William Shatner claims that the Blue Origin space flight "felt like a funeral": "It was one of the deepest emotions of grief I've ever had,"

Going to space has been a dark experience for William Shatner. In his new book, "Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder," the actor, known for portraying Captain Kirk in "Star Trek," says he experienced profound sadness on his trip to space with Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin last October. 

According to a book excerpt, he loves the mystery of the universe. There was no mystery, no majestic awe to behold when I looked in the opposite direction. All I saw was death. The 91-year-old, who made history as the oldest person to travel into space during the flight, described seeing a "cold, dark, black emptiness" unlike anything on Earth. He wrote that his trip to space felt like a funeral.

It was one of the strongest feelings I have ever experienced. The coldness of space and the warmth of Earth made me sad. Shatner is describing an experience known as the overview effect, which is a cognitive shift in how one thinks about Earth and life. Everything I had thought was wrong. He wrote that everything he expected to see was wrong. I discovered that the beauty isn't out there, it's down here, with all of us. Leaving that behind made my connection to our planet even more profound. Shatner spoke about the intense emotions he felt on the spaceflight. 

He told Bezos that the most profound experience he had received was after landing on solid ground. I hope I don't recover from this. Shatner told CNN earlier this year that he couldn't stop crying because he was angry about the destruction of the Earth. Shatner was joined by a former NASA engineer, a healthcare entrepreneur, and a Blue Origin executive on the New Shepard rocket. They experienced weightlessness on the 11-minute trip.