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Word Gems 

exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity

Reincarnation On Trial

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As I write this, the world is at war; a superpower has invaded the territory of another nation-state, now engaged in a hot war, with the rest of the world attempting to participate via sanctions.

Is the world in trouble because of a lack of knowledge?

A respected afterlife researcher lamented, to the effect:

“If only we could get our message out concerning the reality of Summerland and post-mortem survival of consciousness, then the world could change, aggressors would be dissuaded from violence and the oppression of others.”

In other words,

“To achieve a more spiritually-minded world we need more knowledge, more uplifting knowledge, to inspire the soul and to change us.”

The doctrine of reincarnation, in essence, says the same thing:

“We need more lives, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand more lives to change us. We need more experience, lots of it, because this experience will be a form of knowledge, and when we have sufficient knowledge, we will become perfected.”

However, all of these ideas represent great error.

More knowledge cannot change us. The knowledge of one hundred thousand additional lives, fundamentally, in terms of what we are at core being, would have no power to change us.

Why do we believe that more time, more knowledge, will be our salvation?

The quick answer here is that the ego fears its own inadequacy, believes its redemption is in "the future," not now, never now, and only with more, and more, "content" supplied to its neediness. But this "more" never achieves a sense of "enough."

Reincarnation is based upon the faulty premise that human beings are “not enough,” defective, incomplete, in need of remedial aid. It sees us as vessels to be filled, incomplete works of art requiring a finishing school.

All this is the philosophy of the ego, the “false self,” which ever cries, “I don’t have enough” because “I am not enough.”

But this is wrong. This is illusion. We were “made in the image,” complete, whole, perfect “sparks of God” in need of nothing.

Why are we confused about this?

The ego represents a temporary developmental stage for human beings. It’s designed to augment and facilitate the individuation process. It’s a passing phase.

The reality is, in a most basic sense, we do not need to change, we do not need maturity – not in the way that’s popularly discussed – we do not need perfection, we do not need a make-over.

Yes, there is pleasure in gaining knowledge and experience, and we’ll want to avail ourselves of these enhancements over the next million years and beyond, but not for the purposes of achieving perfection, spiritual evolvement, or becoming “more.”

We are already “enough.” Our problem, in the unenlightened state, is that we cannot feel or sense our essential sufficiency. What we need is to become who we really are.

In thousands of pages on Word Gems, we have explored “self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity.” We achieve this by “going within,” by accessing one's linkage to God, to Universal Intelligence. As we do, our eyes begin to open to our unlimited godlike potential stored up for us, deep within, like an inheritance.

We do not require an additional hundred thousand lives, or even one more life, to access this divine aspect of ourselves. All we need is one moment of cosmic clarity – and we’re home.

Editor’s note: Please review information about the ego, how it deceives us, on the “Afterlife” and the “Course In Miracles” pages. Further, there’s a Krishnamurti lecture, which I refer to as his “summary discourse,” which also addresses these issues.

batteries not included

Those who have not discovered the "life within" will invent the religions of the world, including reincarnation, which preach a salvation from some external source.

It's interesting that this factor alone becomes touchstone to identify dysfunctional religions of the world: all of them, by various means and messages, insist that humans are defective, "batteries not included," faulty, sold "as is," in need of remodling, not "enough."

Even on the other side, there are many millions who have not discovered the "inner riches," and suffer in this fundamental misperception. See "the 500 tape-recorded messages from the other side" writing.

Restatement: Why can’t knowledge, even inspiring knowledge, change us?

Krishnamurti pointed out that, when we hear the melodious chirping of a little bird, it might soothe us; stress levels reduce; we feel better. This same benefit might accrue as we view an artist’s painting of beautiful landscape, or when we gaze upon a glorious sunset, or a blossoming red rose.

All these quiet the mind, uplift the spirit; temporarily – for, no one in the history of the world, experiencing this beauty, has been fundamentally changed by the experience.

What does this mean? It means that a bird’s song and the artist’s fine painting might offer temporary solace, but, in the very next moment we can slip into the needy ego’s fearful domain of “I don’t have enough” because “I am not enough.”

knowledge, beauty, experience cannot excise fundamental fear

Anything external, even inspiring works of art, or interactions with the beauty of nature, cannot change us. These cannot expunge the “inner neediness.” The “worm at the core” well survives and will plague us again; very soon.

We cannot be helped, in any meaningful and lasting sense, by any external aid. We need to “go within.” When we do, we’ll find the peace, joy, love, and perfection that we’ve been searching for – and this, all this, in but one moment of cosmic clarity.

A final note: We say that the ego fears its own inadequacy, believes that its redemption is in "the future," not now, and only with more "content", but never to achieve a sense of "enough" - however, these statements cannot be fully apprehended by the egoic mind.

To discover one's own fearful neediness, to see it fully and clearly, is the beginning of enlightenment.

This process of the "inner sightedness" is achieved by allowing a quieted mind, without verbal commentary or repression, to observe and witness, up close, without resistance, the fears of the ego. When we do, we will begin to perceive the true nature of the illusionary ego that has beset the world, and each of us.

In view of the foregoing, what does spiritual growth and evolvement really mean?

As we’ve seen, it’s not change or maturity in the ordinary sense of these terms. It’s not even a total removal of the ego as it will yet serve as basis of our wisdom. Then what?

one part of us expands, the other contracts

At this moment, and all future moments, we will possess both “false” and “true” selves. Even though the former is an illusion, just an errant way of thinking, not a literal part of us, it still can run our lives and take us over. Right now the “false self” tends to have the upper hand.

But this part of us needs to shrink, with the “true” self gaining hegemony. As this occurs, we will enter our “omega point” stature, a higher level of consciousness, a greater state of evolvement.

The “true” self, we might say, needs to “percolate upward,” from the depths of the soul, and become the leading force in our lives.

blossoming rose

Again, none of this is “change” in the usual sense of the term as what we are, right now, the “false” and the “true”, will always “be us.” To "cut out" the ego would be to remove from ourselves a capacity to choose evil, which, while that might sound good, would also remove our free will, and that would make us less, and much less, human. We can't do that without turning ourselves into some variety of vegetable or robotic entity.

Our glory as human beings will be to transcend evil: we could do it, but we don't, and a day will come when, we never will. This takes us closer to godhood and our destiny as sons and daughters of God.

We want to "starve" the ego, shrink it, not surgically remove. With the ego in retreat, the "true self" will naturally begin to expand, like a blossoming rose, such that, the inner “made in the image” aspect of our natures will begin to direct our lives.