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Reincarnation and the Soul’s True Purpose: Part 2

Life

Lauren

-

February 8, 2015

Reincarnation and the Soul’s True Purpose: Part 2

“Yes, but negative is an illusion. Negative and positive are both construction material. Negative is evolutionary catalyst.” ~ Dolores Cannon, A Message from the Subconscious. (The Three Waves of Volunteers and the New Earth)

Once we have embraced the idea of continuing on and transcended the idea of the fixed self, we can begin to apprehend the cycles of karma in our lives and how they may be holding us back from our greater purpose.

Without experiencing a past life regression where the subconscious, soul or guardian energies communicate directly to us through our own mouths what we should be focusing on is not necessarily a bad thing; if we are connected to our inner voice or are able to invite these answers in, then they will inevitably find us.

Like the cycles of karma we are ‘unconsciously’ experiencing, we can chose to attract the solution to them, and probably secretly know this information already. Through the depths of Dolores Cannon (past life regression hypnotists’) research, certain patterns and similarities between sessions have emerged illustrating that it’s not always as straight forward as it seems.

And, while it may be fun to speculate what exotic times we may have lived or people of influence we may have been, all is irrelevant in the law of karma. It is perhaps better NOT to know, but instead recognize these patterns on an intuitive level than explore the past for the sake of it.

Here are some common things to consider that may be the ‘focus’ of this lifetime:

The Subconscious Goes Awry

“Fear creates Disease” ~ They Walked With Jesus.

Our subconscious is a literal translator, and it is through this blunt and un-nuanced language that a huge amount of problems in the body are created. Problems that are often the reason many people visit a hypnotist in the first place; smoking, the compulsion to eat, not being able to get pregnant; the body is a machine and reacts directly to what the subconscious and the ‘agreements’ it has.

Some examples are; compulsive eating due to starvation in a past life, pains in the gut from being devoured by an alligator from the torso (yes there have been such reports whether you believe it or not), unresolved grief in a past life that leads to the desire to constantly warm the lungs (in Chinese medicine the centre of metal where unexpressed grief is stored and may lead to illness)… the results may be surprising and require some backward thinking but the simplest of changes can resolve it through daily mantra, affirmation or prayer. Let your body be your guide.

The Social Beast

Fear of the crowd, empathy, co-dependence or introversion, though signs of our higher calling in this life, can also be signs of unhealed past wounds. A life spent in solitude, as a hermit or a ‘negative’ experience in a community; such as a strict routine as a nun or the experience of abuse in a cult could lead to an aversion to the other in this life.

We need others to thrive and cultivate our energy with in this life, but deep wounds may cause the orphan, rebel or victim archetype in us whether we experienced this in childhood or not.

Being rejected by our community or having a fear of the crowd may weave its way into our karma as we go through life meeting people who desire to destroy us subconsciously, though modern terms like destroying our reputations.

Not taking things personally and transcending the ego will shine a light to drown this out, therefore breaking the bonds of karma and resolving it once and for all.

Karmic Relationships

“The awakening is the purpose. The awakening of the fact that in essence we are light, we are love.” ~ Convoluted Universe, Book One.

There is no ‘One’, as Jung put it; we meet ourselves a thousand times on the path of a lifetime. Whatever form the other takes, those who play a huge role will either be connected to your soul and there to guide it… or there to ruffle its feathers.

The reason marriage, parenthood and the relationship we had with our own parents can test us so much is directly designed to enable us to recognize what we are trying to resolve in ourselves. That said, many people have reported they are living a resting life, where everything seems easy and relationships are peaceful.

In the last century this was more common, but as time speeds up and a new paradigm quickens, we are having to speed up too; resolving karmic relationships at a faster pace and diving headfirst into those karmic webs in order to un-knit them.

The Absence of Light

An explanation for extreme cases of darkness can be an unnerving subject, but karma can offer us some explanation as to why awful things happen to us. Suicide, murder, abuse and disaster; the intense suffering this human experience can create has the ability to inextricably link us to one another for lifetimes.

Though the general karmic rule can be applied; reflecting on what others are doing to you and knowing that you probably did it to them at some point, and the flippancy in which many of us approach such areas of darkness; for example seeing bad luck as a sign of bad karma, or other’s struggle as something they may deserve feeds in to our own fears of wrong-doing and the need to compare.

While others have chosen to approach those areas of darkness and others have not reflects not on their depth of ‘good’ or ‘bad’, but on their soul’s decision to brave the darkest caves and overcome it.

It can be difficult to get our heads around why such atrocities occur, much less have compassion for those involved, but it all goes back to the idea that we are cells in the body of God collecting information. Everything is possible and has some purpose.

Nature vs Nurture

Choosing certain roads in your life path that you attribute to intuitive responses to your karma may not always appear as they seem. Many subjects have reported that their thirst for travel was an integral one, and the many lives they fled from when they were supposed to stay put and uphold the ‘contracts’ they had made with others before that life consequently had to be rewritten again and again.

Every decision has the power to set us rolling back into the same traps; it is our ability to reach the lofty attics of honesty from the basements of our impulses. Fight or flight can often derail our life’s path and have us chose comfort or adventure over hard toil and humility. Only we can know.

From the watery caves of suffering to the middle road of privilege and reflection, the higher calling is always the same; to cleanse past karma, put things to rights and leap to the heights of human achievement.

Whether you feel you are not achieving your full potential, have an unexplained illness or addiction, or are experiencing the same round of bullets in personal relationships, your experiences provide the key to resolving your karma.

As Buddha did when he fed himself to the family of tigers, we have it in ourselves to grasp the highest path and highest option in any given circumstance; whether through giving all our accumulated wealth to others, finding compassion for the greatest of cruelties inflicted on us or simply not procrastinating a moment longer.

Image Source

Patricia Ariel
Pain and suffering

Moral Fallibilism: Interpreting a Language Older than Words

Issues

Gary Z McGee

-

February 7, 2015

8

Moral Fallibilism: Interpreting a Language Older than Words

“Man will become better when you show him what he’s like.” ~ Anton Chekhov

What is it like to be human? What does it mean to be a seemingly finite human being in an otherwise infinite reality? Let’s be honest with ourselves: we are fallible and confused. We are prone to make mistakes and usually wrong about the conclusions we make.

We are in all ways uncertain, and we’re even uncertain about our uncertainty. We make gross errors, and we do it quite often. Because of this, we are hypocrites par excellence. But the question isn’t whether or not we are hypocrites, the question is: what are we going to do about our inherent hypocrisy.

Are we going to embrace it and discover healthier ways of being aware of it, or are we going to avoid it and continue our rampant suppression and dissociation? One answer is to use a basic scientific approach known as fallibilism, and then to further capitalize upon the precept by practicing it under a moral light.

Fallibilism is Latin for “liable to err.” It is the understanding that we can never know anything for sure and is implied within the sciences. The basic claim is that all human knowledge could, in the end, due to our fallibility as a species and our inherent hypocrisy, be completely and utterly mistaken.

In the most commonly used sense of the term, fallibilism implies an openness to new evidence that may refute a previously held opinion or belief while recognizing that any claim, scientific or otherwise, validated today may need to be revised or even withdrawn in light of new evidence, new disputes, and new encounters in the future.

It is the logical conclusion of the secret of open-mindedness. It embraces human fallibility and is therefore a benchmark toward understanding the human condition in relation to an ever-changing reality.

It stands to reason that any and all so-called answers will be discovered within the reality that we find ourselves questioning. Governing this precept, it further stands to reason that we can use this reality as a benchmark for whether or not our “answers” should be accepted. That is, whether or not it should be accepted as right or wrong. Keep in mind, we will still misinterpret the information, but at least we’ll be looking in the right spot.

At least the horse of our reasoning will be in front of the cart of our questioning. Reality holds the “answers,” whether or not we can ever grasp them. Trying to achieve answers should be like trying to achieve enlightenment, both may be unachievable, but the journey is the thing in both cases.

When we turn the focus of our learning upon the natural interconnected order of things, instead of on disconnected human opinion, we discover that the answers we come up with will be closer to being “right.”

Like Aldo Leopold said, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” Or Louis Agassiz: “Go to nature; take the facts into your own hands; look, and see for yourself.”

The first thing we need to do is base the concept of right/wrong in the realm of objective truth, instead of in the realm of subjective opinion. We do that by allowing the concept of “right” to mean “healthy” and the concept of “wrong” to mean “unhealthy,” thereby grounding the concept of right and wrong within the dictated, natural truth of cosmic law.

We do this so that healthy/unhealthy can be as close to “objectively determined” as possible. Otherwise the concept of right/wrong is weighed down by the subjective opinion of good/evil.

By shedding the subjective concepts of good/evil from the determining concepts of right/wrong we allow for the objective concepts of healthy/unhealthy to emerge as a guide toward a “somewhat” objective moral principle. I say “somewhat” because there can never be a completely objective moral philosophy.

Morality is a briar patch. So is philosophy, for that matter. And they always will be. We just have to get better at not getting unnecessarily pricked by avoidable thorns. And the best way to do that is living in healthy balance with nature.

Like Zeno said, “The goal of life is living in agreement with Nature.”

The difficult part is figuring out what is healthy and what is unhealthy, and then what to do about it. We do this by observing, listening to, and cooperating with nature and what it is dictating to us as being the healthier way to live in accordance with it. The simplest thing nature dictates to us is that we need air to survive. If we go just a few minutes without air, our system shuts down and we die.

The next simplest thing nature dictates to us is that we need water to survive. If we go more than three days without it, our system shuts down and we die. Simple. And if anybody is “of the opinion” that it’s healthy to go without air, or to go without water, then their opinion is most definitely wrong and invalid (Nietzsche’s Perspectivism). Such opinions simply do not matter and are completely irrelevant to healthy progress.

Nature dictates what is healthy and what is unhealthy. We only have to develop ears keen enough to hear it, eyes wide open enough to see it, and minds wise enough to interpret it correctly.

Like Dr. Daniel Wildcat said, “I believe that if I can sit out there long enough, those crows, the trees and the wind, can teach me something about how to be a better human being. I don’t call that romanticism, I call that Indigenous Realism.”

As it stands in today’s modern world, the nexus between human nature and the biotic community has been split. The symbiotic interaction between people and place has been hidden by the smoke and mirrors of the modern collective ego which projects a shiny veneer of hyperreality that blinds us to the fact that our roots are in the earth.

Derrick Jensen said it best, “Like the layers of an onion, under the first lie is another, and under that another, and they all make you cry.”

Through the tears of our bamboozlement we may begin to see the unwavering thickness of the deception that has been laid upon us for the entirety of our lives, and we may even begin to peel back that thick-like-molasses deception to reveal the throbbing vulnerability of our naked ignorance which lies beneath.

The truth hurts, it cuts deep, but if we can intuit its lesson we can become healthier people, even within an otherwise unhealthy society.

Einstein pinpointed it when he said, “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”

It’s time to remember the gift. It’s time to peel the layers of deception back. And the most effective tool at our disposal is the Occam-like razor of moral fallibilism.

We’ve hitherto been insulated by institutionalized ignorance. This institutionalization has crippled us into unreasonable, unhealthy animals who overthink the wrong things. Our relationship with the biotic community is practically non-existent. There ceases to be any organic intimacy between the human animal and the natural world.

We’ve forgotten that culture is a product of nature, and we seem intent upon turning nature into a product.

But as Aldo Leopold said: “The land is not a commodity that belongs to us; it’s a community to which we belong.”

We cannot see this because we’ve been homogenized by a system that is hell-bent on transforming the diversity of life into a bureaucracy. But bureaucracy is antithetical to life. Living systems cease to be healthy when they become bureaucratic. Thus are we unhealthy.

Like Derrick Jensen said, “It’s unavoidable: so long as we value money more highly than living beings and more highly than relationships, we will continue to see living beings as resources, and convert them to cash; objectifying, killing, extirpating. This is true whether we’re talking about fish, fur-bearing mammals, Indians, day-laborers, and so on. If monetary value is attached to something it will be exploited until it’s gone.”

And here we are, exploiting resources until they’re gone. Ask yourself: How has this culture taught me to be a better human being? And then ask yourself this: how might nature be better at teaching me how to be a better human being?

Moral fallibilism is the method we can use to become better students to the awesome teacher that is Mother Nature.

A language older than words can only be understood and translated through the filter of moral fallibilism; otherwise we become overburdened by individual opinion and the expense of interdependent truth.

Otherwise truth becomes entangled in the unhealthy guts of an unhealthy culture.

Like Derrick Jensen said, “I had broken the most basic commandment of our culture: Thou shalt pretend there is nothing wrong.”

There is something wrong. Our culture is fundamentally unhealthy and unsustainable. Moral fallibilism is an ethical method of cutting through the screw-tape of an unethical society.

There comes a point at which the universe dictates to us the nature of right & wrong: healthy & unhealthy. And there comes a point where we must choose to accept this dictation and become healthy, or continue to ignore it and remain unhealthy.

This point is at the center of every moment. It speaks a language older than words. It’s in the air we breathe. It’s in the trees that create that air. It’s in the water that moves us. It’s in the moon that moves the tides. It’s in the body, resonating within an ancient muscle memory.

Like Mary Oliver said, “You only have to let the soft animal part of your body love what it loves.”

You have to be in a state of no-mind to hear it. You have to be silent and tranquil to realize how loud it really is.

It can be as simple as the body telling us when we’ve consumed too little water (or too much), or as complex as the cosmos pinpointing for us what is the healthy way for an interdependent human being to live in an interconnected world (or what is an unhealthy way).

In many ways we can tap into the natural order of things through common sense alone, like the feeling we get in our gut when faced with a decision between truth and deception (red pill/blue pill), or how we intuitively know that rape and murder is wrong.

Don’t be afraid to use Nature as a guide. Don’t be afraid to use Pain as a guide. Both are superior teachers to almost everything else except maybe a good sense of humor.

At the end of the day, we are, as Eliezer Yudkowsky wrote, “personally responsible for becoming more ethical than the society we grew up in.”

Moral fallibilism is a superior tactic for achieving a more ethical society. Through the trial and error of human limitation through science and by relying more upon perfecting questions rather than answers, we will, like the Fibonacci sequence seeking to attain the perfection of Phi, get ever so closer to perfecting the fallible human condition in relation with the infallible cosmos.

We will get ever so closer to achieving a more mature and moral society.

Like Stefan Molyneux said, “It only looks impossible because a truly free and peaceful society has yet to be achieved. But once we get there, and we will, people will look back at governments as ridiculous, bloody, and evil hangovers from the primitive and drunken adolescence of our species.”

We can only hope, and through such hope remain circumspect with our implementation of the superior method of moral fallibilism.

Image source:

Aristotle quote
Inhumane yin yang

Cracking the Cosmic Egg: Achieving Authentic Spiritual Power Over Religious Pseudo-power

Life

Gary Z McGee

-

February 6, 2015

4

Cracking the Cosmic Egg: Achieving Authentic Spiritual Power Over Religious Pseudo-power

“Danger: real probability of the awakening of terror and dread, from which there will be no turning back.” ~ Ernest Becker

“Nothing that a Christian, a Muslim, and a Hindu can experience –self-transcendence, ecstasy, bliss, inner-light– constitutes evidence in support of their traditional beliefs, because their beliefs are logically incompatible with each other. A Deeper principle must be at work.” ~ Sam Harris

Quis custodiet ipsos custodies, is a Latin phrase attributed to the Roman poet Juvenal from his Satires, which literally translates to “Who will guard the guards themselves?” The answer: we will.

We must. If we are to have a humane world of loving tolerance and open-hearted compassion instead of blind ignorance and apathetic indifference, we must be the guards who guard the guards.

This requires questioning authority, which requires a leap of faith into non-faith, similar to thinking above mind with no-mind. Ironic, isn’t it? We need an out-of-faith experience, an above-faith experience, of healthy detachment in order to establish a platform for questioning authority.

The main culprit of our confusion seems to be our inability to separate religion from spirituality. What’s needed is a breach of our certainty, a tearing apart of the flag of our blind faith, an existential stretching of our all-too-parochial comfort zone, a way of untangling spiritual liberty from the tyranny of religion.

Cracking the cosmic egg is a shattering of our secure foundations, a smashing of our rigid dogmas. Allow me to take you on a creed-crushing, faith-twisting journey through the so-called forces of good and evil, wherein I will reveal to you how to get power of pseudo-power. Let the sacred breach commence.

Ego & Soul

“Birds are not better than the eggs from which they have broken. Indeed, it could be said that a bird is one egg’s way of becoming other eggs. Egg is ego, and bird is the liberated Self.” ~ Alan Watts

Here you are: this tiny egg, a little bag of ego in an otherwise astonishing universe. But what you probably neglect to realize is that you are just as astonishing a universe yourself.

It’s not so much that you have a self that looks out on a world, as much as it is that you have a plethora of selves, each with a multitude of sub-selves, that each look out upon a world through a finite-bias laden perspective.

From this disadvantageous perspective you attempt to pigeonhole truth. You vainly attempt to put all your eggs into particular baskets, even though, deep-down inside, you know that there is no knowing other than not knowing. There is no certainty other than uncertainty.

There is no kernel-truth other than the truth of constant change. This is equal parts a crippling concept as well as a liberating one. It cripples the ego, but it liberates the soul.

The Ego wants the egg to stay intact, fearful of the unknown. The Soul wants to crack the egg wide open so that it can merge with everything else. It is courageous to discover new horizons.

“When you put all your eggs in one basket you must clutch that basket for dear life.” ~ Ernest Becker.

Inside this astonishing universe you are surrounded by many other astonished onlookers, billions of other little bags of ego, each with their own menagerie of sub-selves, each with their own idea of who they are.

They too carry around baskets which they vainly attempt to put all their eggs into. They too are confused by their own pigeonholing of truth. And you begin to see how all of human history it has been the same thing over and over again; the same ego vanity, just with different egos; the same vain basket-filling, just with different baskets.

Some baskets get overfilled. Eggs get thrown at people’s heads even. Many bad rules, that aren’t based upon the rules of the cosmos, are created. Some are called laws, and they are bad laws. Many eggs get broken.

Much confusion is had, and you see that it has been happening throughout the history of the human leitmotif. You realize that some revelation is at hand, but still you cling to your ego, like you cling to your basket full of eggs, out of abject fear of the unknown.

But your Soul comes to you as your liberator, and the crack down the side of your precious egg is authentic and true, and it can no longer be ignored.

Good & Evil

“There is nothing either good or evil, but thinking makes it so.” ~ Shakespeare

Imagine becoming aware of the egg of your ego for the first time. The egg is a metaphor that represents everything you think you know. You become aware of it, and boom, it strikes you, there must be something more. But whatever it is, it’s unknown and possibly even unknowable.

It’s scary and adventurous all at once. That’s when the crack appears. That’s when your tiny Ego becomes liberated by your giant Soul. But that’s also when other people with their own egos and their own fears come in to take your liberated soul down a notch.

Their fear not only blinds them from testing the boundaries of their own precious egg, it compounds your fears about directly testing your own boundaries. So they sling words at you like “evil” and “sin” and “that religion is bad.”

And they placate you with words like “good” and “righteous” and “this religion is virtuous.” But these words are more like fences than words, more like walls than good advice. And before you know it, you’re going along with it.

You go through the motions of being a scared human being in a scary universe. Best to stay safe within the boundaries of the fence, you think to yourself. Best to remain secure behind the walls of human limitation, you reason.

And as you go through the motions of being a scared human being in a scary universe bombarded by scary laws that keep you scared and in line, you also go through the motions of having other scared people tell you what to do.

They call themselves “authority,” and although you can see through their façade and see that they are also merely scared human beings going through the motions of being scared in a scary universe, you go along with it. How can you not?

I mean, there are holy commandments, and thou-shalt-nots, and sin, sin, sin! There are devils, and demons, and Satans, and wrathful, vengeful gods. There are scared laws made by scared men that keep you perpetually fearful.

Your soul is petrified, a fossilized stone inside you. It must not be freed, because freeing it is somehow… evil? Huh? Like Blaise Pascale said, “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.”

Or maybe instead of being afraid you decide to dig down deep and discover something more powerful than anything else, something that gives you courage beyond courage, something that de-petrifies your soul and un-fossilizes your heart, a deep, primal energy that has its roots in the primordial soup of cosmic love: a divine sense of humor.

Yes! This is your trump card. This is your Soul’s call to adventure. This is your most holy of holies, your divine liberation. And all of a sudden, out of the blue, you are a cosmic force to be reckoned with.

The crack in your cosmic egg is getting wider and wider. Suddenly you’re saying things like, “Jesus Christ can walk on water, but I can walk on Jesus,” or, “Ever mooned the devil under the pale dance lights?” or something crazy-witty like, “In the current zeitgeist the zealot’s zealous zenith zigzags to zero.”

And the laughter can be heard rumbling through the halls of the gods. And the fumbling, stumbling, scared shitless social milieu is staring up at you in wide-eyed fearful wonder. But you don’t give a rat’s ass, because you’re free, Goddammit!

And nothing can ever take that freedom away from you. Indeed, sometimes you have to wreck your life in order to truly live it.

Power & Pseudo-power

“Only now are you going your way to greatness. Peak and abyss, they are now joined together, for all things are baptized in a well of eternity, and lie beyond good and evil.” ~ Nietzsche

Just imagine yourself so completely free that even Nietzsche’s Ubermensch is just another stumbling ape going through the motions beneath you. Imagine tearing through hell decapitating demons, trumping devils, and murdering Satan on his pathetic throne.

Imagine blitzkrieging through heaven toppling ivory towers, liberating angels of their pompous halos, and stabbing God strait through his self-righteous too-white heart (see: If you ever meet the Buddha on the road, kill him).

Imagine shredding sacred texts and using them as kindling in your lighting of the third fire. Imagine taking all the fear and spiritual trepidation, all the religious anxiety and ingenuous placation, and wrapping it all up in a giant bag of cosmic tomfoolery with the label “the jokes on you” and declaring to the powers-that-be, religious or otherwise, “shove this up your fear-mongering ass!”

Then imagine subsuming the whole thing in a giant hug of cosmic appreciation; not in an angry way, filled with rage and vainglory, but in the spirit of high humor, filled with sacred vehemence and divine love.

Do you want to know what true power is? It’s being filled to bursting with sacred humor. It’s being jam-packed with divine love and high humor. It’s what both saints and evildoers alike are afraid of.

There is nothing scarier to an already scared shitless human being going through the motions of being scared in a scary universe, than another human being revealing to them that he/she is definitively not crippled by fear.

This sends their doctrine-filled heads to spinning. It causes true believers with the fear of God in their hearts to shout “blasphemy!” It causes evildoers with the fear of love in their hearts to shout “impossible!” It causes angels to weep and demons to cower. It causes gods to bow at the feet of their true maker: us! Yes, we are the creators of gods.

True power is the revelation that only you have the power to let anybody else have power over you. Pseudo-power is the false power of scared men going through the socially programmed scared motions of being scared human beings in a scary universe.

And the cosmic egg? Well, it is cracked wide open at this point. If this thing we call “life” is indeed a test, then it must be a test of our sense of humor and our sense of playfulness, because from the inside looking out it is all ridiculously laughable.

But that’s also what makes it so devastatingly beautiful. It’s what tears us apart with cosmic joy and earthly jouissance. It’s what has us caught up in the tug-of-war between spirit and flesh, between loving and letting go, between infinity and finitude.

It’s what Ernest Becker realized in his scathing vivisection of modern man, “Primitive man set up his society as a stage, surrounded himself with actors to play different roles, and then invented gods to address the performances to, raising himself to the stars and bringing the stars down into the affairs of men.

And to think that when western man first crashed uninvited into these spectacular dramas, he was scornful of what he saw.

That was because western man was already a fallen creature who had forgotten how to play. Western man was being given a brief glimpse of the creations of human genius, and like a petulant imbecile bully who feels discomfort at what he doesn’t understand, he proceeded to smash everything in sight.” Praised be the unbound playful heart and the liberated humorous soul!

The Egg - by Andy Weir

Image source

Cosmic egg 1
Cosmic egg 2
True power

Reincarnation and the Soul’s Journey: Part 1

Life

Lauren

-

February 5, 2015

9

Reincarnation and the Soul’s Journey: Part 1

“When we have completed all the journeys and adventures through our variety of lives we are supposed to return to the creator with our accumulation of knowledge. It is then absorbed. In this way we are considered cells in the body of God.” ~ Dolores Cannon

Whether we are comfortable with the idea of reincarnation or not, there will be certain patterns and reoccurrences in our lives that are impossible to ignore. Why are we so different from each other in how we react with and digest the world around us?

Why do some succeed in material terms while others ‘fail’? Why are some born with such hardships it can seem overwhelming for others to even comprehend? Everything that makes up US can probably be attributed to a past life or experience we have had along the way, and in some capacity was most likely a choice our soul made, whether we’d like to admit it or not.

The unique part of us that may be an exception to the rule is how we deal with lessons. This can often appear to be a hindrance; whether we take to the challenge we have set ourselves or not.

A soul’s stubbornness, inclination to become a victim of circumstance, inability to learn a particular lesson leaving us stuck in it for lifetimes, goes hand in hand with the positive aspects of that soul that may also reoccur; an interest in certain subjects, academic talent, love of particular parts of the globe, or even prodigal-like talents for a certain artistic endeavor or ability to look at the world with a unique freshness and share it with our fellow man.

A confusion that is often associated with reincarnation is how ‘old’ each individual actually is. In many new age circles this has become a competition – I’m older than you and so on, reflecting the earth-based ego radiating in all its low vibrational glory.

If we assume that we all started out at the same ‘time’; we were born as one with our creator, or as part of the Source, and then branched out as and when we saw fit, we can leave such pettiness behind.

This simplified view of ‘time’ means we can wonder what happened next… maybe we stayed as one with the Source for while, or perhaps we became light beings or other ‘invisible’ forms of energy; helping to create planets and get them up to a standard that life could inhabit. Perhaps we were eager to separate – bursting forth into the unknown to begin learning lessons in material form.

Were we all gas, then rock, then plant, then animal, then ‘man’? Or did we have the option to skip a few steps; weaving in and out of the endless possibilities, and indeed types of life form that we may not have even imagined – inhabiting other planets and being part of civilizations that are mere whispers in our eternal memories.

We have all been in existence, forming and reforming for eons, for energy can never truly ‘die’ and will merely change shape to compliment the next lesson along the way.

In this way then, we are ALL ‘old souls’. The real difference, surely, is whether we are old souls in earthly terms. Whether this is our first ‘earthly’ life, or our one thousandth, when we joined the strong karmic pull of the earth and its unique cycle of lessons – otherwise known as Samsara – can directly reflect how deeply entwined we really are, and how far off are we from overcoming our repetitious pitfalls.

Many people often report (in a regressive state, usually during hypnosis) that they have a deep longing to ‘return home’ and a weighty sadness at the horrible actions of others; this being their first or second life as a human. They are still having trouble adapting to the ways of the world and want out, forgetting their origins during the natural course of birth on this planet.

Others report rejection of their human body through obesity, drug abuse or negative cycles of thinking which lead to disease; anything that will rid them of this heavy and burdensome shell they have come into.

Others sense déjà vu on a daily basis, and feel deeply ingrained emotions that seemingly come from no-where of jealousy, hatred and greed, perhaps reflecting their long stint on earth and all the baggage they have accumulated and are yet to transcend from previous incarnations. It may feel next to impossible for the soul to step out of Samsara due to their time on earth, that the weight is just too great and the amount of karma overwhelming.

This may in fact be the very reason earth is so coveted a place to incarnate. ‘Aliens’ or creatures from other planets certainly seem to be extremely interested in us – ranging from the cold experimental being who perhaps wonders how a species could be so stupidly cruel, to the more compassionate, loving type who understand the effect our demise could have on the whole of existence.

Those who are rooting for our survival and want us to flourish. The explanations of both types probably trigger some resonance within us and many theories have been circulating for centuries about exactly why other beings are so interested.

One is that earth was seeded as a garden, or paradise and other life forms invested in it as a place of perfection until human beings inevitably ‘fell’ (see any religious text on the subject), whereas another is that many planets have come before earth breeding a species similar to humans that are the direct balance between the two ‘types’ of alien race; both compassionate and cruel, and have all come to a sticky end or were able to move into a new dimension just in time and regenerate as a new planet and species that was able to vibrate on a higher frequency.

‘Everything is occurring in perfect timing.’ ~ Doreen Virtue.

Whatever the truth is, it is precisely because of the depth and range of human emotion, and karmic pull (not to mention the beauty of the planet), that earth is a place where one has the potential to advance very quickly if one sticks to the plan. Is it directly due to the likelihood of derailment being so much greater than other places in the universe that the waiting list is so long?

Whatever the truth is – and remembering that there are also the infinite number of parallel universes where we’re living our lives (with slight differences of course) is mind blowing to say the least – the statement that earth is a unique and wonderful place to be living certainly seems to strike a cord.

Life IS precious and if we are able to approach the idea that we are cells in the body of the Creator/Source seeking out all depth of experience and possibility, then it really is awe-inspiring that we get to be a part of it. This kind of reminder can keep us plugged in to the relativity of life and that we are truly honoured to be here.

Dolores Cannon Presents Moving into the New Earth

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Spiral

Koshas ~ The Five Energetic Sheaths that Wrap Your Soul

Sonali Bansal

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February 4, 2015

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Koshas ~ The Five Energetic Sheaths that Wrap Your Soul

Yoga facilitates the journey within to the deepest level of our being. According to ancient texts, each of us has energetic layers or sheaths known as ‘Koshas’ that move from the body’s periphery towards the core of the self: the embodied soul.

The koshas provide a framework for conceptualizing ourselves. As we go deeper with the help of meditation and other spiritual practices, we peel the layers away one by one just like peeling the layers of an onion, to bring our awareness deeper into our bodies, eventually reaching the innermost core, our True Self.

Annamaya Kosha, Pranamaya Kosha, Manomaya Kosha, Vijnanamaya Kosha and Anandamaya Kosha are the five layers that represent the aspects of our personality.

Each layer is an outcome of the energy it feeds on. Let’s begin with the outermost layer, Annamaya kosha is made up of food, Pranamaya Kosha of Prana energy, Manomaya Kosha is formed with thoughts, Vijanamaya Kosha is formed with wisdom and knowledge and the last but significant layer, Anandamaya Kosha is experienced as eternal bliss. Let us understand these Koshas and how they work in detail.

1) Annamaya Kosha, the Food Body

“The infinite is Brahman. From it, from this SELF, space came to be, from space the wind, from the wind, fire; from fire, water; and from water, earth, then from earth, the plants, from plants, the food and from food, the body of man. This body of man, composed of the essence of food is the physical sheath of the Self.” ~ Taittiriya Upanishad (2.1)

‘Anna’ means ‘Food’ and ‘Maya’ means ‘made of’, Annamaya Kosha is made up of the food we consume and represents the physical body – skin, muscles, bones, tendons and tissues. The physical identity of a man often consumes him and leads to ignorance. For most people awareness and observation of themselves doesn’t go beyond the level of ‘Annamaya kosha.’

The primary way to impact this kosha is through asanas – this teaches us to go beyond the physical dimension, to be able to feel your body and sense it from within. Once you become more aware of your body, then you will feel more grounded and present in the moment.

2) Pranamaya Kosha, the Energy Body

Shvetashvatara Upanishad states, “Man and woman, beast and bird live by breath. Breath is therefore the true sign of life. It is the vital force in everyone that determines how long we are to live. Those who look upon breath as the Lord’s gift shall live to complete the full span of life.”

After an intense session of yoga, meditation or any type of spiritual work, you might feel waves of energy flowing in your body, you are in contact with the vital energy body or Pranamaya Kosha. Prana or chi moves through the body in a network of energy pathways or nadis. It governs the movement of blood, fluids, digestion, respiration, etc.

Holding the body and mind together as one unit, the vital force is of crucial importance in functioning of the heart & lungs. When they cease functioning, your physical body can no longer operate. Conscious breathing or types of Pranayama like alternate nostril, abdominal breathing can increase prana into our system and tone the energy body.

3) Manomaya Kosha, the Mental body

Our thought processes, feelings, actions and our day-to-day awareness while we’re functioning “on automatic” creates the Manomaya Kosha. It takes care of our instinctual needs, plus it also helps us obtain our individual desires.

Manomaya Kosha shuts down temporarily and regenerates itself every night when we sleep. Usually animals operate at this level and even human beings in a state of coma. When in coma, we can observe that the first and second layers are working actively but due to the shutdown of the mental body (third layer) there is no movement.

When you examine the contents of the Manomaya kosha closely, you will find repetitive thought patterns in your life in the form of perceptions, reactions and opinions. Mantra meditation is a great way to refine and balance this kosha; focusing on your breathing and being completely centered in the moment helps tune up the Manomaya Kosha.

The external environment is another significant factor in building & functioning of this layer. When we constantly feed ourselves positive and happy thoughts, we feed this layer with good vibes. But if we feed it with negative actions and thoughts, it leaves us feeling exhausted.

4) Vijnanamaya Kosha, the Wisdom body

“Within the mental sheath, made up of waves of thoughts, there is contained the sheath of wisdom. It has the same form, with faith as head, righteousness as right arm and truth as left. Practice of meditation is its heart, and discrimination its foundation. Wisdom means a life of selfless service. Even the gods seek spiritual wisdom. Those who attain wisdom are freed from sin, and find all their selfless desires granted.” ~ Shvetashvatara Upanishad.

Only after removing the blockages in the three lower koshas can we experience deeper insight of Vijnanamaya Kosha or the wisdom body. This layer is composed of intuition, awareness, intellect and conscience. Like when you stop identifying with your thoughts and simply witness them. Vijnanamaya allows us to step back from our current situation and view it from a better perspective; giving a sense of inner knowing.

A person who has an underdeveloped fourth body would be weak in decision-making, lack creativity and will have a poor sense of judgement. In Ashtanga Yoga, the practice of Niyamas (not to steal, speak truth, self study, devotion to god, etc.) and yamas (five restraints include Non-Violence, Truth, Honesty, Continence and non-possession), allows us to refine this layer. Vijanamaya Kosha is also experienced with the help of mantra chanting and additionally meditation.

5) Anandamaya Kosha, the Bliss Body

The inner most layer, right outside your true self (center of consciousness), is Anandamaya Kosha or the bliss body. Its the awareness of being whole and complete, exactly as you are; happiness and joy is your natural state.

It is the final layer standing between individual consciousness and universal oneness; a testimony of the love between Shiva and Shakti. This bliss state is usually experienced in fleeting moments, but can remain for longer periods. When you’re fully present in the moment you experience the Anandamaya Kosha as well as deep meditation.

Shvetashvatara Upanishad states, “Within it is contained the sheath of bliss, which has the same form, with joy as the head, contentment as right arm, and delight the left. Bliss is the heart, and Brahman the foundation. Those who deny the Lord deny themselves; those who affirm the Lord affirm themselves. The wise, not the unwise, realize the Lord.”

In order to activate this sheath, one requires a deeper level of knowledge, detachment and dedication. We experience different layers at different times. When Yoga, Pranayama and Mediation are practised regularly they help us balance these bodies and experience our multidimensional nature.

Moderate exercise helps in activating the outermost layer. With the help of breathing practices, we awaken the Pranamaya Kosha. In a meditative state, we activate the Manomaya Kosha.

Furthermore, the intelligent & logical self that is commanding us right now to sit in a place and meditate, needs to be acknowledged and sensed.

This acceptance would activate the Vijananamaya Kosha. Only after complete realization of the former layers do we get to access Anandamaya Kosha – the dimension of bliss, wholeness and contentment.

The Kosha Model

In yoga texts, the five sheaths are combined into three – the physical body (annamaya kosha) is also called, “gross body.” The three middle sheaths (pranamaya, manomaya, and vijnanamaya koshas) collectively comprise the realm of the “subtle/astral body”. The anandamaya kosha is also called “causal body.”

As you become more aware and conscious of the five koshas, you will begin to create a deeper connection with your own ‘self’ that was hidden and shrouded in different layers developed over the years.

Image Source and references

Chris Dyer
Koshas

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Koshas ~ The Five Energetic Sheaths that Wrap Your Soul

Annamaya Kosha, Pranamaya Kosha, Manomaya Kosha, Vijnanamaya Kosha and Anandamaya Kosha are the five layers that represent the aspects of our personality.

1) Annamaya Kosha, the Food Body

2) Pranamaya Kosha, the Energy Body

3) Manomaya Kosha, the Mental body

4) Vijnanamaya Kosha, the Wisdom body

5) Anandamaya Kosha, the Bliss Body

The Kosha Model

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