What does free will really mean? and some other major questions

[TraineeHuman]

When I had my first samadhi experience, shortly after my sixteenth birthday, my world got turned upside down in more ways than one. The experience – sorry, that awareness -- was so much more vivid than anything else that had ever happened in my life. It was so obviously more real, too.

It was also totally at odds with so much of the consensus reality about anything, and even with the whole popular idea of what a person is. Added to that, it’s very unusual for a person that age to have developed the ability to deal with very abstract concepts at all. So, how to express it? Kind of reminds me of the musical Tommy, or its title song. A deaf, dumb, blind kid trying to say “see me, hear me…”

Eventually I got to study philosophy at university. In fact, I was accepted as a Ph D student in philosophy although I had studied hardly any units of philosophy in my first degree. The reason I was accepted was that I was considered a “natural”. Maybe so, but the passion and understanding I had all came from my “mystical” experiences/awarenesses, and the desire to express at least a little of what was not just truly real to me but truly real, period.

In the world of philosophy, both Western and ancient Eastern (Oriental and Indian), quite a few issues have been discussed and debated by the most brilliant minds, sometimes for a number of centuries. Eventually, though not always, many issues have been settled, with all the brilliant minds agreeing on the answer – which has generally has been the same answer whether in the West or in the ancient East. One example is the issue of free will versus determinism.

I should warn you that my purpose in this thread is to present some of those answers. Unfortunately, in Avalon there seems to usually be a strongly-held consensus reality on all sorts of metaphysical (what is real?, or what exists?) or philosophical (how do we know?, or what do we know at the most general level?) issues, and often it’s simply flat-out wrong.

For example, philosophers have long since proved that the free will versus determinism distinction is in many ways a false distinction. Free will and determinism are really two ends of the one stick.

What does that mean in practice? Well, my experience is that at any given moment you have a kind of ideal you – or most positive “timeline”. But notice what happens if you follow it. Haven’t you then given up your “freedom of choice”, because you’re following that and only that. You can think of it as “following the will of God fully”, or something like that. On the other hand, if you want “freedom of choice”, you’re welcome to have it as long as you imagine it’s a good thing – until hopefully one day you’ll wake up to realise that, ironically, it’s not the most helpful or liberating path for humanity or even for you.

Let’s observe also that some “free choices” are so tiny they don’t mean much in the scheme of things. You can choose to have coffee or green tea or herbal tea or whatever. You can wear one colour today or else another. These petty choices are so insignificant, they’re not really relevant to the big issue.

At this point someone may object that this seems to imply that we don’t have any choice about being exploited by the ruling elite, that I’m saying this is somehow “fate” and can’t be changed. No. The ideal course of action will still no doubt be to in some ways work and communicate against such exploitation as far as you reasonably can. In fact, if you want to have free will, only then will you become “free” to do absolutely nothing.

But, as some of the most astute philosophers have pointed out, it’s also true that there are some things we just can’t change, at least not overnight, and quite possibly not during our lifetime.

The free will / determinism issue shades a little into the issue of who/what is a human being, or indeed anything/anyone that’s real? I’ll do my best to cover that one in my next post.

[seantimberwolf]

Looking forward to the next one, thank you
Sean

[unicorny]

Thanks for this it reminds me of parallels in my own work. I am researching the prenatal origins of health and disease and the gene/enviroment interactions which take place. Some say it is all in the genes (determinists) and others that the enviroment plays a larger role (free will).Whilst the genes are no doubt important we share 99.999% of our DNA with chimps but due to the different times, rates and places that the genes are expressed we look and act pretty different. The enviroment can permanently alter which genes are "turned on" and how much they are turned on by (think of a tap and the enviroment can alter the flow) and these changes can often be passed on to future generations.
However it is a complex interplay between the two that make us who we are there are some things we cant change (we need lungs) but there are other things we can alter ( a stress free pregnancy results in a child that is less stressed - this unstressed child as she grows is more likely to have an unstressed pregnancy and therefore an unstressed child herself). People with low stress levels have less cancer and chronic disease etc.

"Let’s observe also that some “free choices” are so tiny they don’t mean much in the scheme of things. You can choose to have coffee or green tea or herbal tea or whatever. You can wear one colour today or else another. These petty choices are so insignificant, they’re not really relevant to the big issue."

sorry if I haven't quoted the above correctly I am kind of new to forums
Anyway I'd say these are the most important things - change doesn't come quickly but whether we smile at a stranger, laugh at ourself or drink tea, coffee or water out the tap, can actually have the biggest effects in our life path. it's when you forget why your doing something and it becomes robotic that you take your life down a deterministic path but if you know why your going that way then exactly the same route is just free will. However there is something nice about fate,it makes it easier to forgive and let go....... "ah well it just wasn't meant to be" is one of my favourite phrases but sometimes i should probly give myself a good kick up arse and learn from the experience-or maybe i'm just learning to let go :-)
Appologies if this doesn't make sense my finger do go at the same rate as my thoughts

[seantimberwolf]

I think humans on some level are able to change dramatically over very short period's of time.
When people go through something traumatic or dramatic they may often change there entire life views based on that one moment.
this is an evolution, it may be mental but it is still an evolution of the mind.
therefore that in turn has a huge effect on the individual's entire life, and anyone who interacts with that individual on a personnel basis.

[unicorny]

I think humans on some level are able to change dramatically over very short period's of time.
When people go through something traumatic or dramatic they may often change there entire life views based on that one moment.
this is an evolution, it may be mental but it is still an evolution of the mind.
therefore that in turn has a huge effect on the individual's entire life, and anyone who interacts with that individual on a personnel basis.

yeah I totally agree!!
but often it is lots of little things that alter our perception to allow for that one moment to happen

[Rantaak]

All must change; this is known.

Free will, on the other hand, is an illusion of time. Because we perceive time in a linear fashion (normally), it is very difficult for us to imagine that we have no choice or free will because we perceive ourselves making choices.

What we don't realize is that once you take time out of the picture (mystical states, dying, etc...) you've made the decisions that you did and the path of your life has unfolded as such.
I don't believe in free will. I believe that for the sake of character we have the formality of the illusion of choice, but that our entire lives have been scripted "ahead of time" or "beyond time", so to speak.

We experience change. We experience the illusion of influence over our external and internal reality. This path of unfolding has already been written. You're just acting the part.

[TraineeHuman]

In Western philosophy, and therefore virtually in all of Western thought until half a century ago but also to a large extent still today, the basic concept was and is that of “substance”. Anything real was, supposedly, a substance, and nothing else was real.

A substance is anything that is an object. Do you appreciate what this means? It means that everything in Western culture –including, say, a person – is automatically all the time treated like an object. If and whenever we don’t do anything to contradict this (I would say “demonic”) “disease”, this deadly myopia, that has infected the deepest reaches of everything in our society and how we do things at any time and even of how we think of ourselves (basically, pure victims!), then it’s the default mode by which everything and everybody operates. It’s the “obvious truth” that everybody supposedly knows without saying. You wanted to know what some of the things are that The Matrix is based on?

The concept of substance is connected to the fear of death. Because people deeply, deeply believe we must be a “something” and imagine the only alternative is being “nothing”, they are often terrified of the possibility that after death they will no longer be a “something”. (Even though the real truth is, there is no such thing as nothing.) The Catholic Church used this very fear to oppress people throughout the middle ages and beyond.

Can you conceive that you might really be other than any “something”? Well, let’s see. Substances are very similar to nouns. But let me put it to you that in reality, what we are is a little closer to the kind of “thing”, pardon my French, that verbs point to rather than what nouns point to. (Indeed, in the Lemurian languages such as Eskimo, Tibetan, most Polynesian and many Red Indian languages, there are no nouns. If you wanted to say: “The cat sat on the mat”, you would say: “There is sitting past-time-wise cattish fashion mattly.”) Notice that verbs are more dynamic than nouns. They’re far less passive, and far more open to exploring any environment. They in essence tell the nouns what to do, much of the time. Wouldn’t you rather be more like a verb than like a noun? Like a process or an action, rather than a doormat?

You imbibed that "object" view of reality hook, line and sinker probably in large part between the ages of two and five, I would say. Let me say some more about what that worldview is like. Remember, that worldview was foisted on us all, if we are Westerners, and it’s very arbitrary in many ways. Yet we never question it. We presuppose it as the most basic reality. We presuppose that reality is made out of many independent substances (objects) which are, by nature, mostly disconnected and isolated from each other. Any qualities they take on are a matter of accident. At the most fundamental level of reality, almost everything is logically independent from everything else. Each existence is separate from, and mostly disconnected from, all or almost all other existences.

That would make the universe a hostile and arbitrary place, just packed with conflict and hopeless isolation and anomie. Hmm. That’s what the Western Matrix is like.And what have we seen over the past three thousand years? The Western and European countries have been by far the most murderous, the most exploitative, the most cruel and hypocritical , the most war-mad in the world. Coincidence, you care to suggest?

My next post will offer some other, different viewpoints on what it means to be a person, or being.

[elysian]

After considering what "free will" really is for a few minutes and not reading the posts so far in the thread,

"Free will" can in my view be explained this way..

Free will by thought is never exercised.
Because thought is the consequense of your past actions.
In other words when you make your decisions by thought you do it based on past experiences.

Free will I believe work the same way as creativity.
It is the ability to quiet the mind and accessing the field of infinite possibility.
To make a decision not by thought can thus be seen as an act of pure spontaneity.

My conclusion is that though Free will does exist, it's rarely exercised..


Does this make sense?

cheers,
Michael

[TraineeHuman]

After considering what "free will" really is for a few minutes and not reading the posts so far in the thread,

"Free will" can in my view be explained this way..

Free will by thought is never exercised.
Because thought is the consequense of your past actions.
In other words when you make your decisions by thought you do it based on past experiences.

Free will I believe work the same way as creativity.
It is the ability to quiet the mind and accessing the field of infinite possibility.
To make a decision not by thought can thus be seen as an act of pure spontaneity.

My conclusion is that though Free will does exist, it's rarely exercised..


Does this make sense?

cheers,
Michael


Michael, I agree with you, provided one substitutes the word "originality" wherever you say "free will". Yes, that "works the same way as creativity". But that's because it is creativity.

One of the ironies about giving up one's individual will by surrender to what people might call "the divine will" is that such surrender is a surrender into the only true freedom.

Also, I very much liked your looking at truly living in the Now and at the ending of false notions of time. But that's a different topic.

[aranuk]

All must change; this is known.

Free will, on the other hand, is an illusion of time. Because we perceive time in a linear fashion (normally), it is very difficult for us to imagine that we have no choice or free will because we perceive ourselves making choices.

What we don't realize is that once you take time out of the picture (mystical states, dying, etc...) you've made the decisions that you did and the path of your life has unfolded as such.
I don't believe in free will. I believe that for the sake of character we have the formality of the illusion of choice, but that our entire lives have been scripted "ahead of time" or "beyond time", so to speak.

We experience change. We experience the illusion of influence over our external and internal reality. This path of unfolding has already been written. You're just acting the part.

Rantaak you are getting close. I agree. I have to go out like 5 minutes ago so will get back later.

Stan

[TraineeHuman]

Aranuk and Rantaak, I agree with you that if one views one’s life from a vantage point beyond time, then everything has already been scripted. And it’s also true that part of each of us lives in the sixth dimension and in even higher dimensions, where such a vantage point is possible.

However, the problem lies in bringing such information down into 3D in anything like a complete fashion. I can assure you that when guardian angels operate from 6D or on the edge of 6D, as I happen to know they mostly do, they have great difficulty fully understanding what it is truly like to live “in time”, as we very much do live while in 3D. It seems that one can either have the "God's eyeview" of beyond time or the "mortal eyeview" of living within time, but maybe never both -- at least, not fully.

In posts #34 and #35 of the Spirituality thread ‘The journey to discovering my true origins’, I have provided two simple exercises for how anybody can begin to access info from their 6D part. But if you try these exercises, I expect it should be clear that that info is very piecemeal.

[TraineeHuman]

In Western philosophy the movement which made the topic of “freedom of choice” central and prominent was known as existentialism, and also as phenomenology. The whole idea in our society that everybody has equal rights, and that employees have rights to decent holidays and so on, arose thanks initially to the influence of existentialism.

Probably the four most famous figures were Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Soren Kierkegaard, and Edmund Husserl.(Well, there was also Friedrich Nietzsche, whom people misunderstand even though he was a very great philosopher when he wasn’t being ridiculous, but I won’t talk about him here.)

Sartre’s most famous play was called No Exit. In it we see a number of individuals unsuccessfully trying to find a door out of the room they are in. The room is obviously a metaphor for hell. The problem with exercising one’s freedom of choice is that we never have anything more than a tiny part of the facts we would need to have in order to make a wise choice. Sartre deeply understood this. It becomes clear that the hell is very much the creation of the characters in this story. The more they try to assert their freedom of choice, the more they get entangled and the more clear it becomes that they never had a chance of getting out of hell by behaving that way.

In Camus’ novels the hero usually commits suicide in the end. But Camus certainly wasn’t an advocate of suicide. He meant it symbolically. His central character always goes through a similar process to Sartre’s characters in No Exit.

Kierkegaard came from a Christian background. Although “living in the Now” had been a very central idea throughout all ancient Chinese and Indian thought, Kierkegaard identified its importance and called the Now “the existentielle moment”. Soon after that, various French and German philosophers proved that the only time that really exists is the eternal Now, and the concept of time your physics teacher taught you is quite bogus if you believe that what it describes is time.

Kierkegaard also came to the conclusion that the only way out of the “hell” that using free choice to run everything in your life lands you in was to take what he called “a leap of faith”. That leap was into something which for him amounted to something like “the will of God”. It’s what I would call the Higher Self – or, at least, the 6D part of you. I found it very interesting to read what the jinn said in the current “An encounter with a jinn …” thread in Spirituality. Almost exactly as I have said in my other current thread (in Spirituality), what many call “God” is actually your 6D part, or your “spirit”. Only trouble is, it seems and is so different from what you think of as “you”, you don’t recognize that it even could possibly be a part of the real you. And the leap of faith is a leap into surrendering “your” freedom of choice to its will, to its wiser choices.

Husserl sought to describe what reality is like when seen in the Now. The only problem with that turned out to be that words can’t adequately capture everything that is involved with direct experience. As a result he developed a kind of theoretical model of the Now that actually got in the way of direct experience. Let me add that the whole issue of what is appearance versus what is reality was probably the dominant issue of discussion throughout nineteenth century in Western philosophy (and throughout most of Indian philosophy). The biggest difficulty was that nobody could work out how you could tell what counted as “reality” and what counted as “appearance”. I won’t tell you how this was eventually sorted out. Rather, I’d like to invite you to find your own solution.

[Sidney]

For me, free will, is the ability to make a decision, and take action without being manipulated by an outside source. No outside judgement, no outside coersion (sp) no fear. Just say, I am going to do "whatever", regardless.

[TraineeHuman]

For me, free will, is the ability to make a decision, and take action without being manipulated by an outside source. No outside judgement, no outside coersion (sp) no fear. Just say, I am going to do "whatever", regardless.

When I first had a samadhi experience at sixteen, it seemed hugely clear that what I saw was that human beings, if not all beings, are infinite in so many more ways, it seemed, than they are finite. So I would say to all of you have posted in this thread that yes, I appreciate the huge attraction, the kind of irresistible pull, to unlocking the mind-blowing potential we all know we have. It’s like if we just cast aside all our limitations, somehow almost like throwing off our hats and coats, then hey presto! that immense freedom we know we have will really do its stuff.

Throughout my adolescence I used to spend hours just staring at the stars in the night sky, or even at any streetlight in the night. Whenever I looked at the stars, I was often drawn to contemplate the words of the Greek philosopher who claimed to have a simple proof that the physical universe must be infinite. If the universe is finite, then put a soldier, a spear-thrower, at the very edge and get him to face in the direction of the edge. Then get him to throw his spear well beyond the edge of the universe. That would prove that wherever anybody thought the edge of the universe was, we could always go further, beyond it. Somehow the feeling behind that argument summed up for me a profound truth about what life and the universe were really like.

So yes, we should like and indeed love that gigantic freedom and yes it is a huge part of ourselves, our very essence. It’s one more reason why we should hugely love ourselves without embarrassment at doing so.

On the other hand… the 3D world is such a world of paradox. Yes, true freedom is very precious, and ever so important socially and politically and spiritually. And so central to achieving the kind of future we all want. In the end, all I’m really trying to say is that it’s important we get a good understanding of what freedom is and what it isn’t. And that it turns out that free will is something very different from what many even on this Forum suppose. Those who study the history of ideas claim that many of the freedoms which have been won by the ordinary person over the last hundred years or less came about particularly as an effect, at least partly, of the existentialist philosophers. A five day working week, with annual leave and maternity leave, for instance. Those philosophers were effective because they really looked carefully at the true nature of freedom and at the difficulties of exercising free will – particularly the fact that we never have anywhere near enough information almost any time we make a big decision, and so most of us almost always will choose wrongly.

[another bob]

Great Inquiry, TH!

Here's something I just came across today, that addresses some of the issues raised in this thread regarding free will, from one of my favorite authors, Nanci Danison:

The Face Only a Mother Could Love

When I was a child, my mother described less than beautiful people as having "a face only a mother could love." My understanding of that phrase is that mothers see beauty in their children that others do not. In a way, that same concept of a mother's love applies to how we Light Beings view human life. Where humans see ugliness, pain, and suffering, we Light Beings see beauty, courage, strength despite adversity, and unconditional love. It's all in the perspective you choose.

My reader, Elaine, made a number of comments on my December 8th article, entitled "Our First Loving Relationship," arising from the perspective of the human she inhabits.

"There is no way I chose my parents! . . . I don't know why they even chose each other as they don't seem to have anything in common!"

Sorry, I was not clear enough in that article. I did not mean to imply that we choose our parents based on their behavior. We choose the human parents whose genetic combination will produce the physical body we want to inhabit and whose lifestyles will influence us to seek the opportunities we came here to experience.

"So, what if the preview [of the human life we are considering] looks bad and the soul says, 'No, I don't want to be Nanci, I'm moving on to be someone else,' then, whose life were they previewing exactly? Someone who never existed? How can someone who never existed or will exist have a life to preview?"

It was still a preview of the life of the human animal called Nanci, who exists in the manifested world regardless of whether Elaine the Light Being chooses to inhabit her. While I was in the afterlife, I was given "knowings" to the effect that Light Being souls do not animate humans. Nor does one Light Being individually create a human to inhabit. Humans are not outward reflections of the "soul" inside. Humans are manifested creatures that exist, live, and die regardless of whether they are inhabited by Light Beings.

"I don't know, Nanci. It's like saying there's no free choice, you can't change things, you can't make your life 'happen' because you saw the whole thing before you were born and you said, 'OK, Elaine may have issues; but I love her anyway; so, OK, I'll inhabit her body and go along for the ride, but it's not really me'."

First, we do not preview "the whole thing" when we view a human life to consider. My understanding is that we sample events and get an overall gist of the human character and his/her manifested life.

Second, I have tried to emphasize over and over that the human IS NOT REALLY ME! We Light Beings inhabit human bodies and "go along for the ride." But we are not ourselves human; we are Source consciousness. While that may distress Elaine, I hope it provides some comfort to others who may read this.

Third, I have tried to emphasize that we DO have freedom of choice and CAN change our human experiences. Human lives are manifestations and therefore, by nature, subject to change. Most of us simply allow our human hosts to live their lives without us exerting much control over events. But it does not have to be that way. One of the major reasons I returned to this human life from the afterlife is to spread the "knowings" I received that we CAN change things. We CAN take more control over the humans we inhabit. We are NOT chained to their emotions, motivations, instincts and drives. We do NOT have to "go along for the ride" but can consciously choose to use our powers of universal knowledge, manifesting, Light Being perspective, unconditional love, multiple levels of awareness, and other spiritual abilities to improve our own human shared-life and those of others. But we have to wake up to and accept our true nature as part of Source in order to even know we have this option. That is the message so many Light workers have come into human life at this time to spread. We need to wake up to our true spiritual nature in order to improve Earth life.


:yo:

[TraineeHuman]

When I was a child, my mother described less than beautiful people as having "a face only a mother could love." My understanding of that phrase is that mothers see beauty in their children that others do not. In a way, that same concept of a mother's love applies to how we Light Beings view human life. Where humans see ugliness, pain, and suffering, we Light Beings see beauty, courage, strength despite adversity, and unconditional love. It's all in the perspective you choose.

... I did not mean to imply that we choose our parents based on their behavior. We choose the human parents whose genetic combination will produce the physical body we want to inhabit and whose lifestyles will influence us to seek the opportunities we came here to experience.

"So, what if the preview [of the human life we are considering] looks bad and the soul says, 'No, I don't want to be Nanci, I'm moving on to be someone else,' then, whose life were they previewing exactly? Someone who never existed? How can someone who never existed or will exist have a life to preview?"
...
"I don't know, Nanci. It's like saying there's no free choice, you can't change things, you can't make your life 'happen' because you saw the whole thing before you were born and you said, 'OK, Elaine may have issues; but I love her anyway; so, OK, I'll inhabit her body and go along for the ride, but it's not really me'."

... I have tried to emphasize over and over that the human IS NOT REALLY ME! We Light Beings inhabit human bodies and "go along for the ride." But we are not ourselves human; we are Source consciousness. While that may distress Elaine, I hope it provides some comfort to others who may read this.

... I have tried to emphasize that we DO have freedom of choice and CAN change our human experiences. Human lives are manifestations and therefore, by nature, subject to change. Most of us simply allow our human hosts to live their lives without us exerting much control over events. But it does not have to be that way. One of the major reasons I returned to this human life from the afterlife is to spread the "knowings" I received that we CAN change things. We CAN take more control over the humans we inhabit. We are NOT chained to their emotions, motivations, instincts and drives. We do NOT have to "go along for the ride" but can consciously choose to use our powers of universal knowledge, manifesting, Light Being perspective, unconditional love, multiple levels of awareness, and other spiritual abilities to improve our own human shared-life and those of others. But we have to wake up to and accept our true nature as part of Source in order to even know we have this option. That is the message so many Light workers have come into human life at this time to spread. We need to wake up to our true spiritual nature in order to improve Earth life.


Excellent and meaty points, Bob, as usual. One interesting issue this brings up is that actually we choose our parents, yet -- at least in our first thirty or more years -- we don't like or admire so many things about them. So, maybe at a deeper level our biggest choices are to follow what's best for us, in spite of ourselves.

Nanci Danison explains this by saying that we are Source but we "adopt" something which is a "human" whose body we inhabit and whose life we share. While I appreciate that that's not a bad approximation to the truth, I don't agree that there's some separate consciousness called a "human" or a "body consciousness". (Krishnamurti also emphatically disagreed with the notion of a separate "human" consciousness, and spent years discussing the issue in enormous detail.) Unfortunately, that's a notion that scientologists proclaim as fact. I do agree, though, that much of our body's consciousness comes unconsciously from a shared instinctive "pool" that all human beings access. It's just like the way most animals don't have any individual consciousness but draw their consciousness and all their instinctual knowledge from the shared "species mind" for their species. But it would be going too far off track for me to continue on that one.

One thing I really like in the quote from Nanci is that she brings out how one has to "lose one's self in order to find it [and to access real freedom]". I don't agree, though, that only the enlightened ones, or the ones who have been able to "accept our true nature as part of Source", are the only ones who ever access real freedom. Consider the alcoholic or drug-addict who eventually realises that only "a force greater than himself/herself" can save him/her. Consider how most parents somehow find a way to earn sufficient money to accommodate and feed and even spoil their children. Consider new mothers, who somehow find a way to keep communicating constructively with their child, and somehow find the endurance to continue doing so, usually for at least two decades.

[another bob]

Nanci Danison explains this by saying that we are Source but we "adopt" something which is a "human" whose body we inhabit and whose life we share. While I appreciate that that's not a bad approximation to the truth, I don't agree that there's some separate consciousness called a "human" or a "body consciousness".

Greetings, my Friend, and good to be sharing this inquiry with you! I'll address the points where you expressed some doubt about Nanci's report.

When I first came upon this portion of her testimony, regarding the separate human consciousness, I had to ask myself, "Could this be true?" Personally, I do not have sufficient information at this time to say definitively, although I feel that could be a real possibility, and would actually clarify certain issues. She herself is quite adamant that such is the case, based on the "knowings" granted to her in the afterlife. Moreover, she also reports that not all humans may necessarily have a soul component (which is not such a big surprise, given the state of things). She elaborates in a Q & A here:

"You write that a human being can live without a soul. The very thought of that freaks me out a little."

I understand completely. It would freak me out too had I not learned about it while basking in the unconditional love and acceptance of the Light, during my beyond death experience. While we are in human bodies, we come to believe that we ourselves are human. That is perfectly logical, given the limitations of five physical senses and the false validation they give us about our nature. The perception of humanness is reinforced by the amnesia we experience about who we really are-eternal, powerful, spiritual beings who are part of the Source itself.

But we are not, in fact, human beings. We are Beings of Light, for lack of a better term, representing facets of Source's own self-awareness and multi-dimensional personality. We merely INHABIT human animals-as what we call "souls"-in order to experience what it is like to live as a human does. It is far more complicated than this, but the concept of humans' relationship to Source can be likened to the relationship that characters in dreams, virtual reality games, or novels have to their creators. The characters are creations of the dreamer, gamer or writer. They are not "real." But the dreamer, gamer or writer has invested a lot of his/her own personality, emotions, thoughts, and curiosity into those characters.

Source is the artist and creator in our universe. Its creations in the physical world are "manifestations" and are not "real" to Source. They are like dreams, virtual reality, or literature. Humans are part of the creative environment; they are some of the characters. We are like the dreamer's, gamer's or writer's "own personality, emotions, thoughts, and curiosity" invested into those characters. We are not the humans themselves any more than dreamers, gamers and writers are their characters.

". . . what happens with the personality "of the body" when the soul leaves its human host?"

It continues, for the most part, within the Being of Light/soul's personality. We forevermore carry with us all the thoughts, memories, sensory input and experiences of our various human hosts. And, because in our natural spiritual state we have total recall, no moment of human life is ever lost or forgotten. However, most of what we think of as the human personality is actually that of the soul inside.

"How can you tell when somebody has become soul-less?"

You can't. But don't worry about it. It does not happen very often and is nothing to fear. Every dream, virtual reality game, movie and novel has "extras"-characters that do not seem to play any major role in the plot. Think of a soulless human animal as an "extra" in the plot that is your human's life.

"And if a human being doesn't have a soul - is she then, so to say, 'disarmed' from having Light Being abilities such as consciously manifesting reality and unconditional love?"

A human never has these abilities. Only the Light Being soul does. So, yes, that person has no access to Light Being powers or abilities.

"And when the human finally dies, what happens to that very consciousness after death? Does it disappear? Is the consciousness of humans taking another part on its path than the Light Being soul when death occurs?"

Yes, that human's animal "consciousness" (if such a term legitimately applies) disappears from the manifested world. But it forever remains part of Source just like all of creation. The Light Being soul continues to evolve its way through numerous experiences and "lifetimes" until it merges back into Source.

"Could me myself maybe be without a soul right now? Am I born without a soul? How could I know?"

You cannot be without a soul because you ARE a soul. You would not be having thoughts about spirituality, life after death, and your relationship with Source if you were not a Light Being soul.

"Which people are not chosen? How many of us have souls? 99 percent? 10 percent?"

I do not have the answers to these questions. My mission is to share what Universal Knowledge "knowings" I obtained during, and remember from, my afterlife experience. And I remember only a tiny bit about this topic.



One thing I really like in the quote from Nanci is that she brings out how one has to "lose one's self in order to find it [and to access real freedom]". I don't agree, though, that only the enlightened ones, or the ones who have been able to "accept our true nature as part of Source", are the only ones who ever access real freedom. Consider the alcoholic or drug-addict who eventually realises that only "a force greater than himself/herself" can save him/her. Consider how most parents somehow find a way to earn sufficient money to accommodate and feed and even spoil their children. Consider new mothers, who somehow find a way to keep communicating constructively with their child, and somehow find the endurance to continue doing so, usually for at least two decades.

My sense is that the example you give of the human addict would be considered a situation in which the light being nature does inform the human behavior, enabling it to realize this "greater force", as you put it. On the other hand, a few episodes of "Planet Earth" on the Discovery Channel or National Geo channel would be able to demonstrate that many animals have fierce parenting instincts (often stronger than many humans, alas), and so I would offer that this example (of parents going above and beyond for their offspring) would not necessarily indicate some true freedom at play, but would simply reflect more in the nature of a biological imperative.

In terms of what constitutes true freedom, I'd offer that taking decent care of children or acknowledging some higher power, imho, still falls far short of real liberation, but that consideration is perhaps best left for another thread.

:yo:

[Rantaak]

Aranuk and Rantaak, I agree with you that if one views one’s life from a vantage point beyond time, then everything has already been scripted. And it’s also true that part of each of us lives in the sixth dimension and in even higher dimensions, where such a vantage point is possible.

However, the problem lies in bringing such information down into 3D in anything like a complete fashion. I can assure you that when guardian angels operate from 6D or on the edge of 6D, as I happen to know they mostly do, they have great difficulty fully understanding what it is truly like to live “in time”, as we very much do live while in 3D. It seems that one can either have the "God's eyeview" of beyond time or the "mortal eyeview" of living within time, but maybe never both -- at least, not fully.

In posts #34 and #35 of the Spirituality thread ‘The journey to discovering my true origins’, I have provided two simple exercises for how anybody can begin to access info from their 6D part. But if you try these exercises, I expect it should be clear that that info is very piecemeal.

I've traveled to 6D a couple times now using different techniques, from my physical body, and I must say that having done so and maintaining the memory on a physical level does allow for the simultaneous vantage point to exist on the levels of both densities. It's not nearly as complicated as most people have the tendency to make it out to be, what with superfluous philosophies and elaborate structural axioms. It simply IS.

I do understand that most people do not retain these memories as I have and so I would expect them to be very confused about free will. This is probably for the better, as we tend to operate as if it does in fact exist anyway.

[TraineeHuman]

Nanci ... elaborates in a Q & A here:

"You write that a human being can live without a soul. The very thought of that freaks me out a little."

I understand completely. It would freak me out too had I not learned about it while basking in the unconditional love and acceptance of the Light, during my beyond death experience. While we are in human bodies, we come to believe that we ourselves are human. That is perfectly logical, given the limitations of five physical senses and the false validation they give us about our nature. The perception of humanness is reinforced by the amnesia we experience about who we really are - eternal, powerful, spiritual beings who are part of the Source itself.
...
". . . what happens with the personality "of the body" when the soul leaves its human host?"

It continues, for the most part, within the Being of Light/soul's personality. We forevermore carry with us all the thoughts, memories, sensory input and experiences of our various human hosts. And, because in our natural spiritual state we have total recall, no moment of human life is ever lost or forgotten. However, most of what we think of as the human personality is actually that of the soul inside.
...
"And if a human being doesn't have a soul - is she then, so to say, 'disarmed' from having Light Being abilities such as consciously manifesting reality and unconditional love?"

A human never has these abilities. Only the Light Being soul does. So, yes, that person has no access to Light Being powers or abilities.

"And when the human finally dies, what happens to that very consciousness after death? Does it disappear? Is the consciousness of humans taking another part on its path than the Light Being soul when death occurs?"

Yes, that human's animal "consciousness" (if such a term legitimately applies) disappears from the manifested world. But it forever remains part of Source just like all of creation. The Light Being soul continues to evolve its way through numerous experiences and "lifetimes" until it merges back into Source.

"Could me myself maybe be without a soul right now? Am I born without a soul? How could I know?"

You cannot be without a soul because you ARE a soul. You would not be having thoughts about spirituality, life after death, and your relationship with Source if you were not a Light Being soul...."


One thing I really like in the quote from Nanci is that she brings out how one has to "lose one's self in order to find it [and to access real freedom]". I don't agree, though, that only the enlightened ones, or the ones who have been able to "accept our true nature as part of Source", are the only ones who ever access real freedom. Consider the alcoholic or drug-addict who eventually realises that only "a force greater than himself/herself" can save him/her. Consider how most parents somehow find a way to earn sufficient money to accommodate and feed and even spoil their children. Consider new mothers, who somehow find a way to keep communicating constructively with their child, and somehow find the endurance to continue doing so, usually for at least two decades.

My sense is that the example you give of the human addict would be considered a situation in which the light being nature does inform the human behavior, enabling it to realize this "greater force", as you put it. On the other hand, a few episodes of "Planet Earth" on the Discovery Channel or National Geo channel would be able to demonstrate that many animals have fierce parenting instincts (often stronger than many humans, alas), and so I would offer that this example (of parents going above and beyond for their offspring) would not necessarily indicate some true freedom at play, but would simply reflect more in the nature of a biological imperative.

In terms of what constitutes true freedom, I'd offer that taking decent care of children or acknowledging some higher power, imho, still falls far short of real liberation, but that consideration is perhaps best left for another thread.


Again, Bob, many thanks for your intelligent and relevant comments.

First point. Nanci is aware that there are some “soul-less [dead] humans”, but if I understand correctly she implies they are very rare, in her experience. Well, my own experience, and that of quite a few clairvoyants who would seem to see more than I do, is somewhat different. That’s if I understand her correctly.

It so happens the 4D world is absolutely full of dead personalities – which are all soul-less. They separated from their host at the time of physical death. They go on surviving in 4D for at least several centuries, and sometimes for a few thousand years, trying to cling to the 3D Earth all the while – unless some Light worker sends them elsewhere.

This is why in many countries, until a few centuries ago the graveyards were a few miles out of the town or village. What happens is that the personalities of those who died tend to linger around the grave of “their” body. Many people experience considerable pain in the months before they die – and, in my experience, often considerable depression also. Then they are cut off from resolving their pain because at physical death they get suddenly cut off from a live body. The result is that the personality just gets kind of “frozen” in time, in the sense that it completely stops developing or acquiring new information. And if you go near the grave where that body is lying, you may (perhaps subconsciously) feel the negative vibes that that personality is stuck in. Former battlegrounds, for instance, are often packed with dead personalities of former soldiers, all marching around in columns together for centuries without resting. (I wonder if the super-soldier concept came about because some clairvoyant but perverse individual noticed that such dead “soldiers” march indefatigably 24/7 and never waver from their orders.)

Here in Australia, the Aboriginals have always buried their dead at the sacred sites. These are the sites where the nature spirits and positive energy are at their strongest. But let me stress that the dead personalities are not the dead beings themselves. At this current time, I’m unable to see any difference between the personality and what meditation traditions call “the ego”.

I also observe that it is very rare for an individual’s guardian angels to “resign” and leave that individual. This is going out on a limb. But just maybe that could be what Nanci interprets as “being soul-less”, I wonder? In my limited experience it’s also true that in that situation new guardian angels can always be found and will eventually come, though it does help to request for them to come to such an individual and start work immediately. As far as I’m aware, everything that is physically alive in 3D has, or rather is, a “soul”. Not consciously individual, granted. That includes everything vegetable and mineral. Meanwhile there are so many dead personalities clogging up the traffic in the 4D world. You can tell that they’re soul-less because they’re just made out of electromagnetic energy and they’re incredibly inflexible, and if you give them some healing energy it makes them weaker instead of stronger.

Second point. How human beings differ from most animals and (I think) most trees is that they have a clear and strong notion of being individuals. Most animals do everything unconsciously (in effect, as bioelectric robots), in the sense that they follow the path of least resistance and obey their species-mind’s instincts. The species-mind no doubt includes considerable courage, and a strong urge to risk or sacrifice much in the interests of protecting and feeding the young. It seems to me, though, that many human beings do heroic things at one time or another where they are operating from more than blind instinct. I can’t prove this, and I don’t have specific examples I would particularly want to offer. It’s just my general impression.

[another bob]

Again, Bob, many thanks for your intelligent and relevant comments.

Always a pleasure!



First point. Nanci is aware that there are some “soul-less [dead] humans”, but if I understand correctly she implies they are very rare, in her experience. Well, my own experience, and that of quite a few clairvoyants who would seem to see more than I do, is somewhat different. That’s if I understand her correctly.

It so happens the 4D world is absolutely full of dead personalities – which are all soul-less. They separated from their host at the time of physical death. They go on surviving in 4D for at least several centuries, and sometimes for a few thousand years, trying to cling to the 3D Earth all the while – unless some Light worker sends them elsewhere.

I believe Nanci was referring to the 3-D realm. I do understand what you are pointing to about 4-D. In Zen Buddhism, we always left a little food out for what we called "hungry ghosts". Occasionally, as you mention, a Light Being will come along and carry a bunch of them over to the light --I know that ultimately not a single soul will be left behind.



Second point. How human beings differ from most animals and (I think) most trees is that they have a clear and strong notion of being individuals.

My dog Amos might take exception to that characterization. He believes he's no ordinary critter, and often takes the opportunity to assert his individuality in various ways. Some human souls may actually occupy our pets, so as to stay close to us and lick our faces when we're feeling down. Bless 'em!

:yo:

[Orph]

Whenever I looked at the stars, I was often drawn to contemplate the words of the Greek philosopher who claimed to have a simple proof that the physical universe must be infinite. If the universe is finite, then put a soldier, a spear-thrower, at the very edge and get him to face in the direction of the edge. Then get him to throw his spear well beyond the edge of the universe. That would prove that wherever anybody thought the edge of the universe was, we could always go further, beyond it.

Many years ago, I did this same thing, only in the opposite direction. I wondered, if the universe can go outward into infinity, then can it also go inward to infinity? So I directed my focus inward, and tried to imagine an infinity going inward. Inward and inward I went, but then ran into a burst of light that blew me back to my regular 3d world. But for a moment there, when I could look within, and feel that "infinity" going inward, .....well, it was a pretty cool feeling.

[Carmen]

Fascinating thread with much food for thought! Thank you for the enlightening discussion. A few thoughts.

I have been taught that the soul may take up to a year to decide if it wishes to carry through with the incarnation. That the soul may decide to abort the mission or agreement to incarnate and the baby will die. A cot death! Any comments on this idea?

Also that when we make pets of animals we pull them out of their collective soul identity to a greater or lessor extent. We individualize them and set them on a path of incarnating in the future into higher beings. (humans). This is something I have come to the conclusion of from many years of learning and also observing animal behavior. Robert Munroe, in one of his books describes a little being about to incarnate on earth for the first time. He does not spell it out but one just knows that the little being had been a little dog in it's previous life! Any comment on this idea?

[TraineeHuman]

A few thoughts.
I have been taught that the soul may take up to a year to decide if it wishes to carry through with the incarnation. That the soul may decide to abort the mission or agreement to incarnate and the baby will die. A cot death! Any comments on this idea?

Also that when we make pets of animals we pull them out of their collective soul identity to a greater or lessor extent. We individualize them and set them on a path of incarnating in the future into higher beings. (humans). This is something I have come to the conclusion of from many years of learning and also observing animal behavior. Robert Munroe, in one of his books describes a little being about to incarnate on earth for the first time. He does not spell it out but one just knows that the little being had been a little dog in it's previous life! Any comment on this idea?

Yes, any pet animal receives a good training from its human "foster parents" in what individuality means and how to do individuality. Yes, that can make it possible for the pet to be reborn as a human next time around. However, I have noticed that quite often the pet's consciousness is reborn as another animal such as an elephant or some type of monkey or ape. That is very, very frustrating, because now the poor thing knows how to yearn for the greater freedom and power that it perceives anyone human to have. Still, I guess that's part of soul evolution. You have to take the spinach before you can have the sweets.

I remember when I was born. I mostly stayed out of the womb. I spent many weeks just flying around in pure bliss. Then it was time, and part of my body had come out but it got stuck at the chest. It seems the real reason why it got stuck was that I still hadn't jumped into that body. Two guardian angels were there and were kind of shouting that I had x seconds to get in there or it would all be over. I believe this was my first human incarnation (not from having been an animal, but from 6D). Although I listened to their promptings, I was hugely gobsmacked by the horribleness of the energies of the 3D world. The revulsion I initially felt just at being in such a world might easily have been enough to lead me to instinctively lie on my stomach and thereby cut the air supply off, to allow me to escape through a cot death. One other thing I know is that some people with terminal diseases subconsciously want to die. I've had some such people ask me for psychic healing but they just don't accept the healing energy, whereas everybody else gobbles it all up, because healing energy is much like love of a particularly pure and joyous sort.

[another bob]

Robert Munroe, in one of his books describes a little being about to incarnate on earth for the first time. He does not spell it out but one just knows that the little being had been a little dog in it's previous life! Any comment on this idea?

Hiya Carmen!

You might enjoy this movie:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Spanley

It's a great tale about an English clergyman recalling his previous life as a Welsh Spaniel.

:yo:

[Carmen]

Yes, I think I would enjoy that movie. Thank you. Another question. Recently I was informed that humans can incarnate back as animals or trees if they so desire or maybe it would serve their overall evolution!

On contemplating this idea I considered my horses of which I have too many! My retiring main gelding 'Cheeky' came up in my contemplation/enquiry as the one who had been human. He is a real character and the dominant horse of the herd.

Comments on this idea please? Actually it's always been a joke as to what one would want to come back as! I know a guy who always said he'd like to come back as a 'lady's hack' (horse)!!! Wonder if he gets his wish!!

[another bob]

Yes, I think I would enjoy that movie. Thank you. Another question. Recently I was informed that humans can incarnate back as animals or trees if they so desire or maybe it would serve their overall evolution!

On contemplating this idea I considered my horses of which I have too many! My retiring main gelding 'Cheeky' came up in my contemplation/enquiry as the one who had been human. He is a real character and the dominant horse of the herd.

Comments on this idea please? Actually it's always been a joke as to what one would want to come back as! I know a guy who always said he'd like to come back as a 'lady's hack' (horse)!!! Wonder if he gets his wish!!

From Michael Newton's research into life between lives, it seems that we work with our guides and some sort of "council" to determine the most appropriate vehicle for our next adventure. It may not necessarily be human, or even anything recognizable from the conventional human perspective.

A few notches up in terms of levels of awareness, we do come to realize that in truth we go nowhere, and what previously seemed like some process of evolution is in fact simply a dream we have now awoken from. The good news is, we don't necessarily have to wait for the afterlife in order to realize this. It does however require a pretty radical revolution in consciousness, which few are willing to undergo.

:yo:

[Carmen]

Yes, time is a curly one. The concept and realization that all is now and linear time is part of this 3d illusion can only be grasped from expansion of consciousness. I struggle with this at times. Understand the concept and get glimpses of the realization.

[TraineeHuman]

Recently I was informed that humans can incarnate back as animals or trees if they so desire or maybe it would serve their overall evolution!
...
Actually it's always been a joke as to what one would want to come back as! I know a guy who always said he'd like to come back as a 'lady's hack' (horse)!!! Wonder if he gets his wish!!

It does happen that humans sometimes elect to have a lifetime as some type of animal. It's rare, but it does happen. People are funny.

You don't need to actually incarnate as an animal because you can use an animal totem instead. I don't mind using some of my totems occasionally. I use two big cat totems (snow leopard and tiger), and several others. The idea is that you can tune in to some skills such creatures may possess, such as cunning or huge confidence, for instance, that you may not find within "your" "self" so easily. It's important not to cling to the totem animal's energy at all, though, once you've drawn on it, because otherwise it can begin to slightly "possess" you.

Also, some evolved people get to reincarnate as senior nature spirits of various kinds. That can be tough for them, and they often seem to prefer to return to a human form the next time around.

[TraineeHuman]

A few notches up in terms of levels of awareness, we do come to realize that in truth we go nowhere, and what previously seemed like some process of evolution is in fact simply a dream we have now awoken from. The good news is, we don't necessarily have to wait for the afterlife in order to realize this. It does however require a pretty radical revolution in consciousness, which few are willing to undergo.


One of my biggest concerns is to identify ways to bring heaven (12D and beyond) down to the 3D Earth, now. I believe so many people on this Forum -- probably over half -- do that, in a certain sense, however modest.

The sense in which they do it is that they express a point of view in effect, and for a moment, --at least as I read it -- as the omniscient "I". Somewhere in there, if only for an instant, I see some 12D consciousness, some absolute heaven -- I mean literally.

Fine, Bob. From a 15D point of view, everything truly is just the multiverse playing hide-and-seek with itself. The question is, how do we bring the insights into the true nature of freedom from the 12D world of "as above" more fully into "below"? In 12D, there is no longer any "doer" because doer and done to are one and the same there. And just to be becomes a super-powerful thing there. Again, that's why I like the way so many posters on this Forum dare to just be. I don't care whether I can even find a way to agree with anything they're saying (not that that's happened in this thread). I still feel a smile because they're bringing another small bit of freedom into the 5D world, which then appears on my 3D computer screen.

[TraineeHuman]

When I first came upon this portion of [Nanci Danison's] testimony, regarding the separate human consciousness, I had to ask myself, "Could this be true?" Personally, I do not have sufficient information at this time to say definitively, although I feel that could be a real possibility, and would actually clarify certain issues. She herself is quite adamant that such is the case, based on the "knowings" granted to her in the afterlife.


Bob, as I'll try to explain below, it seems to me that Nanci's notion that each of us "inhabits" a "human consciousness" which hosts us in a way amounts to a subtler version of another notion we know well. I'm referring to the Western/ancient Egyptian notion that "you have a soul, and you're completely out of touch with it." Incidentally, is such a notion -- at least the latter notion -- not the ultimate in psychological slavery? Is it not the essence of abuse, and the antithesis of freedom?

Let me explain. OK, Nanci doesn't deny that you are the soul rather than "having" a soul which, as we know, the priests and the advertising and entertainment industries, and maybe even the government and war industries, claim to be expert in handling while you're supposedly not.

The point is, for Nanci you also have a "human consciousness" which somehow isn't a part of you! Talk about much or all of what you do in your life being untrustworthy and misguided and not worthy of admiration! How dare your "human" ever ever even attempt to trust itself? Also, since it's not a part of you at all, aren't you just a parasite on it? And what right do you have to interfere in a life which is not your own?

Plus, for Nanci, you're quite out of touch with your soul, and therefore with you -- unless you happen to be lucky enough to be something like enlightened.

On those occasions when I've carefully pondered what the hell everyone is doing by being here in the 3D world, the only conclusion that made any sense was that everybody is here to spiritualise 3D matter somehow. They're here ultimately to raise it to a higher "D". A 4D Earth would be very interesting, of course. Everything a person thought would materialise before the person had even finished thinking of it. Problems of energy and food would be over, because all you would need to do to travel or eat would be to imagination your destination or meal.

[Carmen]

I'll just hang about while you two converse. I'm learning stuff here! Thanks.

[another bob]

The question is, how do we bring the insights into the true nature of freedom from the 12D world of "as above" more fully into "below"?

Well, here's one good way:

http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?40016-The-Best-Meditation


:yo:

[another bob]

On those occasions when I've carefully pondered what the hell everyone is doing by being here in the 3D world, the only conclusion that made any sense was that everybody is here to spiritualise 3D matter somehow.

Some are here for that, others may be here doing time, some are here on a vacation trip, and others to learn something essential about themselves. Some might be here just to tidy up some loose ends, and others may just be slow learners. In other words, there is no one reason, although I do like the notion of spiritualizing 3-D. The only problem with that concepty is, 3-D is already spiritualized. There is really nothing that needs to be done in that regard. It's just that we make such disctinctions (spiritual/mundane), and so remain trapped in a mental fabrication called duality.
I'm not here to make kindergarten into something like graduate school. Kindergarten is kindergarten -- we learn how to behave and then move on to more complex "schools" ie dimensions/awareness levels. Nor am I here to try and perfect the stage and its props. The stage is fine as it is, though the actors seem a bit dazed and dodgy.



A 4D Earth would be very interesting, of course. Everything a person thought would materialise before the person had even finished thinking of it. Problems of energy and food would be over, because all you would need to do to travel or eat would be to imagination your destination or meal.

Who wants school kids to have the power to instantly materialize their desires? In that scenario, I'd give the planet about 3 minutes before the Q-bomb hits!

(Regarding Nanci's POV about the nature of souls/humans, she goes into quite a bit more depth in her books, addressing the concerns you raised, and although I don't have relevant quotes available at this time, I feel you would resonate a bit more upon reviewing the material.)

As usual, it's a pleasure exploring these matters with you, my Friend!

:yo:

[TraineeHuman]

Let me give you one of Krishnamurti's arguments on the above subject, just to make things more clear. Krishnamurti points out that if I am destructively angry, at that moment -- as he puts it -- I am anger. I would prefer to say that part of me am anger at such a moment. But that's not important here. I believe that what K. is implying here is that if I could have that anger without (at least partly) being that anger, then I would be able to see it with great detachment. Then I would undoubtedly say to myself: "Oh dear, I must immediately turn this into something constructive instead of destructive." So, the fact that it's destructive proves that the anger is one part of me. It's not just something that I have.

Analogously, your soul is everything that is you. While you are physically alive, that includes your physical body as well as your Higher Self and whatever else. You are, in part, your physical body.

Let me give another version of the same argument. Let's suppose somebody painted you green -- all your clothes, your hair, your skin. Hopefully they used a non-toxic paint. It will then be true to say that you are green. OK, beneath the skin you are not green. So, it would be more accurate to say that only part of you is green. It would not to be true to say that somehow you "have" green but you are not green at all. Ask anyone who passes in the street.

Nanci no doubt came from a belief system where she had been programmed to expect a certain type of world in the afterlife. No doubt part of her belief system was that she was some sort of ghost or spirit inhabiting the machine that was her body, plus, I would like to bet a zillion, some kind of Higher Self or soul that was different from her spirit or her astral body or whatever she called it. Trouble is,in the afterlife every member of any religion initially sees whatever they were led to expect by their particular religion. I know this because, as I mentioned in another thread, I sometimes talk to dead people. Hell, I had a stepfather who I eventually worked out, years after he died, was a paranoid schizophrenic. He was a devout Catholic, but from having lived with me he knew that I knew about the reality of spirituality in ways that he probably never would during that current life. When he died, I was freaked out because he had some kind of samadhi experience, or at least a big glimpse of one. He was basically just kind of doing whatever I was doing, and I knew that death was practically indistinguishable from deep meditation, with the exception that after meditation the lights come back on and you exit the movie theatre and return to life in the physical world. After all that letting go of practically everything that he thought had been him, though, he started to insist on showing me an 8 foot wooden cross. He kept stressing that the cross was awfully solid, and mentioning that it was what would really see him through and give him paradise. he kept shoving his solid cross in my face, so to speak, for about two weeks, while I kept emphasizing that he would be very disappointed in his expectations. After the two weeks he sheepishly conceded that I had been telling him the truth.

In the afterlife there are so many false "heavens". Mormon heavens, Plymouth Brethren heavens, any variety or nationality you like. Trouble is, after up to maybe 20 years of inhabiting them, the residents work out that something is very wrong and leave, and go on to where they were meant to go in the first place.

[another bob]

I'd offer that part of the "problem" that we are dealing with in this line of inquiry is that we are employing a 3-D intellect in an attempt to discern matters beyond the scope of its powers. In other words, we can't grasp mind by using mind, much less spirit. This pertains even if we have somehow been given glimpses of awareness levels beyond the 3-D. Both you and I have experienced such "transcendental"realizations, no doubt, and yet they will of necessity be filtered through a mechanism that is rather inadequate in terms of expression, and hence our descriptions will differ.
There's a very interesting show, btw, on the Biography channel, called "I Survived: Beyond and Back", which provides the stories of near death experiencers, and it's amazing how much they do differ. For a more personal example, both my mate and myself had nde's, and she went into the light, while I went . . . I can't even say (although I have no complaints). The point being, for most nde's, it's like entering the parlor, but few go much further and still come back to report what the rest of the house looks like. I do believe Nanci has done that, but I won't be able to verify her account (and the "knowings" accompanying it), until I follow through post mortem.

In any case, I think we're veering a bit off topic vis a vis the investigation into free will. I used her quotes as an example of how we can awaken to our own freedom, and I don't think she was claiming that we had to necessarily be "enlightened" to do so, but rather that we do have the capacity to become more aware that we are powerful beings who can manifest -- that was the point.

:yo: