In 2007, while migrating from a PC to a Mac, almost my entire digital photo collection was lost. Technically it wasn't "lost", the migration process failed spectacularly, and for reasons that are too technical and out of scope for this article, backups were not able to be restored either. After much reflection on the situation, it was clear that for multiple catastrophic failures to happen, there must be a reason, and I decided to let it go.

Love you Dad

My father was a photographer who worked in the printing industry, and over the years I had occasionally sent him photos of some of the projects I had worked on. After he passed a few years ago, my brother and I inherited his photo collection. It didn't take long to discover a folder with my name on it, containing all of those photos, some of which have been posted on the site.

Letting go of the old

As it turned out, 2 years after loosing my photo library I met Sara, and she completely turned everything upside down. Within a few weeks of meeting she told the story of a person who lived 100 years ago in China, who just happened to look like me, act like me, and even had the same sense of humor as me. The next 3 years were spent trying to understand how reincarnation works, how our consciousness interacts and interfaces with the biology of our bodies, and why these things are not better understood.

That entire process required letting go of the idea of who I was. It was easier for me than it might be for others, because I didn't have childen or a family legacy to maintain, and only had a few truly meaningful friendships. Most of what I had identified with as being me, were just ideas. Once the context of our lives change, meaning often falls away. Looking back from where I sit now, loosing 10 years of photos, reminders of the life I had left behind, actually made it easier to let go of the past and live more fully in the present.

For several years Sara and I traveled around the western US in our Airstream travel trailer, and would often meet retired people who were either living full-time in their RV, or simply visiting family in different parts of the country while following the good weather. Something we started to notice was how hard it was for a lot of retired people to adjust to their new life. One couple in a new luxury motorcoach in Sedona introduced themselves as former Northrup executives, rather than Joe and Sally from California. As we paid closer attention, it became apparent many people introduced themselves as "a retired X", rather than just Bob from Michigan.

And that is the way it was for me, only it happened at the age of 38 instead of 65. All of the sudden my phone was no longer ringing, and the habit of checking email every hour became once a day. It took a while, but eventually I stopped mentioning what I used to do when meeting people. I was just a guy. Born into a family from Texas. Nobody special.

However, how many people discover who they were in another lifetime? And, I didn't go looking for it, it found me. There must be a reason why that happened...

Dad and Grandpa

The Big Picture

Looking back, it's apparent that there is a bigger picture plan unfolding, something outside of the conscious awareness of Sara and I both. The last 15 years together has been a process of letting go of who we thought we were, and the stories inherited from our families and our cultures, in order to get a little better understanding of who and what we really are, underneath the stories we tell about ourselves.

There is nothing wrong with identifying as a retired X from someplace, with such and such ancestry and X number of kids. We can identify with our history, our family and culture, and love those that are close to us. All of that serves a purpose, it's part of our experience of life. However, it's not who we are.

When we reflect on our life from the perspective of a 70 or 80 year old, we don't remember the time we ate too much pizza and didn't sleep well, or the hurtful thing someone said when X or Y happened, or how much stuff we had in relation to those people over there when we retired. What is important is how we lived our lives, the people we helped and the people who helped us, the lessons learned and the things we were able to teach others. Those are the things that matter, those are the things that become part of our permanent record.

Mini-me and Mom

Re-writing History

Over the course of these last 15 years, Sara and I have done much research into our previous lifetimes, some of which we will share in our upcoming books. As part of the research process, it was discovered that my last incarnation was the son of a prominent family in Hong Kong. His family had a political and business legacy going back hundreds of years, he attended Cambridge in the UK, and in his later years was a philanthropist. His family also had a connection to the previous lifetime in China.

In this lifetime, my parents and their families are hard working middle class people. Few people outside of my immediate family remember my grandparents, and in the not too distant future, more than likely, few will remember my parents. However, they taught me about being kind, generous, and honest, not just with words, but by the way they lived their lives. They also taught me the importance of working hard, and being humble.

My family in this life may not be prominent people, but they have demonstrated values that, to me, matter more than anything. As the old saying goes, "And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?"

When we understand that we are our ancestors, and that we will inherit the world that collectively we are all creating now, what could be more important than making the world a better place for everyone?

Reference:

James Perkins gave a talk in the 1950's called "Reincarnation for Everyone", which covers some of the concepts presented.