Is the human self nonexistent?

This assumes the soul when incarnating makes choices for the sake of the human character, rather than itself. Whether one finds the sources of information valid or not, I never encounter any such experiencer source that says this is the case.

You have made my point for me. The soul is not the human character - they are for the most part separate beings. I merely point out the clear immorality and wrongness of this from the human standpoint.

[Ninshub]

If some super high tech virtual reality video simulation system were invented that in such a way as this totally immersed the user in his synthetic AI generated experience (including realistic nerve stimulations along with everything else like sight and sound and smell and sense of touch), do you think anyone setting up their simulation run would decide to be the simulated character who breaks his leg and has to undergo emergency surgery without anesthetic? I don't think so, not even if the user knew that when in the simulation he would not remember his real life. 

Christian Sandburg says this reality system is very much like a virtual reality game. He explains that as a soul who hadn't incarnated yet and having met one who had, he wanted to experience it but was warned it would be very hard ("do you really want to do this?"). In the first incarnation, he remembers freaking out when he was in the womb and causing the mother to lose the pregnancy. He couldn't handle the sense of complete separation and total amnesia, and the extremely low vibrations of this dense reality. (He then had a life review that showed the effects of what this did to the mother and a host of other people.)

The second time around, even having had the life review, he almost did the same thing, but then cried out for help and a higher source (God?) showed him the universe, etc., and reassured him.

So souls may not know experientially what they are getting into, only intellectually.

In my own life, there have been at least a few times I've undergone something that while it was happening I found absolutely intolerable, to the point of preferring not to have been born, but after it was over I no longer felt that way.

[Ninshub]

You have made my point for me. The soul is not the human character - they are for the most part separate beings. I merely point out the clear immorality and wrongness of this from the human standpoint.

I have mixed feelings about your statement here, in some ways I agree, in others not, maybe around the word "immoral". Because of course the soul is doing it to itself, torturing itself (in those moments where the experience is like torture), not another being.

I have mixed feelings about your statement here, in some ways I agree, in others not, maybe around the word "immoral". Because of course the soul is doing it to itself, torturing itself (in those moments where the experience is like torture), not another being.

Then the basic "psychology" and nature of the soul must be very very different from the human, alien in fact. I used the analogy of the super high tech immersive virtual reality video system to demonstrate that no human "user" in their right mind would do such a thing, even if they knew that while in the system's simulated world they would not remember who they really were. The user would know that it would still be them that would be undergoing whatever bad experiences were generated by the system.

Would that we could all of us look at and understand our and others' lives deeply from the perspective of our souls, as you seem easily to be able to do.

It's not so much "easy" as me seeming to need to be in the right frame of mind to have access to this kind of perspective. Which depends on a variety of factors in my day-to-day life.

Most importantly, can you do this when you are going through a bad trial or tribulation?

Depends on trial or tribulation in question, really. Sometimes, yes, sometimes, no.

Your description of your soul's perspective on human suffering is dispassionate and calm, and I could well believe that it is also the truth for the soul experience even during the worst experiences of its human avatar.

The big question is whether this soul perspective is morally or ethically or otherwise humanly justified given that it is the human that does the suffering, that has to climb into the trenches and get shot up and mutilated, etc., so to speak. To the blind or cancer-ridden person, most certainly what matters is the affliction, not what can be (or maybe or might be) learned by the soul in the excruciating human process.

You presume and imply that the human self is separate from the Soul-self. The Soul is not separate ~ even if the human-self experiences the appearance, the sense, of separation during its incarnation. The Soul experiences no such separation.

If the human suffers, the Soul also directly experiences that. The Soul experiences not only the conscious suffering, but all of the suffering that is not consciously felt.

For example... I am barely conscious of the violent hurricane of anxiety and anger residing in the depths of my subconscious / unconscious, because I have mastered keeping it mostly suppressed somehow... but comparatively, my Soul experiences it in full, as it has unfettered access to every single thing happening in my subconscious / unconscious.

The Soul has a seeming capacity to be fully feel all the suffering, including all of the suffering the human-self has concealed from itself, and yet also simultaneously detach itself from the same.

A sort of... dissociation without the dissociation, if that makes any sense at all.

Christian Sandburg says this reality system is very much like a virtual reality game. He explains that as a soul who hadn't incarnated yet and having met one who had, he wanted to experience it but was warned it would be very hard ("do you really want to do this?"). In the first incarnation, he remembers freaking out when he was in the womb and causing the mother to lose the pregnancy. He couldn't handle the sense of complete separation and total amnesia, and the extremely low vibrations of this dense reality. (He then had a life review that showed the effects of what this did to the mother and a host of other people.)

The second time around, even having had the life review, he almost did the same thing, but then cried out for help and a higher source (God?) showed him the universe, etc., and reassured him.

So souls may not know experientially what they are getting into, only intellectually.

In my own life, there have been at least a few times I've undergone something that while it was happening I found absolutely intolerable, to the point of preferring not to have been born, but after it was over I no longer felt that way.

I don't think that can let them off the hook, so to speak, because at least according to many teachings we are mostly "old souls" who have incarnated hundreds if not thousands of times. Plenty of experience to know exactly what "we" are getting into. Of course, if this information is false and we are mostly souls new to the game, then that might work.

[Ninshub]

Then the basic "psychology" and nature of the soul must be very very different from the human, alien in fact. I used the analogy of the super high tech immersive virtual reality video system to demonstrate that no human "user" in their right mind would do such a thing, even if they knew that while in the system's simulated world they would not remember who they really were. The user would know that it would still be them that would be undergoing whatever bad experiences were generated by the system.

That's difficult to answer. So much depends on what is the life we're examining, how much suffering it involves.

One thing is it's possible (likely in my understanding) that it's only an aspect of the soul that is incarnating itself, and another aspect is observing in knowledge of what's happening. Like the soul in the NDE of Nancy on BATGAP I posted today that was watching in peace while the human part was having the experience of being under the car.

Another thing is we're discounting in the "is it worth it?" calculation the benefits the soul possibly gains from such experiences. (Christian S. wanted to experience what the soul he met who had previously incarnated did because that soul radiated that much more spiritually because of it.) So, to use your analogy, maybe it would be like a human agreeing to such a video game where instead they would not remember who they were, and therefore suffer agony because of it, but somehow having a net gain after the experience that we can't quite perceive or experience from our vantage point here.

So the soul may know intellectually but not experientially what the cost is for incarnating, but the human, reading or hearing what it's apparently like for the soul (an extremely recent phenomenon in the history of the human race!!, and made exponentially available through the internet!) can also know the gain intellectually but not experientially. And in both cases I'd argue experience trumps intellect! (Apparently that's why Source creates in the first place...)

[Ninshub]

I don't think that can let them off the hook, so to speak, because at least according to many teachings we are mostly "old souls" who have incarnated hundreds if not thousands of times. Plenty of experience to know exactly what "we" are getting into. Of course, if this information is false and we are mostly souls new to the game, then that might work.

Whether it's Sandburg, NDErs like Sudman or channels, I do hear a lot about how there are so many souls who never incarnate at all, or do so on other physical planes but not Earth, often described as one of the toughest, most dense and greatest sense of amnesia and separation.

So my current image is that the billions of souls who have incarnated on Earth (and we're not counting all those who perhaps incarnate in animals and other life forms), is minuscule compared to the actual number.

There are likely many who incarnate on Earth who are old hands at it, of course.

Again, I'd disagree with the phrase "let them off the hook", because the "them" speaks too much of a separation for my taste.

It's not so much "easy" as me seeming to need to be in the right frame of mind to have access to this kind of perspective. Which depends on a variety of factors in my day-to-day life.


Depends on trial or tribulation in question, really. Sometimes, yes, sometimes, no.


You presume and imply that the human self is separate from the Soul-self. The Soul is not separate ~ even if the human-self experiences the appearance, the sense, of separation during its incarnation. The Soul experiences no such separation.

If the human suffers, the Soul also directly experiences that. The Soul experiences not only the conscious suffering, but all of the suffering that is not consciously felt.

For example... I am barely conscious of the violent hurricane of anxiety and anger residing in the depths of my subconscious / unconscious, because I have mastered keeping it mostly suppressed somehow... but comparatively, my Soul experiences it in full, as it has unfettered access to every single thing happening in my subconscious / unconscious.

The Soul has a seeming capacity to be fully feel all the suffering, including all of the suffering the human-self has concealed from itself, and yet also simultaneously detach itself from the same.

A sort of... dissociation without the dissociation, if that makes any sense at all.

But the human self can't do that. Hence the injustice.

[Ninshub]

This discussion over the intolerability of incarnation according to the human perspective brings to mind this video with Rupert Spira, where the problem of evil surfaces, which is the other face of this. Someone asks why does infinite consciousness allow evil (violence to children for example).

Suffering is the price we pay for Source knowing itself, or creating/manifesting, says Spira, which I think is is line with what some experiencers report as well. Spira's model of course goes straight from Source/infinite consciousness to finite (incarnate) minds, so it's lacking the individual souls as intermediaries. But I think how he describes finite minds as experiencing intolerable separateness and vulnerability expresses exactly what it's like for the aspect of souls-incarnating-as-humans who forget their larger identity and connectedness.

I do find his answer at the end one of the good arguments for trying live this reality with the realization we are souls, rather than individual, separate bodies.

Only listen from 6 minutes onwards. You can hear the understandable outrage, which nbtruthman is expressing, in the questioner in the audience who says "fuck this manifestation".