How often do you contemplate coming back after you die? How many of you have joked that'll you were a sloth in a past life or that you'll come back as the opposite sex, or richer, or without disability or with, hopefully, more wisdom? How many of you have contemplated the animal you'd like to come back as, should you have a choice, hoping it'll be something noble like a dolphin or an eagle over a dung beetle?
'I don't mind, so long as I don't have big boobs or asthma' I joked last week to my best mate and her husband as we had a cuppa in the garden, enjoying a little winter sunshine. She looked at me and laughed, reminding me I don't believe in reincarnation. She does - as a vipassana meditator who have essentially Buddhist beliefs, coming back again to learn your lessons is a given.
There's a lot of Buddhist philosophy I subscribe to, but not that. It seems like wishful thinking to me, or perhaps just an easy answer to what happens to our brains - and our consciousness - when we die.
It's impossible for us to believe in no thought as thinking creatures.
Try it.
Told ya.
It's easier for me to rest easy in the idea that we become part of the earth physically - our matter is absorbed into the universe to feed the universe. This is infinitely beautiful a concept - the ones we love become part of the very air we breath. I struggle to think of me not thinking when I am gone, but accept this is the case. I'm just neurons firing in my brain, and that's okay. When those electrical impulses stop, so do I. I will live on for a while in the brains of people who remember me, and I am plant and fungi food and that's absolutely freaking awesome. I existed, and then I do not.
I don't need to think about coming back as a beautiful spotted quoll or as princess to give my life meaning.
The cases for reincarnation are indeed fascinating, but without proof, it's just a story we believe in to explain the inexplicable and inconceivable, in the same way some of us choose to have faith in God. We are constantly creating stories - the whole of humanity is a collective story of how we see ourselves on the planet. We tell stories and believe in them because they motivate us and compel us to have a reason to exist. They explain our suffering and life circumstances. It is easier to believe in a multitude of extraordinary stories than it is to understand that we are just a material being that will be one day immaterial.
That isn't to say the stories of reincarnation aren't worth contemplating in some way. How fascinating it is to contemplate that someone is afraid of swimming because they drowned in a previous life or that they feel so connected to their 'soul' mate that they must have met in all the previous lives before. The research of Dr Stephenson who explored the anecdotal evidence of reincarnated children does sound so convincing that I don't blame people for ignoring the cognitive bias and various fallibility in his studies. How cool is it to think that a child has a memory of being a WW1 fighter pilot or great Aunty Susan who we loved so very much.
It's a nicer story and perhaps we can wrap our neurons more easily around that than the thought of our brains no longer thinking.
And boy we can come up with any reason to explain the problems with reincarnation, can't we? For example, there's roughly 2.5 million more ants for every person on earth. How is it possible people possibly come back as an ant? Do we just cycle through? What about all the other ants? Do they not have a consciousness? What about the expanding population of people in the world? Are new souls created? By what process? Is there a reservoir of souls just hanging out waiting for the possibility of reincarnation? We do seem to have an answer to any questioning of reincarnation, without any proof whatsoever. We argue we don't need proof to believe what we know is true.
Okaaaaaay.
The way I figure, if I'm reincarnated after all, that's a happy bonus, because earth is pretty beautiful, all told. But I also have to be happy with the idea that I'm just stardust, and that's just as meaningful.
It's meaningful because it's a framework less likely to start war. Because if we and every living creature is also dust, then we have something in common, and perhaps are less likely to drop a bomb on each other for believing other stories.
It's okay to just live one life, and do as best we can by acting out of love so that the ones born out of nothing after us inherit a good life too. If we achieve that, then our life has meant something.
With Love,
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I loved that last paragraph! Although I have often flirted with the idea of reincarnation, as I have suffered some losses and it makes those burdens less painful when I think there is the possibility of meeting again, in other ways, in other lives, my deceased father, my dead nephew. But I found your closing words very beautiful. Perhaps one life is enough. Maybe the big test is this life, our only chance to prove what we are, before we are completely extinguished. Like those flowers that bloom for an instant and then wither, so do the human beings in the world: perhaps our light lasts only as long as the light of a candle. Greetings
Beautifully said. I know it's comforting to think we will meet again and I wouldn't want to take that comfort from you, but I'm glad you found reassurance here. I'm sorry for your losses and I'm sending you a ton of love.
Hmm, earth is pretty beautiful as you said. But the bad things in world would not make is wish to come back once we have gone.
I don't think we'd appreciate the goodness and beauty in the world if we didn't have the darkness too. And I think it's one of our jobs as human beings to show an example of what we could be through our own goodness.
I can't really articulate all my thoughts on your post, because it probably deserves a post of its own.
The notion that the atoms in our body aren't destroyed, merely transformed beyond death, and the very fact that our cellular renewal constantly means that we're a forever changing bundle of atoms is chemically and physically beautiful.
As an atheist, the fact that the processes of the universe (and our limited consciousness / intelligence) has me see beauty in all things.
Those trees and grasses growing in the old, abandoned cemetery? The carbon in them was probably the person once upon a time. Or rather, the bird soaring over head? It may have eaten a beetle or whatever scavenger once ate a human corpse.
Its a cycle, and its beautiful. But at the same time, it is not all that important that we find it that way, because it would happen just the same without any of us.
It's nice to know that there's at least one other person on Hive who sees things the way that I do. Perfectly said.
As I slept on this post over night, I knew there was a thousand things I could have added, but it was enough for the purposes of this post. Would love to read your response - feel free.
I went majorly off topic, grab a cup of tea or something before you read the response below :P
Btw, thought you might enjoy this. The red sorites and blue jets blew my mind.
I was hoping I could have this on in the background while at the gym, but it will need to wait until I get home.
Okay, I watched the whole thing. Brilliant visuals. Emotive heartstrings by giving energy nomenclature that tries to get us to apply anthropomorphism to the red sprites.
They're beautiful and evocative, and the fact that all this plays out whether we're there to observe it or not is fantastic. :)
I'm so glad you loved it! I was like 'yeah yeah, more storm chasing vids from the hubs' - and then was amazed, in the way that I was as a child, discovering something new and unknown in the world! Rare these days. I can't stop thinking about it. Sitting down to critique now.
Reincarnation is for sure one of those interesting existential questions we should grapple with. I’m a little bit of a fence sitter on it which is easy because we aren’t committed one way or the other.
In some respects I think we reincarnate but the issue is where and how. I’ve listened to a couple interesting guys Billy Carson and Jason Jorjani and their thoughts on the subject are that we leave the spiritual plane we are in now when we die and we have the chance to go somewhere else if we can. Unfortunately these days there’s a lot of demonic forces that make it far more difficult for us to move onto the next step in the spiritual journey, where we would go to another dimension or realm not the Christian Heaven stuff but to continue our journey to where we should go. We are blocked and therefore we will often reincarnate somewhere here.
A lot of this is based on ancient Sumerian writings, which have a lot of knowledge in them on things we’ve forgotten. It’s pretty fascinating stuff!
I think it's always been the case that there's been 'demonic' or other forces that cause us to behave badly or to make the wrong decisions so that, accordingly to ideas about reincarnation, we need a theology or philosophy that says 'behave badly and you will come back as a slug' or 'dont do the right thing or you'll go to hell'. Perhaps 'these days' we have less people subscribing to religious ideas that would moderate their behave or perhaps we just have more people or we have the media to inform us and make us believe their are 'demonic' or equivalent forces.
Bottom line is we seem to need to think there's a reason to behave well for some after this life reward, rather than having an intrinsic motivation to be a good person in this ONE life.
Sumerians were just philosophising like human have over the centuries - that's the rub right - no one can be sure.
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I really like your writing style; it's such a pleasant read, but I've never really thought about the subject. Sometimes I decide to believe in fantastical things just for fun. Since we're here, why not believe in interesting things? But reincarnation is a direction I haven't looked in. It would be a cruel joke if we only reincarnated those who don't believe in them to learn something, haha.
Ha well yes, I've thought about that too - perhaps I'm reincarnated to think like this or my soul is always going to look at the physics and biology of it and be happy with that!