What are the most important values to live by to have a good reincarnation?

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

After you's told me that having kids wasn't required to have a good reincarnation I am rethinking my whole value system. I am in college right now and now I am questioning whether it's worth it to go for all that schooling right at this point. I am wondering if I should settle for something less ambitious.

So let me ask you what values do you think are the most important to live by here in the physical for a good reincarnation? Thanks.

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

I'm wondering if it's worth it to compete against smart people to get into a University program to make 60,000 a year. That is how I see it right now at this point. So I'm questioning my value systems. I'm questioning the competitive nature of College and University. Part of it is that I just don't have the drive and ambition I use to have ever since I got a bout  of severe depression. Even though the depression is now gone, I am still just less ambitious.

[EscapeVelocity]

Plasma,
I will just say this: I had (have) depression issues. They can discourage you, they did me at times. Depression can bring me to a "full stop"...I do my best not to revisit those old dark days.

Find your center, find your passion...and then move from there as best you can make it work. I know it is not easy, each day is a new/same old challenge.

Today's values?

There is always better

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

Plasma,
I will just say this: I had (have) depression issues. They can discourage you, they did me at times. Depression can bring me to a "full stop"...I do my best not to revisit those old dark days.

Find your center, find your passion...and then move from there as best you can make it work. I know it is not easy, each day is a new/same old challenge.

Today's values?

There is always better

Thanks for the reply but I already know that. I am mainly looking for what values and accomplishments help us get a good reincarnation. Sorry if I mixed up my question with another topic, but it was related to in part why I am contemplating this. 

[T-Man]

Plasma,

What makes one incarnation better than the next?  I believe that you are here to learn and experience from every incarnation.  Sometimes you may have to try and learn the same thing over and over until you have overcome that challenge.  I think you have already answered your own question. 

I'm questioning the competitive nature of College and University. Part of it is that I just don't have the drive and ambition I use to have ever since I got a bout  of severe depression. Even though the depression is now gone, I am still just less ambitious.

That's great that you have overcome the depression.  Maybe that was part of your incarnation challenge.  Maybe the other challenges in this incarnation is to deal with your 'drive and ambition'.

I think EscapeVelocity has also answered the question you are asking.

Today's values?

There is always better

I agree with EscapeVelocity.  'Don't settle!'

[funfire]

I not a big into reincarnation but I would like to throw my 2 cents in and please enlighten me if I misunderstand. Why do you think you have to accomplish something big or good for a better reincarnation, I always thought that we decide what we want to be if we choose to reincarnate. Also do you think reincarnation is forced when you die? Because I don't think thats how it works in my opinion. I think that as counciousness we inhabit this universe and when we die we just return to the non physical or 4th deminsion and can do whatever we want from there.

On another note you said you were rethinking your value system, well that system only relates to you. whatever you think is good to do is subjective, since we all have diffrent perceptions and opinions. you're not going to find any concrete information on what is good for reincarnation because it's all subjective. Whatever you think is right for your good reincarnation is right.

[Xanth]

What you do, you do for yourself.  To better yourself.
What you do is what allows you to continue living in this physical reality... which, in turn, allows you to continue bettering yourself and get closer to becoming Love.

Do what makes YOU happy.

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

What makes one incarnation better than the next?  I believe that you are here to learn and experience from every incarnation.

But certainly we should avoid abject suffering if we can, shouldn't we? Or even just suffering that causes us to not grow.

you're not going to find any concrete information on what is good for reincarnation because it's all subjective. Whatever you think is right for your good reincarnation is right.

This is kind of what I was thinking. The reasons why and how we reincarnate should be decentralized just like how most things are decentralized in real life anyway. And if there is centralization it's only temporary as we move more and more to decentralization. So if you think that you should reincarnate for a certain reason that you would find others that believe the same and reincarnate with them.

What you do, you do for yourself.  To better yourself.
What you do is what allows you to continue living in this physical reality... which, in turn, allows you to continue bettering yourself and get closer to becoming Love.

Do what makes YOU happy.

You don't want to know what I've been thinking about to be happy. LOL And I don't mean psychedelics. But I get what you mean, sometimes I just wonder if all this stressful hard College work is worth it. At the same time I want to get a good reincarnation so I feel like I should finish College. I've just got mixed thoughts on this whole thing.

[Xanth]

You don't want to know what I've been thinking about to be happy. LOL And I don't mean psychedelics. But I get what you mean, sometimes I just wonder if all this stressful hard College work is worth it. At the same time I want to get a good reincarnation so I feel like I should finish College. I've just got mixed thoughts on this whole thing.

Well, let me tell you this... your education has zero bearing what-so-ever on your spiritual growth. 

[baro-san]

After you's told me that having kids wasn't required to have a good reincarnation I am rethinking my whole value system. I am in college right now and now I am questioning whether it's worth it to go for all that schooling right at this point. I am wondering if I should settle for something less ambitious.

So let me ask you what values do you think are the most important to live by here in the physical for a good reincarnation? Thanks.

1. Don't drop out of college, and even more: apply yourself there! You attend the college not for making more money later, but for joining an environment where people better themselves, where they develop their mental capabilities. Minimize your involvement in partying and brainwashing activities that are part of the package!

2. Lead your life as YOU think and feel is right, not how others tell you is right! You can't know which advice is good, which is bad. The Universe / God / whatever Higher Force will always, in long run, reward you according to what you did (thoughts, desires, actions). You just have to pay attention to what you get, and if you don't like it, it means you didn't do right, and have to change. Important: the payback isn't immediate, so you have to take a longer view, an average.

3. You incarnated to learn a lesson, while trying to accumulate as little as possible bad karma (on three planes: thoughts, desires, actions). As you can't remember now what is that lesson, try to find out through alternate state of consciousness. In my experience hypnosis, especially self-hypnosis is the best way.

Good luck!

[baro-san]

Well, let me tell you this... your education has zero bearing what-so-ever on your spiritual growth. 

If you mean by "education" getting a diploma, then I agree. But "education" is so much more, and very important for the development of your mind.

[Xanth]

If you mean by "education" getting a diploma, then I agree. But "education" is so much more, and very important for the development of your mind.

Depends entirely upon what you mean by education then.

Spiritual growth happens only on the non-physical level within the interactions we have with each other on a daily basis here.  It's the non-physical result of those interactions which govern your spiritual growth.
But what makes this physical reality a better environment for that spiritual growth to happen is BECAUSE of the ruleset and limitations this reality provides.  Essentially, it provides "risks".  Without taking risks (emotionally, physically, etc) there's nothing to push you to grow.  You can make the same decisions while non-physical and because there is very little risk involved in those decisions, there's very little reward as well.  It's not zero, but it's very small.

I dunno... it's extremely hard to put into words what I'm trying to say here and I KNOW what I'm saying is confusing and is going to be misunderstood.  All I can really say is that when you "GET IT", you'll get it.

If you're truly concerned about spiritual growth and reincarnation, then all you need to worry yourself about is how you treat your fellow consciousnesses which inhabit this Earth with you.
And that isn't limited to "humans"... everything.  Kindness.  Don't ACT kind.  BE kind.

So if that's the kind of education you're talking about, then yes.  I agree. 

[baro-san]

Depends entirely upon what you mean by education then.

Spiritual growth happens only on the non-physical level within the interactions we have with each other on a daily basis here.  It's the non-physical result of those interactions which govern your spiritual growth.
But what makes this physical reality a better environment for that spiritual growth to happen is BECAUSE of the ruleset and limitations this reality provides.  Essentially, it provides "risks".  Without taking risks (emotionally, physically, etc) there's nothing to push you to grow.  You can make the same decisions while non-physical and because there is very little risk involved in those decisions, there's very little reward as well.  It's not zero, but it's very small.

I dunno... it's extremely hard to put into words what I'm trying to say here and I KNOW what I'm saying is confusing and is going to be misunderstood.  All I can really say is that when you "GET IT", you'll get it.

If you're truly concerned about spiritual growth and reincarnation, then all you need to worry yourself about is how you treat your fellow consciousnesses which inhabit this Earth with you.
And that isn't limited to "humans"... everything.  Kindness.  Don't ACT kind.  BE kind.

So if that's the kind of education you're talking about, then yes.  I agree. 

Thank you for your thoughtful reply

For many years I asked myself, around, and rhetorically, questions like "why am I here?", "what am I supposed to do, and not do?". With age, I asked these kind of questions more often. When I got on the spiritual path more seriously, and I began reading and looking up information, I started to form hypotheses, and build models, then amend them, or radically replace them. Every new piece of information I subjectively deem worthwhile I try to fit into my current model, make it work together with the other pieces, leading to confirmations or adjustments.

One of the pieces I still have a hard time to fit is "love" in the sense you, and others, are using, often packaged as "unconditional love", which seems to me same with "indiscriminate love".

It is said that that kind of all around love is the feeling that encompasses the other superior dimensions, from where we pop up here to incarnate, and reincarnate over and over, an enormous number of times. It seems to me that if we come from "love", our souls already know it, and learning to "unconditionally love" here everybody and everything can't be the reason to incarnate. A typical counter argument is that loving and enabling somebody who does bad things makes you too responsible for those bad deeds.

At the moment I believe that what we need to learn is twofold: to improve our reasoning power, and to master our emotions. Not being able to master our emotions, like fear, hate, leads inevitably to have them spiral us down in a thought responsive environment. On the other fold, I believe that we were not created at our maximum reasoning potential, so we need to develop and sharpen it.

In my personal spiritual quest, when I started to employ self-hypnosis I made a significant jump ahead, in my opinion. For once, I was able to regress to past lives, and to life-between-lives dimensions. I was able, for most of those lives, to learn what was the lesson I was supposed to learn, to understand how karmically some lives are connected to others, to gradually map in time and space my journey.

None of the lessons I identified so far was "love" related, but I identified the first life when my reasoning stepped over a threshold that separated my lives in "mental obscurity" (marred by fear and survival instincts) from those those of "reason". It wasn't something I was looking for, and I was surprised to find it, then understand its importance.

Anyway, at the moment, I believe that without purposefully educating ourselves, in the sense of "brain gymnastics" that develop our reasoning and understanding capabilities, we can't approach our full development potential as souls, no matter how much we succeed in indiscriminately loving around

I think that we should be compassionate, and love discriminately our fellow man, but do it both keeping under control our emotions, and apply a continually improved reasoning onto each situation.

Sorry for the long post.

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

Anyway, at the moment, I believe that without purposefully educating ourselves, in the sense of "brain gymnastics" that develop our reasoning and understanding capabilities, we can't approach our full development potential as souls, no matter how much we succeed in indiscriminately loving around

I think that we should be compassionate, and love discriminately our fellow man, but do it both keeping under control our emotions, and apply a continually improved reasoning onto each situation.

Yo, this makes the most sense to me. BTW I'm not black. LOL But yeah this makes a lot of sense, I remember Szaxx saying that he uses wit to help with retrievals. And I would much rather be a witty, funny, smart angel than a clueless basic minded angel in a trillion years from now. LOL The question becomes how to best reach that place. I think college could help with that.

Also just because someone becomes enlightened doesn't mean that they automatically gain critical thinking, logic, and reason or a scientific mind set needed to merge science and spirituality. One can become a Zen devil by negating the reasoning, personal development, self discipline. Just Google "Becoming A Zen Devil."

So I see both sides of this coin. I just wonder sometimes if going to college for all these years are worth it. I guess I really just need to make up my mind what values I want to embody. It's hard though because there seems to be no hard set rules for this. But I got a general idea of the values I want. Just the depression really got me off track.

[Xanth]

Well, "indiscriminate love" isn't quite what you think it is.  It's not "love" as in the emotion.  That's what everyone ends up confusing.  It's Love as in acceptance / understanding... the opposite of "Fear". 
If Fear is a retreating of self, then Love is an embracing of self.

Adyashanti uses the statement "Allow everything to be as it is" (within reason, obviously... ie: knife guy above)... and that's the crux of "unconditional love".
If you can allow someone to be as they are regardless of how you think they should be, THAT is the epitome of learning to love. 

And Plasma, you're right, nothing changes about YOU when you awaken/become enlightened.  What changes is your perspective, or how you view the world and those around you.

"Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.
After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water."

[Kzaal]

Here's what I think about reincarnation Plasma.
You're only searching for something more "suitable" than your current reincarnation and that's perfectly fine.
What I've learned to accept is that: Whatever you do, there's always a possibility that you end up in the same exact life you're currently living if you can't be awaken completely and permanently.
What do you do then? Learn to observe, be there when it counts...
Your mind has to understand all the subtleties between the good and the bad.
A better reincarnation? It would be to actually understand this^ and then doing what you think is the right thing to do in all your life situations.
Doing so will make yourself truely believe that you are worth something more, a better challenge maybe? or an easier life?
It all depends on what you want to do.

For your college man, just do what you think is right, don't fear what people might think about you if you drop out.
Find your passion and stick with it.

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

Your mind has to understand all the subtleties between the good and the bad.

Can you explain this more. Thanks for chiming in Kzaal.

[Kzaal]

Can you explain this more. Thanks for chiming in Kzaal.

It just means that even if you see something very subtle in a life situation that you can identify it as a good thing or a bad thing.
You can see people who try to manipulate others even if it's really nothing much, you can still see it.
Anything that implies someone's feelings, or someone's generosity or naivety.
Anything that someone can take advantage of. Learn to see theses things even if they're really small.
That way when you look at yourself you can see when you do something wrong. And you can stop doing that thing.

Once you're there all you have to do is good things, that's all.
It's funny because people often think you need to do miracles in order to have a better/more suitable reincarnation when it's actually not the case at all.
All you have to do is, keep the bad deeds to a minimum while doing as much good deeds as you can.
To me if you lend someone a hand for something and they smile and thank you then that's a good deed.

Take care of yourself and try to leave that ego as you go along.
It's hard to do but it can be done.

Edit: Sometimes even a situation that appears to have nothing wrong might have a bad side hidden behind it.

[baro-san]

It just means that even if you see something very subtle in a life situation that you can identify it as a good thing or a bad thing.
...
To me if you lend someone a hand for something and they smile and thank you then that's a good deed.
...
Edit: Sometimes even a situation that appears to have nothing wrong might have a bad side hidden behind it.

If that someone is a criminal, you help him hoping he'll change, but he doesn't, and commits another crime, you accumulate bad karma. Indiscriminate goodness isn't a positive thing neither for you, nor for those that get injured as a consequence of your goodness. Agree?

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

OK thanks Kzaal for the clarification.

[Xanth]

*YOUR* Intent is all that truly matters in life.

You can't be held responsible for the actions or intents of others, especially those intents hidden from you.

[baro-san]

*YOUR* Intent is all that truly matters in life.

You can't be held responsible for the actions or intents of others, especially those intents hidden from you.

That would be nice ... but I believe in the truth of the saying "Hell is full of good intentions or desires" (Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153), because the "action" part of the karma deals with the results of your actions.

This actually makes a lot of sense, because it stimulates the development of our judgment, and our attunement with the vibrations of the multidimensional Universe. Not knowing, and guessing wrong don't excuse us.

[Lumaza]

 We have all come here to "experience". The good, bad and ugly are all experiences. Like Xanth says, your intent, or the way you handle those experiences is what creates Karma.

The next time you come here, it will be the same and the next and so on. Experiences come in all shapes and sizes and can and do fill up many lifetimes.

[Xanth]

In a sense, all that truly exists of anything is "Intent".  It's all that goes with you when you die.

[PlasmaAstralProjection]

In a sense, all that truly exists of anything is "Intent".  It's all that goes with you when you die.

I guess the question then becomes will there be higher level beings that oversee who reincarnates into where and if they are looking at more than just intent for your past life. They just might be looking for the actual effects of our actions. Certainly that is where we can learn the most.

Besides that we all know that here on this physical plane just having a good intent is not enough. Eg when I was a kid I believed that God would protect me no matter what, but that lead me to do careless things sometimes and I eventually ended up getting injured at one point because of that. My intent was wrong even though it was good, and I paid the price. And I've had other similar experiences. But who knows how it works with reincarnation.