Post by stormflux on Oct 16, 2012 7:22:02 GMT -5
Something I wrote on a journal to others doing generic past-life regressions. This is based on my experience so far.
---
I think it is important that we remember that when placed in a spiritual position of trust, we do not, intentionally or otherwise, abuse the power we have to over-immerse the person coming to us on the issue with which they seek help. A person can only handle so much information at a time. We must not override what our mind's do naturally in limiting how long we can dream at once or how much of a life we can remember in a short time on our own, by throwing too much at someone too quickly.
Also, it is our responsibility not to oversimplify our friend's situation, memories, dreams, etc - as well as to avoid presenting our opinion on the matter - however high we or others regard our word - as fact, the single truth, or to set in stone anything that is not OUR experience to define. I do not even think we should declare any of our own experiences to be set in stone, and consider anything we analyze as a "solved case." I believe that instead, we must simply shed light, clarity, and insight on that which others bring to us based on our own experience and the clear vision that comes from being an outsider to a dream, memory, etc.
With analyzing others' dreams (and our own) it is important to remember that there are many interpretations within each manner of analyzing - literal, metaphorical, etc. - and many insights that involve events and feelings in both the past, present, and future.
For example, your friend may have a recurring dream they are being chased by a red bull, and you might tell them it means they are suffocating under an overbearing father. You might also suggest that they are struggling with frustration or anger about a dominant issue in their life. There are many possibilities, all which might be true. You and your friend feel very certain about this analysis, until a week later, when their uncle gets hit by a red Ford Taurus and dies in a car accident. You see? It is nearly impossible to see every detail and possibility in a dream, and arguably irresponsible to focus on any one analysis.
So, ultimately, I think we are always adding understanding to our dream analyses, even years in the future as we look back on them, and add new insight based on events in our life that happened after the dream which shine a new light on certain aspects within it. I think it is fair to say then that the only person who can truly understand a dream, is the dreamer.
With past life memories and regression, meditation, etc. it is important to consider many variables which I feel are frequently and regrettably ignored.
I believe we live in a world of energy and spirits. Those energies and spirits can aide or harm us. They contain some manner of personal sentience, and in the case of ghosts, carry memories as well. I have a ghost, a friend, and I was fortunate enough to recognize that his memories are his, and mine are mine, and not confuse his memories as mine and research them and then fall into a trap of believing his past life was my past life, thereby giving myself false spiritual information, and failing to get in touch with what life was actually mine. Part of the danger of this is that you are taking on a karma which is not yours - say you believe you were someone who did terrible things, you are suffering for something you did not do, which is incredibly unhealthy and entirely pointless in the realm of spiritual growth. On top of this, you are not working out your own karma, which is obviously. And most tragic of all, you are cementing yourself in a lie - no lie hurts worse than those which attack your soul.
Some people are intellectually aware they are living in a spiritual lie, but they are either too cemented within the lie or too afraid to try and get out of it. These people are spiritual and emotional vampires, even the best of them who are not intentionally aiming negative energy at others. The worst of them are masters of deception and spiritual manipulation and will seek to drain and harm anyone in their web, and use them as puppets against everyone in their individual lives until they are as miserable and paralyzed in life as the Black Widow of souls herself.
My advice: Do not try and help these people. Sever all ties with such people. Understand that failing to invite them to walk on your path is saving yourself and those you care about. It is not wrong or irresponsible of you at all.
And yes, for those of us who enjoy mending broken things, I do believe there is a difference from serving a karmic sentence and carrying the burden of another versus letting a black hole of a person leech off and take you down with them.
Your sentence is to carry them so far with you until they point where they start to break. They may become a shadow of their former selves, a zombie of sorts. They may become something like the Black Widow I just described. One being self-harming, the other seeking to harm others. They might be both. They will have methods of appearing more powerful than they are so as to try and paralyze you from trying to escape out from under them, or they may try and appear weak and vulnerable to appeal to many of our need to care for and protect others. They may be doing these things consciously, or subconsciously. It does not matter. The only thing that matters is that placing someone else before yourself in importance does not necessarily make you a saint, or give you some sort of amazing karmic bonus points. Most of the time it just makes you a miserable doormat, sends your spiritual journey steps backwards, and hurts the healthy people who care about YOU.
You must also in such a situation, ask yourself for what purpose you place someone else's needs above your own. What do you seek to accomplish? Are you going to cure them? Fix them? Stop their downward spiral and prevent a suicide? Really ask yourself if you have that right. Are you saving someone? Or are you denying them the life they have been given to work out a motherload of bad karma so that their next life might be worth living? Perhaps this life is like a prison sentence for their soul. They are here to suffer. If you break them out of prison early - even if you could - you are not really helping them at all. You are condemning them to never know what freedom is like again, as they will spend the rest of their life a paranoid fugitive on the run. What is worst, you have given up your own life and freedom for nothing, thereby not only f*ck*ng up their experience, but wasting your own freedom, and shot at a decent life.
Everything is a test. Many things are a trap. What you do with them carves out the path of your experience, shapes your soul, and defines you. Every action writes your soul's story. Waste as little ink as possible, and learn as much as you can from the mistakes you do make, so that you need not repeat versions of the same suffering - especially in the same lifetime!
Sometimes we mistake memories or dreams that stem from a spirit or an energy or a friend close to us as our own. These spirits or energies could be from this life, or from one many centuries in the past. It is important to work through these misunderstandings to avoid internal chaos and spiritual conflict in the future. Mostly, it is important so that we might clean our slates and begin absorbing the correct information. Above all, it is important to recognize unhealthy and dangerous spiritual practices, build defenses against them, and avoid unhealthy indulgences as if they were the Plague.
---
I think it is important that we remember that when placed in a spiritual position of trust, we do not, intentionally or otherwise, abuse the power we have to over-immerse the person coming to us on the issue with which they seek help. A person can only handle so much information at a time. We must not override what our mind's do naturally in limiting how long we can dream at once or how much of a life we can remember in a short time on our own, by throwing too much at someone too quickly.
Also, it is our responsibility not to oversimplify our friend's situation, memories, dreams, etc - as well as to avoid presenting our opinion on the matter - however high we or others regard our word - as fact, the single truth, or to set in stone anything that is not OUR experience to define. I do not even think we should declare any of our own experiences to be set in stone, and consider anything we analyze as a "solved case." I believe that instead, we must simply shed light, clarity, and insight on that which others bring to us based on our own experience and the clear vision that comes from being an outsider to a dream, memory, etc.
With analyzing others' dreams (and our own) it is important to remember that there are many interpretations within each manner of analyzing - literal, metaphorical, etc. - and many insights that involve events and feelings in both the past, present, and future.
For example, your friend may have a recurring dream they are being chased by a red bull, and you might tell them it means they are suffocating under an overbearing father. You might also suggest that they are struggling with frustration or anger about a dominant issue in their life. There are many possibilities, all which might be true. You and your friend feel very certain about this analysis, until a week later, when their uncle gets hit by a red Ford Taurus and dies in a car accident. You see? It is nearly impossible to see every detail and possibility in a dream, and arguably irresponsible to focus on any one analysis.
So, ultimately, I think we are always adding understanding to our dream analyses, even years in the future as we look back on them, and add new insight based on events in our life that happened after the dream which shine a new light on certain aspects within it. I think it is fair to say then that the only person who can truly understand a dream, is the dreamer.
With past life memories and regression, meditation, etc. it is important to consider many variables which I feel are frequently and regrettably ignored.
I believe we live in a world of energy and spirits. Those energies and spirits can aide or harm us. They contain some manner of personal sentience, and in the case of ghosts, carry memories as well. I have a ghost, a friend, and I was fortunate enough to recognize that his memories are his, and mine are mine, and not confuse his memories as mine and research them and then fall into a trap of believing his past life was my past life, thereby giving myself false spiritual information, and failing to get in touch with what life was actually mine. Part of the danger of this is that you are taking on a karma which is not yours - say you believe you were someone who did terrible things, you are suffering for something you did not do, which is incredibly unhealthy and entirely pointless in the realm of spiritual growth. On top of this, you are not working out your own karma, which is obviously. And most tragic of all, you are cementing yourself in a lie - no lie hurts worse than those which attack your soul.
Some people are intellectually aware they are living in a spiritual lie, but they are either too cemented within the lie or too afraid to try and get out of it. These people are spiritual and emotional vampires, even the best of them who are not intentionally aiming negative energy at others. The worst of them are masters of deception and spiritual manipulation and will seek to drain and harm anyone in their web, and use them as puppets against everyone in their individual lives until they are as miserable and paralyzed in life as the Black Widow of souls herself.
My advice: Do not try and help these people. Sever all ties with such people. Understand that failing to invite them to walk on your path is saving yourself and those you care about. It is not wrong or irresponsible of you at all.
And yes, for those of us who enjoy mending broken things, I do believe there is a difference from serving a karmic sentence and carrying the burden of another versus letting a black hole of a person leech off and take you down with them.
Your sentence is to carry them so far with you until they point where they start to break. They may become a shadow of their former selves, a zombie of sorts. They may become something like the Black Widow I just described. One being self-harming, the other seeking to harm others. They might be both. They will have methods of appearing more powerful than they are so as to try and paralyze you from trying to escape out from under them, or they may try and appear weak and vulnerable to appeal to many of our need to care for and protect others. They may be doing these things consciously, or subconsciously. It does not matter. The only thing that matters is that placing someone else before yourself in importance does not necessarily make you a saint, or give you some sort of amazing karmic bonus points. Most of the time it just makes you a miserable doormat, sends your spiritual journey steps backwards, and hurts the healthy people who care about YOU.
You must also in such a situation, ask yourself for what purpose you place someone else's needs above your own. What do you seek to accomplish? Are you going to cure them? Fix them? Stop their downward spiral and prevent a suicide? Really ask yourself if you have that right. Are you saving someone? Or are you denying them the life they have been given to work out a motherload of bad karma so that their next life might be worth living? Perhaps this life is like a prison sentence for their soul. They are here to suffer. If you break them out of prison early - even if you could - you are not really helping them at all. You are condemning them to never know what freedom is like again, as they will spend the rest of their life a paranoid fugitive on the run. What is worst, you have given up your own life and freedom for nothing, thereby not only f*ck*ng up their experience, but wasting your own freedom, and shot at a decent life.
Everything is a test. Many things are a trap. What you do with them carves out the path of your experience, shapes your soul, and defines you. Every action writes your soul's story. Waste as little ink as possible, and learn as much as you can from the mistakes you do make, so that you need not repeat versions of the same suffering - especially in the same lifetime!
Sometimes we mistake memories or dreams that stem from a spirit or an energy or a friend close to us as our own. These spirits or energies could be from this life, or from one many centuries in the past. It is important to work through these misunderstandings to avoid internal chaos and spiritual conflict in the future. Mostly, it is important so that we might clean our slates and begin absorbing the correct information. Above all, it is important to recognize unhealthy and dangerous spiritual practices, build defenses against them, and avoid unhealthy indulgences as if they were the Plague.