What is it that I am so certain survives my death? My mind? My essence? It's obviously not my body. I'm not terribly certain, really. Whatever it is, it is that part of me that is capable of communion with the Divine.
Now, I've never been terribly good at prayer, so that part of me that communes with the Divine is not that part of me that speaks to me in my inner voice. Meditation, though, seems to come relatively easily to me. And it is there that I most feel I touch the Divine. But, in meditation, one seeks to still the mind, so I doubt that it is my mind--or, at least, that very active part of me that I consider to be my mind--that communes with the Divine. Let us, for lack of a better term, call it the spirit, this part that is able to join with Divine Nature.
Perhaps my spirit is what survives my death, and rejoins with my Source. Perhaps, also, my spirit grows through the growth of my mind and body (this may have something to do with the purpose of the Divine Dream or Game I like to cite so much). My experiences, though, are experienced and analyzed by my mind--perhaps by my spirit, also, but definitely by my mind.
My mind, I know, is also very heavily influenced by the health and well-being of my body. It also seems able to control my body and thus to alter things around me. I am therefore inclined to believe that my mind is a thing of this universe--at least, in large part. That is why I am so adamant in my claims that there will be measureable effects that can be correlated with changes in my mind--in my experiences, even.
Naturally, having read my Protagoras and having been duly impressed by his reasoning, I consider that if the above holds true for me, it must hold true for anyone like me (sophistry does have its uses, after all ;-). And so, of course I assume that your experiences will correlate with measurable effects, and it is those effects that I seek out since I cannot know your experience directly. |
