Janine Starscream wrote:

The Tibetan book of the dead is as much a devotional literature as it is
a how to manual, and it is necessary to read it (or its equivalent) so
much that it becomes so well remembered that during and after the death
process one can put the instructions to use.

Some people are so traumatized by death they go 'numb' experience
nothing and reincarnate quickly, if on the other hand, one can be brave
enough and remember to interact with the experience it is said that one
can have some control over when and if and how one reincarnates.

Ultimately, either some form of awareness continues on after physical
death of the body or it does not, if it don't there is nothing to be
concerned about, if it does, it cant hurt to be prepared for what ever
the experience might be.

The Tibetans agree that the experience of demons, hell or punishment, is
in the individual, and will express itself in whatever symbology that
individual is steeped in, how they are 'programed' to respond to the
experience.

"Then the Lord of Death will say, ' I will consult the Mirror of Karma'.

So saying, he will look in the Mirror, wherein every good and evil act
is vividly reflected. Lying will be of no avail.

Then [one of the Executive Furies of] the Lord of Death will place round
thy neck a rope and drag thee along; he will cut off thy head, extract
thy heart, pull out thy intestines, lick up thy brain, drink thy blood,
eat thy flesh, and gnaw thy bones; but thou wilt be incapable of dying.
Although thy body be hacked to pieces, it will revive again. The
repeated hacking will cause intense pain and torture.

Even at the time that the pebbles are being counted out, be not
frightened, nor terrified; tell no lies; and fear not the Lord of Death.

Thy body being a mental body is incapable of dying even though
beheaded and quartered. In reality, thy body is of the nature of
voidness; thou needst not be afraid. The Lords of Death are thine own
hallucinations. Thy desire-body is a body of propensities, and void.
Voidness cannot injure voidness; the qualityless cannot injure the
qualityless.

Apart from one's own hallucinations, in reality there are no such things
existing outside oneself as Lord of Death, or god, or demon, or the
Bull-headed Spirit of Death. Act so as to recognize this.

That Voidness is not of the nature of the voidness of nothingness, but a
Voidness at the true nature of which thou feelest awed, and before which
thine intellect shineth clearly and more lucidly; that is the [state of]
mind of the Sambhoga-Kāya.

In that state wherein thou art existing, there is being experienced by
thee, in an unbearable intensity, voidness and Brightness inseparable --
the Voidness bright by nature and the Brightness by nature void, and the
Brightness inseparable from the Voidness -- a state of the primordial
[or unmodified] intellect, which is the Ādi-Kāya. And the
power of this, shining unobstructedly, will radiate everywhere; it is
the Nirmāna-Kāya.

A saying, the truth of which is applicable, is:

'In a moment of time, a marked differentiation is created; In a
moment of time, Perfect Enlightenment is obtained.'

Till the moment which hath just passed, all this Bardo hath been dawning
upon thee and yet thou hast not recognized, because of being distracted.
On this account, thou hast experienced all the fear and terror. Shouldst
thou become distracted now, the chords of divine compassion of the
Compassionate Eyes will break, and thou wilt go into the place from
which there is no [immediate] liberation. Therefore, be careful. Even
though thou hast not recognized ere this -- despite thus being set face
to face