Confused About Buddahism "no Soul" Concept And Rebirth

[100rockets]

23 hours ago, Deep said:

Reincarnation is just a concept to explain Consciousness taking on many identities. Consciousness is continuous but there are individual egos within it. Why does it do this? We don't know. 

Thats an interesting way to look at it.

So much stuff on this post to think about

[Guivs]

Forget all we said and maybe try not to think your way into it, please. Nor settle with what fits your preconceived ideas. Nor settle with what makes you feel best. 

Just look it is not particularly easy

[Dodo]

On 16/01/2017 at 2:57 AM, Deep said:

Consciousness has made an identity called "Deep". This identity is imaginary so there is no such thing as a separate "Deep" from Consciousness. It's all created within my mind. That's how it is with all the other humans. The illusion is so powerful they believe they are that identity and they are experiencing life as that. Reincarnation is just a concept to explain Consciousness taking on many identities. Consciousness is continuous but there are individual egos within it. Why does it do this? We don't know. 

 

I bet it does it with the sole purpose to create  experiences and adventures

[100rockets]

@Guivs  I'll try to do that. Thinking about it gets me frustrated anyway

[Deep]

@100rockets There is research by Dr. Ian Stevenson from the University of Virginia on reincarnation. He interviewed a few thousand children who remembered their past lives. It doesn't prove reincarnation but it's interesting nonetheless. I think it's possible that we exist as separate souls. 

Edited January 18, 2017 by Deep

[100rockets]

@Deep  Yea I read about that, I find it hard to take that as evidence but still interesting study

[Azrael]

On 15.1.2017 at 9:46 PM, 100rockets said:

Who ever is being reborn, is that not you? will it not be your own consciousness that is experiencing a new form of life?

I've meditated quite some time on the question of rebirth. In the beginning on my investigation I had quite some problems with the idea because there seems to be one point in this paradigm that is "wuu-huu". And that is: "How can your consciousness transform into another body when you're dead?" That just seems new-age, doesn't it?

Well, it seems that way when you're very convinced that you were popped in this physical universe at some point, developed yourself over time, made your free choices and did your thing. When you live in that kind of world, it indeed seems new-age and like wishful thinking.

But when you look at it again with some openness, you'll discover some obvious things. If you "the person - the individual" were popped into this world when you were born, there must be something that did that, right? Some mechanism, some thing in nature that popped you. 

Well if this is so, first of all how can you say that you are separate from the mechanism that did that? Transpose yourself into another dimension to get this point. Look at an apple tree. It apples. Now, at what point can you say that the apple from the tree is separate from the actual tree? For us it becomes an apple if we can identify it as an apple, right? But this is a distinction we make, something conceptual. Nothing else. Pure fiction.

Now, the same thing applies to yourself. You cannot separate yourself from the thing that you grew out of. In that way everything that there is, is necessarily inter-connected by design.

If that is the case - which is so - you didn't started at one point. We could say you "the absolute infinity" transform yourself quite regularly to new forms and patterns, but they are all the same thing - just looking different. So, you and everybody else, are fundamentally that - now being a certain pattern of this universe for some time.

Do you get that? If you really do, that is extraordinary to begin with.

So in that respect, you can never die. Because you can't stop. Because stopping implies starting, and there was no start to begin with. So later - won't you - transform into a new perspective who sees the world through its eyes.

This is - in my current state of seeing it - the worst case scenario that can happen to you. You always transform to new beings and perspectives and live forever and ever. And the thing we call death is just the necessary counterpart that needs to exist so that you can say and be sure that you are really here, right now. It's a cycle like everything else in existence. 

I think this cycle thing really is a give-away in the afterlife discussion. Look at the planets cycling, look at nature, your own psychology, everything works in cycles.

Now, I said the thing I just described is the worst case scenario because it means that you'll loose everything of your individuality that you embody right now. My guess however is, that nature is even more crazy then that.

Now, this is just an intuition I have: If you drop your Newtonian world view and realize that the only thing you can know that there is - is your perspective and by that yourself, you'll quickly realize some amazing things. How can it be that nature is so stunningly beautiful? Look a stunning nature documentary and see for yourself. How can it be that nature is so dramatic? Look at our wars we fight, about the animal world and what they do. How is it that nature is so diverse and always getting more complex? See how a few billions years ago everything was dust and now we created super-human computers who are better at chess and Go then the ones who invented it - us. If you really meditate on that, you'll quickly be astonished by all these things.

And so, I have the intuition that there might be a bigger game around "you the individual, the personal consciousness, the perspective, you currently have" and it wouldn't surprise me if there is an endless chain of levels and dimensions and what not that you go through. It really wouldn't. But this is all just speculation, a lot of DMT and some MeO trips and me thinking about it.

The fact here is, you never started and you'll never stop. And by that you're infinite by design and have not to worry about anything in the future. Relax, and have a bowl on that.

Cheers, Az

[WaveInTheOcean]

52 minutes ago, Azrael said:

I've meditated quite some time on the question of rebirth. In the beginning on my investigation I had quite some problems with the idea because there seems to be one point in this paradigm that is "wuu-huu". And that is: "How can your consciousness transform into another body when you're dead?" That just seems new-age, doesn't it?

Well, it seems that way when you're very convinced that you were popped in this physical universe at some point, developed yourself over time, made your free choices and did your thing. When you live in that kind of world, it indeed seems new-age and like wishful thinking.

But when you look at it again with some openness, you'll discover some obvious things. If you "the person - the individual" were popped into this world when you were born, there must be something that did that, right? Some mechanism, some thing in nature that popped you. 

Well if this is so, first of all how can you say that you are separate from the mechanism that did that? Transpose yourself into another dimension to get this point. Look at an apple tree. It apples. Now, at what point can you say that the apple from the tree is separate from the actual tree? For us it becomes an apple if we can identify it as an apple, right? But this is a distinction we make, something conceptual. Nothing else. Pure fiction.

Now, the same thing applies to yourself. You cannot separate yourself from the thing that you grew out of. In that way everything that there is, is necessarily inter-connected by design.

If that is the case - which is so - you didn't started at one point. We could say you "the absolute infinity" transform yourself quite regularly to new forms and patterns, but they are all the same thing - just looking different. So, you and everybody else, are fundamentally that - now being a certain pattern of this universe for some time.

Do you get that? If you really do, that is extraordinary to begin with.

So in that respect, you can never die. Because you can't stop. Because stopping implies starting, and there was no start to begin with. So later - won't you - transform into a new perspective who sees the world through its eyes.

This is - in my current state of seeing it - the worst case scenario that can happen to you. You always transform to new beings and perspectives and live forever and ever. And the thing we call death is just the necessary counterpart that needs to exist so that you can say and be sure that you are really here, right now. It's a cycle like everything else in existence. 

I think this cycle thing really is a give-away in the afterlife discussion. Look at the planets cycling, look at nature, your own psychology, everything works in cycles.

Now, I said the thing I just described is the worst case scenario because it means that you'll loose everything of your individuality that you embody right now. My guess however is, that nature is even more crazy then that.

Now, this is just an intuition I have: If you drop your Newtonian world view and realize that the only thing you can know that there is - is your perspective and by that yourself, you'll quickly realize some amazing things. How can it be that nature is so stunningly beautiful? Look a stunning nature documentary and see for yourself. How can it be that nature is so dramatic? Look at our wars we fight, about the animal world and what they do. How is it that nature is so diverse and always getting more complex? See how a few billions years ago everything was dust and now we created super-human computers who are better at chess and Go then the ones who invented it - us. If you really meditate on that, you'll quickly be astonished by all these things.

And so, I have the intuition that there might be a bigger game around "you the individual, the personal consciousness, the perspective, you currently have" and it wouldn't surprise me if there is an endless chain of levels and dimensions and what not that you go through. It really wouldn't. But this is all just speculation, a lot of DMT and some MeO trips and me thinking about it.

The fact here is, you never started and you'll never stop. And by that you're infinite by design and have not to worry about anything in the future. Relax, and have a bowl on that.

Cheers, Az

Brilliant comment Azreal. Great to see others being inspired by Alan Watts (and also obviously on a deep level understanding what the old man is talking about in the lectures on YouTube).

Only thing I didn't really agree with was:

"This is - in my current state of seeing it - the worst case scenario that can happen to you."

Why so? And to which "you" ? ... I mean, sure, from a very ego-driven person stuck in the illusion then this is of course very bad.
However, for a person who isn't stuck in the illusion I find it pretty beautiful actually ... Infinite existence without ever really becoming fully conscious of the fact that you are an infinite existence ... (only on a logical/conceptual level, and maybe partly intuitively conscious of it through no-self experiences)
And I mean that new perspective you might transform into after death, cannot remember ANYTHING about the "old"/"previous" perspective -- in fact words like old/previous don't make any sense even...Time is an illusion, we already know this from science/relativity -- so there's nothing to be either sad or happy about; it is just is; it's neutral.

I mean from Absolute Infinity's perspective, which is a non-dual perspective, it's both fantastic and terrible at the same time, which together just merges into: neutral/no-perspective.

[WaveInTheOcean]

"Now, I said the thing I just described is the worst case scenario because it means that you'll loose everything of your individuality that you embody right now."  ... Yes, but then there will also be no "person/mind" left to then be "sad" about that particular "loss" .

[Azrael]

52 minutes ago, WaveInTheOcean said:

Why so? And to which "you" ?

For the simple reason that it would be so nice to start as a blank slate, experience multiple lives and dimensions and love, hate, religion, science, drama and all that, go through that and carry a little bit of that around with you, forget yourself, remember yourself again and then blow up after some time completely and go to the next level. And this for ever and ever and ever. And the forgetting of oneself would make this journey quite unique every time you reach a new level.

... but I'm obviously dreaming here

[Martin123]

35 minutes ago, Azrael said:

... but I'm obviously dreaming here

Hehehe

[cetus]

21 minutes ago, Azrael said:

For the simple reason that it would be so nice to start as a blank slate, experience multiple lives and dimensions and love, hate, religion, science, drama and all that, go through that and carry a little bit of that around with you, forget yourself, remember yourself again and then blow up after some time completely and go to the next level. And this for ever and ever and ever. And the forgetting of oneself would make this journey quite unique every time you reach a new level.

... but I'm obviously dreaming here

@Azrael If this is happening and time is no factor, it would be happening simultaneously. Maybe this is where parallel universes become a possibility. You exist in infinite dimensions at once but are only aware of this one from this perspective. Who knows, maybe when we break through the illusion that we are existing in only one dimension to realize that we do exist in many dimensions is when we truly become whole. I may be dreaming too.

[Bob84]

@100rockets religions are not suppose to make sense 

[WaveInTheOcean]

7 hours ago, Azrael said:

For the simple reason that it would be so nice to start as a blank slate, experience multiple lives and dimensions and love, hate, religion, science, drama and all that, go through that and carry a little bit of that around with you, forget yourself, remember yourself again and then blow up after some time completely and go to the next level. And this for ever and ever and ever. And the forgetting of oneself would make this journey quite unique every time you reach a new level.

... but I'm obviously dreaming here

"blank state" + "carry a little bit of that around with you" = does not compute :> 

 

[100rockets]

@Azrael  How do you meditate on that? I thought I'm not supposed to purposefully think while meditating. Also whats your perspective on how perspective evolves throughout this cycle? or is it just consciousness that evolves and gets thrown into random new perspectives that in the big picture don't matter what form or perspective it takes just your level of awareness?

[100rockets]

7 hours ago, cetus56 said:

@Azrael If this is happening and time is no factor, it would be happening simultaneously. Maybe this is where parallel universes become a possibility. You exist in infinite dimensions at once but are only aware of this one from this perspective. Who knows, maybe when we break through the illusion that we are existing in only one dimension to realize that we do exist in many dimensions is when we truly become whole. I may be dreaming too.

It's such a fascinating topic I always wondered why can I only perceive myself and why this self specifically on some level it seems like there must be more to it

[cetus]

2 minutes ago, 100rockets said:

It's such a fascinating topic I always wondered why can I only perceive myself and why this self specifically on some level it seems like there must be more to it

Maybe because the mind is a product of this universe/dimension and so it's all tuned to work as one. Just a thought.

[100rockets]

1 minute ago, cetus56 said:

Maybe because the mind is a product of this universe/dimension and so it's all tuned to work as one. Just a thought.

Possibly. So you would have to go out of the mind to perceive anything else