Past lives

I have been doing a bit of studying about “Taming the Mind and Walking the Bodhisattva Path” (Buddhism).  One of the things that caught my eye is the idea of the “Wrong View”.  The first of these wrong views is that there are no prior and future lifetimes.

I have always had a hard time with the concept of past and future lifetimes.  The concept just doesn’t seem to make any sense to me.  I have always figured that when I die, I am dead – period.  However, this believe started to get a bit shaky when I spent some time with aborigines in northern Australia.  They have a slightly different twist on the subject (which is imbedded in their ideas of the Dreamtime).  They don’t seem to really believe in past and future lives, for the simple reason that they don’t believe in the past and future!  Now this is something I can get a bit more comfortable with.  They believe that the past, present and future are all here all of the time – therefore there is no “past life,” there is just life.

For a number of years this seemed to be somehow closer to what I believe in, but it has been pretty vague and about as nebulous and improbable as the idea of past and future lives.  
However, over the past couple of decades I seem to have been solidifying my belief in one life rather than a lot of multiple lives.  I really mean one life, at least one life on earth.  Maybe there are more lives out there, but I have no information concerning that.  It seems to me that the “earth” is really one life and has been that way for billions of years.  All of the earth, water, the atmosphere, all of the plants and animals and other critters make up parts of this one being.  In some way the sun has to be included because that is the source of the energy that allows this life to be.

The more I contemplate this idea, the more I realize that the idea of past and future lives is pretty self-centered and maybe silly.  It supposes that there are separate lives that come and go over time.  I think that there is just one life that changes and lives over time.  From this point of view, does it make any sense at all that we even die?  I don’t see how that can happen (unless the whole thing manages to die).  Sure I had past “lives,” and will have future “lives” – but really I have been involved in a continuum and will continue to do so.  Yep, it is as sure as anything that my actions will influence what happens in the future, and in that sense it is as sure as anything that they will impact my “future lives,” just as my past actions have impacted my present. 

I don’t think this is what the Buddhists are thinking about when they discuss the idea of past and future lives, but it is getting much closer to what I believe to be the case.  My problem is that the harder I look the more it looks like there are no distinctions between lives and beings.  We are all relatives, and there was never a time or a place where one died and another took over.  It has always been continuous (that is what evolution is all about after all).  Since there was never a beginning or an end, that means that they are all still one.  

Death as an advisor

The idea of using death as an advisor is a common one. It is discussed in Buddhism, the Toltec teachings, and probably in most (if not all) major religions. The basic concept is a simple one. When death comes to tap us on the shoulder, none of the things that we have, want or don’t have, make any difference. Money and possessions become instantly meaningless for us (except as it might help our loved ones in the future). I think we all have a goal of having done what is important and having “our house in order” at that time. Since death can come totally unexpectedly at any instant, if we are to have our house in order at that moment, we had better keep it that way at all times (or as much as possible). Folks who have faced their imminent death, but survived for one reason or another, usually report that they regret not taking enough time and care with their loved ones. They end up thinking things like, “if only I had known, I would have ….” (Fill in the blanks from you own life).

The realization of the possibility of our imminent death opens an opportunity for using this knowledge to assist us in making our day-to-day decisions. We can use it to determine which choice is the better one. Questions such as; “If I were to die today, tomorrow or some time soon, which choice would I have rather have made?” can be useful. This is one simple example of using death as an advisor. Once the idea of the reality of our death has become crystal clear, it turns out that there are many instances where we end up doing things differently than we would have had we not had that point of view. It can become a powerful tool to help us shape ourselves into the person that we want to become – both in the practical day-to-day aspects and in the development of our spiritual being.
I have been wondering how we can cultivate that realization in a way that is useful, but not morbid. I find that my experiences as a fireman have given me a new appreciation of how quickly death can overtake us. If have been to several accidents and medical aid situations where it is clear that the person was totally unprepared for their death in the sense that it happened very unexpectedly. Maybe they were cruising along in the car, reaching to change a CD and then it happened! Bang! All of a sudden the world changes and they are dead. They had no time to plan, not time to contemplate, no time to do any much – they are just dead. Every time I witness this sort of situation I think that; “but for the grace of God, that could be me.” I am possibly standing on the brink of death unawares, just as they were minutes before. I am amazed that these experienced do not seem to bring up a morbid side in me, it is just life.

While meditating upon this question of finding ways to bring our death into our lives in a way that is useful, it occurred to me that maybe some of us who were children during the fifties and early sixties have a leg up on the idea of possible instantaneous death. At about the age of six, they started teaching us to “duck and cover” in school in preparation of being attacked by a nuclear weapon. By the age of seven or so it had dawned upon me that duck and cover made no sense. Either we would still be there, or we would not. Ducking wouldn’t help at all. We were brought up with the idea that at any instant, without any warning whatsoever, we could be vaporized where we stood. It was a pretty sobering thought for us small children. We understood early on that we would likely have two choices. Either we would be so close to the blast that our brains would be gone before the nerve signals associated with the event reached it, or we would die a rather slow and painful death associated with radiation poisoning. There was really no hope of survival. Not only that, but we were promised that this would almost certainly happen within ten years or so.

Based upon this knowledge, I think that a lot of us learned to use death as an advisor early in our lives. We knew that whatever we did, and whatever we had, could be rendered totally meaningless in a flash. I was careful as I grew up to try to stick to things that were important, and ignore those that were not. Of course, I was also a child and did all of the stupid child things, but even then it was with a certain level of knowledge that I was doing stupid things intentionally. Sometimes I did stupid things that I didn’t know were stupid, but that was from ignorance, not from lack of consideration. In fact, I still do stupid things unaware of what I am doing, but I at least have the awareness of what I am attempting to do, and why. I think I came out of this early training with a keen understanding of how close we may be to death at any instant. I don’t think I have lived a day in my life without thinking about this, and have gotten used to the idea that I need to do what is right in the moment, I may not have time to fix things later. (Of course, I have not been particularly successful at that endeavor, but I am certainly aware of the need.) 

I wonder if it is harder for people who didn't grow up facing the prospect of instant annihilation to appreciate the concept of using death as an advisor.

Walking the path

I have been fasting in alignment with the Muslim time of Ramadan.  It is a one month period of time each year where they (I say “they” because I am not a Muslim) do a number of spiritual activities, including fasting between the hours of sun up and sun down.  No food, no drinks (including water), no “eating” other people’s energy, no sex, and no alcohol for the month.  I am a week into it and am finding it to be a much more meaningful, and powerful, activity than I had anticipated.  The hunger and thirst during the day is a small part of it.  They just provide a reminder of what I am trying to accomplish, which is to become more clear about who I am and what I am doing.

A very dear friend of mine wrote the following poem about this task of remembering, seeing and understanding. Enjoy.

WALKING THE PATH
I walk along the path,
I stop here and there.
I see light, I see reflection of light.
I stop and look here and there.
I walk along the path,
I see my reflection here and there.

I walk and watch along the path,
I see familiar faces and hear clear voices.
And when I get to the end of the path,
I wonder, What was my intention to walk this path?
and I ponder, where have I been and where have I gone?
So I wonder as I walk along the path.
What are the seeds of my desire?
I walk alone the path to the end of my time and
wonder,
where have I gone with the seeds of my desire?
I walk along the path to the end of my time and wonder,
where have I gone?

Ramin Yazdani October 2005

Love Poem

I would like to share a poem that a dear friend of mine wrote for his wife:

I am not here to judge,
I am here to love.

I am not here to fear,
I am here to love.

I am not here to take,
I am here to love.

I am not here to expect,
I am here to love.

I am not here to disconnect,
I am here to love.

I am not really here,
but I am love!

Ramin
September 2005

Trip to Mount Shasta (California)

Last Friday I took a “road trip” to Mount Shasta with some of my Toltec friends. The purpose was to be in the energy of the mountain. One of the really intriguing parts of the trip was that it was made in a diesel car powered by bio-diesel (made from used restaurant vegetable oil). Everything worked normally, but with a slight scent of tempura. The thing that was interesting about it wasn’t the way the car worked, it was in how it made me feel. I felt like I could relax to the road trip because I didn’t feel guilty about burning ancient oil, and we were basically not polluting the atmosphere with new carbon or other nasty chemicals. (The carbon that we were spewing out had been removed from the atmosphere by the plants, we were replacing it – not adding to it. I suppose we added to the short term pollution by adding NOx compounds created by the high heat of the engine, but these eventually break down and don’t add anything in the long run – my personal rationalization.) I felt guilt free, and could just relax and enjoy the trip – which I did for the entire day. I can only image what it will feel like when I am using hydrogen created by the sun.


The trip started with a few hours of a relaxing drive up the Sacramento Valley in the early fall sunshine watching the colors and chatting with my friends. By the time we got the bottom of the mountain, we were under clouds. As we drove up the mountain to the end of the road (about 8,000 feet elevation), we were engulfed in magical clouds/fog that turned our walking through the meadows and forest into a magical trip, in absolute silence. Besides our footsteps, all that you could hear was the burbling of a number of brooks running through the meadows and an occasional call of a bird. The experience was a walking meditation. Very lovely and full of power. What a wonderful day it was – I give my thanks to my friends and the mountain.