
She says to repeat the word love as often as possible, at least six times every hour, using breath, affirmation or sound.
Who is P.M.H. Atwater in Ruth’s story?
Ruth says she met P.M.H. Atwater at a science symposium, and that Atwater told her she had been through multiple death experiences.
Is a near-death experience proof of an afterlife?
Next Level Soul shares near-death experiences as lived experiences told in the person’s own words. Researchers continue to study and debate what they mean. Nothing here is medical advice or a medical claim.
Keep Exploring
- The complete guide to near-death experiences
- What channeling means
- Who Mother Mary is
- P.M.H. Atwater on what thousands of NDEs revealed
- Annette Bricca, a psychic, on her NDE
- Alysa Rushton on returning with ancient wisdom
- Mariko Frederick on hidden realms and life between lives
- Lorna Byrne on being told by angels to go back
- Browse more free masterclasses and the Divine Encounters podcast.
Follow Along with the Transcript
Alex Ferrari 0:00
Tell me what your life was like before you died.
Ruth Rousseau Clothier 0:08
When I was 20 years old, I was seven months pregnant for my son, I went to a cardiologist office for electrocardiogram, and I had a cardiac arrest on the table. The gynecologist felt as though that that was from the baby cutting off the main artery, but because of my heart history, there was five cardiologists in the hospital greeting me, because they put me through every X ray. They thought that I was going to die. That night, they had the priest came out to give me last rites, and they had the whole operating room ready to take the baby. And when I had this I went over, and at that point, I felt love beyond anything. I even greeted my son's spirit. And I was told that I could go back, but if I went back, I would have to recite the word love, because I touched love beyond anything, and I never forgot it. And if I would repeat the word, just the word love, and do breath work that it would I was shown where it would go, and the baby would be born, and everything would be fine. If I went into fear, which was very easy for me to get into, because they had the operating room ready. My parents came in thinking I was going to die because the priest had just come in, and I asked the priest to leave because I wasn't planning on dying. And I said the word love 50 million times all night long, and I just breathed. They rolled me over every 15 minutes because they that's what the gynecologist wanted to make sure the baby was all right. But they have the all in all monitors IV for five days and seven days in the hospital. They were convinced that it was not going to work. One part of me was staying with the baby. I mean, I wouldn't leave it, but there was another consciousness that went over. I met some of the ones that I channel now again, and they gave me that information so that when I came back, I could take that and utilize it. So it was really like we learned with with meditation, where you use breath work and you just sit in quietness. It was not feeding the fear, because the fear was outrageous. I mean, they were convinced. I mean, they were talking out in their desk about it, and I could hear them. You know, she won't make it through the night, all this kind of stuff, so. But all I learned from that was that the power of the word love, and it never, ever, ever left, and it's still the main part of our book, is the human heart and and love. It was Jesus that I recognized on the mother aspect, probably in a couple different ways. One was Mother Mary, and just all these other energies which I didn't recognize him I knew nothing because I was a Catholic. So after that, you know, was two months later, the baby was born, and he was perfectly fine, and everything was wonderful, but I'd like to share something with you that brought sound. First started with sound. I was just into a wheelchair. I had many problems. I dragged away everything. My son had asked me to go down to a potluck, and we brought my daughters. I had, you know, four children, and my boys were older. My daughters were young. And we got into the car, and he said, Would you please sing this? Sing Omar ash, Dubai, with me. I didn't know what? Oh my gosh, goodbye was I had no idea, you know. He said, Well, Mom, it's God within. And he kind of knew me, you know. And so he says, he said, you'll love it. So we started singing. We were harmonizing all the way down, 45 minutes to get there. Got out the car, and I had no pain. My legs walked perfectly, so that set me on a destiny to find out what sound was, and no one around knew. So I was getting information from them. It's been, it's been a journey with sound, human heart breath work. Ever since those I was with a center that was called the Human Heart Institute, and I was the teacher I channeled. And, you know, I was the one that led the meditations. So I was already channeling at that time. I was verbally channeling in 1991 so it was, it was interesting. When I went over, I had taken an antibiotic for UTI, I had chronic bladder infections, and so I took it. I had been allergic to antibiotics before, so And of course, I got a terrible allergic reaction. And I went over, and as I went over, I heard sound, and it filled the whole universe, and then came back with all harmonics and embraced the earth, and then went back up again. And I went, wow. So I was greeted by all the masters that I that I channel, that I know right now, but then there are so many more that are in the group, so they showed me what's happening now. And I was stunned. I mean, I'm sitting there going, Whoa, okay, guys, why am I singing this? And so then I went on a journey to see what would how things would come about, not that I retained everything when I came back. I'm not saying that it was, it's been a process for me to learn it when they would give it for. Worth. But they showed me all of this, and then it didn't happen. When that was 1993 then in 2020 and December 30, I was sitting in meditation, and all of a sudden I saw and I felt everything I had felt in that death experience, in detail. And I said, Why am I seeing this now? And I said, because this is now. I sat there with tears. I thought, What are you talking about? I thought it wasn't going to come about. I thought it was with ease. You know, we kind of went through all this, and we already went through it, and they said no. And then from that day forward, we've been putting through advanced meditations and going into more depth and writing more I would see hospitals. I saw fires, I saw floods. It was just earthquakes, tornadoes and and then arguments, just, I'm not one that's very heavy into all of what's going on in the world in the news, but I got to see the chaos that was going on, and it frightened the living daylights out of me. I thought, why are you showing me this? And they said, because it's time to get out, and it's time for people to understand that there's hope, that there's actually beauty going to happen, and it and it depends on what what they told me, and I guess they could tell it to you better than I could, but what I got explained to me is that we were going to go through this time, but at the same exact time, there's this whole energy coming off from the earth, just blessing the earth, because we're supposed to be rising in consciousness, and it's a mass thing. And they said, No matter, they told me, no matter who you are, no matter what past lives you've had, no matter what everyone is equal, and you are exactly what we are. You just don't know it. You know, I still bow, but you know to them, but you have to understand that they are. They've lived here, and most of them, all the ones that I'm really putting forth with the book, I think now I'm not sure if they're mixed with other ones, have all lived on this earth. They all know what it's like. They've all experienced it. They've taught in ashrams, they've taught in different places. They've walked as regular people. They've come in many times to really see the human race in the third dimensional reality. They showed me that we were going back to something that we had forgotten, that the Earth at one time, was balanced, and that it was free of emotion, of negative emotion. So we were regaining, you know, when a baby is born and how they have innocence and their eyes sparkle, and they they see everything as beauty. Well, that's what their message was. Is we are like that. We are that innocence. We are that part of us that are, that our whole essence remembers. We just have forgotten it that was a long, long, long, long, long, not in history. I don't think we'll ever find it, because it was another vibrational frequency. It was higher than it is now. So we've digressed into the third dimensional reality. The third dimensional reality is what your where to feed her on.
It's still living in the third dimensional reality. Your soul and your spirit are gradually moving and fluctuating between this reality and higher realities. And that's that's when, I don't know if you've this one, these two have experienced it, and other people have been calling her, I just lost a couple hours. And, you know, so it's that time frame. You didn't really lose it, but you were moving into different, different vibrational frequencies. And so what mother always says, And I will say it for her, because she didn't get to say it, you have to exercise your heart. It's like when you do breath work, it's not work. It's not sitting there, you know. It is exercising the breath work. And that's what this one does with sound. Exercises, the breath work with vibrational frequency, you exercise that part of you that moves, and you start being able to enjoy the growth that you're having. I'm not saying that people don't need to meditate, but once you learn how to meditate, you have to learn how to walk it into life, to bring it into every step of your life, every breath, everything so that you're visualizing through a centered reality, not through the chaos. You see the chaos. If you watched a person who was ascended in there, they came into embodiment and their teaching, they see everything. There is sorrow at times. I you know if someone dies, or you know, you know that from the writings of Yogananda, he had had grief. Those things are there, but you learn to do it with the two together. So it's not that we're saying, put blinders on. Don't look at anything. We're saying. If each person would give out and say love six times in every hour, you would be amazed on what would happen justice. Repeat the word love as often as possible. Repeat the word love. Love is not a definition. Love is a fluent movement, so which means, if you're standing there and you are looking. Everything around you seems to be crazy, then use your breath work. Use a positive affirmation. Use the word love. If everyone would do that, or as many people as possible, this energy would go out. And you are a collective. You're moving into Unity more than you think you are. That's why we're able to speak right now. We are moving into a higher frequency of reality, and you just trust you understand and you give allowances. Back then I was a full conscious, you know, full channel, and we had a group, and I would travel different places. I traveled all over to Alaska and worked with people in physical therapy offices with sound, and then I would channel, and it was accepted by different groups of people. I met PMH Atwater at a Science Symposium, and I had talked to her on the phone because someone said, you have to call her, because I have my third one. I never admitted that I had the other two, and I didn't know. And so I met her, and she put her arms around me, and she said, Honey. I said, What? What? And she said, you've had multiple death experiences and so many experiences, you better sit down and meditate and ask. She's wonderful. I gave I was not booked for a lecture and my table, I had called them, and they said, Yes, Ruth, we have someone that that we have a we have a booth for you. You can put your book and you can put your music there. And I said, Okay, we arrived, and it was right in front of the big doors. It opened up, and then they would come out, and they'd say, Ruth, could you just leave the booth with your husband and come in and give a talk? And I said, Sure. So, you know, it was accepted back there, you know, with the science symposiums, and you know, there was drum below when, you know, I met cry on one time when I was just starting out. I didn't even want to talk to him. I said, you have to go talk to him. I shook his hand, and a crowd of people came and I went, I'm out the door, so I've gotta, I've gotta contact him some time and say, No, I would really like to meet you. Between my two death experiences, my ex husband, at the time, was very much looking into everything. I mean, he was, you know, it was every Christianity, every Buddhism, he turned gray if he meditated. And he left for meditation class, and my son went to Aikido. And so I brought the girls up to put them to bed, and I was sitting in the bed, nursing, and all of a sudden, and the only one that could ever describe this is, PMH Atwater. I don't understand it. It was like someone took the roof off the house, but I was completely alive nursing. I knew, I mean, they must have planned it, because I knew I was right there, and I didn't leave the room. And this phenomenal energy came and said to me, you will bring the human heart, the Sacred Heart, into humanity, and have them understand that the heart is much more expansive, and in the future, people will get to understand it. So it was how the heart, I'm not scientists. I no idea what they were talking about. And they said, You will bring this into the world. And this was before my second death and the third death experience. And I went, who do you think you're talking to? I'm sitting there going, Are you crazy? And so I said, Can I can I go around ashram then can I go and learn? No, I've never gone anywhere to study, you know? And and so it's just it was remarkable. And my husband came home, and I told him, and he said, Oh, great. I go and meditate all my life, and you sit there, and this great, big, wonderful and it was like all I can say to you is some of them had come in the room, and I do think one of them was Jesus, and he was sitting on the bed. But this voice came through, and it was like this positively glorious revelational voice. I mean, it just in there went, my dear, and it was just beautiful. My whole body was radiating. And I'm just sitting there going, and I've never forgotten it. And then all of a sudden it closed up, and that was it. So it was to bring the Christ energy, the heart energy, into the world, is really what it was, and that there would be a time where people would understand it was glorious. There's no perfect foundation of spiritualism. It is for some people, and you can bring it with you, but I guess what people are teaching out right now, I think they're getting into it more, is that you have to learn to be consciously aware. You can take your own spirituality and keep on moving with it, because it's good. Many of us come back and forth. Jesus is on the earth a lot, and nobody is aware of it. In the Himalayan Mountains, people would know it. They would see me, you know, they could see that, that essence out in the world. It sometimes, you know, out in the regular world, people wouldn't even notice us. We love the Earth, and we would love to see it go back to what it was, and I guess that's what all of our messages are to people. You can do this. There is nothing holding anyone back.
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