Hannibal

I guess what I was getting at, is that unless we go beyond in the here and now, we are bound to come back. More importantly, given our general ignorance of karmic propensity, there is no saying when we will again be born in a place where we will be able to practice. Practice in the here and now my friend.

If you are familiar with the Abhidhamma Pitaka, the Buddha describes the though process at the moment of death as one which conditions further existence. The object of the though process can be one of the following: (1) an action which one has performed during his/her life, which is experienced as if it is being relived (as a side note, this is a common theme in many near death experiences), (2) some sort of symbol that was present at the time of and is representative of that particular action, (3) a symbol of the place in which one is destined to be reborn (which is more related to the sum of past karma rather than the current state of mind). One of these three will be experienced during the dying moment, and in turn lead into the next existence.

I admit I probably would not have written an introduction if not forced, but alas, here I am. I hail from the US, the state of Florida. For the past four years I have maintained a strong interest in Eastern philosophies (religions, sciences, whatever the term you prefer), particularly Buddhism. Over this time I have been meditating off and on; however, it appears my resolve to do so grows stronger with age as the benefits make themselves more apparent. I was introduced to Taoism relatively recently, so my knowledge of it is not very deep. Hopefully it will grow through this forum. For the most part I am mostly interested in reading old threads, but will on occasion post something of my own.