Creation

When discussing the concepts of reincarnation, it's easy to describe what happens to us individually because we can see and touch and feel our experiences - at least on this physical level. We've all dreamed, experienced deja vu, felt the instant liking or disliking that sometimes occurs when we meet someone new, had telepathic episodes when we think of someone we haven't seen in ages and then run into them the next day. We can easily identify with the reincarnational concepts and examples discussed in prior posts because we live them physically every day.

Not as easily understood is how we collectively create our environment. How together we design and engineer the physical world we live in. Perhaps it's more easily understood if we look at it as a further extension of our subconscious abilities. If we can plan and execute our individual roles and lessons within the core circle of our family and friends in each lifetime - is it such a huge step further to realize that we all, as a larger group, create the physical world?

How better to execute our reincarnational plan than to do it in a place that we create - a location that is perfectly suited to the physical form we have assumed for a short time? In order to accept this concept, one must set aside the creationist theory - that the earth and everything in it was created by a supreme being and the evolutionary theory - that we began as single cell life forms and evolved to our current state. We have to accept a new theory - that we created our environment and everything in it and we continue to create and refine it every moment.

If you can believe that your ka is immortal, that you have lived dozens of lives throughout history and that you are an integral part of the All That Is, then you are not that far from understanding how you have contributed to the physical world as well.

Reconciling our differences

There has never been peaceful coexistence among humans in all of recorded history, so there is little reason to believe there ever was. The reasons for this are many, but we can speculate that in the beginning, violence between people was driven by hunger, a need for shelter and sometimes simply greed. In later times, when people came together in larger groups and began cooperating so that everyone in the group had shelter and enough to eat, the only way to perpetuate and protect that society was to create a set of rules (or religion) that applied to all. That way, everyone knew what was acceptable and what was not. Enforcing the rules and ensuring the religion was followed, lead to the evolution of a hierarchy (or government) in each society. By various means, including fear tactics and especially by limiting education to a select few, these enforcers could ensure that everyone conformed.

Unfortunately, if one society encountered another that had a different set of rules (or religion), their absolute belief and conviction that theirs was the "right" one, could, and often would, lead to war.

Of course this description is very basic and simple. There are many complex dynamics that contribute to the strife we still see among differing sects and societies; the point or question that I really want you to consider in this post, is how can we reconcile our societal differences in a peaceful way, when all of the participants believe passionately that theirs is the right way and everyone else is wrong?

The answer is education, not subjugation. If we can educate the populations of those societies that are in need of more food, or better living conditions, or that have oppresive governments, we will have given them the tools to build strong, healthy, more peaceful societies. The problem lies with the enforcers - they don't want to lose their positions of power, so they will resist any attempt to educate the general population.

Because we live in the age of instant communication and we have the ability to know immediately what is happening anywhere on the earth, for the first time in our history we are a position to reach all people. It is not our religious beliefs we need to be sharing; instead we need to be educating those subjugated or poorer societies. We need to be building schools and spreading our knowledge of medicine, agriculture, industry, history and the arts. This will take a few generations to come to fruition, but eventually, through education and interaction with the rest of the world, we can adopt and adapt to each others' best traits and begin to think as one society instead of the sadly fragmented and secular groups we have been historically and still are today.

Societies

We're drawn not only to our physical environment, but also to the society that inhabits it. There are a number of complicated mixes of environments and societies available for us to choose from. At any given time, any combination imaginable is possible.

We not only choose the society we inhabit, we contribute to it as well. While we're living our 'focus' life, our psyche is helping with the development and construction of its societal mores. For example, if you live in a democratic society, you help maintain it physically by casting your votes and mentally by following your society's rules. By supporting and believing in your society, you enable your ka and those of your inner circle of family and friends to perform the specific functions they have decided upon, while at the same time holding together a societal structure for other core groups to work within as well.

While we may think that some societies other than our own are unfair, or wrong, or misguided, the fact is that they wouldn't exist if they weren't required by the people who live within them. Throughout mankind's history, our societal and phyiscal differences have often resulted in violence and bloodshed. We build models, try them on for a while and then leave them behind to try other experiments. This is how we learn and grow.

In each current life, we are passionate about our beliefs. So much so that we may strive to force them upon others, without understanding that those complex structures have been built by 'other' societies to fill their specific requirements. Yet it is also true that if we contribute to the destruction of another society, it is still within the realms of ending one experiment to move on to another.

The conundrum is that whether we participate in the building or destruction of a society - we're still working within the overall plan. Where this gets tricky, from an insructional point of view, is that it appears to be permission to be violent or destructive towards a different segment of society. This is not the case. Remember earlier postings that emphasized karma and the fact that any act performed in one lifetime will come back to you in another. We should always be working to end violence - especially violence committed in the name of a religion or societal belief system. There are many peaceful, loving ways to deal with our differences and that is where our focus should always be.

Connection to the Earth

Because we're so focused on ourself and the core of family and friends that is the nucleus of our physical existence, it's easy to become so wrapped up in living life that we miss our surroundings entirely. Yet our physical surroundings greatly influence who we are. In order to accomplish those things that we set out to do, we choose the setting that will best assist us.

When you find yourself questioning the path you're on or you're dealing with a particularly difficult situation, by shifting your focus from what is bothering you to what is around you, your physical surroundings will automatically sooth and comfort you. This is part of your make up that you probably don't even realize.

At one point in my life, I had to move to central Canada for work reasons. I went there with an open mind and even a sense of excitement to be moving to a bigger center, rife with culture compared to the area I was born in. After less than a month I was filled with longing for the sea. The Great Lakes are huge bodies of water, but when you stand on the shore, the smells and sounds feel nothing like standing on the shores of the full blown Atlantic Ocean. I realized with wonder that I needed the ocean, it's actually a part of me. Even one of the world's biggest lakes couldn't come close to taking the place of the ocean in my soul.

The earth is a part of each of us, and we are the Earth's keepers. Of all the creatures that exist, we alone, except for perhaps the whales and dolphins, are actually aware of the earth and its part in our lives. This week, a day was designated as Earth Day in order to remind us of our duty to look after it, as it looks after us. I would encourage everyone to think of everyday as Earth Day, and remind you not to overlook that this Earth is an important, integral part of your being.

Physical and social structure

Sometimes we choose our physical environment to assist us in our journey to understanding because we want or need to experience a particular climate or culture, and other times we choose it just because we lived in the same area before and for various reasons are drawn to it. (See posts on February 14 & 15, 2010 about affinity for places.) Some people are born into an area and remain there, while others leave their childhood neighbourhoods because they are drawn to another area that will better satisfy the tasks and experiences they've set for this particular lifetime.

I'm drawn to the ocean - maybe because I'm a water sign (Cancer) - or maybe for other reasons. I love the harbour city where I live on the east coast of the Atlantic Ocean just the way it is, but shortly after moving here in the 1980s, I became aware that I'd lived here before when I unexpectedly "remembered" it as it once was.

I was born a couple of hundred miles from here and came to this area because my husband's work dictated we must. We bought a house not far from the seashore and the road home passed right along a rocky stretch of beach. One evening as I was driving home from work I came around a bend in the road and suddenly had a vision of that same beach, but in another time. In my mind's eye, I saw long wooden racks of fish with smokey fires burning beneath them. Adults were working busily catching and gutting the fish and laying them on the long racks to dry under the billowing smoke while older children tended the fires. The younger children ran up and down the beach throwing stones and waving their arms at swooping seagulls to keep them away from the precious smoked fish that would help carry them through the long cold winter. My vision lasted only a moment, but in those few seconds I stepped into another time. Then the beach reverted to it's current state of barren rocks, waves and water and I was back in the modern world of supermarkets and speciality stores, where I'd never even thought about how fish was caught and preserved long ago. That little glimpse of another time was so clear and detailed, that I have no doubt I'd lived it myself and I still think about it often. I obviously have an affinity for this part of the world that has brought me back.

Along with the physical environment I enjoy so very much, comes a social structure that allows freedom of choice in almost every aspect of life. As long as I pay my taxes and live within the confines of our legal system, there are no religious or political restrictions in this part of the world that inhibit me from persuing whatever path I wish to follow. It is because of these freedoms that I can develop my own theories and religious belief systems and share them with others. This might not be the case if I'd chosen to reincarnate into a some other areas of the world. In my next post, I'll discuss other types of society and the importance of cultural diversity.

The physical environment

So far I've spent a lot of time discussing our individual paths and choices as we travel along the reincarnational journey. I've pretty much focused solely on personal events and lifetimes, but they are each just single facets of our multi-faceted world. With this post, I'd like to introduce the concept of our collective conscious.

While we are each individual and separate in our waking lives, on the subconscious level nothing is further from the truth. In this physical life we walk alone, but in our sleeping lives, and in the intervals between our physical lives, we are totally connected. Just as we have an inner circle of entities who make up our closely related groups or families, we are also part of the much larger outer group whose focus is not on the individual experience, but the overall environment in which we function and have those experiences.

So, while we decide individually who will do what in each lifetime so that we can each undertake our personal learning paths, as a group, we decide on the type of environment we will journey through. This environment is not only the physical world, but the technology of that world as well.

There are deserts, oceans, mountains, glaciers, plains, boreal forests, and rain forests in every possible combination and/or permutation imaginable. Yet all people are basically the same. Yes, we have some obvious cosmetic physical differences, but overall, we are generally the same type of being no matter which environment we inhabit. So, with just a few adjustments in how we clothe it, our physical body is capable of adapting to almost any environment the earth has to offer. This adds a myriad of choices to the type of life and experience we can choose.

Twists in the path

It's interesting how your focus and beliefs mature and change over your lifetime. Although the basic tenets haven't changed for me for a very long time, life's experiences have shown me the finer details and the intricate workings of the very complex world we've created and exist within. Many things that were abstract ideas in the beginning are now firmly entrenched as truths.

What never fails to surprise me is how life pushes you along paths you never intended to travel. The last couple of years have been difficult ones for me personally, and as I struggle to find my new 'normal', I find instead that the Universe is very firmly plotting my path away from the future I was sure of and into a realm completely unexpected (and I might add, undesired) at least on a conscious level.

Lately it seems that I've been experiencing the same lesson over and over and frankly, it's getting a bit tiresome. I'd like to think that I'm not obtuse, but this time I haven't a clue what the point is and where it's leading. It's getting easier to understand how people sometimes get 'lost' on their journey.

I'm actually in awe of those people who are risk takers - the ones who suddenly do a complete turn around and follow their heart to a new and self-fulfilling place. This often happens after a major life event - perhaps a brush with death or the loss of a loved one, or maybe just a sense of time running out and a need to complete all the tasks on the 'bucket list'. Whatever the cause, my hat is off to those who can and do.

The important thing is to recognize a major shift in the plan when it happens and not be afraid to find out where it leads. When life's path takes an unexpected and/or unpleasant twist, we need to remember that in spite of the fact that it appears to be chaos, everything in life eventually does and will make perfect sense, even if it isn't the road we always thought we'd travel.