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Reincarnation - and Compassion

Ailish,

"Light shines continuously; and it is only the dark clouds in the minds of men that shut it out." - G. de Purucker
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That´s my favorite analogy, sun sky and clouds, simple as that, exact and almost childish in the best sense:D. Not long ago my daughter (6yrs old) and I were discussing"what´s God?" and she caught on at once when I presented my view in this way.


Beautiful post, it seems there´s light coming right out of it.;)
 
Very nice post Ailish. I couldn''t agree more. :D

Phoenix - I agree; for me it is a daily walk. Every action, reaction and intention. The goal, according to Braden - Compassion is not something we "do" - it is something we become. What a challenge. :cool
 
Deborah,

Yes, in my opinion learning to walk the the talk daily is what makes it meaningful... I think that the continual daily practicing is something that´s sometimes not emphasized enough and naturally this will take time, effort, willingness...your whole life and more I guess;).

Like a toddler we will fall down just to get up and try again, do a little better and fall down again, etc... But like it´s inevitable for the little child to finally master walking I think that´s the case for all of us, now or in the now of tomorrow, regarding the growth of a loving, forgiving way of seeing (and, besides... we´re all really just as innocent as babes in our, sometimes foolish-looking, efforts:D )

Of course, it´s more fun to fantasize that one weekend workshop will change your lives all over in a whiz (well, it might), but...it´s rare for anyone accomplished in any "skill" to get there in any other way than- over and over until you finally get it right.

(The movie "Groundhog day" comes to mind for some reason.)
 
I'm glad I stopped by and got to revisit this thread. :thumbsup:

It was just one year ago (almost to the day) I was able to attend an amazing seminar with Gregg Braden and the following are some of my notes from the event:

'WE are discussing how words are not the prayer – but FEELING IS THE PRAYER.

Feel peace – feel it within and it will happen. Feel health – feel it within and it will happen - Feel compassion - feel it within and it will happen.

Next we see Egypt and are discussing how we must merge Logic and Intuition.

Thought = Higher chakras
Feeling = Heart charka
Emotion = lower charkas

Thought and emotion are reconciled in the heart.

Peace in a world – not enough to just think about it or just have emotions about it… WE must merge the two at the heart and feel it.

“Three are the dwellings of the sons and daughters of man; these are thought, feeling and emotion.” – Essene Gospel of Peach III

Buddha taught – Compassion – Gratitude and Love
Jesus (500 years later) taught – Compassion – Gratitude and Love

We need to stop responding to our world with fear – like attracts like – think back to the experiments.

We must become in our lives the very condition that we choose to experience in our world.

Remember – Our DNA (The God Code) translates to: God/Eternal within the body '

Lots of love,
Julie
 
hi julieZ,
Im with you! you know over the years, when you have a life that is all about seeking, all about knowing, there comes the time when the experience of that knowing is all you'll settle for! When I think of how many rivers i've had to cross to get to the here and now, (where we have always been) lol! It seems a good enough reason as any to be here, simply to observe and be part of the greatest evolutionary shift there is!. I've studied all kinds of teachings, been fascinated by geometry,physics and metaphisics, experienced creation through a brush and a canvas, time travelled through dreams that are more real, more alive than my 'waking hours'. the syncronicity is astounding
 
Shield --

Thank you ;) What a lovely way to present and discuss God with your daughter. She's a very lucky little girl! :D


Ailish
 
Well, thanks, Ailish:), but maybe I was the luckier one to be able to get it right for once... as the all to often nagging and tired parent (*sigh*) :rolleyes: ;)
 
HI Julie,

Braden is one of my favorite authors. :) I especially liked -We need to stop responding to our world with fear – like attracts like. For those that have not read The God Code- you might want ot check it out. It's not what you think. It's about sound -vibration, our DNA and creating with conscious intent.

Shield -your daughter is lucky indeed. :thumbsup:
 
I think that for me the hardest aspect of truly living a compassionate life is forgiving and forgetting. Recently, on some unrelated forums, I had some very unfriendly things said and done to me, to the point that after more than 5 years involvement, I left the community. Before I left I forgave the people who had done wrong by me, although I felt that their apologizes were insincere.

So in effect, I forgave them for my selfish reasons, but held onto the pain and injustices almost like a prize. Since coming to this forum, I've been able to forgive them for their sakes, and in doing so, I have lifted the cloud of resentment from my heart. Now all I have to do is let them know that I hold no ill will toward them, and that will clear my heart and soul again. I have felt out-of-step with my spirital being for the last several weeks, and look forward to completing my Forgive and Foget process.

John
 
I think this is a wonderful thread -- a reminder to think, to feel, to be compassionate towards others whom you feel have harmed -- or wronged you somehow, either in this life, or past lives.

I think it's important to let those negative feelings go -- and remember to be happy -- to love yourself, for if you cannot love and be compassionate towards yourself, you cannot truly understand how to do so with others.

Do any new members care to share?

Bright Blessings,

Ailish
 
Funny I was thinking about this question this morning. Here is an excerpt from a longer work of mine. The same principles apply to one life or many:-

“Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” Mahatma Mohandas Gandhi

Most people would like to think that they are very forgiving, but sadly, forgiveness can be difficult to really feel deep down inside when we have been hurt by someone or something. It can be difficult to truly feel forgiveness when we have been injured, even once we have said those magic words ‘I forgive you’. In theory, the stronger, wiser and more secure we are the more we should be able to withstand damage and therefore forgive those who harm us. This can be somewhat easier to say than to do however.

None of us is perfect. We all do stupid, hurtful and unwise things and have such things done to us. Some are minor, some major. Bad things happen to everyone some of the time. Life is like that. You don’t get your money back if you don’t like it and you can’t hit the ‘undo’ button when something goes wrong. So what to do if you have been harmed or offended in some way?

Taking the egoistic, self-justifying moral high ground when someone does something that causes us hurt and saying ‘Well, that is no way to behave. I would never do that. Such an action is simply unforgivable...” will shore up our sense of superiority, but will keep us locked in anger and bitterness. It will not assist us in making our way with any speed towards love. Maintaining a sense of self-righteousness comes with a very high price tag. Forgiveness is on our direct route towards love. Trying to get out of it or go round it will take a lot longer and be more difficult.

If it is too difficult to feel forgiveness when you have been injured in some way, back up a step. How thoroughly has all guilt been processed, discussed and agreed upon? Are you still angry? It is not usually desirable to skip over the whole guilt and remorse thing too quickly if you have suffered a serious injury. Is there something else, more fundamental behind whatever the surface reason for the disagreement might be? How much of the burden of forgiveness is on you and how much on the other? Don’t be angry, be honest. There are always two sides to every story. Are you prepared to listen to the other side calmly and quietly or are you too furious and hurt to hear it?

The more upset you are the more important it is not to let your fears and your imagination run away with you and make matters worse than they already are. You need to get a grip and work out what you are trying to do and where you are trying to go. Do you want love or do you want revenge? You can’t have both, not at the same time anyway. One has a way of excluding the other....
 
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, tanguerra. It is beautifully written and oh-so-true. :)
 
You are welcome. It is my pleasure. Thank you for the compliment.

I think some people sometimes hold themselves (and others) up to impossibly idealistic standards and cause themselves difficulties in this way. It is perfectly natural to be temporarily angry and upset if someone does something to hurt or offend us. (Hitting is not permitted though. :) ).

Forgiveness is something that can take a little while to really get to and it takes some work and thought and some analysis usually, unless you are some kind of saint, which remarkably few of us incarnate earthlings are. :)

It is important to be patient with oneself as well as patient with others when things go wrong. Life is full of messy situations. That is partly what makes it so interesting.
 
I came across this newspaper article today. I was not sure where it might fit, but this seems like a good place.


The basic thrust is that human society today is much more gentle and compassionate than it ever has been before (yes really). The writer cites all sorts of interesting statistics, like the murder rate has dropped, wars are both less frequent and less deadly, people are routinely much kinder to animals and children than they once were and so on. I was thinking there really is hope for humanity!


Perhaps we really are evolving towards love and compassion - slowly, perhaps, but surely nonetheless.

IN 16th-CENTURY Paris, a popular form of entertainment was cat-burning, in which a cat was hoisted in a sling on a stage and slowly lowered into a fire. ... Today, such sadism would be unthinkable in most of the world. This change in sensibilities is just one example of perhaps the most important and most underappreciated trend in the human saga: violence has been in decline over long stretches of history, and today we are probably living in the most peaceful moment of our species' time....
....Some of the evidence has been under our nose all along. Conventional history has long shown that, in many ways, we have been getting kinder and gentler. Cruelty as entertainment, human sacrifice to indulge superstition, slavery as a labour-saving device, conquest as the mission statement of government, genocide as a means of acquiring real estate, torture and mutilation as routine punishment, the death penalty for misdemeanours and differences of opinion, assassination as the mechanism of political succession, rape as the spoils of war, pogroms as outlets for frustration, homicide as the major form of conflict resolution — all were unexceptionable features of life for most of human history. But, today, they are rare to non-existent in the West, far less common elsewhere than they used to be, concealed when they do occur and widely condemned when they are brought to light.
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See the full article here..


http://www.theage.com.au/news/in-depth/mans-inhumanity-to-man/2007/05/25/1179601673603.html
 
Gosh, I hope we are becoming kinder, although I wonder sometimes!


This thread is filled with great points about our reason for living and the importance of compassion. When I am upset about things in this lifetime, I think it has really taught me the fragility and strength of humanity. Everyone gets hurt, everyone grows from it. It took me a long time to realize that and to realize everyone was worthy of compassion. If we heal others, we heal ourselves and our karma. Great topic.
 
Interesting older article, there's a lot to it and I'll probably be chewing on it for a while.


First things first, whether or not we're 'evolving' or at least changing as a 'planet' so to speak, rather than individuals, I don't know. Social mores and what's acceptable definitely has changed throughout societies over our history, but are we as people becoming more compassionate naturally? Call me a pessimist but sometimes I tend to think it might be changing in the opposite direction! Hm, I think I'd have to rub elbows with a lot more people and see a lot more of life to make any determination of this one way or the other. My 'sample size' of years is somewhat limited.


I'm of the personal opinion that our experiences build us (with that little caveat "If we let them", perhaps in small print...) and unfortunately through really painful or negative experiences one's outlook can probably change, even slightly, towards something more negative. Maybe it's just fanciful thought or naivete, I know everyone is different, but I tend to think of a person's natural state as one which is quite compassionate.


Through 'rediscovery' of self through reincarnation experiences methinks I've managed to recover a bit of this compassion which seemed to be locked up in some of those nastier past life events. Growing up I had this latent anger, not a violence or a lashing out, just a constant frustration with myself and others if anyone (especially me) failed to perform in some way to some crazy standard, but I ended up recovering some memories in the last year or two and since then this sort of strange rage has subsided a bit. I've not lost my competitive edge and I don't just lie down when challenged, but overall I'm so much more patient with and tolerant of others and I'm typically content to just let them, well, 'be them'.


When I find myself getting unduly irritated with others or I see myself picking up that old habit of micromanaging others, if I'm afforded introspection I take a breath and remember that little Poem that was on Mother Teresa's home in Calcutta and I 'love them anyways'. Sounds cheesy, I know, but methinks we all have ways to mitigate those moments where we might lack compassion for those we love. Love might be a bit of an overstatement and at the risk of sounding too gooey, my version of love for others might be a bit more along the lines of 'acceptance of and care for'. These days, I find myself far more able to do the same for those I'm inclined to not love than I would have been able to in the past and I try my utmost to find something to appreciate in those who might rub me the wrong way.


Maybe it's a stretch to say compassion is a natural state for everyone (I just don't want to assume things about people, we're all different and I'm not one to evaluate for others) but compassion feels a lot more 'right' for me personally. Not that I can't get heated or stand up for something, but I think I spent enough time locked up with those nastier feelings to know which I prefer. I'm a lot gentler with people these days and it feels pretty darn good.
 
Is real compassion belief in a god and good will towards men always a good thing?


If you believe that then you are truly naïve.


We dropped atomic bombs on Japan and showed no compassion what soever for then tens of thousands of innocent men women and children that were killed. We danced in the streets with the news of what had been done. Having no compassion for those innocent people bought about change for the good of all mankind


So is there a place for no compassion violence, death and destruction to bring about change for the better?
 
John Tat said:
...So is there a place for no compassion violence, death and destruction to bring about change for the better?
Click to expand...
Being a natural system, human development has never traveled in a direct line. Like a 'fractal' image, there have been many forks in the road, plenty of catastrophes and setbacks and huge misjudgements made by leaders who probably thought they were doing the right thing at the time. Human history is littered with these things and has been for untold thousands of years, if not on such a modern scale. So, sometimes we improve in one area, while taking a backwards step in others. We talk about these things, discuss them, grieve over them and hopefully learn from them and take steps to avoid it happening in the future if we can.


One of my favourite sayings is 'Two steps forward, one step back isn't failure — it's a cha-cha!'. Not to make light of the many, many terrible things that have happened in history or the suffering involved, but to say, over time I think things are getting better, even if progress is so slow.
 
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