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Past Lives/Reincarnation

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PaganOne:
I have always wondered why people believe in reincarnation and past lives.  I have never felt I lived before.  I have to wonder if I am a new soul, or in the past I was something not in human form.  I never get anywhere doing past life meditations, there's always nothingness.  I am not saying that I do not believe in reincarnation, but that there is nothing in my life to lead me to believe its real for me.

I have a strong affinity for dogs and spend time at a local humane society walking dogs and flowing Reiki for them.  I have to wonder if I was once a dog, although I don't have any thoughts or memories that would lead me to think that, except that I sometimes get glimpses into what a dog is thinking or feeling.

What do you all believe as to reincarnation and why?  What are some of the clues/glimpses as to your past life or lives?  Do we always come back as human?

Tirya:
My own belief is that when we die, the energy that makes us "us" (spirit, soul, etc) returns to the Universe like a glass of water being poured back into the ocean. When something is born (or whenever you believe it is "ensouled"), the energy that makes it an individual is drawn from that ocean. It may have some energy that used to be a part of someone or something else, in greater or lesser quantities. To me, that's why different people feel they've been the same person in a past life (they both received some of that person's energy), or why some people have an "affinity" for others or for animals. I don't believe in whole-soul reincarnation. But when something dies, its physical body breaks down into more basic foundational parts and is then re-used by something else, I don't see why our energy should be any different.

Fox:
My belief in past lives is tied to a very powerful experience I had where I remembered something from another life that could have in no way come from anywhere but another life.  So, yes I do believe in reincarnation, but in what forms or how it all exactly works, I haven't a clue.  I lean more towards how Tir explained it, but that doesn't seem to fully mesh with my experience.  That makes me think that just about anything is possible, but I'm convinced that at least some part of us does come back.

Ghost Wolf:
I think that what we experience sometimes as past lives is genetic or ancestral memory, passed down in our DNA. I think that our personality is shed like a husk at death and our spirit reintegrates with The All.

VenusInFurs:
I have to go somewhere to really know.  There are a few places I've been that I get a distinct feeling that I've been there before, even when I haven't.  I never got it before I moved to Europe, so I think I've always been here (probably why I was drawn here.)  I've never been to Asia though, so maybe if I went to Asia I might get that feeling somewhere too.  I have a distinct feeling I've lived in Paris.  My first time in Paris it was like going home.  I've never been lost there, even when I wasn't sure where I was.  I'd turn a corner and voila, I'd be somewhere I knew.  I don't think I can live in Paris in -this- life....it's a much more hectic place than it used to be.  But whenever I go there I still feel like I'm going home.  When I was younger I used to dream in French often, but it's stopped and my French language skills are getting worse (though I'd like to improve so I can be tri-lingual.)  I love French food and wine, and French fashion.

I got a big sense from Greece too, but it's really hard to tell.  I don't think I was there so recently (I think Paris was only one or two lives ago) and it's a place that has changed a LOT in the past few hundred years. 

It's not like this for all of Europe.  When I was in Vienna, I felt like I was never there before, or if I was I didn't spend much time there, for example.

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