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The meaning of life and reincarnation: A heretics view.

fiziwig

fiziwig

moderator emeritus
I know I've posted this idea here before, but it's been maybe four or five years since the last time I mentioned it, so I thought I might toss it out there again so any newcomers who want to can yell at me for being a heretic. :)

There is no doubt at all in my mind that reincarnation happens. This I believe with every deepest fiber of my existence. But why do we reincarnate? And what is the meaning of this existence? Here's my take on it:

To begin with, we are all perfect. More than that, we are all one. There is literally only one of us. Outside of this limited physical reality, in the place that is not a place that we variously call "the spiritual realm", or "heaven", the concepts of "time" and "space" are very different from what we know time and space to be. Space-time is so flexible, in fact, that your next incarnation might be in ancient Rome, and your previous incarnation might have been in 4000 AD on Mars.

What if we can reincarnate not just "forwards" in time, but backwards and sideways as well? Then we are all, every one of us, the same, one single only soul that exists, reincarnated over and over in time and space so that we can keep our self company.

Justice is perfect because if you punch somebody in the nose you either have been or will be that same very person who got punched in the nose. Hitler will, in time, be reborn as every one of his victims, and suffer first hand every cruelty he inflicted. (And don't forget that "Hitler" is who every one of us was a few million incarnations ago. There's only one of us.)

So why do we reincarnate? The fact (or at least what I'm passing off as fact) is, being perfect is boring, and being the only conscious being is lonely. So we split ourselves up in time and space so that we could relieve the loneliness and boredom by playing together. We're here just because it's fun. No other reason. This is a game we play just for fun.

We hide our perfection from ourselves because that perfection is the very source of our boredom.

Of course we can play this game a lot of different ways. We can play "business tycoon" and make the game all about money, or we can play "celebrity" and make the game all about fame, or we can play "society" and make the game all about knowing the right people, getting into the charity balls, and selecting the "in" dress designer for this season.

Or, if we have been blessed (or cursed?) with a glimmer of awareness of our true nature, we can play "sacred journey" and pretend we are on a path to enlightenment or engaged in a multi-lifetime struggle to perfect our soul.

Of course, that's just a joke, because we are already perfect. We already have Buddha Nature. We are already enlightened. We've deliberately hidden our perfection from ourselves just to make the game interesting.

(I say "our" just for fun. What I really mean is that one and only single consciousness called "me/you/all of us". No matter who you look at, you are looking the the mirror. And when you look in an actual mirror, it's me that's looking back at you. :) )

So the meaning of life is this:
  • To have fun and
  • relieve boredom by
  • deliberately hiding our own perfection from ourselves while
  • pretending to be a whole bunch of different people at once and
  • playing all sorts of imaginative games with
  • our imaginary friends who are really just me (you) in different disguises

It's just viewer-participation cable TV on a cosmic scale, and it's all just for fun.

Disclaimer: I just make this stuff up. Any resemblance to reality is purely coincidental.
 
fiziwig said:
To begin with, we are all perfect. More than that, we are all one. There is literally only one of us. Outside of this limited physical reality, in the place that is not a place that we variously call "the spiritual realm", or "heaven", the concepts of "time" and "space" are very different from what we know time and space to be. Space-time is so flexible, in fact, that your next incarnation might be in ancient Rome, and your previous incarnation might have been in 4000 AD on Mars.
What if we can reincarnate not just "forwards" in time, but backwards and sideways as well? Then we are all, every one of us, the same, one single only soul that exists, reincarnated over and over in time and space so that we can keep our self company.
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Hi fiziwig,


What do you think about all of us being part of the same consciousness - just different pieces of it, each with a unique perspective of the whole?
 
stardis said:
Hi fiziwig,
What do you think about all of us being part of the same consciousness - just different pieces of it, each with a unique perspective of the whole?
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I believe that is essentially true. My theory of backwards and forwards reincarnation is just one possible way of explaining it. My theory is probably nonsense, but however it works, I do believe there is only one consciousness, even though it appears that there are many.


Who knows? It's all so delightfully mysterious, and that's what makes it all so much fun. :)
 
Hi fiziwig:


I certainly will not call you a heretic. To charge heresy, is to make a claim that one knows the whole and absolute truth. IMHO none of us knows enough to call anyone a heretic, I certainly do not. I do not know how serious to take your post. Maybe I am wrong but I get the impression that you are hiding some closely held beliefs behind statements like:

fiziwig said:
Disclaimer: I just make this stuff up. Any resemblance to reality is purely coincidental.
Click to expand...
I therefore am responding seriously. I think you raise some interesting and potentially valid points. However, to me the problem with your theory is that it claims that we are all a single perfect consciousness. Leaving aside the question of whether we are just portions of a single entity, and the idea that we are doing all of this to relieve boredom, I quibble with the idea that perfection is a possibility in any realm (physical or spiritual). To me, and I suspect some will think me a heretic, perfection is a goal, but not a reality. Yesterday, a friend asked me, if you feel you belong in Argentina, why did you choose to be born in the US. My reply was that it was a mistake. My friend, who believes in reincarnation was incredulous. “There are no mistakes,” he replied. To him on the other side, there are no mistakes, because there is perfection.


I respect his beliefs but I do not share them. I do not know enough to say what happens in the spiritual realm, but whatever it is, I doubt it is a place of perfection. I suspect that our higher selves, while more advanced in certain ways, are just as imperfect as we are. I also suspect that we, that part of us that is here in this plane, and that other part of us on a higher plane, are not the end of evolution. I strongly suspect that we are pretty far down the perfection ladder, trying to improve ourselves. However even at the very pinnacle of the process, I seriously doubt we will ever find perfection. We will seek it, and hopefully in the process move toward it, but I doubt we will ever find it. Because to me, I doubt it exists.
 
Your thinking on the subject is quite close to mine, fiziwig. A quote that sums it up perfectly for me comes from one of Neale Donald Walsch’s books (I can’t remember which one offhand):


“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?


It is the only question God ever had.”

fiziwig said:
Hitler will, in time, be reborn as every one of his victims, and suffer first hand every cruelty he inflicted.
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This troubles me. Why do you think that this is the case?
 
Groovy said:
Your thinking on the subject is quite close to mine, fiziwig. A quote that sums it up perfectly for me comes from one of Neale Donald Walsch’s books (I can’t remember which one offhand):
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?


It is the only question God ever had.”


(RE: Hitler) This troubles me. Why do you think that this is the case?
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If there is, in fact, only one soul, then that one soul is you, me, Julius Caesar, Mother Teresa, and Adolf Hitler. It has to be that way if there is only one soul.


To Alexnovo:


As for how seriously I take this theory, I don't know how seriously to take it because I don't really know what's going on "behind the scenes" in the spiritual realm.


Off hand, however, I'd say that no matter what theory I, or anyone else, comes up with, the odds are overwhelmingly in favor of that theory being wrong. I seriously doubt any one of us have much of a chance, while still on this side of the veil, of figuring out what it's all about.


But it is fun to speculate. :)
 
fiziwig said:
If there is, in fact, only one soul, then that one soul is you, me, Julius Caesar, Mother Teresa, and Adolf Hitler. It has to be that way if there is only one soul.
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Sure, but I was under the impression that your statement that “Hitler will, in time, be reborn as every one of his victims, and suffer first hand every cruelty he inflicted” meant more than this. It seems to imply subsequent incarnation of the fragment of the overall soul that was Hitler in the role of his former victims.
 
Fiziwig said:
Off hand, however, I'd say that no matter what theory I, or anyone else, comes up with, the odds are overwhelmingly in favor of that theory being wrong. I seriously doubt any one of us have much of a chance, while still on this side of the veil, of figuring out what it's all about.
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Tee hee Fiziwig! By George, I think you've got it! :laugh:
 
Fiziwig,


Ruminating over your post, I had a perverse thought. If as you say this is “just viewer-participation cable TV on a cosmic scale, and it's all just for fun,” are those of us, like you and I spoiling the fun, the diversion of this life, by even asking about the true nature of everything? Let’s say that those of us who exploring the other realm from the spiritual perspective, together with our friends in the theoretical physics world ultimately “prove” what you say is the truth, will that cause cosmic cable TV show to be cancelled as it would no longer provide relief from the boredom of perfection? Just a thought.
 
The Game


Interesting post, fiziwig. to say the least.


I've had some very long and interesting discussions with a few other people who remember some of what you describe. Just not the perfection part. I believe that perfection is an ideal, not reality.


We talked of starting out as one, being lonely and bored, splitting and splitting and splitting, until there were many. Each of the many being part of the one in a profound way, as well as an individual. Hard to explain the concept in a short way.


And the many were still bored, and began to play the Game with each other. The creation we know as the Earth, was one of many playing fields for the Game.


Our recollections differed from what you've written, primarily in that there were certain rules of engagement to the Game. One was that time within the Game was sequential-it was used to measure rounds for the purpose of keeping score.


You could not cheat and go back in time and thus win that round by knowing what was going to happen next. If you died in the game (and a lot of that went on-still does) you had to return to it after you died.


There weren't many rules of engagement, other than those set up at the beginning of each round. Not formally, because each player jockeyed for position to be the one who set the rules of engagement, forcing the other player(s) to play by those rules. No shortage of cheating, of course. Cheating was a big part of the Game.


You could play all sorts of different types of games, including War, Influence, Power, Religion, Sex (always popular), etc. The longer we played the game, the more sophisticated, decadent, and/or cruel the games got. Wiping out your opponent's people was one way to win a round of the Game.


Some of the civilization simulator games, like Sim City, the Sims, Civilization III, Age of Empires, etc., remind me of the Game as it was played. Because they are no more and no less real to the people playing those games as they were to us who were playing our Game.


Phoenix
 
Alexnovo said:
Fiziwig,
Ruminating over your post, I had a perverse thought. If as you say this is “just viewer-participation cable TV on a cosmic scale, and it's all just for fun,” are those of us, like you and I spoiling the fun, the diversion of this life, by even asking about the true nature of everything?
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No matter who proves what, those who don't want to believe it simply won't believe it. :)


I think that Dean Radin at Univ. of Nevada with his advanced statistical methods and meta-studies (read: The Conscious Universe) pretty conclusively proved that ESP works. So does that mean everyone believes him? Not a chance! There are some people for whom no amount of proof will be enough to convince them of something they don't want to believe.


In fact one person I'm acquainted with actually gets very hostile at the mere mention of reincarnation. For some reason just to hear the word makes her intensely angry. Think anything a physicist said would get through to her and people like her? I doubt it.
 
Phoenix said:
Interesting post, fiziwig. to say the least.
We talked of starting out as one, being lonely and bored, splitting and splitting and splitting, until there were many. Each of the many being part of the one in a profound way, as well as an individual. Hard to explain the concept in a short way.


And the many were still bored, and began to play the Game with each other. The creation we know as the Earth, was one of many playing fields for the Game.


Our recollections differed from what you've written, primarily in that there were certain rules of engagement to the Game. One was that time within the Game was sequential-it was used to measure rounds for the purpose of keeping score.


Phoenix
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Fascinating! I'd like to hear more about what you came up with. I'm always in the market for good ideas to adopt into my own ever-changing world view. :)
 
Hi Fiziwig,


Nice to see you here again! :) I'm contemplating the topic - your POV always interests me and requires a little thinking "out side the box...". ;) I thank you for that. :cool
 
fiziwig said:
So why do we reincarnate? The fact (or at least what I'm passing off as fact) is, being perfect is boring, and being the only conscious being is lonely. So we split ourselves up in time and space so that we could relieve the loneliness and boredom by playing together. We're here just because it's fun. No other reason. This is a game we play just for fun.
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My thoughts about this for today:


We were looking out the window during supper tonight and watching two little girls playing in the field across the street. The oldest, maybe 6 or 7 years, was picking up the cut, dried grass and throwing it all over the younger girl who was about 2 or 3 years old. They were having so much fun that it made us happy to sit there and watch them. They were so full of life and innocent.


I think that is the reason that we keep coming back. Not so much that it is a game to relieve boredom but rather to continually feel the joy of being alive. It is the experience of being a blank slate ready for the Teacher's chalk. As children, we don't remember that we once had the knowledge of the cosmos because we willingly forgot that knowledge just for the opportunity to start over. The gift to be an innocent child again must be valuable beyond our reckoning.


All of those wonderful memories of being little girls or boys and having the dried grass thrown all over us while we laughed and rolled on the ground are saved in the River of Life with every other experience - memories for us all to keep and have in common. Hopefully, those children will become nurturing adults and help make the Earth a better and safer place for us when we return as children to once again have our turn to forget everything and play in the field of grass.
 
The 'one soul' theory reminds me of a book I read about 35 years ago in high school - Stranger in a Strange Land - and though I'm not sure I could subscribe to the one soul concept, the time aspect I think I can accept, though not absorb. I think living in linear time makes it difficult to accept the "all time is NOW" concept.
 
I think living in linear time makes it difficult to accept the "all time is NOW" concept.
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Yes, Equestrienne. It is a tricky one for most people! :)


To get back to the topic of 'the game' which Phoenix raised and some of Fiziwig's intial thoughts about these lives we have being for our amusement and perfection being boring...


I had a similar inkling once, while in a meditative state of what it is like 'on the other side' to be planning things out and deciding what 'game' I was going to play with my friend X in our next few incarnations. It was very vivid at the time and makes perfect logical sense to me when I look at the long picture of our history together 'on Earth'.


In the 'vision' we weren't people, we were pools of light. When I say we were 'sitting around' it's a figure of speech! :)


Once we had decided what we were going to do, our pools of light turned into liquid like molten metal (he was silver and I was gold for some reason) and we sort of 'poured' ourselves downward through a 'hole' into the 'other' dimension below in order to begin the incarnation section of our 'game of dare' or whatever it is we are up to. I described it in brief thus:

I had a sort of lucid dream/meditation once where X and I were in a spirit state, up in 'heaven' and were having an argument, something we never, ever do in real life and never have even at our worst moments. Anyway, in the 'vision' we were sitting around somewhat bored, up in 'heaven' and could not agree which was the worst kind of separation from a loved one: for someone you love to die, if so, to die of an illness or accident, to die if it was your fault, if it wasn't your fault, to disappear and never know what happened to them, or to be in love with someone who did not love you. [This was not any kind of verbal disagreement but was all done in 'thought waves' if you know what I mean. It felt almost as though it was going on 'now' also, rather than 'the past' - It's different 'up there'.]
My view (always the romantic) was that unrequited/unreturned love is the most painful experience, but I was wrong. I think the worst is when someone just disappears and you never know what happened to them.
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Indeed as Fiziwig says, I had a strong sense during this experience of the 'boredom of perfection'. Also, there was no way to settle our 'argument' except by actually going 'down' and doing it for ourselves - a bit like a scientist having to do an experiment to prove an hypothesis.


In that timeless state there is a certain longing to be 'doing' something - to be 'feeling something' even if what we feel is pain. Somehow, we don't take the 'pain' aspect of it all as seriously 'up there' as we do 'down here'. Somehow, we just can't really imagine it, or understand how truly unpleasant it will all be or else we just don't 'care' - partly because while in that state there is no 'suffering' - there is no 'care'. Partly because it is not perceived as 'real', just as we don't perceive our dreams (or nightmares) as 'real'. No matter what happens, we know we will wake up and we will not be harmed in any serious way.


There is a longing (or a curiosity?) for something to happen. To use a metaphor, it's a bit like how we long to be on holidays while at school, then as the summer holidays stretch on and on we begin to get tired of it and long to be back at school, to see our friends again to 'move along' to the next grade and so on.


If you have ever seen the film 'Wings of Desire' or the remake 'City of Angels' - which are about an angel who decides to become mortal because he wants to feel something 'real' (love, of course). It explores some of this notion of the desire to step outside of agelessness, painlessness, immortality and perfection and to step into time and experience - even though it entails suffering.


I wonder if anyone else has any experience such a thing to share?
 
Fascinating tanguerra,


I will have to did up some notes of old dreams and meditations that revealed something are similar. Thanks for sharing yours!
 
I can see how you could get bored of afterlife if it's some sort of idyllic existence where there's no challenge, where anything you imagine or think instantly appears, a kind of long, comfortable, easy vacation. The same way the rich get bored with their life when everything's handed to them with no effort. To truly have thrilling excitement (like our adrenaline rush at real life dangers) requires danger, risk, fear, a real possibility that something might go wrong, that we might suffer. Without that, it's just pleasant and comfortable at best, not exciting. Similarly, there's no challenge, no feeling of accomplishment or fulfillment without effort, without limitations and obstacles placed on you. If everything's easy, if no effort is required, if you don't have to overcome any obstacles, if you have no limitations, then what's the point, the challenge? So I can see how you could get bored with afterlife, because everything's easy and comfortable, and thus the longing to "do" something, to feel, even if it includes pain.


I've also heard of accounts where some souls are afraid to come here because of pain, loneliness, etc. And that also makes sense in a way. I was really afraid the first time I rode a rollercoaster. I can't even describe the dread the first time it slowly ascended to a great height, knowing what's to come, that quick, scary descent. But it wasn't so bad after that, it was even fun. I remember wanting to go again and again because of the exhilaration, even knowing that there'll be moments where I'd still be scared. But you couldn't have one without the other so...


Right now, though, a nice, long, comfortable vacation in the afterlife sounds pretty good to me. :laugh:
 
Right, that sounds pretty logical, but the wise don't need excitement, for they have already found their peace with themselves. At least according to the philosophy of Taoism. So they can acheive this vacation-like state of mind even in the middle of the chaos, and never get bored.


For us, ordinary people, such a peaceful afterlife might get boring after a while, but just like you, I am rather longing for peace than excitement at the moment.


Skarphedinn
 
i liked this old thread and wanted to bump it. I wish I could remember the link to the thoughts someone wrote about there being only God and one soul manifest as all the world's population - where a newly-dead personality is offered the chance to return in China a few centuries back.
Here is the link.
 
IMO, ethereal time does exist, and it's completely different from Earthly time. If we think of life as a holographic DVD movie, each time we live a life, we take out a holographic DVD disc and play it. Then, it makes sense that the next movie could be set in the Stone Age, and the one after that set in the year 2150. They're just movies with no continuity from the previous one.

Then, according to this viewpoint, it'll be the ethereal time that has elapsed and is linear as we spend it watching the movies we selected from different eras in "chronological order"...


BTW, I didn't think of this stuff, I'm merely reciting from the works of modern truther David Icke (he has a forum on his website, but it's now closed to new registrants).
 
So the meaning of life is this:
  • To have fun and
  • relieve boredom by
  • deliberately hiding our own perfection from ourselves while
  • pretending to be a whole bunch of different people at once and
  • playing all sorts of imaginative games with
  • our imaginary friends who are really just me (you) in different disguises
Click to expand...
(fiziwig)

Somehow, we don't take the 'pain' aspect of it all as seriously 'up there' as we do 'down here'. Somehow, we just can't really imagine it, or understand how truly unpleasant it will all be or else we just don't 'care' - partly because while in that state there is no 'suffering' - there is no 'care'. Partly because it is not perceived as 'real', just as we don't perceive our dreams (or nightmares) as 'real'. No matter what happens, we know we will wake up and we will not be harmed in any serious way.
Click to expand...
(tanguerra)

Agree with both of you. I came to the same conclusions. :)
 
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