Karma and Reincarnation

[Andras]

This ancient belief system turns up different emotions in us, either we love the idea or we hate it. This emotional dualism is based on whether we subscribe to this belief system ourselves or we are antagonists to this due to a conflicting belief system.

The fact is western men carry the awesome burden of death on its shoulder; this deforms and alters him psychologically, leaving him without the true understanding of his purpose in life. I suspect this idea of temporariness induce us to be more materialistic, in need of instant gratification, after all we say “you got one life to live”. But is that really the case?

Reincarnation is caused by our attachment, our zest for life that will pull us to transmigrate and come back again and again. This attachment can be anything. Even the love of God, can cause us to be pulled back again. Usually this attachment is something more mundane; sex, food, alcohol, drugs, money, power and countless other venues, some appearing benign others quite sinister.
It is said that Ramakrishna’s love for God, in reality his love for Samadhi, was his pull.
He was said to be intoxicated with his innate ability to enter Samadhi almost at will,
People told him to back off as moderation in all things is desirable. Ramakrishna said
“You are right maybe I am mad, too many men are mad for money, or fame, other are for power, but too few are man for God”.
The life cycle of birth, death and rebirth is called the “wheel of karma”.
Note: Karma and reincarnation are the bus and the bus driver, nothing happens without one or the other. Karma is the Cosmic Law of cause and effect. You rob a bank, and then you might go to jail. This is instant karma. If you somehow escape punishment your next life you will be born into a circumstance to balance out this cosmic imbalance.
People on the spiritual path can ask the Hierarchy (The White Brotherhood) to have their karma speeded up. Why delay the inevitable?
When a person loses all his attachments, and finally loses his attachment to the self, his ego, then and only then he will gain the final bliss and he will then fall off the wheel of karma.

You can read about reincarnation a million times, and it will be just words until you can remember past lives. Then and only then it will become reality and fact of spiritual live.
There are ways to remember past lives but it is not desirable for the novice.

Incarnations alternate, one time you were a man and now perhaps you are a woman. It is likely we have been everything under the sun. Warriors, maiden, murderers and spectators to murder, we were all. This is precisely the reason we have no moral ground to look down on anyone who is perhaps in the shoe that we were in perhaps a dozen lifetimes ago.
Personal traits are carried forward from lifetime to lifetime but we always get situated into life circumstances that will a lot us to learn the specific life lesson that caused us to be here the first place. For example a person who was a professional musician might come back with some skills and affinity to music but his next life he will do something different. Certain ingrained traits will remain with us but sometime quite dormant in the subconscious.
All this information is carried in our Aura and the few and very special who might be around to read ones Aura can instantly have the map of traits, and thousands of lives lived. A true Guru could do this...

Before a certain time an animal, for example a horse or a dog could perform a heroic act, like saving the life of a human by self sacrificing, (which is commonplace act among animals). At that point, this animal could incarnate into a human being this went on for a long time in human history but it is no more.

Some people argued against reincarnation on the basis of total number of souls ever lived since the dawn of men would far outweigh the number of human beings on earth – currently six billion. There is an explanation to this and it is as follows;
The average length of the unaware, mundane human being not in any Teaching is about 700 years, further some people incarnate into beings on other planets and vice versa. We cannot be Earth centric to detriment of the Universe. Some of the people who millions of years ago taught early men to skills of using fire or tools, were in fact beings incarnated from Stars like Sirius. These were advanced beings and they chose to be reincarnated into the primitive milieu of early men with the full knowledge of getting killed. They did not mind as their purpose was to serve and help. Thus after being brutally slain they were promptly reincarnated back and kept on.

[TuningIn]

Hi there.

First off, let me state, that this thread is beautiful in every way. Not only because of the synchronization of two random soul's thoughts when they just happen upon one another during their travel's, but also the true beauty of the person who is simply themselves.

The last paragraph contains within my own brain a question. What do you think about the concept of a soul who is somewhat of a "watcher"/"Traveller" who goes to certain places, at certain times, with one purpose, and that is to give to those who need help, in order to keep them moving towards their goals, because the beauty of life is the variety, and oneness of all things. A soul who has been given a job, and has been here from the beginning.


?

This is why I disagree with your statements concerning ego los. Ego's exist, just like cancer, they are, thus, they do their job. It is part of the problem and solution. One must not IMHO destroy their ego, but some ego's need to be shattered. One must balance the ego, or personal sense of self, with the reality that their surface level self, has no say so in what happens. God looks on the heart.

This is a contradiction. Yes. This is my point.

[HiImJeremy]

Thanks for sharing!

I used to believe these things because they were 'common knowledge' and there were an abundance of believers. These people couldn't possibly be wrong?

When i looked into it i found i really didn't have any experience with either of those things. I've found little to support the concepts Karma and Reincarnation - Scripture, stories and experiences of others aren't enough to satisfy me of their existance, though they may be lovely things to hear.

It's hard to have a discussion about these things sometimes. Things like Karmas existance for example are such heartfelt beliefs that suggesstion otherwise brings out the worst in people. Asking the hard questions makes us prone to defense rather then to be open to new and exciting ideas. It's almost like another form of programming. As it so often happens, I think, If you believe it, it will become apparent to you in your life. The opposite is also true, and I, as well as many I suspect, have been on both sides of the fence in that regard.

You might find though, also, that Karma in particular is very engrained in our psychology - in many different ways and forms I suspect. You'll often hear "What goes around, comes around" and " Karmas a B***h". It's a common knowledge thing, a bit like how we once thought "The world is flat". I actually think as a whole, that's where we are now in terms of our spiritual evolution. I think most of us are in this flat earth society, spiritually. There's to much to learn and too much at stake to stay where it seems comfortable. We need to be taking things like Karma and reincarnation further, or leaving them behind.

My understanding of these things in technicality is elementry, however, I remain open to these things, but for now they're in the possibility basket. With all due respect.

[VinceG]

Jeremy, have you ever astral projected? All of these things I've seen you question, can be independently verified through experience, through projection. I've been working on that myself for the past few weeks.

[HiImJeremy]

Originally Posted by VinceG

Jeremy, have you ever astral projected? All of these things I've seen you question, can be independently verified through experience, through projection. I've been working on that myself for the past few weeks.

I've thought about this. Logically, that could work. My intuition tells me otherwise.

However, Robert Bruce who encouraged my line of thought here, is a very seasoned astral projector - almost 60 years worth. A man of his experience remains where i've come to find myself. You would think perhaps, being an expert at what he does, that he would verify these things also, yet he finds himself still working on it as well.

To answer your question, No, i have not consciously projected yet as far as i am aware. It has been on my list of goals for a while, but i haven't pursued it yet. Sounds very exciting actually - but i'll have to wait a while.

[VinceG]

Originally Posted by HiImJeremy

I've thought about this. Logically, that could work. My intuition tells me otherwise.

However, Robert Bruce who encouraged my line of thought here, is a very seasoned astral projector - almost 60 years worth. A man of his experience remains where i've come to find myself. You would think perhaps, being an expert at what he does, that he would verify these things also, yet he finds himself still working on it as well.

This is a very good insight, one that I started to get a few weeks ago when I started exploring astral projection. If all these masters were enlightened, why are they busy making their living as authors? Wouldn't they find something better to do, something more exciting?

Actually, this insight and others relating to consciousness is what led me to really start believing in reincarnation. The way I see it is, it's every soul's eventual destiny to become enlightened. You can't do it in one lifetime. That by itself wouldn't be enough for me. But once I saw that people are born into a particular level of consciousness, that's when I suddenly realized that there has to be multiple lifetimes involved.

What I think is happening in guys like Robert Bruce is, they found astral projection at a relatively early period in their progression. When you find it that early, it's rather like taking LSD than it is an active participant in your growth. You have experiences, but you can't really understand them. And you don't really have the consciousness to see how to be able to put them together to form a coherent picture.

You spend your whole life trying to make sense of these experiences and spend more and more time in the non-material. When the real insights are to be had here on Earth. Astral projection and learning the mechanics of the non-material universe do nothing to bring you closer to universal love.

To answer your question, No, i have not consciously projected yet as far as i am aware. It has been on my list of goals for a while, but i haven't pursued it yet. Sounds very exciting actually - but i'll have to wait a while.

I'm still trying to learn how to project, just what I'm learning about sleep and consciousness is worth it for me right now. I've always been an insomniac, I've been sleeping much better now with the sleep aids I've been taught.

When I do finally manage to project, I want to keep it as a tool in my exploration toolbox, not the whole animal. I'll use it to verify things like past lives and the oversoul, try to make sense of everything I'm seeing, but, like with everything else out there, if I can't fit it into my holistic view of How The Universe Works(TM), I'm just going to file it away until I can. An example of one such body of knowledge is alien visitations and abductions. I don't know what to think about that crap.

[pianoperformer]

Astral projection is just another illusion. You will find there exactly what you expect to find. It can be fun but it will only show you the truth you already believe in.

Just like NDE's. You'd think they would reveal the truth, but they are as diverse as you could imagine. People in NDE's report going to hell, yet I don't believe in hell. Some report a Christian-type heaven, yet others report an impersonal light. What's the truth? All of them and none of them.

Astral projection will get you the exact same thing.

[VinceG]

Originally Posted by pianoperformer

Astral projection will get you the exact same thing.

Have you ever done it?

On some level, you're right, but there's more to these things than you could possibly imagine.

[pianoperformer]

Originally Posted by VinceG

On some level, you're right, but there's more to these things than you could possibly imagine.

That's exactly what I'm telling you.

[VinceG]

Originally Posted by pianoperformer

That's exactly what I'm telling you.

Again, have you ever done it?

[Andras]

Far Memory - this is the word that keeps coming up when people who are mystically predisposed contemplate their prior incarnations and past life’s*. To remember a past life, one must be advanced enough in esoteric matters to understand and be able to carry the added burden of knowing other life’s, seemingly distant, yet reflecting upon your very own spirit. Was it really you in spirit, who committed that act that was done by a different soul, who is actually you? Or is she?
When you meet an old soul, usually there is a hint; the unexplained love of history and archeology, or even antiques; why is that certain people are drawn to old things, in general and in most cases specifically to certain eras in the human past? I, for example always had a vivid attraction to Roman era’s and to WWII.

*Far Memory is the autobiography of Joan Grant.

[HiImJeremy]

Originally Posted by pianoperformer

Astral projection is just another illusion. You will find there exactly what you expect to find. It can be fun but it will only show you the truth you already believe in.

Just like NDE's. You'd think they would reveal the truth, but they are as diverse as you could imagine. People in NDE's report going to hell, yet I don't believe in hell. Some report a Christian-type heaven, yet others report an impersonal light. What's the truth? All of them and none of them.

Astral projection will get you the exact same thing.

This is exactly the sort of thing i find when i talk to New Age inclined people. I've seen this same ' illusion' argument more then i can count. How can you possibly know this is how it is without experiencing this? You've deduced your observations in a logical explanation that suits you and how you view it. Perhaps it's not logical. Perhaps it's not at all how you think it is.

It just so happens Robert works with blind people to Astral project. In fact he established his Astral projection techniques for the blind which is why his teaching is so different. The blind people he trained wrote told him astral projecting for them, instead of seeing, were able to feel everything around them simultaneously. I thought you might find that interesting.

[pianoperformer]

Originally Posted by HiImJeremy

This is exactly the sort of thing i find when i talk to New Age inclined people. I've seen this same ' illusion' argument more then i can count. How can you possibly know this is how it is without experiencing this? You've deduced your observations in a logical explanation that suits you and how you view it. Perhaps it's not logical. Perhaps it's not at all how you think it is.

It just so happens Robert works with blind people to Astral project. In fact he established his Astral projection techniques for the blind which is why his teaching is so different. The blind people he trained wrote told him astral projecting for them, instead of seeing, were able to feel everything around them simultaneously. I thought you might find that interesting.

No no, I'm not saying it doesn't exist. I pursued it pretty vigorously for a while. I'm saying it's just as much an illusion as this world is, as are NDE's, etc. Everything that we could experience reflects back to us our beliefs.

I've heard of some people experiencing hell during an NDE, yet others experiencing heaven, when there was no real difference between them: one wasn't noticeably holier than the other. They just got what they expected.

It's the same in our waking world. We get what we expect and what we believe deeply. It is the same in the astral world, and in the causal world. It's all illusion.

It works if you want to learn about illusion (e.g., karma and reincarnation), but two people might experience different things, and it is still perfectly true for them.