Elizabeth Clare Prophet - 13 Aug

Karma and Reincarnation

Transcending Your Past,
Transforming Your Future

Elizabeth Clare Prophet
and Patricia R. Spadaro

KARMA AND REINCARNATION
Transcending Your Past, Transforming Your Future
by Elizabeth Clare Prophet and Patricia R. Spadaro
Copyright 2001 Summit Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Second edition 2004

No part of this book may be reproduced, translated, or used in any format or medium whatsoever without prior written permission, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review. For information, contact Summit University Press, 63 Summit Way, Gardiner, MT 59030-9314 USA.
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Library of Congress Catalog Number for print edition: 00-110853
ISBN: 978-0-922729-61-6 (paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-932890-28-0 (eBook)

Summit University Press is a trademark registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. All rights reserved

Luck is a word devoid of sense.
Nothing can exist without a cause.

VOLTAIRE

The word karma has made it into the mainstream. Just look at bumper stickers like My karma ran over your dogma or Its a thankless job, but Ive got a lot of karma to burn off. But not everyone understands what karma really means, why it matters and how to deal with it.

Think about the talents you were born with and the good things that have happened to you in life. Now think about the so-called limitations and challenges that have come your way. Both have to do with your karma. Karma simply tells us that what happens to us in the present is the result of causes we ourselves have set in motion in the pastwhether ten minutes ago or ten lifetimes ago.

Weve all grown up learning about karma. We just didnt call it that. Instead we heard: What goes around comes around. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. In essence, karma tells us that whatever we do will come full circle to our doorstepsometime, somewhere.

Karma and reincarnation go hand in hand. While karma means accountability and payback, reincarnation is simply another word for opportunity. Reincarnation gives us another chance to make good on the karmic debts we owe others and to reap the blessings we have sent forth.

Karma and reincarnation also help us make sense out of the question marks in life. Why me? Why not me? Why was my niece born with Downs syndrome when her brothers and sisters are healthy and robust? Why have I been blessed with promotion after promotion while my brother cant hold down a jobeven though we had the same opportunities growing up? Why do all my relationships become a tug of warhow come I cant live with him and I cant live without him? Why, when I just landed the job Ive been after for a year, do I have to leave town to care for my ailing parents? Why did I survive a car accident when all of my friends in the car were killed?

Life is full of paradoxes and questions like these. Like a Zen koan, each paradox is designed to make us dig deeper, connect with our inner soul knowing and solve the karmic conundrum.

Come forth into the light of things,
Let Nature be your teacher.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

At times it seems that the only thing we can count on are the cycles of the seasons. No matter what else happens, we know that the surge of new life at springtime will give way to the full-blown beauty of summer. The ripe autumn harvest welcomes winter as nature prepares once again for a fresh new start.

Many a sage has looked to the cycles of nature to understand the cycles of the soul. Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood and so it is in everything where power moves, said the Sioux holy man Black Elk. French philosopher and author Voltaire put it this way, It is not more surprising to be born twice than once; everything in nature is resurrection.

Karma and reincarnation tell us that our soul, following the patterns of nature, journeys along a path of birth, maturation, death and then the renewed opportunity of rebirth. They tell us that we are a part of a moving stream of consciousness and that through many life experiences our soul is evolving. Karma and reincarnation explain that our soul, like the legendary phoenix, does indeed rise from the ashes of our former selves to be reborn and that our former lives contain the seeds of our new life. In other words, everything we are today we have been building for thousands of years.

The natural cycles of karma and reincarnation can help us understand how we got where we are today and what we can do about it. They can help us understand why we were born with a particular set of aptitudes and talents, crises and challenges, assignments and aspirations. They can help us deal with the questions that tease us in moments of exasperationWhy was I born to these parents? Why did I give birth to the children I have? Why am I afraid of the water or of heights? Why am I here?

In this book well talk about the underlying principles as well as the practical aspects of karma and reincarnation: How the belief in reincarnation spans East and West, through many centuries and cultures. Why karma is the x factor in our relationships, our health, our careerevery aspect of our life. Why karma isnt fate. How karma works. How we can trace the karmic threads we have woven from lifetime to lifetime.

Well also talk about the traps that keep us from working through our karma and taking full advantage of our rites of passage. Finally, well share some tools and techniques that can help you transform karmic encounters into grand opportunities to shape the future you want. Whether or not you believe in reincarnation and karma, this book will offer new ways of thinking about lifes most profound paradoxesand promises.

One of the most ancient symbols of rebirth, rejuvenation and immortality is the phoenix. The phoenix legend, in various forms, appears in ancient Egypt, Greece, China, Japan, Ireland, Turkey, Persia and also in Christian writings.

According to the legends, the phoenix is the only one of its kind. When its lifetime comes to a closeevery five hundred yearsit builds itself a nest of spices. The nest is ignited by the sun or by the phoenix itself as it fans its wings, and the bird is consumed by the conflagration. Out of its ashes a young and vibrant phoenix arises. One version of the legend explains that out of the ashes a single glowing spark remains, representing the immortal spirit, from which new life is kindled.

In spiritual terms, the rebirth of the phoenix out of the fiery flames portends both the testing and the reincarnation of the soul. Through the sometimes fiery trials and traumas of life, the soul is purified and refined, ascending to higher and higher levels of consciousness.

I had the feeling that I was a historical fragment,
an excerpt for which the preceding and succeeding
text was missing.... I could well imagine that I might
have lived in former centuries and there encountered