By Girish Deshpande
Just as matter cannot be created or destroyed but merely transformed into another form, our body after our passing away from this life is transformed into another form. There is no end, no finality, to our lives. There is just transformation.
It is proven in Buddhist tantric experiments that the natural elements of nature – earth, wind, fire, water and space – have qualities of the mind and also support vital systems of our body functions. It is also proven that there is continuity of our mind from one birth to another. There have been reports of instances where a child quite naturally yet vividly remembers the place of birth and some of the critical happenings of her past life. Therefore, there could be direct linkage of elements to our psychophysical state.
If we conclude that there is afterlife, the question arises: What kind of births could we take? According to Buddhist teachings there are six realms in which we can be reborn. As hungry ghosts, animals, humans, demigods and god realms. It is not to say that there are different worlds that we are born in or anything like that. All these countless rebirths are the direct effect of our afflicted emotions. The reason for being born in these realms is driven by the resulting karmic accumulations. Being born in the hell realm is due to our afflicted emotions of hatred, being born as hungry ghosts is due to greed; envy and jealousy leads us to birth in the asura realm, pride into the god realm, confusion as animals and ignorance as human beings. Even for those born in god realm, there is intense suffering as the good effect that has given them this birth will be worn out someday and they will have to be reborn in lower realms. This is because they are not in a position to neither accumulate anymore good karma nor clean their accumulated bad ones, being in a state of mental blankness.
Now the good news. It is birth only in the human realm – with its freedoms and advantages of being born with sense faculties at a place where dharma teachings can be obtained (perhaps obsolete in this internet era) and with the right intent and faith – that spiritual trajectory and, therefore, possibility of good rebirth is possible.
All this simply means that if we wish to be born in higher realms we can undertake practices in this life to achieve the end we want. We can tweak the stacked-up causes before us to our advantage to have the desired good effect. And these practices essentially lead us to doing good deeds of body, speech and mind, in the process accumulating deposits of good karma in our spiritual bank account.
Accumulate good karma by doing good deeds without an ulterior motive of personal gain or gratification or to show-off. However, the true fruit of this merit is deposited into your account only after such deeds are dedicated to the wellness and Buddhahood of every sentient being. While it is good to increase the ‘bank balance’ in this way and add to credit, it is important to keep an eye on the debit side of the entries as well!
What better investment can we think of in this materially driven world than investing in the mother of all investments, where accomplishment and returns are guaranteed – the investment in good karmic deposits?
Just as matter cannot be created or destroyed but merely transformed into another form, our body after our passing away from this life is transformed into another form. There is no end, no finality, to our lives. There is just transformation.
It is proven in Buddhist tantric experiments that the natural elements of nature – earth, wind, fire, water and space – have qualities of the mind and also support vital systems of our body functions. It is also proven that there is continuity of our mind from one birth to another. There have been reports of instances where a child quite naturally yet vividly remembers the place of birth and some of the critical happenings of her past life. Therefore, there could be direct linkage of elements to our psychophysical state.
If we conclude that there is afterlife, the question arises: What kind of births could we take? According to Buddhist teachings there are six realms in which we can be reborn. As hungry ghosts, animals, humans, demigods and god realms. It is not to say that there are different worlds that we are born in or anything like that. All these countless rebirths are the direct effect of our afflicted emotions. The reason for being born in these realms is driven by the resulting karmic accumulations. Being born in the hell realm is due to our afflicted emotions of hatred, being born as hungry ghosts is due to greed; envy and jealousy leads us to birth in the asura realm, pride into the god realm, confusion as animals and ignorance as human beings. Even for those born in god realm, there is intense suffering as the good effect that has given them this birth will be worn out someday and they will have to be reborn in lower realms. This is because they are not in a position to neither accumulate anymore good karma nor clean their accumulated bad ones, being in a state of mental blankness.
Now the good news. It is birth only in the human realm – with its freedoms and advantages of being born with sense faculties at a place where dharma teachings can be obtained (perhaps obsolete in this internet era) and with the right intent and faith – that spiritual trajectory and, therefore, possibility of good rebirth is possible.
All this simply means that if we wish to be born in higher realms we can undertake practices in this life to achieve the end we want. We can tweak the stacked-up causes before us to our advantage to have the desired good effect. And these practices essentially lead us to doing good deeds of body, speech and mind, in the process accumulating deposits of good karma in our spiritual bank account.
Accumulate good karma by doing good deeds without an ulterior motive of personal gain or gratification or to show-off. However, the true fruit of this merit is deposited into your account only after such deeds are dedicated to the wellness and Buddhahood of every sentient being. While it is good to increase the ‘bank balance’ in this way and add to credit, it is important to keep an eye on the debit side of the entries as well!
What better investment can we think of in this materially driven world than investing in the mother of all investments, where accomplishment and returns are guaranteed – the investment in good karmic deposits?
