QUOTE FOR TODAY – The Gita

Credit : International Society for Krishna Consciousness ( ISKCON )

 

 

As the indweller  ( the soul ) in the body experiences childhood, youth and old age in the body,

So does it pass on to another body. Therefore the wise  man is not confused.

 

It is neither born nor does it die. Coming into being and ceasing to be do not take place in it.

Unborn, eternal, constant and ancient, it is not killed when the body is slain

( it does not cease to exist when the body perishes)

 

As a man casting off worn out garments puts on new ones,

So the embodied one ( the soul) casting off worn out bodies enters into others that are new.

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A Valiant Choice – Part II ( Dramatized )

Credit: soundofheart.org

                                                                                                                                           

                                      A    VA LIANT     CHOICE

                                         (A   One -Act -Play )

 DRAMATIS   PERSONAE

Gayatri :  A soul preparing to incarnate

Prashant:  A Guide soul

Gambheer:  A Teacher soul

Yogini, Nirvana, Advait:    Souls assisting the incarnating soul

Voice of Siddharth: Voice of a Master, The Buddha from a higher realm

THE   SETTING

A small group of soul forces are engaged in discussion and preparation for the reincarnation of one of them.

The stage is laid out in a simple setting with a rockery in the middle on which five figures are seated at different levels as people would on a picnic. One of them, Gaitri is seated on the floor in the space which the rockery encircles on three sides, except the side facing the audience. She is seated in the lotus position, eyes closed in Yogic meditation. Most of the spirits are dressed in similar white silken robes and sandals, irrespective of sex. The incarnating spirit Gaitri seated on the floor is dressed in a cotton saffron robe of the same type. The guide spirit Prashant is dressed in cream silk and the Teacher spirit Gambheer is in blue silk.

The scene opens in virtual darkness with very dim pools of light to the accompaniment of strains of a Sitar playing Raga Parameshwari as the curtain swings open. The music then dies out  before the dialogue begins.

THE    PLAY

Yogini:    Even after so much preparation, it is difficult when it finally comes to take the plunge as if into an abyss, a bottomless pit. Not all one’s knowledge of physical reality and experience of eternity prepares one for the jolt of matter, the bombardment of the senses, the metamorphosis. 

Nirvana:    It is remarkable that we do so despite the fact that there never is any compulsion in the choice of whether to enter Earth life or to remain in equilibrium. The choice of incarnation has therefore always been a valiant one.

( Gaitri stirs from her meditation, looks around and slowly rises to her feet turning to where Prashant is seated at the lowest extremity of the rockery. She goes and stands beside him, casually placing her hand on his shoulder and addressing him)

Gaitri:    I always quake with fear before making entry, every single time, unfailingly, but have always opted in favour of going again and never because I enjoyed the experience.

Prashant;    On the other hand, I have never felt your kind of compulsion. Perhaps I am not courageous enough.

Gambheer:    ( seated at the highest point in the rockery) Or because you are not in need of  the experience for such growth which you manage to attain on the basis of other strengths.

Yogini:    Once you commence, there is no end to the need for repeated reincarnations revealing some more subtle aspect of matter which one quickly realizes has in it the inherent dynamics for ascent to higher levels.

Nirvana;    I have always felt that it is an act of great courage to want to experience embodiment, the imprisonment of being, the subjection to physical senses, the lessons of pain, the shocking displays of the law of opposites. Discounting of course the  experience of sex ( Chuckles).

Prashant:    Nirvana, you surely need to reincarnate precisely because you have yet to overcome your lingering memories of carnal relationships.

Gaitri:    In my view the sublimation felt in sexual ecstasy is hardly something to be frowned upon. Providence has created it not merely for ensuring procreation but to give the earthly persona a foretaste of the higher ecstasy that we experience when ultimately merging with the supreme spirit at the highest levels.  Sexual love derives from Spiritual love which is the prototype for sex.

Gambheer:    I did not mean to denigrate sexuality. After all it is a great motivating force that can help overcome the ego and to sublimate its baser attributes, particularly when it gives rise to a kind of profound love. I believe it was conceived for that very purpose rather than merely for procreation which earlier was possible through simple regeneration. That kind of world would have created horribly inflated egos where each entity was entirely self sufficient creating a clone of itself and in opposition to other clones which differed. What I meant was that hankering after it as a motive for reincarnation was completely misplaced.

Nirvana:    Hey, I was only joking, but I’m glad we have analysed its value on the physical plane.

Gaitri:    Returning to choices of reincarnation – we have available, unlimited number of choices of gender, circumstances of birth, strengths, weaknesses, life-span, race, social status, familial relationships – the spectrum is indeed very broad. What is important is to arrive at the right combination for the kind of experience one wishes to have for a certain kind of growth.

Gambheer;    It is not easy subjecting oneself even to one’s own choices.

Prashant:    Even linking up as a guiding force has been an overwhelming experience. How much more must be witnessing and enacting one’s reincarnation?

Yogini;    You choose for instance, whether you wish to work out with the domination of being a male or experience the  ‘passivity’ of womanhood – differing parameters and compulsions making for different settings.

Nirvana:    Conceptually, the plan always appears a good one for the purpose for which it is created with positive sustaining features and negative ones representing trials and obstacles. But the results are quite often unpredictable and traumatic. I still carry the ache for someone I dearly loved whom i left behind.

Prashant:    It is precisely in such situations that the Guides play a crucial role. For instance in averting suicides, depressions, addictions and morbidity, though it is hard work creating the right volition at the material level to avert an untenable situation. You certainly need dear Nirvana, to rise above your lingering cravings. Both sex and attachments need to be overcome and sublimated. Attachments are a form of love which have to serve a purpose, not become a purpose in themselves. Love for a son/daughter should not become an obsession even after that love has secured them in life.  In all earthly scriptures such obsessive attachments have a name – in the Hindu scriptures it is called ‘Moh’ – infatuations which arise from ego and are evil, hampering the progress of the Soul. Other scriptures also define such infatuation as being negative.

( Gaitri turns away from Prashant and faces the audience)

Gaitri:    It is really hard infiltrating the material world even to get to your own incarnation. It is as if  you are dealing with insensitive beings who neither heed, hear or obey. The physical gravity, electromagnetism, time-frames and compulsions of organic life produce the extremely stubborn phenomenon of ego.

Yogini;    Nothing is as startling there as to witness the possession of one’s incarnation by its ego, the force of the ego-personality. It is a force that pegs it down and gives it a novel motivation, dimension and twist. The sheer weight of ego and its compulsions are at time overwhelming.

Gaitri;    Yes, it is at the heart of the challenge – the challenge of the primary experience of matter and also the ultimate one – the fetter of fetters which makes you appreciate so starkly the return to the freedom of equilibrium.

Yogini;    Can you imagine the trauma of possession, of being possessed or wanting to possess. The continual violation of subliminal will by the force of ego and procreative desire which is only another manifestation of ego. The appalling dependence, the reliance, the submission to another’s will (pausing) in exchange for making the imposer submit to yours later. ( laughter all around). Bilateral control dramas that go on endlessly.  At the time of release, as the material desire slips away with the possessions, what an overwhelming sense of relief returns! How strange that love and compassion should find such a gross manifestation in matter.

Prashant;    Yes, how quickly desires and attachments arouse murderous rage. You could kill for the hand of your love or for ensuring that your progeny gets ahead of others – love for family, one’s ethnic group or community of believers could lead people and nations to war in the name of love or even faith! The mortal world confronted by the uninhibited flux of opposites runs riot prior to our equilibrium.

Yogini;    Yet as our incarnations experience the grinding weight of ego, the workout strangely, inexplicably, enhances our luminescence and the equilibrium becomes more meaningful.

Gambheer:    Indeed, it would appear paradoxically that the interface with matter is always alleviating. We Teachers have always been supportive of those willing to experience matter, having ourselves incarnated infinitely, we feel satisfied and able to play our role in helping others with choices and settings.

Advait:    Never having considered materialization, I must ask what is the distinction between a planned negativity and one that is spontaneous?

Gambheer;    On the material plane, negativities arise with every challenge because of the nature of ego. Anger unchecked reaches murderous proportions. depression leads to suicide. Jealousy to injury, greed to cheating, lust to betrayal and so on. On the other hand where these interactions have been planned to produce a challenging situation, as when two soul forces incarnate as enemies by agreement to work on the hate syndrome, then there is no problem. but when an extremity arises involuntarily, as in the case of murder, suicide, genocide – then we have reached a dangerous crossroads, often out of control and these end with fall in luminescence for the incarnating spirit involved, its Guides and Teachers.

Advait;    Of course, there are other ways of enhancement than reincarnation, such as, a study of the great Masters and their mysterious purposes – what on the material plane is taken as pure devotion and spiritual communication.

Gambheer:    True there are those safe alternatives for the timid and reluctant souls but without the roller coaster ride I’m afraid their evolution remains stunted even for the best intentioned.

Gaitri: (addressing Gambheer) It is only by your love that I mustered courage to incarnate again and again Sir, secure in the knowledge that your strength,  guidance  and wisdom would see me through when the rhythms become most disturbing.

Gambheer:    At such points of material crisis when the incarnation is no longer able to sustain the shocks and threatens to abort, we reluctantly enter the Auric field around the embodied spirit with a strong beam of healing light but interfere only when such a point arises because the trials and problems, their experience and resolution are part of the master plan of the incarnating spirit, chosen for a purpose. But choice does not mean that situations will be predictable and the risk is always there of a situation running out of control, leading ultimately to a severe dimming of luminescence as after a suicide or murder or the accumulation of enormous negativities which are not in the plan.With such dimming of luminescence there is only one choice left for the poor volunteer soul-force – to devise an immediate return to another incarnation to dissipate the accumulated negativities. However that option is frowned upon and is really an admission of failure.  At that point the poor incarnating soul has already descended to a lower realm of resonance – the obverse of what it intended.

Prashant:    (addressing Gaitri)  I shall always volunteer as your Guide, dear Gaitri, were you to wish re-entry – the experience earned in being a Guide or Guardian has been quite as fulfilling for me as the experience of incarnating itself, though less courageous.

Gaitri: ( moving to centre stage facing audience with arms out stretched) I need to choose womanhood to fight subjection and experience patience. I need to learn about equitable treatment of siblings, of powerful relations of sacrifice , of overcoming deep hatred, jealousies and animosities and in the face of these trials to overcome addictions of one kind or another that inevitably develop. What are the cardinal points that I must choose for this, what relationships, what addictions, climaxes in life and what circumstances of birth and death?

Nirvana:    ( suddenly animated with an inspirational thought ) I volunteer to join Gaitri, incarnating as her domineering and violent husband.  Let Advait and Yogini be the siblings between whom you are to exercise equity. Let the circumstances be the changing norms in which liberalization of women is the issue. Let the times be the end of the 20th century on Earth in the Solar System. Let your earthly goal be dissemination of greater understanding of the spiritual world through an appreciation of the growing metaphysical orientation in science and technology. Let the climax of your life be the separation from the domineering spouse. Let the ultimate isolation be betrayal of your love by friends and relatives. Let the resultant cynicism and anguish lead you to drug addiction and finally suicide from which you are saved. Then would begin your rehabilitation and total transformation with the growing spirit of social and humanitarian service. May you then grow in prestige and power and become instrumental in  initiating the fundamental transformation of the material world through the propagation of  a paradigm shift away from gross materialism towards a holistic appreciation of reality and the first steps in social transformation away from violence towards a peaceful planet with an equilibrium almost matching our own. Let such transformations occurring here and there be finally crowned by the appearance of a Master to lead the world into a new age of expanding consciousness, signalling the end of the childhood of man. ( sighs after the long speech comically raising his eyes upwards )

( As Nirvana completes his  speech the group of souls break out in spontaneous applause )

Prashant:   Bravo Nirvana, very creative suggestions. That is indeed a beautiful theme – a fundamental revolution and transformation of material consciousness,  the very transformation of man’s destiny. ( sighs deeply) but such a  metamorphosis would surely need more than a single incarnation.?

Gambheer: Granted that it would be most enobling an assignment and most enlightening. But , yes, would it not be too ambitious a task to expect Gaitri’s incarnation to move the entire material world?  After  all she is no prophet or Avatar.

Yogini;    Yes but we can reach out to other groups with what Nirvana  has proposedoposed – it could have a chain reaction of universal responses from several levels of the spirit world.

Gaitri:    Indeed I can sense  a rising crescendo of responses coming  in our direction even as we speak from every ethereal level – great and glorious luminescences pooling in their assent.

( flickers of light flash on the backdrop in all the colours of the rainbow from all directions  to denote responses from different levels, to the accompaniment of thunder and the positive and assenting strains of Raga Desh  in orchestra in rising volume – then the lightening flashes cease and the melody is reduced to a background accompaniment. )  

Prashant:    How energizing the spontaneous responses are. Let us then together invoke the blessed Lord Siddharth to help us in our venture from his highest realms.

( Gambheer leads the invocation and chanting with the Mantra ”Om Mani Padme Hum” – We follow his lotus jewel footsteps – as the others join him in harmony in a circle as the pools of separate light upon them converge into one brilliant spot at the centre )

All:    Om Mani Padme Hum – O Lord of the spheres, grace us with your presence. ( A point of bright blue light on the backdrop enlarges like a blue-white sun while the light upon the gathered souls dims in obeisance. )

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Voice of Siddhartha:    ( sonorous ) You envisage a historic coming in an age of transition from the Information Age to a Consciousness Age to mark the evolution of man to super-manhood on earth. This is indeed more than a simple incarnation of a soul experiencing material existence for enhancing its level of luminescence. Your proposal would involve the incarnation of  a galaxy of souls in such a fundamental transformation of the very essence of matter and material existence – a most worthy if ambitious project.

Prashant:    Master, your august presence in our midst does us great honour and we are already overwhelmed with luminosity and motivation to do your bidding. The interaction of numerous soul forces has already created an ambiance in which such a historical event as your incarnation would become the nucleus for a fundamental transformation of the human material, leading to other far reaching transformations. On Earth there has always been a legend of the coming of a new messiah for more than a millennium.

Yogini;    Great seer, as your glorious light infuses me, I wish to devote myself only to serving you in your descent to the world of matter.

Nirvana:    O  omnipresence, I delight in your compassionate visitation. Our naive  invocation was indeed presumptuous in  suggesting  that you  incarnate.  you are beyond such a need. I do hope we have not disturbed your supreme equilibrium.

Gaitri:    Glorious master, your sudden appearance in answer to our simplistic exchanges has already filled me with so much light that I no longer wish to experience reincarnation, let alone dare to suggest that you too descend to transform the realm of matter.

Gambheer:    O  compassionate one, we cannot presume that you have illuminated our quarter merely heeding our limited exchanges. Rather I sense that you have superior purpose and would like us to conform to your great and glorious design. Indeed all the realms of spirit bow to your holy purpose. what better can we do than incarnate and prepare for the descent of your glorious Avatar.

( All fold hands and bow to the glorious presence signified by the glowing light on the backdrop)

Bodhisatva Maitrya – the messiah to come Credit: Norton Simon Museum – triadvisor.com

Voice of Siddharth:    The time is nigh when a part of me shall make its descent into the material world in the mountainous region of pious Tibet, even as a new millennium dawns on planet Earth in the Solar System of the Milky Way galaxy.  Soul forces will move to incarnate high and low in these regions as we begin the process of ending the childhood of man and creating a new material equilibrium. Numerous soul forces will endeavour  to structure and restructure the material plane as an ideal gymnasium for their enhanced evolution, till the environment is right again for matter to rise to its fullest potential.

( With these prophetic words, the blue-white light fades and disappears. The pool of light on the gathered spirits brightens again. They now congregate around Gaitri  as she prepares  for her own reincarnation. She is seated concentrating her being in deep thought in the lotus yogic posture. They surround her, hold and support her, a spirit in ‘labour’. Prashant stands behind her in his role as the guide spirit with both hands on her shoulders. linking with her thoughts. The others hold her with compassion from all sides. An Earthly yellow light glows around Gaitri and Prashant. )

Gaitri:    ( with eyes closed ) I can see her in labour and i can feel my descent into the heavy medium. I am now within the fetus as it stirs to be born. I shall now maintain silent contemplation and immobility to the exclusion of all other thoughts, watching over my incarnation’s passage till its completion. Prashant will be with me always through the experience, free to use all his resources.  Together we shall guide my incarnation. I shall inspire my material form and personality with intuition, which it may choose to act upon or ignore. while Prashant shall assist in the unfolding of the basic plan through the use of coincidences and guidance of other companion incarnations who are to interact with mine. Gambheer shall oversee our joint sojourn and use his power to avert irretrievable malfunction of the plan, assisting finally in aligning the progress of this life within the larger context of the descent of the Master, even as several other Teachers do likewise in the infinite reaches  with other wards, in other groups.

( As Gaitri falls into deep meditation and Prashant and Gambheer now stand on either side of her with a hand on each shoulder , the others contemplate her, concentrating their thoughts on her incarnation in compassionate communion, as all lights begin to fade except the broad yellow beam on the figure of Gaitri in meditation, before this too begins to fade and go out even as the sound of wailing of a new born child grows louder and louder. )

Credit: soulbirth.co.za

 

 

 

 

 

Yogananda: The Soul’s Final Liberation

Swami Yukteswar
Credit: bolstablog.wordpress.com

The rarest revelations, for anyone curious about the mysteries of the spirit and the Soul, are to be found in Paramhansa Yogananda’s autobiography, in Chapter 43, ‘The resurrection of Sri Yukteswar”, his beloved deceased Guru. It had me completely enthralled and totally nonplussed. The latter because the language of the ‘spirit’ appears often to be totally beyond our materialistic earthly comprehension when we are not adept or evolved sufficiently to understand what indeed is being said. Yet, with minimal discernment, some ideas do come through to provide some framework of the spirit world and the stages through which the Soul passes from one realm to another of the spirit world and eventually beyond even that, into the release of the Soul and ultimate ‘Union’ with the Godhead, what we may call the Universal Essence.

I was amazed beyond comprehension to read of the manifestation of Yogananda’s beloved Guru, in Bombay at the Regent Hotel, on his Indian sojourn after decades in the USA when he so mourned the passing away of his Guru Yukteswar during that visit. First he saw the vision of the Avatar ‘ Lord Krishna’  in a ‘shining blaze’ over the roof top of a building across the street ‘ waving and nodding greeting’ before the vision disappeared. Then he was accosted by a ‘beatific light’ in his hotel room with the ‘flesh and blood’ form of his Guru Yukteswar.

Yukteswar
Credit: rockyourboatyoga.com

The apparition claimed that he was indeed a ‘flesh and blood’ body whom he hugged with reverence. Yukteswar asserted that he was now a ‘saviour’ on an illumined astral planet called Hiranyalok, to help advanced beings there to rid themselves of ‘astral Karma’ to attain liberation from ‘astral rebirths’. The people on this astral planet plane were highly developed spiritually, yet were bound by karmic effects which yet needed to be cleansed.

The Guru Yukteswar then remarks to Yogananda that the Soul was shrouded in three layers or ‘bodies’ – the gross, the subtle and the causal ( see my posts: The subtle Body and the Law of Karma & The Soul’s Reincarnation and Rebirth ).The gross shield is what we have on earth as the physical body of senses. The subtle shield is that which adheres to the Soul  (after death on the physical plane)  on the astral plane, consisting of consciousness and feelings with a body made up NOT of matter but of ‘lifetrons’ or light. The astral subtle body has to evolve to the Causal stage which is a’blissful realm of ideas’. Yukteswar’s role in the astral plane was to elevate the astral beings to the still higher realms of the Causal world.

According to Yukteswar the astral world  is ‘ hundreds of times larger than  the material cosmos’. The astral world is ‘ infinitely beautiful, clean, pure, and orderly’ when compared to the physical one. The astral world is both ‘gross’ and ‘subtle’. The gross aspect has millions of astral beings arrived from earth on different astral planets depending on their karmic evolution.

The astral beings live on cosmic energy and light. They are ‘exact counterparts’ of their last physical forms, with the same appearance which they possessed at youth on earth. However, they possess a ‘sixth’ sense, intuition, with which they sense their world and a Third Eye over their forehead, ‘open’. The astral bodies can heal by will when ‘hurt’. Yet they suffer ‘mental agonies’ if the truth is not fully comprehended. They communicate through telepathy and television. They ‘consume’ ‘nector’ from glowing fountains of light’. Only later at an advanced level in Hiranyalok ( its subtle level ) are they freed from the necessity of ‘eating’ anything but the ‘manna of bliss’

Life on this astral plane is not however eternal. It could range to a thousand earth years. Often astral visitors, when not ‘permanent’ return to earth when their Karma commands. At astral ‘death’ a being could thus return to the physical plane.

At the Causal level, which is more advanced than the astral, desires manifest as something superior to physical or astral sensations. The  existence of a body ‘would signify that its existence is made possibly by unfulfilled desires’.

The Soul when freed from the gross body at death is still covered by the astral and causal sheaths which debar its union with the Absolute.

When the astral sheath is shed there remains the Causal sheath. This is a mould of ‘thought’. The Causal body ‘feasts’ only on ‘knowledge’, ‘drinks from the springs of peace’, ‘roams on the soil of perception’, ‘swims in bliss’.

Beings remain in the ‘Causal condition for thousands of years. The Soul then tries to shake free from this last bonding or sheath to join the ‘Causal consciousness’ – ‘all the separate eddies of ideas,…. waves of power, love, will, joy, peace, intuition, calmness, self-control, and consciousness melt into the ever joyous Sea of Bliss’. The Soul then is no longer individualized consciousness but merges with the ‘Cosmic Ocean’ of ‘laughter, thrills and throbs’.

The Soul thus released from this last confinement, encompasses and becomes ‘IT’. It ‘expands into the spirit’, ‘in the region of lightless light, darkless dark, thoughtless thought, full of the ecstasy of joy or ‘God’s dream of cosmic creation’.

It becomes one with the infinite, yet without losing its individuality, like ‘Christ had won the final freedom even before he was born as Jesus’. However, such a freed soul may return to earth as a prophet to bring other souls back to God – whether on the astral plane or the earthly plane.

The law of Karma has to be completely worked out before graduation to the astral plane, the Causal plane and beyond into Unity. When the earthly Karma is not redeemed fully after even an astral death they cannot enter the Causal realms of ‘ideas’ but must go back and forth from physical to astral levels for further lessons on earth. Others that are freed  of physical Karma graduate to the Causal plane. When ‘seeds of past desires’ are extinguished finally, the soul emerges from the Causal sheath into the eternal.

Having explained the mysteries of the soul’s release from the triple bondage of physical, astral, and causal captivity, the great guru Yukteswar then vanished from Yogananda’s sight saying as he departed ”tell all….that your earth is a dream of God.”

This experience of Yogananda, though hardly fully comprehensible to a soul like mine covered in all the three sheaths, did reveal the mysterious workings of the spiritual realms and its master, the Universal Essence showing the long and arduous path to final liberation.

Yukteswar and Yogananda
Credit: yogananda.us

The Child I Knew

Credit: marymademe.com

Change is a fundamental fact of life. The Buddha observed that everything changes all the time and this is a cause of sorrow. If we remain equanimous while experiencing change sorrow will not afflict us. We ourselves change from moment to moment. We are not the same person which we see in a photographs of the past – childhood, youth, maturity, yesterday, five minutes ago. They are all different persons seemingly connected. It is as if we reincarnate from moment to moment not merely at the end of a life. We are able to observe this phenomenon more acutely in our children – they keep changing quite remarkably and if we were not conscious of it the child who you knew scarcely resembles what he is now  – with varied experiences of life transforming him every moment. This thought is not a sophisticated intellectual excercise but a vivid realization which all parents have known even if they did not put it down in words. My poem seeks to capture such a feeling, difficult to explain, like a rare visual caught suddenly on your camera:

 

            THE   CHILD   I   KNEW

 

Where is the child I knew,

Merged now in my grown son’s face ?

As if he just left the stage

And moved behind the wings

Allowing another to take his place.

Where his high voice has gone

Never to return, his little face ?

Another person I love well

Now inhabits that space,

Till I meet him again and another

Man has replaced the one I knew,

Now standing face to face

Like someone holding a baton in a race

As the others fade into the distance

And then even he moves on

As someone sprints ahead keeping pace

With my latest son. bearing my face.

Paradise: through the eyes of a Medium

 

Credit: wallpapre.brothersoft.com

 

In probing the ‘After-Life’, World of Spirits, we moved from Near Death Experiences to episodes of Past Life repressions by eminent psychiatrists and hypnotherapists providing glimpses of that alternative reality which many described as our real Home World. We now look at it more closely through the eyes of a renowned American psychic and medium. Sylvia Browne for the past 50 years and more has established herself as possibly the most remarkable psychic, medium, channel and clairvoyant of the New Age, whose personal experiences and hypnotic regression appear to reveal all the secrets of that mystical world where souls are at home before and after life on the physical plane.

Her findings have been steeped in controversy with allegations of fraud by none other than a former estranged husband. Many of her forecasts and predictions have been proved erroneous and eminent sceptics and atheists have challenged her claims in the public domain. Yet, police and even the FBI are believed to have quietly relied on her sixth sense to apprehend criminals with satisfaction. She claims that these challenges were indeed of her own choosing in the Theme of Life Chart of her present incarnation wherein her soul itself inserted such negativities to hone her skills and for its own evolution in overcoming them.  Frankly I don’t see why a psychic is made to indulge in the business of making forecasts. A psychic is not an astrologer or palmiest after all. There is little doubt that she has paranormal abilities which does not need to be tested in such a public manner. It is like asking a great athlete to prove himself not merely on the parallel bars but to swallow fire and pierce his cheeks with flaming rods. She is a psychic not a circus performer.

If we wander into any Barnes and Noble bookshop in NYC to the section on philosophy, mysticism, the paranormal and New Age, we would find a whole shelf dedicated to the display of her books, several of which have been on the # 1 New York Times’ bestseller list. One can also find her numerous interviews with Larry King and the Montel Williams Show and several others on the internet. She has also set up a church inspired by the Gnostics called Novus Spiritus and the Nirvana Foundation of Psychic Research. She has also studied theology and world religions and interacted with priests, yogis, Tantriks, nuns, rabbis and Zen masters.

Her psychic abilities became evident from early childhood. She claims that her family history is full of psychics for almost 300 years, including her grandmother, son and granddaughter. She began having visions and premonitions of impending events from the age of five. As she grew to adulthood and began having frequent visitations from her Spirit Guides Francine and Raheim she began to doubt her sanity believing that she now fitted perfectly the description of a schizophrenic until Francine sought to disabuse her of her fears. Francine then by pre-arrangement materialized before her sceptical parents and sister. After that she never questioned her sanity and seriously began her quest. She began to give talks and lectures, many of which were ‘delivered’ by her Spirit Guide Francine by channeling through her. She also began regressive hypnotherapy to help cure psychic conditions.

Her knowledge of the ‘Other Side’ comes from her perpetually chattering companion and Spirit Guides Francine and Raheim, her own Near Death Experience (NDE), her claims to Astral Travel together with those of her son Christopher and granddaughter  in dreams and trances ( Out of Body Experiences OBE) and her questioning of patients and clients through regressive hypnotherapy.

Sylvia Browne

The picture she paints generally matches those of persons who have undergone NDE and the reports of Regression therapies of psychiatrists and hypnotherapists we have covered earlier:  the soul moving out of the body and viewing it, the tunnel into which it is drawn, the growing light on the other side, the reception by guide Spirits, relatives and friends, recuperation, reconditioning and healing, the review of the last life, realization, acknowledgement and judgement of ones own failures in the charted mission goals that one had set, discussions with the Council of Advanced souls, the Elders, further research and threadbare examination of the course of that life, choice of reincarnation by the soul itself rather than God or Karma or anyone else, the existence of more elevated souls that do not need to incarnate, like elders, angels, teachers and Masters, the peaceful and tranquil, non judgemental environment of the Spirit world full of love and familiarity, preparation for reincarnation into the physical world at an appropriate time of the soul’s choosing, freedom to choose location, environment, parents, family and chart of a new life, including negativities and challenges and time and manner of exit, the dire need for reincarnation for soul’s evolution through experience of negativities on the physical plane and the challenge to overcome them, the presence of dedicated Spirit Guides throughout ones life time, the acceptance of all religious denominations and cultures as equally necessary and ennobling.

While all these attributes of life on the Other Side are familiar to us from previous posts, in her path breaking book ‘Life on the Other Side – A Psychics Tour of the After Life’ ( copyright @ Sylvia Browne, SIGNET 2001, New American Library, a division of Penguins Group USA) she dwells in great detail on remarkable facts about the spiritual world on the Other Side which provide fresh insight on a topic hardly explored elsewhere.

What emerges is a kind of parallel living world in an alternate dimension ( barely a few feet away) which in many ways resembles our physical world as a kind of prototype. Incredibly, the spirit world is remarkably similar to the physical one with all the continents (add Atlantis) oceans, mountains and peoples inhabiting it as spirits. A glorious perpetual dawn ( no day and night), and clement weather (no storms) however distinguish it from the volatility of the physical one. It is also ‘timeless’ and its inhabitants are all aged about 30 years in perpetuity. Thought creates instant mobility ( no need for cars or vehicles). Thought also provides instant construction of homes, ones we have always dreamed of ( no need for masons or architects). Individual personalities and preferences are the permanent  identity and stamp of each souls’ identity, some have humour, others are serious and sedate etc all with diverse abilities and ambitions. Spirits are not intangible or wispy but have bodies and even, unbelievably, organs ( heart, lungs, kidneys – the works), though there is no production of ‘waste’, no ageing, no disease. A soul can enjoy eating what it likes in the early stages of rehabilitation, though it is not necessary for survival – you may cook your favourite meal for a while till you don’t want to anymore. There is no termination of ‘life’ which is eternal. Communication is possible through language or telepathy. Every manner of entertainment is universally available.

Flora and fauna are at their resplendent best, never withering, with unmatched scenic beauty and gardens. animals and birds abound adding to the beauty of the spiritual ‘nature, though there are no insects!. Spirits specialize in all manner of activity and research. Most inventions on the physical plane are first conceived by spirits in their research centres ( they are presently working on eradicating AIDS and Cancer)! Spirits pursue careers as scientists, artists, philosophers, students, performers, teachers, thinkers, healers – you name it. Schools, libraries, research centres, areas for socializing and recreation abound. In a word, spirits are busy with their lives and have fun also. Spirits can also adopt any appearance they wish without loosing their identity or recognition.

Spirits however do not suffer from anger, hatred, envy, greed, or any other negative quality. spirits also do not engage in sex ( sorry). However when they feel deeply intimate toward one another, they ‘merge’ exquisitely, sharing in harmony all their knowledge of one another, which is more profound, intimate and satisfying than sex could ever be !  Spirits also have gender and retain the same gender throughout eternity, despite reincarnating as either male or female for evolution. The institution of marriage does not exist on the spirit side ( redundant), nor are there any families, though there are friendly groups and clusters of like-minded souls at the same level of development who are closer than any family could be.

On arrival back at the spirit world the soul observes certain important buildings. The Hall of Wisdom where scanning machines help one to review in holograms, ones past life experiences, for evaluation. Then there are the Towers, where troubled and disoriented returnees are cacooned for healing. There are also the Hall of Records and the Hall of Justice where distinguished Elders help in a detailed examination of lives on the physical plane.The Hall of Tones is for meditation and chanting while the Hall of Voices for hearing the celestial songs of angels.

In due course spirits decide to reincarnate (reluctantly) after deciding upon a chart for a new incarnation. Before departure they have the privilege of an audience with a messiah of their preference ( Christ, Buddha etc)  which is fulfilling. energizing and empowering beyond measure. The final stage is a twilight sleep and transfer to a waiting womb of ones choice.

The story of an After Life Paradise through a psychic and medium’s perspective and experience, does appear at times like an incredible fairy tale or a scene from a fantastic science fiction movie, particularly the aspects which show that the spirit world is quite as tangible and physical as our own. But this should be neither surprising nor novel. All religions after all speak of such a Paradise, a ‘land of milk and honey’. peace and plenty, eternal fulfillment and bliss, constant satisfaction. We have the Christian Paradise full of angels, the Muslim Zannah with Houris, the Hindu Swarg Lok with dancing Apsaras – if you research these concepts in the respective scriptures you will find some echoes of Sylvia’s Paradise.

Sylvia also speaks of a dark side, though it is not ‘Satanic’ in the sense of being ruled by a Satan with horns and a pitchfork. Those beings who commit irremediable crimes with no trace of remorse or repentance are souls that deny and refuse to embrace the light and are neither received by the light, at death nor find a place in ‘Paradise’ but quickly return through a dark abyss into another womb until some action eons later provides a glimmer of hope. Even they are not eternally lost though, being doomed to return age after age as dark entities without spirit guides to help them along the way, particularly because they reject help. The effort to redeem them however continues and one day they may see and accept the light. They till then dwell in a dark and lonely isolation and they may well intrude into your charted course of life uninvited as someone in your closest circle who exhibits evil traits with little hope of redemption.

Sylvia’s ‘Paradise’ appears to reflect the beliefs of several cultures and religions. Her description of buildings and monuments in the Spirit World with gothic arches and Greco-Roman architecture clearly are Western in their inspiration. On the other hand her repeated assertion that God has a male and female aspect, intellectual and emotional, combined as one, are Eastern. The ‘Mother goddess’ she speaks of with flowing hair and a staff in one hand, though robed in a classical western gown, has a lion standing beside her, clearly inspired by the popular Hindu depiction of the ‘Mother’ (Ma), epitomizing the energy of god and the universe (the concept of Shakti in Hinduism) astride a tiger or a lion. In the Hall of Tones, the chanting actually begins with the Sanskrit word Om, common to most religions of Indian origin when commencing a prayer and referring to the sound of creation. Paradise then does not neglect either Eastern or Western inspirations in becoming their prototype!

Sylvia’s Paradise though supported by scriptural analogies, is not always easy to accept no matter how comforting. It is one thing to accept that the soul is eternal and survives after death and that it reincarnates for its own evolution through experiencing the challenges and negativities of the physical plane and that it is welcomed after death into the spirit world, embraced by divine light and love – quite another to allow magnificent and thoroughly tangible scenic beauty, bodies with organs, buildings with halls and marble benches, scanning machines with holograms, records of lives being maintained in scrolls in libraries, dressing for events with just a flicker of a thought, wandering through superb gardens and a host of other physical activities  we never imagined  spirit worlds would, could or even needed to engage in.

From a metaphysical standpoint, those of us who are so inclined, would only allow a divine spirit to confine its physical activity to the human body when incarnating on the physical earthly plane rather than carrying forward a physical ‘hang-over’ to the spiritual one. All we would allow is an urge for the soul to be finally free of the physical and as pure spirit to seek to reunite blissfully with its divine source to become one again with the creative force, rather than enjoying separation. The idea of divinity within as a drop, merging back into the divinity of the grand ocean which creates the mirage (Maya) of the physical world, rather than itself becoming yet another physical albeit elevated mirage. Even if we were to allow this physical ‘Paradise’ to have any reality, it would only be another intermediate manifestation of the divine mirage or illusion (Maya). Only another physical level to be transcended.

To be fair, Sylvia does hint or address this issue when she speaks of levels of advancement for the soul. The Seventh level ( seventh heaven?) is as she says where the ‘rare’ souls lose their very identity and merge into the ‘ uncreated mass’  or the ‘ infinite, unfathomable force field from which the love and power of God emanates’. That is surely the ulterior dimension from which it never returns either as a spiritual entity or as an incarnation. Compare this with the Hindu concept of the last incarnation of an embodied soul where after it totally merges with the Absolute it  never incarnates again. She uses the same analogy as in Eastern cultures – the drop falls back into the ocean or as she puts it ‘ a cup of water spills into the Pacific Ocean’.

She however confesses that the ‘Seventh Level’ is not for her, as she would rather remain in a ‘spiritual world’  which still resembles the physical one.

In the Hindu scripture the Gita, there is a revealing passage which says:

”Worshppers of the gods go to the gods, worshippers of the ancestors go to the ancestors, worshippers of the ghosts go to the ghosts; but those who worship Me come to Me.”

Thus those who cannot overcome the need for physicality return to those realms (Paradise?), while those that have advanced merge with the pure spirit of Godhead.

Caption: wallpapersus.com

We Together – Perfection and Imperfections

Credit: goodfon.com

 

No one is born perfect. Imperfections trail the best of us as do our shadows. Those without imperfections exist in other realms not needing to be born here.Even sages and seers who inspire us cast their ego shadows as the bright sun of our physical world glows furiously. Each imperfection reminds us why we are here. This is the great laundry, the giant washing machine. Our bodies are the garments whose indelible stains are sent back time and again for cleansing. the shining Self then dons it for another life time of energetic washing.

Some garments are spotted red with incredible anger. Another is green with envy and avarice. Yet another has obsessive yellow addictions for substance and sex. Others are purple with arrogance and pride. There are shades of grey growing darker with greed and gluttony. Shades of blue are in depression and restless dissatisfaction. Ignorance and confusion are painted in black. Deception and falsehood are silver. Every imaginable shade and colour painted by ego, fear and urge for the false security of acquisition and possession. A radiant white shroud  also awaits the soul that has no need for garment and apparel but which it nevertheless dons to become the washerman, blazing a trail for cleaning.

I offer my poem which seeks to show that while here we must reconcile ourselves to being fallible bodies attached to radiant spirits, for when the garment is totally cleaned, it will be cast away for good.

 

                 W E     T O G E T H E R

 

Facets of myself

Reminding of some genetic impropriety

I must not inherit, I disown

As enemy.

 

Facets I own

And love, espouse, protect,

Good looks, graces

Mental energy and prowess

Are friend.

 

But we move together,

Fungus and host

Conjoined,wanted

And unwanted entities,

Inextricable.

 

I know, like when I tried

From my pet fish

To peel off its fungal growth,

That peeling will kill,

That you are whole,

 indivisible.

 

Yet I abhor my spots,

Wish to extend my chin,

Cannot countenance

My inabilities, cowardice,

Or love my guilt.

 

So I compromise

As we rise together;

The shining self

Amid the shadows of the negative.

Effects of New Age Thought on our Psyche

kundalinispirit.blogspot.com

Emerging New Age concepts of the soul, ‘after-life’ and rebirth, and reports of Out of Body Experience and Near Death Experience begin to affect our conventional mind-sets slowly but surely, transforming the structure of our thoughts and beliefs.

The mind begins tentatively to accept the new concepts and inevitably they get embedded  at conscious and sub-conscious levels, shaping behaviour, attitudes, priorities, outlook and even our world-view.

Reincarnation was always reassuring for those brought up in cultures that had belief in it for millenia. For those who began to share this belief, it also had a transforming effect. The understanding that we are not here just once and that our essence would continue in time, made life more meaningful and less desperate. The aphorism ‘ eat, drink and make merry for tomorrow we die’  no longer applied. There was a sense of relief and the fatality of death was less alarming, there being no finality about it. An ‘after-life’ where we had a chance to make corrections and try again, made the end less traumatic. The thought  that our essence was in fact eternal was comforting. If we additionally accepted divinity in our essence, it became ennobling. On the other hand, if we did not, even then the evolution of a less than divine but empowered ethereal entity in our essence  was no less comforting.

The premise that there was no judgemental hell waiting for us was also less alarming, though we as entities that judged ourselves, did not do away with the need to guard against excesses and hedonistic and self-centred approaches to life. We were after all our  own hardest task-masters, for when you in clarity, sat in judgement on yourself, there was nowhere to escape.

Even in the course of the evolution of Christian theology, the acknowledgement of reincarnation was considered and upheld by many. The Gnostics, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and St. Jerome are cases in point. It was only in AD 325 that the Roman Emperor Constantine with the enthusiasm of a new convert, together with his mother Helena, erased all  references to reincarnation from the New Testament. Later at the Second Council of Constantinople in 553 AD reincarnation was declared a heresy. This was an attempt, according to some analysts to strengthen the church which felt threatened by the possibility that through the concept of reincarnation individuals would rely on self salvation, ignoring the church. Yet several esoteric Judaic orders like the Kabbalah and the Rosicrucians continued to believe in reincarnation. 

New Age concepts of self-regulation by souls in ‘after-life’  through mutual reviews of conduct during past lives and through reviews with Councils of Elders, Masters and Guides and their reincarnation in groups as spouses, parents, progeny, relatives, friends and even as adversaries through considered choices to work out residual negative attributes, provided a novel and fresh perspective of the challenges we face in life through relationship issues. Good, bad and indifferent parents, as also good, bad and indifferent progeny, tests of friendship, sacrifices made and privations endured, sibling rivalries and jealousies and a whole range of relationship issues and challenging situations in life like being born with handicaps, were seen in the backdrop of clusters of soul comrades enacting dramas to work out and challenge their imperfections which had  carried forward from acts of omission and commission in precious lives.

The closest and warmest relationships were confronted by painful turn of events to test their metal and moral fibre. The course of life was never intended to be an uncomplicated, smooth sailing journey.The perspective that the emotionally charged atmosphere of family life and the constant confrontation between individuals was an exercise in evolution ordained by souls prior to incarnation, had a transforming effect on those who cared to believe.

Inspired by such revolutionary thought, I composed a poem on the birth of a grandson, which I wish to share with you. It shows how new ideas can begin to fundamentally transform ones belief systems:

 

    WAITING   TO   BECOME

 

From where have you come

Suddenly new face,

Smiling so fully with your gums,

First chalk on a new black board

Grandson?

 

Crawling about us with trust,

Recognizing us so instantly,

Being recognized at once,

As if you have existed always

Behind a secret door

Which has just opened.

 

Like our children

Who arrived before you in their turn

From the recesses of our minds,

Familiar from the first moment,

 

Or the wife who joined me

From the time we first met,

One by one we have become

Permanent,

 

And even if I rewind

To when there was no one else but me,

Yet they

remain in the shadows

Latent and familiar,

Waiting to become;

 

As if long ago we stood

Joining our hands together,

With the conviction

That we would come

As father, mother,

Daughter, son,

Grandson.

soul-service.tumbir.com

 

Astronauts Of Ether

Credit: universal-harmony.com

We often wonder why souls need to incarnate on the physical plane when in their state of eternal bliss this can only be painful and difficult. Yet leave alone souls the Divine Essence itself does so as Avatar or as great beings. In the Gita it is suggested that matter and spirit are attracted to one another, the one in viewing something immensely superior and wonderful, the other to experience the trials and tribulations of earthly life, both to learn something in the process. Matter learns from the spirit, the spirit too is studying something, what we do not know precisely not being spirits ourselves. It is an intriguing thought for which we can only surmise what that may be. There is no compulsion for the spirit to undergo such an experience, yet it does from one lifetime to another (Hindu view). Is it to refine matter? Or is it to learn some physical lessons from the realms of opposites. What can it learn that it does not know already? Intense pain and pleasure and consequences of actions arising from them? Yet they come voluntarily to experience. We too do something similar when we go on a Roller Coaster ride or hand gliding or any adventure. Risking much if not all. What does it do for us? I’m sure it is not just about the thrill, it is a learning process, kind of makes us more whole. Thinking such obtuse thoughts i composed a poem which I wish to share with you:

 

                   A S T R O N AUTS   O F   ETHER

 

In this gymnasium

Dumb-bells and weights of your choosing

Lying in wait, presumption of gravity,

For, if you were conceived

In the vacuum of space

It would be without biseps,

Floating free like a shapeless cloud

Beyond earthly contours,

Beyond the need of a work-out,

Much would surely change

In the way you exert yourself

and suffer pain,

As the astronauts will tell you.

 

But that is only a little way out into space

 

And shapes in ether in another dimension

Do not even have the weight of ego,

That other proud muscle’s force

To grip and stride, a sure compass

Of physical circumstance.

 

Astronauts of ether are yet another tribe,

At home in their timeless state

Of floating free, timelessly,

No implants of organs

To start hunger, thirst,

No procreative affair,

Nothing to stir addiction,

No breath of air,

No gift of gravity to build calves

And keep feet on the floor,

No sure-shot ego to tell

what you want from what you don’t.

 

Is there a hankering for fear

In this fearless state

Is there a wish for kidneys and liver,

Stomach, member,

Which immortality with one felt stroke

Severed,

The bygone biseps and athletic gait?

 

They come from inner space

to the gymnasium of endless weights

Infinite work-outs, experience in pain

And pleasures

To build the spirit’s muscles

with material gains

In another medium, another plane,

Wearing space suits of bodies, organic equipment

And the latest models of evolution

In which to train,

Astronauts of ether

Again and again.

Earth School

Credit: ISKCON

” If the soul could have known God without the world, the world would never have been created” – Meister Eckhart, sermons.

This is an amazing quote from the great 13th century controversial Christian mystic and theologian which is so relevant to the subject of my post. Was the world then created so that souls could understand the problems of an earthly existence and thus graduate to a level bringing them closer to God?  The concept of the soul and its purpose in embodiment on the physical plane has been discussed at length in Hindu scriptures also. The soul is said to be a fragment of divinity embedded in the body and obliged to remain entrapped for successive rebirths until the personality-ego-body complex shrouding it evolves to perfection, It is only then that it gets released from captivity to merge back into its divine origins.

Meister Eckhart echoes this Hindu assertion of the presence of God in the individual soul and its divinity, when he says: ” man should consider the great aristocracy which God has set up in the soul, such that by means of  it man may wonderfully attain to God”, He goes on to say :” there is something in the soul that is so akin to God that it is one with Him…. it has nothing in common with anything created.”

New Age thinkers have also examined the concept of the soul and sought to give their own interpretations. Their inspiration comes from the emerging mysteries of Quantum Physics which has transplanted the Newtonian world of mechanical certainties on which science heretofore relied. They have also been influenced by the investigation of paranormal phenomena outside the framework of orthodox religion by the scientific establishment and reputed institutions of learning in the West. Their views formulated on the soul are pretty close to that of Hinduism though with some unique and far-reaching modifications in the concepts. The Hindu view and the New Age view agree that the experience of material existence is important for the soul and for achieving its purpose and it is for this reason that it gets embodied.

An ethereal eternal entity of light and energy, the soul is too boundless to have limitations. Experiencing the limitations, confinement and mortality even through the proxy of the personality-ego-body complex becomes essential to understand the ethical secrets that the physical plane holds. Restricted mobility, imperfections, disabilities, disease, consumption, renewal, reproduction and competition can only be fully understood from within. This then is Earth School where souls get educated on need and want, competition, confrontation, or conflict invoved in survival, all manner of inter-relationships and the complex ethical issues thrown up. The soul also acts as a compass on the ship of life providing guidance and direction to the personality-ego-body it is attached to, helping it to evolve. In some unexplained manner this experience in the Earth School  also serves to help in the evolution of the soul. This is not clearly mentioned anywhere but it appears as Meister Eckhart explains, that the experience is a ticket so to speak for being ushered into the divine fold or presence, which the soul yearns for. This needs further research for confirmation whether the soul is there to help only or to get help as well?

The concept of the soul however gets modified by New Age thinkers and answers  the second part of the question. It is no longer as distinct from the personality as conceived in Hindu scriptures. While the Hindu view is that the soul is a fragment of divinity, perfect, eternal and unblemished, the New Age view is that while the soul is eternal and ethereal it is capable of developing negativity and blemish. It is like a radiant sun that can develop sun spots and in order to heal it chooses to incarnate into a personality of its choosing to undergo a physical experience which would heal it. This descent to the physical plane through a massive reduction of its unlimited power and force into the incarnated personality is for the purpose of healing itself.

The term Earth School where the healing through experience takes place has been coined and used extensively by Gary Zukav in his book ‘Seat of the Soul’, which I consider the New Age bible on the soul. Thus we see that New Age thinkers have made a fundamental modification in the concept of the soul and its purpose in incarnation. The other major modification which follows is that of choice in reincarnation as opposed to the premise that the Law of Karma leaves no choice and the soul willy-nilly has to inhabit the next incarnation determined by the Law of Karma based on the actions of the personality in the just completed life. This modification with far-reaching implications I shall seek to examine in the next post.

The foregoing may appear esoteric and academic but is important for researching the theme of my blog. Furthermore, concepts as they evolve, in my view, begin to have a fundamental effect on human behaviour and thinking.

The Soul’s final liberation from reincarnation

(CONTINUED FROM LAST POST)

In the last post we saw that the soul enters a new body after the demise of the previous one. This process of rebirth can go on indefinitely until all Karmic debts and obligations are fully discharged. We may wonder what is the purpose of this exercise. The purpose is the evolution of man on the earthly plane. The Karmic law ensures, by designing a new personality and body that lessons which earlier incarnations failed to learn may well be learnt in the new life. Thus eventually, slowly but inevitably, the process of evolution begins to gather momentum after several false starts and hicups and the shroud that was a thick coarse blanket begins to refine.

The shining spark of divinity within, the soul, is the supreme standard to which the physical entity has to aspire in the course, if neccesary, of hundreds of thousands of life-times. As it begins to approximate the perfection of the ‘indweller and reflect in some measure the divinity within, the shroud gets refined, until in its very last incarnation the personality/body has shed all ego with its attendant grave failings and stands out as a shining, altruistic star totally reflecting the divinity and perfection of the soul within. Such a state would have been achieved by the personality/body of the Buddha in his last incarnation or innumerable other prophets, sages, seers and saints.

Picture of the role or function of a Buddha: to enlighten the path for other people to follow, so they too can cross the stream of samsara and reach Nirvana. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 At this point of enlightenment, the ‘shroud’ finally slips away and there is total identity between the soul and the person in question. Karmic effects have now dissolved, there is no  debt left in the subtle body (‘History’ in the PC now stands deleted) and at this last death, reincarnation ceases with ‘Moksha;, ‘Nirvana’, enlightenment – whatever one calls it and the soul finds ultimate release from the cycle of reincarnation, merging back into the divine source from which it emerged, even as the drop of water that had been thrown up from the ocean by the tidal wave, falls back into the ocean and becomes one with it.