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Meaning of life is spiritual improvement until you reach the highest plane? I dont think so!

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posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 03:51 PM
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I tend to disagree with this and i think others should question this to.

The buddhas and others say that the aim in our life is to develop your spiritual self to the best it can be.

Well i have many problems with this.

First of all, how can a young person in some third world country do this?

The "high class" spiritual humans would say that when a person dies they will eventually be reborn again and again and again until they develop themselves spiritually to the level of these great buddist monks etc.

How can certain people from all over the world do this?

What if someone somewhere in the world who has no education or spiritual awareness possibly do this, they wouldnt know how to,even if you told them what they had to do they wouldnt understand.

To me the people with high spiritual/soul awareness needs to step back and take a look at what they are saying.

To me they seem like the spiritual government of the spirit world, in as they say, if you dont develop your soul/spirit whilst on earth then you will have the chance to be reborn and rectify yourself so you can come and join us in nirvana,and until you do you will be reborn and reborn again.

This is wrong,they cannot say this, fair enough if thats what the eastern belief is and they are happy with that then its ok,but they are literally saying you are going to be punished if you dont improve your soul/spirit by having another life on earth as a blind/deaf person to learn your lesson.

This is the equivelent of some posh person with a big house.twenty cars,nice wife n kids etc telling some homeless person that they should have worked hard in their life and done everything they could to get as much money as possible to live the better life.

Its basically spiritual snobbery!

[edit on 4-3-2007 by markjaxson]



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 04:06 PM
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I think you're missing the point. The missing link in your understanding is that you do not have to meditate and be aware of your soul or spirituality to progress. You don't have to chant or be a bhuddist or anything like that. Have you ever heard of someone who has died, isn't it always said that it couldn't have happened to a nicer person or that they were wonderful and did not deserve what happened to them. Have you ever met someone where you could say or have heard of them something like "Yeah, that Dave is an awesome guy, couldn't do enough for you". Those are the guys that get it. The people calling him a sucker, a fool or glutton for punishment are the ones that don't.

That person needn't have understood the first thing about the soul or spirituality in order to progress or improve. Just be honest and true to yourself and treat others around you well and with empathy and compassion. It's as simple as that.

Your example of a third world kid actually is the other way around. I think they have a better chance because of the environment they live in. It's the western world with all our money and gadgets and quality of life where it's difficult to rise above the materialism and getting ahead of the game, keeping up with the jones's, vanity, ego and all that.

[edit on 4/3/07 by Prote]



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 04:28 PM
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Your absolutely right with everything you say.

I find it hard to get my point across in a clear concise way,thats one of my weaknesses and i always try to improve that.

The image i have in my head is a buddist who has gone through every plane there is starting with the etheral up to the mental and through to the very last one (or is it?) i think its called atmic or Adi,they look down on the souls still stuck in the etheral because they have a desire and this desire might be to wait for a loved one to die and join them,but the ones who have achieved higher planes/vibration seem to think that until the souls who have desires realise that desires are an illusion they will start to improve themselves and eventually they will join the highest plane.

This to me is wrong because different people have different needs and ideas of perfection,therefore if i dont want to leave my desires to go improve myself to eventually live eternity on the highest plane then i dont have to and i shouldnt have someone say to everyone that if you dont improve then you will be reborn until you do.

Hope you understand what i mean?

Basically i dont want to live eternity the same as a buddah, i have my own goal and i dont think i should have the fear of someone saying if you dont improve in your physical life then when you get a life review you will have the choice to experience another life to learn your mistakes.

I just think this is wrong, its the same thing with jesus also.

Im not demeaning their beliefs but it seems like spiritual snobbery.

I dont want to live for eternity in the way they describe you can, the buddists have to condition thereselves to rid of ALL desires and thats because they have to in there way of life, they just describe all desires and anything else that people enjoy/love as illusions and although they are in essence illusions then so is their "nirvana" that is also an illusion because they created their own perfect world.

Spiritual development is a reason why we live because we need to improve this in order to attain our perfect world/illusion.



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 04:39 PM
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Iv totally contradicted myself.

The buddists seem to think that eventually everyone will realise that everything is an illusion and everyone has to realise this to progress to their mental plane,which they seem to think is the aim in everyones life.

This is because they have experienced different things.

If thats what makes them happy then its ok,but its not what makes everyone happy.

And thats fine. I have just read what some people believe and they have said this is everyones goal in life.

And i disagree strongly.



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 04:47 PM
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I kinda get what you are saying.

To me, no matter what we do in life, we can learn from our experiences if we try to. Just cause someone is enlightened doesn't make them "better" everyone has their own priorities and their own path, that's what makes you you.

Buddha said to test his ideas for yourself, don't listen to anyone unless you have your own reasons to believe them. Something like that.

But I think spiritual snobbery should take care of itself right? If someone wants to start thinking they are more valuable than others, that's just feeding their ego, which is counterproductive to Buddhism I am pretty sure.



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 05:54 PM
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Read your own signature. Don't listen to the Bhuddists if you strongly disagree, just go with what works for you, but I don't think they lord it over those that don't "get it", that is ego and not what they teach.

OK, this is how I think it basically works...

When you die, your soul is greeted by your guardians and maybe other helpers. You are oriented in the realm of the astral and then your life is reviewed. God doesn't judge you, you do. The only way you come back without choices is if you are a nasty piece of work or if you have basically been an unpleasant person to a greater or lesser extent.

The decision to come back is often by your own making. In the astral, you have no ego, none of the dogma's and beliefs you had whilst on the physical plain. You have truth. You have access to the akashic library which is a record of pretty much everything but most importantly, a history, in minute detail of your being.. you as an entity, your previous lives, everything. Immediately after death is this period of reflection and the majority of us will see the errors of our ways regardless of how good or bad we have been but that karmic level dictates your options.

It is the karmic level you are going for, the better person you are in your interactions with others in this life, the more choices you have. The worst case scenario is that you just get dumped back to try again. So, the only thing you have to do is spread more joy than sorrow and the more the balance in favour of joy you bring, the better choices you have when you die.

None of this need have anything to do with spirituality but connecting with the Earth and the Universe and your inner self, higher self or overself will help you immensly because once connected, it becomes totally natural to be kind and loving even in the face of the horrors in the world and this is the illusion the Bhuddas speak of (I think). It make no odds if you realise it's an illusion or not.

It's all about choices. You can do what you want, agree or disagree with what you want, have as much money as you want... anything you want. Live your life however you want but if you are screwing people to get up the ladder, don't bank on a lot of choices when your time is up, you will choose to come back by yourself, another choice that YOU will make.

My point is, what you believe or experience, doesn't matter, you opted for the life you have anyway, the choices you make whilst here is your challenge. In a nutshell, none of it matters provided you conduct yourself with compassion and integrity and more words like that.... all is good.

I suppose I better say this is my opinion... or belief. I don't know anything for certain.



posted on Mar, 4 2007 @ 09:22 PM
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has anyone read the celestine prophecy?



posted on Mar, 6 2007 @ 02:56 AM
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I see your points.

One thing i cannot understand is the past lives part, i mean i have heard of people being hypnotised to access any past lives they have had but i have also know people to be hypnotised and made to think they are an animal.

If someone chooses to be reincarnated into another body if they think they have bad karma and they want to make up for it then in their next life how do they know that they have chosen to be in that body and make sure they end up with good enough karma before they die again?

Theres just something not right about it.

I mean lets take this for example.

A parent of a child decides that every time her child does something bad she will write it down on a pad,and not tell the child when he/she has done something wrong.

And at the end of every month she will add up all the bad things the child has done.

She decides that her child has performed badly this month and gives her child a good beating.

Now this child doesnt know right from wrong, if he/she had any memory from a past life then the childs past life voice should be hinting at what is right and wrong,therefore he/she could make up for all the bad karma throughout this new life he/she has chosen.

And the problem lies right there.

Different people have different opinions of what is right and wrong.

Even if you do good things,there is bound to be someone else whos opinion differs even of they are both out of love for someone or something.

It just boggles the mind.



posted on Mar, 6 2007 @ 10:28 AM
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Apologies for the exceptionally long post, I can't seem to write short one, I do try..

Well, we are into the question that most of us ponder, what is it all about and we may well all come up with different answers, it's one of those subjects that only has meaning to the individual. For example, I could answer your questions and say it is truth but it would be my truth and no one elses, for every truth, there's someone that will heartily disagree, hence you will see lots of phrases like... "look within yourself". I will try and offer you food for thought without trying to push my own beliefs but you have to remember, this is one persons persepctive and may not be right but you are simply questioning the very thing(s) that at some point we all question.


One thing i cannot understand is the past lives part, i mean i have heard of people being hypnotised to access any past lives they have had but i have also know people to be hypnotised and made to think they are an animal.

Personally, I don't like hypnosis because I think our physical being and the nature of humans is that we are programmable and easily influenced. If you want to find out what past lives you have, my choice would be to start with meditation. Astral Projection (AP) aka OOBE is, in my opinion the best way to access past lives without experiencing physical death. Calming of the mind, body and spirit is the start. Personally, I wouldn't want a third party involved to any great degree with this subject, but that's me.


If someone chooses to be reincarnated into another body if they think they have bad karma and they want to make up for it then in their next life how do they know that they have chosen to be in that body and make sure they end up with good enough karma before they die again?

Theres just something not right about it.

The short answer is they don't know and rightly so or that would be cheating. Perhaps some of us have this knowledge, others find this knowledge but most of us don't have a clue. It is only the in between stages of physical life where you get the truth of your situation. You've heard that life is an illusion and reality is what we create for ourselves? I buy into that philosophy. Doesn't mean it's right. It works for me at this juncture though. If it worked for all of us, life would be boring and getting the truth would be easy. I believe it's difficult for a reason, it's clear to me that we are here for an education, make of it what you will.


I mean lets take this for example.

A parent of a child decides that every time her child does something bad she will write it down on a pad,and not tell the child when he/she has done something wrong.

And at the end of every month she will add up all the bad things the child has done.

She decides that her child has performed badly this month and gives her child a good beating.

Now this child doesnt know right from wrong, if he/she had any memory from a past life then the childs past life voice should be hinting at what is right and wrong,therefore he/she could make up for all the bad karma throughout this new life he/she has chosen.

And the problem lies right there.

We can all come up with examples of a horrible existance. In this scenario, you have two people, an abuser and an abusee. They both are learning different lessons and perhaps the mothers lesson is to come. Lessons aren't always abuse but with young ones it's a difficult subject. The child may have been an abuser in the past life or has not chosen the life she has, it would have depended on what choices (or lack of) she/he had before she came. Some may say this does happen for a reason but we don't like responses like that because it is logical to us that children are innocent so some of these philosophies don't wash well particulary with anyone that has experienced it.

About 15 years ago, I became disillusioned with life, I think many of us hit that stage at some point. Everyone I got to know had issues, everyone had had a horror story to tell, everyone had some psychological issue or another whether they would admit it or not and most of us don't like to admit when we have a problem. In fact, the only way to defeat such issues is to recognise them in the first place. You can lead a horse to water etc etc.

I have my own horror story and I bet you do too. I have little family left, how do you forgive a murderer of a parent, child or sibling? or abuse of the same or even both or in combination, it is psychological torture but how many of us experience this? ... more than you may think. Look around the world. Even the religions teach forgiveness and that's really, really hard. How can you possibly forgive? Forgiveness is a choice. If you don't, it eats you from the inside out, you can become bitter and angry, it consumes you and changes you unless you realise what is happening. Forgiveness is the only way (I have found) to find that peace or at least recover from the negative emotional spiral. Once you go through these stages, you are freed from those shackles and can finally move on. The child in your scenario has such a challenge and may or may not make life work for her and the mother is an ass and may find herself dumped back into a similar scenario or worse than the one she is dishing up... she WILL pay for her actions... who knows, this is IMHO.


Different people have different opinions of what is right and wrong.

They certainly do but the only opinion that matters is your own. I like to think of this as a window. Everyone has a moral/ethical window, some can see wonderous beauty through a large clear window and others are looking through a tiny dirty window that blurs and confuses what they see.


Even if you do good things, there is bound to be someone else whos opinion differs even of they are both out of love for someone or something.

So what if someone elses opinion differs? Follow your heart, you know what's right and wrong. I don't believe we need it laid out for us to know what's right and wrong. Given what you said here, the best example would be two parents who simply disagree on disciplining a child, one may see a smack as abuse and the other may see it as necessary. Both will claim love for the child and their best interest and could argue a case on either side, so yes, even in cases like this where it isn't perhaps wanton abuse but more of a grey area then it's difficult but that's what makes life challenging. I have an opinion on this issue, but again, that doesn;t make it truth for another person. That's why we need patience, openness, support networks, love and understanding. Without these things, we have a small, dusty window.


It just boggles the mind.

Yes it does. We just need to keep plugging away and stand up for what we believe is right. Do unto others as you would have them do to you. Be kind. Be respectful. Forgive where you can. Give where you can. Smile. Think of others. Help where possible without reward. Follow your heart. Have fun... and you will be just fine.

Also, if we question it too much without trusting our own instincts, that can also lead down a slippery path. At some point you have to set a flag in your belief system and follow it until you have further realisations where you may adjust your behaviour accordingly, that's called learning and why we are here.



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