It's been many years since I read this book, but it had a big impact on me, and my spiritual beliefs. I read the Egyptian Book of the Dead, as well, but I was less inspired by it.

The Tibetan version would be better titled "The Book For the Dead", for it is written explicitly to help people through the trying period between death and rebirth. It is traditionally read to people upon their deathbeds, and shortly after they die, in the hopes that they hear and remember the instructions to guide them through the afterlife.

I remember that a goodly portion of the book is devoted to describing in great detail, various monsters, demons, beings and landmarks that one can expect to encounter during the time of death. This impressed upon me the cultural specificity of the book. I seriously doubt that Americans who have never once heard a Tibetan legend, fairy tale or religious myth, would encounter the same beings ... but rather, I expect we create our own demons to haunt us in the afterlife.

But apart from the Tibetan-centric nature of the descriptions, I felt a strong affinity for the general subject of the book, which was, roughly, that after death, you will be lost and confused in a strange land, beset by one frightening being after another, and gradually you will forget who you are, as this strange world slowly overwhelms you until, in terror, you happen to leap into the next comforting shell you come across ... a new baby.

With practice, meditation and study, you can, however, enter the afterlife fully conscious and aware of yourself, unafraid of the illusory beings around you, and calmly choose your next incarnation -- or not, as you see fit.

Maybe it is all just one more fictitious religious treatise to keep the masses malleable, distracted and compliant ... maybe. But it resonates with truth for me.

I agree that it's compelling. Why does it ring true for you?

Past life memories.

I actually don't remember anymore. At the time I read it, I had the distinct impression that I was reading the distilled knowledge of first-hand accounts. Now, I only remember that feeling, not the points that impressed me. Could well be that I was biased and predisposed to believe it at the time.

At the same time in my life, I was reading and studying a lot about Eastern philosophies and religions, particularly Buddhism (the Tibetan branch of Buddhism is called "The Short Path", because a sufficiently dedicated student might attain enlightenment in as little as 40 or 50 years).

I was also studying and practicing out-of-body and astral projection. One way of learning to leave your body, is by learning to dream lucidly (a lucid dream is one in which you realize you are dreaming, stay asleep and in the dream, and can then control the dream any way you like ... more or less).

That particular goal led me to, among other things, the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Tibetan Buddhist monks practice a more advanced form of lucid dreaming. They are capable of relaxing, entering the dream state, and in fact passing all the way down to delta brain activity, and then back to "waking consciousness" again ... all while remaining fully lucid, conscious and self-aware. Mastering this exercise in life is supposed to be what gives them the ability to remain conscious and self-aware after death, and to rationally navigate the "between time".

There's a saying that myths may not be true on the outside but can be true on the inside. That means to me that myths can resonate psychologically or spiritually certain philosophical "truths," even if they aren't literally true. Like, Washington confessing to chopping down a tree may be a fictional story, but it teaches some values anyway.

But it is interesting that almost every culture in human history until the modern era believed in some variation of reincarnation. There also might be a few bits of truth somewhere in the myths as well.