Question about the afterlife

[SiriusTraveler]

Asked this to Robert but wanted to post this here to see what you all think about it. And sorry if this is posted in the wrong thread, I just don't know where to put it!


My question is what we do in the afterlife? What do we strive for when we have passed on? Is there any task we must carry on, like our jobs now in this life, or do we do what we want to do?
I'm asking because it feels like eternity is a long time doing nothing *smiles*.

Regards //Linus

[SoulSail]

Hey Sirius,

I highly recommend you read The Unanswered Question by Kurt Leland. He deals with your exact questions in considerable detail. I've read plenty on the subject, but I think his book offers the most satisfying look, and the one that lines up with my inner senses and experiences.


Soul

[CFTraveler]

I may move it when I have time, but for now, I suggest you read "Otherwhere" by Kurt Leland. The old edition was extremely expensive but he's going to republish it.
When I have more time, I'll come back to flesh it out a little more. Meanwhile other posters can come back with how they interpret their own afterlife experiences (not NDE, OBEs with departed, which some of us have experienced.)

ps. Now that I see I've cross posted with SS, I'll add that I do think that the Unanswered Question is the most satisfying reading experience I've had in this theme also, but Otherwhere is kind of more simple, so I'd start with that one and go to the second one, if you can afford it.
I'm a fan of Kurt's as many of us who have read his books are. And if you're reading this, hi Kurt!

[Neil Templar]

Worthwhile adding here is Kurt's website - http://www.kurtleland.com/home
If you sign up for the newsletter, you'll receive monthly(?) insights and adventures, often delving into more detail than he can go into in the books.

[Sinera]

As I see it: We are in a school here, which is Earth in this 3D-Timespace dimension, which we enter by repeated / multiple incarnating. As long as we attend this school we are busy with doing homework and preparing the next project (incarnation). :wink:

Next to Leland's books already mentioned here (btw, CFT, is Kurt still here since I have not read from him after the forum move?) I recommend Michael Newton's books. Or have a look at Tom Campbell here where he explains more or less the same thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RORIyVXBgQ

For what comes after we leave this school? Well, yeah, who knows. Apprenticeship, University, First Job ... ;) ... Serioously, I think it's all about Evolution (and I guess that RB will answer you also something along these lines).

The Mothership called "Higher Self" will move on to new levels (probably with friends) to evolve itself further, and further, and further to a god-like status, so I suppose. Robert Monroe also wrote quite a few things on it and there are also lots of channelings on what goes on after that, also the Explorer tapes at the TMI which deal a bit with it (some of them at least, especially the ones with "Miranon").

http://www.monroeinstitute.org/downloads/explorer-series-6/

And here is Monroe' on "why we are here" and also why it is so cool to have 'graduated' from this "school" because you have great 'prospects' elsewhere(ever-it-is):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCFWoBS1sKk#t=4m30s

:cool:

[SoulSail]

I think you've got plenty of reading to do, but I think I'll throw in one more: Seth Speaks.

Okay, done.

[Neil Templar]

I think you've got plenty of reading to do, but I think I'll throw in one more: Seth Speaks.

Okay, done.

Hahaha, yep. Essential reading. And none too small either...;)

[SiriusTraveler]

Thank you all so much for sharing the information with me (and everyone else). It'll take some time to digest this so I'll get right on it this evening!

Regards //Linus

[SiriusTraveler]

To extend this perhaps i can ask you what you yourself think we will do when we die. So, what do you think?

Regards //Linus

[ButterflyWoman]

I think referring to "the" afterlife is like referring to "the" life. Lives can be vastly different, so much so that the experience of, say, living as a Kalahari bushman is so different from the life of, say, an eighteen century Austrian princess, that they're almost beyond comparison. I have no reason to think that our afterlives (if there is such a thing) are going to be all the same any more than our lives have been all the same.

Certainly, there are people who have had experiences, visions, OOBs, etc., and they interpret their experiences as "an afterlife" and that's fine. I don't dispute that people have these experiences, certainly. But are these things universal? They don't appear to be so, any more than the experience of material "life" is universal. We share only very basic things, and the rest is extremely variable.

But, if you take the "time and space" constraints out of the picture, it's all actually simultaneous rather than linear, so the idea of "afterlife" might be entirely moot....

[Summerlander]

The afterlife is merely an idea. One that many of us would like to believe in. The truth is that reality might be a little harder to swallow for some of us. To me, there is more evidence that death means the end. Buddha's idea of a nirvana (the cessation of being) might be a lot easier to come by than many of his followers think. To die is to be liberated from life. To die is to cease to be. Ultimately, I imagine that as the self dissipates, one experiences bliss (a release from noisy thoughts), an approach to a still and emptier mind, and...slowly...one is soothed into embracing non-existence - a very attractive prospect, mind you, as the thought of coming back to life seems so painful from the "point of no return" perspective. The afterlife is a fantasy that many of us harbour in our minds for comfort.

[CFTraveler]

@ Volker: I think Kurt is still a member- I can't be sure, but I think we've pm'd after the change, soon after, IIRC.

[CFTraveler]

To answer the OP, I don't know what happens when we die, but I get the impression that at least for a while there is something left over. I have had messages (verified that I couldn't know the info, and I think I've shared this before. I also had some communication with my grandmother shortly after her passing (once again, with info that I couldn't foresee) I also had experiences with my mother before her passing (in which she indicated a date of her passing) which was accurate.
Every time I have these experiences it's usually in the same place, an in-between place where I've gone to.
I have never had a visitation (as in one of them coming here), it's always been in my projecting to this 'place', except of when my grandmother was in a coma (she projected to my room here and told me she hadn't passed yet).

I've read various books (including Newton's and Danison) and the only author who thinks similarly to me is Kurt Leland. Of course who knows what the truth is, but the theory that most resonates with me is the one described in his books, with a little sciencey (or science-fictiony) stuff thrown in.

[SiriusTraveler]

So you mean that you think we will be in this "in-between" place before we have actually passed away? So that we first die here in the physical reality and then we spend some time "in-between" and then we go somewhere else ("in-between" makes me think of Robert Bruce's rest areas/recreation areas/hostpitals he have been writing about in his books). Did i get that right? :)

[SiriusTraveler]

The afterlife is merely an idea. One that many of us would like to believe in. The truth is that reality might be a little harder to swallow for some of us. To me, there is more evidence that death means the end. Buddha's idea of a nirvana (the cessation of being) might be a lot easier to come by than many of his followers think. To die is to be liberated from life. To die is to cease to be. Ultimately, I imagine that as the self dissipates, one experiences bliss (a release from noisy thoughts), an approach to a still and emptier mind, and...slowly...one is soothed into embracing non-existence - a very attractive prospect, mind you, as the thought of coming back to life seems so painful from the "point of no return" perspective. The afterlife is a fantasy that many of us harbour in our minds for comfort.

I do not agree with the afterlife beeing only a comfort for us, rather i believe that our identity could perhaps be erased so that we do'nt know who we were or something like that.
Why? I would'nt know but I get the feeling its possible.
It seems to me that once we have passed away there will be a time when we process things we have experienced and after that we can make choises of what will happen next, or what our goal in a greater reality is going to be (or already is).

[CFTraveler]

So you mean that you think we will be in this "in-between" place before we have actually passed away? So that we first die here in the physical reality and then we spend some time "in-between" and then we go somewhere else ("in-between" makes me think of Robert Bruce's rest areas/recreation areas/hostpitals he have been writing about in his books). Did i get that right? :) Maybe.
There is an author (Anthony Peake) that has the theory (or is it hypothesis? I'm never sure, lol) that when we die, we go into a state of 'no time' (which people report as the 'going through your life' phase) which in subjective terms goes on 'forever', and in which you change things as you 'relive' your life, which is basically similar to reincarnation but in a 'subjective' way, so that the life you are living right now is (or could be) one of those 'relivings'. This explains the apparent holographic nature of the universe, things like precog visions and deja vu, and other interesting brain effects. This doesn't mean you die 'completely', because the state of 'no time' is a quantum state and your consciousness is 'in it'. He calls it the ITLADian theory (derived from the initials of the title of his first book) and the universe we experience the 'Bohmian IMAX' (Dr. Bohm postulated something similar about reality in his theoretical work).
Or,
That when we die we go into an 'in between' state (Tibetans call it the Bardo) in which we resolve parts of our lives that caused us issues- this is completely self-generated, and go through a series of steps to resolve the issues. Usually when this step is passed through, you either reincarnate or go on to 'something else'. This can be staying in this state to help the recently departed make their transition, becoming 'higher beings', and then the 'unanswered question', reabsorbtion to the Source, or something completely unknown.

For now, this is the view I'm most comfortable in, for purely emotional reasons, and also my own experiences in projection appear to support this view.

There are other views, of course, but these are the ones that are closest to my thoughts on the subject.

[SiriusTraveler]

Interesting. And about the Bardo, i just bought The Tibetan Book Of the Dead so i guess its a little of that in that book to.
It seems to me (when having heard mediums, channelings etc.) that one (or the soul/spirit etc.) can evolve and excist on some plane forever and ever, and though one perhaps loose ones identity as we know it one seems to remember the experiences that the one had before.

[CFTraveler]

That's why I'm partial to the binary soul theory- you know, the theory that postulates that a part of you grows and develops (and collects memories that get stored in the Akashic when it finally gets deconfigured upon death) and the other part that is essence of Source that gives life and being but doesn't really evolve, just reincarnates and possibly reintegrates once material existence isn't wanted or necessary.

[Summerlander]

I do not agree with the afterlife beeing only a comfort for us, rather i believe that our identity could perhaps be erased so that we do'nt know who we were or something like that.
Why? I would'nt know but I get the feeling its possible.
It seems to me that once we have passed away there will be a time when we process things we have experienced and after that we can make choises of what will happen next, or what our goal in a greater reality is going to be (or already is).

When you say our identity is erased and then we don't know who we were, you still speak as though there is a continuation of consciousness that can reflect on things. Why is it that you more readily believe in the continuation of individual consciousness beyond death and reject the notion that there won't be a consciousness and thus the "I" is annihilated completely?

Note that you also use the words "believe" and "perhaps" in the same sentence. How can you believe in something you are not sure of?

You also say that, once we have passed, a time will come when we will be able to process past experience and will also be able to make choices on what will happen next...on what grounds do you base your postulation? Is this something that you would like it to be? Something which is more acceptable and therefore comfortable perhaps?

[SiriusTraveler]

When you say our identity is erased and then we don't know who we were, you still speak as though there is a continuation of consciousness that can reflect on things. Why is it that you more readily believe in the continuation of individual consciousness beyond death and reject the notion that there won't be a consciousness and thus the "I" is annihilated completely?

Note that you also use the words "believe" and "perhaps" in the same sentence. How can you believe in something you are not sure of?

You also say that, once we have passed, a time will come when we will be able to process past experience and will also be able to make choices on what will happen next...on what grounds do you base your postulation? Is this something that you would like it to be? Something which is more acceptable and therefore comfortable perhaps?

To answer your first question, I believe that because I base my beliefs on what I have seen, experienced, heard and read. And perhaps faith just is enough to believe something? Now I don't belong to any religion but i still have faith, or a feeling that I go with combined with the above (experiences etc.). I honestly believe that the "I" will not be annihilated completely.

Second question, same answer as above regarding the faith thing, and also I have a hard time explaining myself sometimes because english is not my native language and so the sentances might not reflect my thoughts perfectly. To further explain what I meant is that instead of "believe" and "perhaps", I believe its possible. Perhaps that's a better explanation?

Well both yes and no on the third questions. I would certainly like it to be so but i base this on the same as above, what Iv read, seen, heard and experienced etc. etc. For example Robert Bruce's literature to name one.
Thats my conclusion right now and discussions like this will perhaps change my mind but thats where I stand right now. You have an interesting theory though.

[Summerlander]

Fair enough. Don't let me stop you. I just want to add that other books are merely someone else's interpretation. One type of experience can be interpreted in so many ways. But I don't blame you for basing your beliefs on what you see, hear and experience in general. After all, John Nash believed that his hallucinations were real for a while.

[Sinera]

Fair enough. Don't let me stop you. I just want to add that other books are merely someone else's interpretation. One type of experience can be interpreted in so many ways. But I don't blame you for basing your beliefs on what you see, hear and experience in general. After all, John Nash believed that his hallucinations were real for a while.
And so now he doesn't and he is right, you think? Who tells you he is now? Whoever he is, he might also be basing assumptions on assumptions, beliefs on beliefs, like all skeptics and R@ndi-followers do.
So you think that you (or any of us) knows what the basis of a "hallucination" or thoughtform in general is. You just take it as a pre-defined notion. That's the mistake. The truth is: we don't. And who tells us that this Mr Nash isn't wrong about his conclusions about "hallucination" (I assume it means = "not real") and everything he experienced has indeed an underlying reality. I think it has. Every thought is "real". Maybe we should even ask us, if hallucination", as some circles (e.g. scientific / psychology mainstream) (pre-)define it, exists at all?
Those "Debunking" rhethoric strategies (and that is what it's all about: it's just a rhethorical exercise) you use here base their "arguments" on definitions that are not clear at all, but everyone forgets about it. So what is a "thought", what is "real", what is consciousness and self-awareness? And what is "delusion / illusion / hallucination"? Or what is the basis and underlying physics / reality structure of the experience? You don't know. We don't know. Not from our perspective here.
So we draw conclusion by our experiences, because that is what remains to do for us as science CANNOT give us an answer, neither can religious dogma. These are personal experiences of ourselves and others (including book authors), then we compare then, then we can indeed "find out" about a possible afterlife if we find consistency - and we do. You should maybe read some more literature about NDEs, reincarnational data (be it by regression or memories of children), APers' findings (e.g. Monroe, Leland, Buhlman, etc.), scientific (!) parapsychological laboratory research, medium (lab!) research etc., and 'believe' less blindly in the unlogical belief-defending explain-way-strategies of the professional scoffers.
Also, as most is indeed on a personal/individual level, it is true that so far we cannot prove a lot scientifically / objectively as objectivity does not work for consciousness - that much is certain. IT is always subjective. We cannot research it this way unless we change epistemological scientific methods, but it looks as if that will not take place in the scientific community so fast.

[CFTraveler]

Guys, guys, let's honor the original spirit of the post, sharing your beliefs or thoughts or theories about the afterlife, and not making this about criticizing or denigrating each others' viewpoints, please and thank you.

[Summerlander]

I agree with CFTraveller. Let's be calm please. And like I said: "One type of experience can be interpreted in so many ways."

I will shed some light on John Nash though. He was a mathematician who was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. So, as you can see, his delusions were taking place in his waking state. His hallucinations were later found to be a "defensive/over-imaginative mechanism" stemming from certain events and how they psychologically affected him earlier in life.

He spoke of non-existent characters who seemed to be endangering him and believed that all men who wore red ties were part of a communist conspiracy. Later, his wife admitted him to a mental hospital where he would make a partial recovery and eventually learn to ignore his hallucinations.

There is no reason to believe that his chemical imbalance enabled him to experience another physical reality and more pragmatically, he was dreaming while awake. The actively imagined scenarios were superimposed on his waking world perception and were often fairly irrational. The fact that he believed his hallucinations to be real to begin with actually endangered himself and his family. Whatever the case, he was better off regarding them as unreal and troublesome distractions. From this way of thinking, he was able to get more control and regain a social life where individuals found him interesting and eccentric.

[CFTraveler]

But you're doing it at this moment, Summerlander. When you say "There is no reason to believe that his chemical imbalance enabled him to experience another physical reality and more pragmatically, he was dreaming while awake" what you are really is saying is "John Nash was schizophrenic but was able to function when he changed his belief", inferring that's what others should do. And that's the same as saying 'you should believe x y or z'.

[poème]

I think we have to keep in mind that science (and I’m including human sciences here), although valuable to seek understanding, also has its limits and is not `unbiaised`. The other day, I read on the topic a very interesting passage about science and scientific instruments’ limits in Seth’s Dreams, Evolution and Value Fulfillment -Volume I- page 142 :
`` The instruments will be planned to catch certain camouflages, and since they will be expertly thought out they will perform their function. (…) By certain means, the instruments themselves will transform data from terms that you cannot understand into terms that you can understand. Scientists do this all the time.``
In other words, even carefully designed scientific instruments may not bring us truths beyond doubts, since these tools are designed to focus on small parts of the whole, therefore may be seen as filtering data to serve a subjective purpose (such as verifying a subjective hypothesis). Moreover, this once filtered data will then also be interpreted by scientists who are subjective human beings.

Therefore, in my opinion, it is not because a scientific instrument measures one thing, or a scientist says one thing, that it is to be held as a truth beyond any doubt… Nor should a psychiatrist’s diagnosis, whatever are the tools he may use to measure and evaluate psychological disorders, be held as such a truth…

Science surely is a great mean to explore possibilities but can it establish undeniable truths?
After all, chances are that what we hold true today will be seen otherwise tomorrow…

[jamboh]

Very interesting discussion guys. My 2 cents..

I think a lot of the disagreements boil down to how you classify reality. By what criteria do you say if something really exists or not? How can you say that your experience of reality is more 'real' than the reality experienced by someone 'halluncinting'? How can you say whether or not a dream is an 'illusion'. What tests must an experience pass if it is to be given the status of absolute reality? Until you determine that you can't say for sure what is real and what is not, whose version of the afterlife is real or not.

[Sinera]

I think a lot of the disagreements boil down to how you classify reality. By what criteria do you say if something really exists or not? How can you say that your experience of reality is more 'real' than the reality experienced by someone 'halluncinting'? How can you say whether or not a dream is an 'illusion'. What tests must an experience pass if it is to be given the status of absolute reality? Until you determine that you can't say for sure what is real and what is not, whose version of the afterlife is real or not.
This is also exactly the point I was trying to make further above. I think that we even do not know a lot about what we think is our own reality we experience ourselves in so-called "waking" consciousness.

Just one example that makes you actually 'shiver' comes to my mind which I saw recently. Yes, I am aware that the guy (D. Wilcock) who's giving this talk is a controversial figure with some daring theories and conclusions. However, many facts are drawn from other sources and literature, e.g. from Cleve Backster ('inventor' of the polygraph and plant consciousness researcher) or M. Talbot (Holographic universe) and they are repeatedly reported and witnessed elsewhere.

It shows us that hypnosis is also sth from which we need to re-think what and how we experience this dimension and what we let into our highly filtered, focussed and crystalised awareness about reality, and what many things not. I recommend watching some minutes of this now from where I bookmarked it. There is e.g. mention of a man who is is hypnotised not so see his daugher - which is already astounding, but then he correctly identifies an object (even reads inscriptions) he did not know before only by 'seeing through' his daughter.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR-klTa1y54#t=14m16s

Reality is not what it seems. :cool:

[Summerlander]

But you're doing it at this moment, Summerlander. When you say "There is no reason to believe that his chemical imbalance enabled him to experience another physical reality and more pragmatically, he was dreaming while awake" what you are really is saying is "John Nash was schizophrenic but was able to function when he changed his belief", inferring that's what others should do. And that's the same as saying 'you should believe x y or z'.

Actually, CFTraveller, it is not the same thing in saying people should believe x, y or z. If you read my post carwfully, you will see that I merely state that for John Nash, it was better for him to regard his condition as unreal and troublesome. This is a fair statement given the fact that throughout his life, it was observable how his perspective and believe affected himself and his family. His initial regard for his hallucinations had no practicality in his life whatsoever and it was harming him and others. This all changed when he put his experiences in a different light. He never got rid of his characters from the other world of conspiracies but he was able to not interact with them and his life improved massively. Fair statement because it was a fact in his case.

[Beekeeper]

CF, I just finished Danison's "Backward Beliefs." I think she has something in common with Newton when she talks about the human as the animal body plus eternal spirit. She mentions that religions are human - often responding to the needs of the animal more than the soul, even if the initial impetus for religion is soul-inspired. I think her idea (well hardly hers really) about the animal and spiritual aspects of the human being reconciles nicely with Newton's description of the spirit needing to integrate with the body-personality/brain chemistry upon incarnation. Newton also says that this can be a real incarnational challenge: to reconcile a personality that is more spiritual with the inclinations of that particular body that may be at odds with the spirit it harbours.

Danison talks about how the more deeply the discarnate soul infiltrates the layers of the afterlife, the more it sheds of its earth-based personality traits. She sites other NDE accounts that see those discarnates that won't leave the grey zone close to the physical. Like Kurt (or was it Monroe?), one experiencer she sites in the book sees a departed alcoholic attempt possession of the body of a man passed out at a bar. The "grey zone" is like the one Monroe passed through where sexually addicted beings were entangled and attempting sex without their physical bodies. She says there are all kinds of people there trying to work out their issues from the pervious life. Now, this made me think of what Kurt experiences when he sees souls working through the various issues of their lives before they're permitted to pass into the next zone. It's been a while since I've read these books but I remember a story about one man he knew (a suicide, I think) who was replaying a basketball game he was involved in as a kid, working through issues of frustration and aggression. There's also the old lady who saw her long-suffering daughter-in-law instead of the facilitator who is actually shepherding her. It also made me remember reading in a Moen book about a megalomaniacal psychiatrist who loved hurting people continuing his cruel psychological games on the other side, probably in this zone.

I think what Newton talks about in his between life books is the process after those initial periods of adjustment, purification and healing when astral and mental elementals, as Kurt calls them, are shed.

[Beekeeper]

Whoops, just missed a whole page of this and now I've read it I realise it would have been worth mentioning Danison on the topic of what we are to Source. Again, it's not a revolutionary idea when she suggests that Source is discovering itself under conditions and in circumstances it wishes to experience by investing its consciousness in realities of its own creation. Where she differs to others is in her assertion that Source absolutely delights in us not knowing it. Our amnesia is a necessary condition to its exploration.

[CFTraveler]

@ Beek: One thing I didn't like about Danison's book (I'm not done with it, so I may be prematurely judging) is in her dualistic interpretation of what a human is.
But everything else sounds good to me.

@ Summerlander:

I merely state that for John Nash, it was better for him to regard his condition as unreal and troublesome. This is a fair statement given the fact that throughout his life, it was observable how his perspective and believe affected himself and his family. His initial regard for his hallucinations had no practicality in his life whatsoever and it was harming him and others. Fair enough.

[SiriusTraveler]

@ Beek: One thing I didn't like about Danison's book (I'm not done with it, so I may be prematurely judging) is in her dualistic interpretation of what a human is.
But everything else sounds good to me.

May I ask what book that is? I'm currently reading her latest one, and that one is almost completelly about religion. I want more of her thoughts about life after death and so on.

[CFTraveler]

The one I'm reading is "Backwards", but in the video BeeK posted she talks about her NDE (as she characterizes it). So I was hoping the book was about what she was told (directly)- as for now, it's about how she correlates them (without actually quoting them so far as I've read) to current works of spirituality, and her interpretation of it.
But like I said, I'm not done with it, so there may be direct information that I just haven't gotten to.

[SiriusTraveler]

Robert himself answered the question I had in this post too. Here it is (http://www.astraldynamics.com.au/showthread.php?13087-Question-about-the-afterlife&p=108158#post108158).

EDIT:
I was curious what Jurgen Ziewe (author of Multidimensional Man) thought of the answer I got from Robert Monroe and emailed him about it.

This is the question i wrote to him:
"Hello Jurgen!
I recently bought your book and have begun reading it. Very interesting!
I have something I want to ask you regarding life after death. I recently contacted Robert Bruce about what he thinks happens after we die, what we do and how the cycle of life looks like. This is the answer I got from him (posted below).
I am wondering if you have any opinion on this, or if you believe it is in a different way than he describes it?

A follow up question I asked Robert about which I have’nt got an answer to yet is this one:
So the evolved soul does not get higher up in a evolutionary chain to be, for example, released from physical reality and live on in a different dimension and evolve there, but stays in the physical dimension forever?
"
And this is the answer I got from him:
"Hi Linus,

I like the way Robert puts his observations across. You'll have to bear in mind that people naturally use different metaphors to describe the same thing. Robert Monroe referred to the after life levels it as focus levels, I like to call them dimensional levels. What Robert says regarding the afterlife states matches my own observation, though he calls them "anomalies" to me they are only anomalies when compared to waking consciousness. I see them more as results of different functions of consciousness which follow their own inherent natural laws. I also observed consensus environments which are not subjectively perceived but also shared by others. I share with him the observation that not everybody realised that they have "died", but many of them do realise.

I tend to only report of what I have experienced and don't like to offer theories which are no more than beliefs. As I haven't followed through the MO of the reincarnation process I cannot comment on it.

Kind regards,
Jurgen"