Soul Searching

In our third week, we considered together the first main teaching Krishna gives to the inquisitive and seeking Arjuna: that we are not this body, but the soul within. We explored together how this paradigm of personal spiritual identification, including the concepts of karma and reincarnation, fits with the paradigms we grew up with. Do we only get one shot at life or is it a constant stream of opportunity and experience? What is the meaning and the goal of our existence if we are to define ourselves as an eternal spirit, rather than just a temporary body in a temporary world? To shed some empirical light on our intriguing conversation, we discussed the work of Dr. Ian Stevenson, whose research on the remembrance of past lives by young children around the world offers many thought-provoking questions as to the potential reality of reincarnation, and we also watched an ABC News report about a young boy who remembers his past life as a doomed World War II pilot, with corroborating and startling evidence proving many of his statements. Lots of food for thought about our deeper identity and how this can shift our perspective to understand the presence of spirit within us and around us