An NHL Veteran Shares a Life Lesson from His On-Ice, Near-Death Experience

The following is adapted from The Comeback by Dave Scatchard.

I spent fourteen years playing in the NHL. Most of it, I wouldn’t change for the world. Injury and pain, however, were a constant in my career, until one day, one hit ended almost all of it — pain, hockey, and life itself.

Little did I realize at the time how that fateful moment would enable a total healing and transformation of my life — one with an unprecedented feeling of well-being, abundance, and love. My primary purpose since then has been to share this feeling, so that everyone who hears my story knows how unconditionally loved they really are.

The Life-Changing Hit

I was playing for the St. Louis Blues’ American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate in Peoria at the time. With four games left in the season, I sustained my worst and last hockey injury. My fifth concussion, which knocked me unconscious, ended my career and my life as I knew it.

The puck dropped at center ice. I remember skating forward as fast as I could, stickhandling and moving the puck onto my backhand. The next thing I remember is being in a black void with a floating sensation, looking down on my crumpled body as the paramedics and my trainer worked on me. Weirdly, I watched them wheel me off.

The hit happened so fast, I hadn’t seen it coming, but I felt my life slip away as my body left the arena. On the other side of the void was something I’ll never be able to explain fully.

We’ve all heard the “go toward the light” stories, but the light is more than what we understand it to be. It wasn’t a metaphorical movement or the appearance of light. It was more real than anything I’ve ever felt on Earth but so surreal, there is no comparison. There was a definite sensation of leaving my body. I was moving somewhere — like traveling upward through a tunnel in complete darkness.

The Light That Surrounded Me

When the tunnel opened up, I was both consumed and surrounded by a light so pure and expansive that it felt alive. Without fully seeing a physical form, it was clearly a presence of God. While clearly feeling physical sensations as I’d never experienced them before; it felt like being held.

For what seemed like forever and also just a moment, I was curled up like a child in my parents’ arms. I almost didn’t feel like I deserved to be there, but I felt my hair being stroked and heard a soothing, “Everything’s going to be okay.” As I relaxed into the arms that held me,

It was the most belonging, welcoming, and inclusive reception I had ever received. I knew that I was coming home.

The Love I Felt

I was in the presence of love, creation, wholeness, and peace. There was no need for time; it was expansiveness, openness, and being connected to all things with shining light on everything. Words weren’t needed.

The light overflowed from my body and exploded into the space around me — a space that had no form but was expansive, stretching, and reaching out into everything. There were no rules. Every limit I’d ever experienced was gone. Everything was wide open, with no boundaries, no beginnings or endings. Walls, forms, words, weight — in place of all of those limitations was just…love.

The light was love. The presence was unconditional compassion. I curled up into those arms and let that love take my breath away, while at the same time breathing more freely than I ever had in my life.

It was pure ecstasy, bliss and joy, and peace and beauty.

I Knew I Had to Share This

I laughed, cried, and I breathed. I had no idea why it was all happening to me, and I knew it was exactly how life was meant to be from the very beginning. How it was supposed to happen to all of us. How it was the only pure thing a soul could experience — the way things were before the pain, anger, and hurt could weigh us down. I had lived an incredible life in my thirty-some years, but this was beyond any of it. A state of completion and being that I didn’t know was possible.

For a few moments, I walked with God, before asking “Can I go back?”

The response was immediate: “Take this feeling of unconditional love, warmth, and light that you feel right now with me, and share it with every person you come across for the rest of your life. Love them like they are your brothers and sisters. All of them.”

I nodded, knowing I would live this truth when I went back. I looked back once more to ask, “Is there anything else you want me to do?”

With a loving warmth, I will never forget, God said, “Just promise me you’ll share this.”

For more compelling details on Dave Scatchard’s NHL Journey and profound life lessons, you can find The Comeback on Amazon.

Dave Scatchard had a fourteen-year career as a hockey player in the NHL, but after his fifth concussion left him with slurred speech, headaches, and traumatic brain injuries, he embarked on a journey around the world to restore his health and reinvent his life. With the guidance of top coaches, healers, and energy workers, Dave transformed himself and developed a systematic coaching approach for businesses and individuals to redesign, optimize, and transform their future into one that is filled with abundance, health, and incredible amounts of energy. Dave lives in Arizona with his wife, three kids, and two dogs. For more information, visit Comeback.DaveScatchard.com