There is a lot of confusion over whether consciousness ends when we die. That is based on the belief that our brain is home to consciousness. A wrinkle in this theory is the several instances when someone flatlines on the operating table and is resuscitated.
How is it they are able to tell the doctors working on them as they were brain dead, the verbatim of the conversation the docs were having at that moment? We also have reports of people who have briefly died and remembered being encouraged to move toward light and crossed over, only to be told it was not their time. The stories across the globe match and there are several books and publications documenting such.
The confusion is caused by mistakes that our mind and consciousness are one and the same. They are not. Our mind is the thinking and feeling part of us and is experienced in our head and body (the embodied brain). The mind is brain-based but adding to the confusion is the inclusion of ego state. Ego is the self- identified separate self of I and/or me.
I think therefore I am, therefore if I am dead, cannot think and so I am no more! However, the consciousness not being mind and having no need for thought in order to exist lives on regardless of death. The problem here is that a dead person, brain dead person or near brain dead (say comatose) is unable to express being conscious as us alive and well folks can.
Thus, psychics and mediums have been able to communicate and read expressions of those who are deceased, brain dead or in a coma. This has also been documented and mediumship is not uncommon as we may think. Adding to the confusion is that we experience consciousness alongside our experience of mind and most do not know those are two distinct experiences.
Consciousness is quietly in the background taking on the role of being. We can experience being whether we are thinking (in ego) or not. I do not have self-identify to be. I can be in awareness and join my experience and expression consciousness being.
When someone is labeled unconsciousness, they mean they are unable to express their consciousness at that moment. They have consciousness but are not awake or physically able to claim the expression of being, (as an I or not).
This distinction is important whether we are a profession helping someone heal or if we are an individual on the path of evolving. If I am working as a therapist, I am working with different ego states via memory. There I am working with mind. If I am using dual awareness such as in EMDR or Hypnotherapy, then I am working with both consciousness and mind.
If I am doing past life regressions, I am working with consciousness. If I am working on helping someone evolve through experiences with higher consciousness, we are integrating the awareness of higher consciousness states with the ordinary consciousness of being. Most probably this will involve working with our mind and ego as well.
This theory is assuming we are souls that do not die and move on from our deceased body to cycle into another form or body at a later time. Consciousness is the awareness of soul self within our human form.
As we become more self-aware, we can realize the energetic presence of the soul within. We realize our soul is of a divine nature and is made of energy, love, and light. As souls, we are eternal and limitless. This is self-realization.