Reincarnation: An acceptable topic?

I am not sure if this is allowed here or not....so I'm asking if it's okay. I wanted to ask about reincarnation. It is obviously not a religion, but it is a belief of certain religions. However, it is also a belief held by some of the people who do not ascribe to any religion, but consider themselves simply spiritual, and it is also a belief held even by some people who are members of religions that do not traditionally hold the belief of reincarnation. So, while specific to some religions, it is also held by people outside those religions, and also people who have no specific religion. So, can we talk about that here, or is it overstepping the rules?

I think it is ok to talk about as long as it does not become a debate.... or thrashing of any ones spiritual beliefs.

What would you like to talk about concerning Reincarnation?

No I don't think it can be discussed here...this is for support only.

You can join the ALL FAITHS social group and discuss it though... click on your Private Messages up on the right under your name, and then in the new page look at the left and see social groups... and then onto All Faith.

are we voting ? everyone matters... i agree with a peaceful discussion

Sorry, these things aren't up for a popular vote.

Because reincarnation is a belief that has been passed on down through the ages, even amongst Greek philosophers who had no specific religious concern, I will allow it for now.

However, be warned that this is only a discussion about the spiritual belief of reincarnation, not for any discussion regarding a specific religion's interpretation of reincarnation (or methods leading to such).

DocJohn

Thanks to everyone for their opinions, and docjohn for the final say. I hope this thread doesn't upset anyone, as it is not my intention. But thanks to Sky for telling me about the All Faiths group. I will check out joining.

Anyway, with DocJohn's permission, I shall continue. Rhapsody you asked what specifically I wanted to discuss. Anything about reincarnation really, although, of course DocJohn said not to discuss the way it relates to specific religions as that is over the line. But anything else, I'd like to discuss. It has been on my mind a lot, lately.

I am open to the possibility, but am not sure if I believe in it. I just figure it's as likely as anything else. In some ways I like the possibility of reincarnation, but in other ways I find it frightening. I won't go into all the reasons in this specific post, but will say one way in which it is comforting to me, is this: I have abandonment issues, and many people who believe in reincarnation feel that important people in our lives often come back with us in other lives (I do not believe this is religion specific. If it is, I am unaware of it), which means if they leave me this time, they will likely be with me again. That's pathetic of me, I guess, but.....eh.

I have known people who believe they were reincarnated, and I have had some dreams about being someone else, dieing as them, etc. I don't think my dreams (or even the memories of others) are, in and of themselves, proof of anything- after all, I have had some pretty bizzare dreams in my life and they aren't all literally true, of course- but having read up on and watched shows on reincarnation some of the evidence was impressive to me. I am not saying it's real or unreal, but as I said, I figure it's as likely as anything else. I was wondering what you all thought about reincarnation. Please don't actually debate it though, because I'm not sure that's allowed and really what could we prove or disprove, anyway? Nothing, right? So, no need to debate. Just curious as to what you all thought about reincarnation. Also, do you have any idea who you might have been? Do you feel like anyone you know in this life was with you before, etc.? If you do believe you know who you were, how did you come about this belief? A flashback, a dream or.....? I would really like to have a past life regression, but I cannot afford it, so I try to piece together the possibilities from other things. Anything you want to add really, is fine with me, as long as it is not against the rules (don't mention specific religions, and do not argue). Thanks.

Also, since this is a support board, I guess we could mention if we found the idea comforting in any way. Like I said, I like the idea that I can have people in my life again. It's soothing for a person with abandonment fears, I think. At least it is for me. Any of the rest of you feel that way? Or does it comfort you in another way?

reincarnation is interesting to me because it explores the topic of a returning..

spiritually speaking, the spirit of persons past can be reborn in living individuals simply by voluntary adoption..

For me, the possibility of it connects up a lot of dots, and it's actually only very recently that I've begun to feel that there's something to it, even though I've been interested in Buddhism and some New Age stuff for years. I don't even think that it'd be proof of some kind of afterlife - just life, period. The fact of life, the essential energy of life. I don't see that it's physically possible for something to become nothing, but it can change of course.

I'm not going to read the posts here...because by doing so that'd probably trigger too much stress for me...

But, ever since I was a kid my mom would tell me about reincarnation. At first I didn't get it, I was only about 6 or seven when she first told me but as I grew older I understood the concept. I'm pretty much neutral on all aspects of spirituality though...so I'm not a very spiritual person I guess, but if I were to believe in anything, I think it would be in reincarnation.

hi buggy

i am a firm believer in it... but more as the Doc suggested, as a sort of philosophical blend of thought. i went to a funeral for a dear friend who died of cancer a few years back... oh my.. 6yrs now ... anyway, at the funeral they read this lovely folk tale from native american culture (not sure which group). It talked about a grandmother explaining life and death to a child by talking about the energy that runs through each of us as water in a pond, and that each person was like a single glass of that water. Each glass is filled but is then mixed back in later... the water is still there, every bit of it, but each glass is different...

i thought it presented a nice philosophical idea.. many theories about reincarnation are very wrapped up in the oreservation of the "core self", spirit or soul, whereas this one does not. It is a challenge to our abilities to grasp... the idea of existing but not as this one thing, not as the unit we see as precious. To accept it one would have to really let go of our ego-bound nature.

i think it is one of those life-journey questions.. and much like we can't wrap our heads around how long forever might be, or even how far a 1000 miles might be... i don't think we could easily let go of our ideas of our individuality.

of course... the more common concepts of reincarnation aren't that way.. they do preserve that core.

hope that wasn't toooooo far off track...

nice topic buggy

A great topic for late night discussions among friends....

Humor me here for a moment if your will....

Everything in the universe (that we know of) is made up of stardust. Literally everything...no exceptions. Exploding stars provide the material for you, me, Aunt Joan, and Dusty my Dog. His poop too.... Everything we eat,,everything we see and all we don't is made up of remnants of exploded stars...

Ok...that's pretty much physics as we understand it and I'm the first to tell you that may change tomorrow...but hang in with me for a bit more...

The Big Bang theroy states that all the matter in the universe at one time condensed to a millionth the size of a pin head,,,,then exploded...which over a few billion years of cooling and condensing...viola..we have our present universe....More modern Physics..widely accepted but with new theories appearing all the time...

Now many physisists believe this has happened before...many times..an infinite number of times actually...

Infinite is big...bigger than I can imagine,,but I do know that it means that anything is possible within the infinte...

So lets say that that is true... and I am made up of a few hundred trillion bits of stardust that came together in this infinite we are talking about..

Now let's imagine tossing 5 dice on the floor an infinite number of times...

Do you think they would land exactly the same way at any time.?..Of course they would..actually they would land exactly the same way an infinte number of times if we were to toss them an infinite number of times...

Get were I'm going with this?

If we follow the logic,,,then the universe expanded and collapsed an infinte number of times and my particular mass of startdust came together just like it is an infinte number of times..and yours did too....just like the dice....

And if so,,,then I have typed this exact post an infinte number of times....and typed it differently too...

Now that is a different story....

Thank you for humoring me....

Lenny

I am jewish, and there is really no specific idea twoards reincarnation but I would like to think that we might bring our personalities and experiences from a previous life..

What Lenny said (very well indeed )

The way my cat Whitie looks at me sometimes, it almost seems as though there is a wise one in there, checking me out. Reincarnation or not...

There may well be a wise one in Whitie, but in the end only Whitie could know for sure Maybe what you see is your own inner wise one unconsciously projected out onto your cat, did you ever think of that? We can be really empowered when we consciously acknowledge what we project onto others

In that case!
Generally, I think western people of western faiths/no faiths believe in such things because they are afraid of death.
I would specify why eastern faiths are an exception, but I'm not allowed to.

^ Could you tell me in a PM please?

Ah, well, who can really know? I've often thought I might have been a nun in a spare stone room in a past life. A "reading" once told me I had been part of the Essenes. And I do seem to be drawn to an ascetic spare life much of the time, bewildered by the materialism and accumulation of modern society. That said...who can really know. Much of it ...the belief in reincarnation, seems self-deluding.
Patty

i think that we become very distracted in our search for evidence of these beliefs.. what if we simply tried to strain out the positive messages of such concepts and then allowed that positivity to work in our favor without the over examinations and search for absolutes? does a flower need to explain its own beauties? it is our human nature to dissect and examine but sometimes in the process we disassemble the objects perfection... humor is an example, politics another, and yes, even religions...

the idea of reincarnation is presented as a method of creating value in THIS lifetime so that one is not required to return in an endless cycle of suffering and rebirth

Close but no cigar. We're not supposed to be reborn, reincarnated or even be alive - it's all a big mistake and we're all trapped in this cycle which needs to be ended, for all of us - not as individuals.
I wouldn't say "value", value for others perhaps - but for you as an individual it requires a complete loss of ego and doing whatever people ask you to do, even if it's considered to be bad. Since I can't mention religion, I can't go into details. But let's just say that if you were vegan and someone offered you a piece of rotten meat - you would have to eat it because you couldn't deny that person the good karma. And you can't do good things -because- you want good karma, you have to do them because you want to do good.
It also requires a complete loss of desire, including the desire to end the cycle.

And when you get to the point where you're released from your human vessel and you have the option to end the cycle for you - you can't. Because at that point, you've achieved perfect compassion and you have to help everybody else achieve the same. And so the cycle continues.

I can't stand how the theory of reincarnation and karma have gone from being about being selfless and denying your ego, to be about being reincarnated so that you can "learn" from life for your own benefit.
Same thing happened with "the secret", it annoys me so much.

Theama

I think it would be both rude and dangerous to feed someone rotten food that is not a part of their diet. Why should such a person deserve "good karma?" Why would it be considered "bad karma" to decline an offer to ingest a harmful poison?

Well if the person didn't KNOW that it was putrid. It doesn't matter if it's not part of your diet, the buddhist monks are all vegetarians - but if someone comes along and gives them meat, they have to eat it.. AND be grateful.
It's not RUDE to give someone food! Wanting a specific type of food is greedy and selfish and that's the type of behavior that makes the cycle continue.

If a person offers you food, even if it's something you don't like or if it's putrid but they don't know it - that would give them good karma, and you can't deny the person that good karma since all our karma is a collective thing and we all need to work to improve it. We're greedy and selfish because we're tainted by bad karma.

Siddharta Gautama died because he ate rotten meat btw. Vegetarians will claim it was a mushroom, but it was meat. :P
He also did a whole lot of other selfless things like that. For example, when he was an elephant - he helped a hunter saw off his tusks. He also gave away his family to a stranger because the stranger asked him to.

You can only achieve good karma, and thus perfect compassion, by killing your own ego and realizing that there is no "you". His stories sound insane, but that's what it takes.
Good karma is not about doing good because you don't MIND, like giving a homeless person your change. Good karma is, if that homeless person asked for your house, your clothes, your money, your car, and everything else - you would give it to him without even thinking about it, and you wouldn't regret it nor feel good about it. And you wouldn't do it -because- you wanted good karma or -because- you wanted to do good; you'd do it just... just because. Because he asked.

That's a scary thought for many westerners and that's why the west invented its own version of reincarnation and karma which is, ironically, based on ego, greed, desire, stupidity and me me me me me.

Thanks Theama

Makes sense now. It's similar to donated clothing. It's a very generous and charitable act, but donated clothing is usually something the person doesn't want or can't use. It would be truly compassionate to donate your finest possessions.

I have a Lakota friend who had some first-time visitors to her reservation on official business. The visitors were nervous because they had only heard twisted stories about the Lakota and were told to graciously receive anything offered. She invited these two men to her home for lunch.

My friend could tell the two men were nervous, so she decided to play a little trick on them. She happens to breed Chihuahuas, and had a litter of puppies. She brought out the box of puppies and told the men to choose which one they wanted for lunch. Their eyes popped out of their heads, and she waited until a little sweat broke out on their foreheads before telling them it was just a joke. They were pets, not food.

hahahahaha xD omg that's so mean.
And yeah, it's exactly like donating clothing and such - people only give away what they no longer need or want. There are some treasures in thrift stores though!

please excuse me if i sounded selfish...