[quote=Grizzly Adams]This is my perspective.

What if the 'human experience' is a test or right of passage to another level of existence. Where it is how much we grow in love and compassion, as humans, that we will be rewarded for. How well we live this life, and die well, determines what state or level we will experience next.
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what if, the better we live this life expedites our next incarnation.
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I don't want to exit this existence with any regret. I don't want to look back and wish that I had done better with this 'human experience'. Sometimes it can feel like a curse, but that is not real, only a mindset. Those that overcame more and grew more in love and compassion will have the greater reward.
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Any psychedelic experience that noes not move us to grow into better 'humans' is an waste of sacred energy, and may be something that we will have to answer for.
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Alright. I just wanted to jump in here and say something about this because it touches the heart of an important matter. Let me begin with this:
A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.
- Albert Einstein

I think it is unwise to think of ourselves in the way you suggest. I don't know if you've studied buddhism or any eastern schools of thought, but the buddhist, for example, is trying to get out of reincarnation whereas as a westerner is fascinated with the idea, and somehow, for the westerner, it's a relief to believe in this idea - because we have for so long been tormented by the looming inevitable judgement day hoping you and I end up on the right side.

You see, when you say "those that overcame more and grew more in love and compassion [u]will have the greater reward," you are making a ghastly error, because you are making the assumption that good work, charity, tolerance, righteousness, anything that you do to get somewhere else is the way to the "the kingdom of heaven", or the way beyond the wheel of samsara, which is the cycle of birth and death through the realms on the wheel.

Love, compassion, charity, tolerance, wisdom - these are all good things. This is true.
Lao-Tau made the statement, however, that real virtue does not know itself virtue. Virtue which tries to be virtuous is not virtue.
This simply means that so long as we try to make ourselves better, more holy, more kind, more generous, more charitable, more spiritual - we are, as Alan Watts put it, trying to make rough water smooth with a flat iron, because we are trying to identify ourselves with a 'conceptual image' that is the image of who we wish to be - that is to say - a character stereotype that we imagine for ourselves, which is indistinguishable from the linguistic ghost that is the so-called ego!

Love, compassion, charity, tolerance, wisdom - these are all good things. This is true.
I'm not saying one ought not to strive for excellence, or friendship, or spirituality.
What I am saying is that you will never achieve this because it is the ego desiring self-improvement.
Imagine a machine made of concepts tilling a conceptual field in which is sowed conceptual seeds.
What will be the substance of the fruits grown this way?

"Feeling? IMO this is not about feeling but about having mental concepts about what life is and what death is. I think it's normal to have concepts, but to what extend do they play role? They're just concepts you know. And they are about one against another million other possible concepts. Some of them really get to us, but then it only looks as there is no choice. A change of perspective and they're broken. They're strong, but then again very fragile." --- Jees

Jees hit the nail on the head. Concepts are strong merely because we've agreed collectively on their substance. The ego is piece of conceptual machinery, a ghost. It's immaterial. It's not Real.

In regard to the subject of moving up the hierarchy of being as we ascend through the higher levels of charity, kindness, and all that spiritual hokum - we must realize that the point of life is always arrived at in the immediate moment - to miss this point is the gravest of all sins. The word sin comes from a greek word that means "missing the target" - or as we say in our culture, "missing the point". What I'm trying to get across is that the highest realization (or goal if that's how you want to think about, though that is still missing the entire point) is to see that who you really are "is the expression of what are Now. And there is no need whatsoever to defend, improve, or hoist yourself up with a grunt by your own bootstraps. You are God right here and Now - and you need no improvement.

There is no meaning, that is the meaning of our life imo : to find peace with this thought and live life authentically. What I mean by authentically is free from all that you have named : find a passion and do it. I too look forward to death, even if there is nothing afterwards I enjoy the thought. I like to believe that hyperspace awaits us also. If this is the case I would very much enjoy being there, but there is always the possibility that we only perceive the surface of hyperspace and not it's content.

I like that symbolic representation of the big cycle of life

There is no absolute truth : we are only a small piece in a maybe infinite puzzle and we make the mistake of thinking about ourself in absolute terms.

Good point ! With every concept are attached other concepts in our minds. For example, in our culture we link the concept of death with a bunch of negative concepts, thus this is why you question the validity of your feeling. The sad truth is no feeling is more valid than another since they are all relative to the links they have to others. IMO what can be considered a valid feeling is a feeling free from all links or maybe only dead end links (dogmas/conventions/etc). A feeling can either be valid or invalid, there is no in-between.

Ahhh....The problems with far too much thinking!

There's far too many fun experiences to enjoy and share amongst others to lose yourself into, to have time to dwell on death.

Sure, it's inevitable, and something to ponder, but it's not as if life isn't worth living as death is worth dying.... If you're dwelling on death too much it's cos you're not making enough effort to allow the joys of living to happen.

no insults intended... it's just that many of the replies here suggest the prevalence of "younger souls" posting, so to speak

do you know that the insights of ramana maharshi came out as products of his fear of death, of constantly contemplating death? i wouldn't say he had much of an ego. i wouldn't say he was a slave to social conventions. i wouldn't say he dealt in (pre-)manufactured concepts. there is undeniably quite a bit of wisdom in his teachings. and i don't consider myself strictly an advaitin. more like (par-)advaitin, for the record.

death could teach alot even while you are still alive. then when it comes its teachings are unique, unobtainable any other way. how could possibly so many people miss that, especially, say, those that label themselves "immortalists". in a sense death is the ultimate teacher.

i do feel about (?) death, on a daily basis. and yes, "feel" here is a slightly better word than "think", not exact, and, no i am not really concerned about finding (nor coining) the right word. who knows how it "feels" knows, who does not, his time has not come yet to know.

don't worry so much op.

I can relate to your post. Even as a child, we all learn about death at some point. This affects everyone differently. I was devastated when I first learned. It was so bad, that even my young brain had to cope with it somehow.

My coping strategy - was to believe that we are better off dead, and reach a better place. This belief took root well before it should have, since I did not have a traumatic childhood by any means. It was just my personality, and my disposition, that life was really not good (enough).

It worsened in my teenage years and reach a culmination in my early 20's. But, I have survived this rock bottom and suicidal thinking somehow. That in itself has been an enormous change in perspective, albeit quite slow.

However, today I am drawn to learn about DMT because part of me REALLY WANTS to die, and feels like it is a justified quest to undertake. There is a permanent illness that I suffer from, which is also a source of guilt. This illness is a daily burden, and has interfered with my wellbeing for over half my life, kind of like chronic pain. Also, I cannot speak freely of this illness. It has me trapped, and I have been forced to keep it locked up.

That is why I can relate to DMT and the "death" it brings.

Life is but a small blip of existence. Death is eternal. Or is it?

You're not wrong in the slightest, and I feel the exact same way. In fact, anyone who's had an experience of the other side, or researched it thoroughly, is bound to feel the exact same way. I am absolutely excited!!! Every year I celebrate my birthday even harder. It's one year closer to heaven and the endless having fun again.

That's the thing a lot of people have misunderstood about spirituality and what the nature of everyday existence is going to be like for them in the afterlife. You're not going to spend it in some temple, obeying/worshiping some deity there. You're going to be doing stuff! Laughing with friends, go to comedy shows, explore endlessly magical forests, eat all kinds of cakes, foods and candy without feeling full or disgusted, go cart on actual rainbow roads, have as many orgies as you want as all kinds of creatures, do sports of all kinds, etc. In some ways it will be just like here, except that for air you'll have unfathomable love, peace and joy permeating everything and everyone.


Well, we are programmed by society to live such hollow lives. This world and society undeniably sucks, but it's also why we're here. As many deep NDErs have pointed out, we're superstars in Heaven already for coming here. Coming to this wild west of cruelty and suffering takes courage and experience. We're actually able to enjoy this shitty existence! And learning to enjoy this crappy place even more so, despite our challenges, makes us even stronger. That's half the reason why we even came in the first place. The other reason we came is just to enjoy this role-playing game for what it is, and derp around as these random animals and personalities in this random society in this random world. Enjoy it!

You don't have to follow the arbitrary rules that society have set for you. Live your own life, go crazy, do whatever you want. Wanna spend your life playing World of Warcraft, building sandcastles, taking walks in the rain? Then just do it. You don't have to fit any pre-defined mold. No one has their shit together anyway, people just follow the model because they're afraid of being original. I play chess, dance around, take ayahuasca and research what death is, and don't even begin to care about ever doing anything else in this world. You're not a slave to your undesires unless you want to be.


Hyperspace is just a tiny taste of what it's really like over there - it's much more amazing than that. So yeah. As one NDEr put it, "So I went into the light. And as I was moving up into the light, I just started to feel so good. You know like I can't, words can't explain it. Like, the higher that I went into the light, and the more that I moved up and further away from Earth, the better I felt. And the feeling of pleasure does not really apply to this Earth. Like, nothing can compare, like if you took everything that you were in favor of, like maybe getting a massage in a hot tub, your favorite music, your favorite food, your favorite drink... Everything that you love, happening to you all at once, no matter what it is, all at once... It would not even closely compare to the pleasure that was just within that light. And as you moved further into, like further away from this Earth, the pleasure felt even better. So you just moved up it felt better and better, it was insane."

As another put it, "If I lived a billion years more, in my body or yours, there's not a single experience on Earth that could ever be as good as being dead. Nothing." - Dr. Dianne Morrissey, near-death experiencer

You may also want to give this a read. It's just a guess and hope from me, but I think that it's more or less how most people will come to relate to death in general in the (far, utopian) future.

To the OP, the premise for your question sounds a little bit like escapism to me.
Maybe that’s not a bad thing, but I’d like to share a story:

About a year ago I took my then five year old son hiking, and at the foot of the trail head there was a large stone with a bronze plaque. My son asked what it was for. I explained plainly that it was a memorial for a man who loved this trail, who built and took care of it, so that other people may enjoy the trail too. And after the man died this stone was placed here by the people, who like us, hiked and loved this trail too. “The word memory and memorial sound the same, yeah? This is this man’s legacy, and this is how we continue to live even after we have died, through the memories of those who are living.” My son thought for a few moments, and said, “Oh, I understand. I will give my gem and mineral collection to my children someday as my legacy so that they can remember me.” I kid you not, this was my five year old son. He’s pretty cool.

I’m not so good at judging how old many of you posters are, but I’m not so sure some of you have had kids yet, and if you haven’t, perhaps some day you will. Or perhaps no. While I hear a lot of deep thought and even some wisdom, I’m not convinced that some of you who say these things have actually lived yet. So how could you know what it is to die? I know I’m full of preachy pretense, I’m sorry for that. I am only speaking from my experience, and you well may no doubt have had very different experiences yourselves. I can remember getting very abstract when the veils were lifted for me when I started experimenting with psychedelics as a young man. I thought I knew something then. But as soon as my son was born, anything I thought I knew, I was wrong. I didn’t know anything, and know even less now. But becoming fully responsible for another human being with a love that I do not have words for, now I know more so what it means to live.

I think there is a risk here. From the stations of youth you will skip the middle and go right into the end of life lessons, usually patterned for an old, old man, becoming a sage (I guess you could pull a Tony Randall or an Anthony Quinn out of the hat and sire some brats when you're eighty-one.). [I see it: I've hoisted my own self-images onto you. Such an ass.] Of course it’s up to you what you do, but are you sure this is what you want? You could be missing out on something - that if you knew it, viscerally down into the marrow of your being what it is to love a child, more so your own, down into your DNA, coupled with all the physiological triggers that fire off all these ineffencredible neurotransmitters - I mean, c’mon, you’re here exploring the world of DMT - is this part of the journey you would miss?

I watched Hjortron's youtube link about the near death experience gal. (Pretty isn’t she!) I found her genuine. But irony on me, she talks about earthly love with all these physical pleasures: massage, food, music - but she doesn’t mention kids really. Hmmm.. Ah well, what a trip her seizure was!

I tend to believe we made from both spirit and matter. So as far as death, we only know that we descend into Sheol, back into the ground. Anything else, mmm, to me would be speculation - in the same way that one who drinks from the cup knows for himself whether the tea is hot or cold. So you can guess, or listen to other people’s stories, but only the person drinking really knows. I’m skeptical. Unless you’ve been clinically dead, no heart beat, no breathing, well, I am reading your wonderful, romantic, and nuanced notions, but I get the feeling its a young person describing the excitement of say, sex (!) because he’s read some really great books and inhaled deeply some real evocative images. And could have even activated the depths of his imagination, has ruminated what it is to really rut. But he hasn’t actually done the deed himself. Just saying.

She doesn't no, but other NDErs who have children do. And I'm not denying that the love we can feel for our children can be better and more magical than anything else on this planet, and for many it's their greatest pleasure in life by far. But rather, it's just to highlight how amazing that place is reported to be given that NDErs would much rather stay there than stick around for their children, even though they absolutely love them deeply. Here is a good example from a talk show with a mother who doesn't care for her children and family in light of her knowledge of that place, but again, as the NDE researcher neuropsychiatrist Peter Fenwick points out later in the show, this is not the rule once someone has come back, even though they often feel it while they're there. And here is a relevant example, where an NDE researcher talks about his encounter with a mother who had an NDE during childbirth,

[...] She raised her hand at the end of my lecture and she said, "I've been to Heaven." Now, standing from my viewpoint, you have to see these medical doctors and everybody in the room they turn, and they look over her. And the woman down here in front from University of Illinois Medical School kind of yells across the room and says, "Just don't sit there - tell us about it!" And this woman said "I was delivering my third child," I don't know what the reason is but I have a number of, probably half dozen cases childbirth stories. And she was delivering her third child and she said, "You know I reached a tough time in the delivery and I was in a crisis and I zipped away to Heaven." No evidence, she zipped away to Heaven, and I said to the group I said "Alright listen, I'll do a quick little interview with her and let me show you what an interview with a near-death patient looks like." And I had never talked to her about this before, so I started asking her questions.

"Was there a boundary?"

"Yep, there was a stream, and I couldn't go past the stream."

And I said "Oh yeah, what did it look like?"

And here's how near-death patients typically describe what they call you know Heaven or whatever this beautiful place is that they are, they'll say like this, they'll say, well, "I was in this most incredible place. And the colors! Oh, I wish I could explai- the colors were like, oh no I can't do it because when you think I mean colors, you're thinking about colors like here, but this isn't it. This is color you can like walk into, and you can touch color, and you could, no I know I'm not doing a very good job. And the music! It's the most incredible music I ever heard! And... nah, because you see when I say music you're thinking about The Beatles or something and I'm just, no never mind, I know I'm not doing a very good job."

And this is called ineffability, the inability to, they're talking about colors and music, and she said "I just really wanted, I just really enjoyed it, I wanted to get past that river and they wouldn't let me go."

I said "OK, let me ask you in front of the whole group." I said "You just delivered your third child?" "Yes." I said "I've always heard it said that the strongest biological bond in the universe is between a mother and her child." And she said "OK, I'll grant that."

I said "For the sake of this group, tell me something, did you want to stay, or did you want to come back?" She kind of look down a little and she said "I didn't want to come back." And she elbowed her husband kind of playfully and said "He can raise the kids."

And I said, "OK let me ask you again, you're a mother of your third child, you're close to these kids, it's a newborn, you haven't had any time with this child, and you would rather stay there?"

She said "Absolutely."

Hi Hjortron,

That was a very intense response, and I appreciate your heroic manner to transcribe word for word this video. You are clearly passionate about this subject of Near Death Experiences.

For me exploring this world of things ineffable, I’m as guilty as anyone getting caught up in magical thinking or wishful thinking. It’s really my nature to. So part of my struggle is making my Pop-Eye Karl Popper fore arms pop! I do my best to approach as a skeptic but with an open mind that possibility is always there. My concern for me, in spite of the great passion and insight you are showing for this topic of near-death experience, could this be a confirmation bias? Looking for evidence that confirms what you would like to believe is true? It may very well be a real phenomena, I won’t discount it, but I have to kick the tires plenty.

I see this in your description: She looked downwards - clearly that was a moment of shame (!), and then covered it with humor. The humor part, that was healthy for sure! But how do we know it was her heavenly experience that made for want of her to stay in this heavenly place? Maybe there is some other psychological model at work - a Jungian archetype speaking out, the Shadow Mother abandoning her children?

She could be the exception, a catalyst to the crisis that puts a whole paradigm into question. I’m not a biologist, just a layman, but would you agree the larger empirical pattern, which she herself agreed to, the mother-child bond is as strong as strong can be: we can surmise that the mother-child bond may be one of the strongest bonds across all healthy,living critters, especially mammals. I am confused why anyone healthy would abandon their child.

I certainly don’t mean to make you wrong. If life were enough, would we still be exploring inner / outer space with DMT? There are drivers no doubt in the complex of our personalities that have brought us here. Death and taxes, both are inevitable, and more than a worthy exploration. To me its part of man’s search for meaning.

To sum up, tonight I just discovered in a wiki this quote for the first time, so prescient and with serendipity, as I’ve been thinking about responding all day to your thoughtful post: On Joan Vollmer's death, second wife to William Burroughs, resonated with Allen Ginsberg, who wrote of her in Dream Record: June 8, 1955, "Joan, what kind of knowledge have the dead? can you still love your mortal acquaintances? What do you remember of us?"

With utmost respect,
Alloklais

I don't know. Does it feel wrong?

You know I resisted this sort of thinking for a long time, but my experience tends to point to something like this. And you're right on the money, the meaning of life is simply being alive.

This thread feels really challenging and clarifying. The Nexus cultivates some great teaching.



I wanted to respond but felt puzzled.
Then I found this:



and



Now for me I hear an amalgamation of two similar voices: Richard Rorty and Hakim Bey, both of whom have enriched and at times influenced how I myself engage in the world. Rorty as one of the most honest men of the 20th century, and who forged an unpopular path among his Ivory Tower peers as the Pragmatist of all pragmatists.

“My principal motive is the belief that we can still make admirable sense of our lives even if we cease to have … "an ambition of transcendence."

Introduction to Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth: Philosophical Papers, Volume I (1991).

and

“…. if we can work together, we can make ourselves into whatever we are clever and courageous enough to imagine ourselves becoming. This is to set aside Kant’s question “What is man?” and to substitute the question “What sort of world can we prepare for our great grandchildren?”

"Human Rights, Rationality, and Sentimentality." Truth and Progress: Philosophical Papers, Volume 3 (199.

Lastly Hakim Bey / Peter Lamborn Wilson, (I don’t agree with everything he says) and his Immediatism, direct experience, echoes for me the honesty of good food and good people, emerging into conviviality.
What else could express best, simply being alive?

But, is it enough? Zounds! what might the gods have to say...

Much gratitude for getting me thinking, moar...