Spiritual development.

Two questions, frequently asked.

(1) Why do I have to worry about my next life, my after life? I don't really know who my "predecessor" (previous incarnation) was and it doesn't seem to matter, does it?

(2) Why are we the way we are?

This is how I approach the first question.

I think my life is quite good. According to the theory of transmigration, this is the sum total of what my past lives did. Obviously, my previous incarnations didn't do too bad a job. I'm grateful to them.

Incidentally, could ancestral worship be a veiled form of worshiping one's former incarnations? Just a thought, but an interesting one, I believe.

I know my life can be "better" (however one interprets it), but I don't really strive for a "better" life. Maintaining and enjoying this life I have is more important (call me unambitious). Out of basic human decency and empathy, I would like my next incarnation to enjoy at least the same level of "goodness" that my current life seems to be blessed with. And, hopefully, with a little effort on my part, that being will have a "better" life. After all, that being will be a continuation of "me" and if I'm nice to my family and friends, I have no reason not to be "nice" to the future "me".

As for the second question, I believe it all boils down to "scale". We have five to six senses, out of many senses that we possibly can develop and employ. But for each sense, we have to allocate some resources. Therefore, we need to strike a balance, between maximising the number of senses that we possess to safeguard our survival, security and well-being and minimising the amount of energy we consume in order to mobilise those senses.

In other words, it's almost certain that the senses we KNOW we have are essential to our survival. But are they enough for our spiritual well-being? This is an open-ended question. Through meditation, we seem to be able to sharpen these "normal" senses and develop some extra ones. It's easy to assume that those extra senses are essential to our spiritual well-being, without which we are mere "living" organisms, not enlightened beings.

Imagine - the totality of this cosmos (including all dimensions, spiritual and physical) is projected onto a spectrum. We as average human beings have access only to the middle section of the spectrum (we can sense the vibrations occurring across a certain stretch of frequencies on that spectrum, which are palpable to us). Being aware of vibrations beyond this bracket is not essential to our physical survival. We have those senses so we can sense and avoid danger, and sense and find sustenance. That's why we are the way we are.

I don't want to discuss the "necessity" of spiritual pursuit here, as that's too personal.

Let's say you decide to make a foray into the spiritual realm by taking up a religion and/or following a spiritual master and/or practising meditation. Then you are exposing yourself to the rules of another realm, which presumably are rather different from those governing this reality. In this reality, most of us have from birth a complete set of senses tailor-made for this physical world. But when you embark on a spiritual path, it's unlikely that you are fully equipped with all the senses necessary to steer you clear of lurking perils in that other realm. In this reality, if you lost sight and hearing, you couldn't walk without aid. It would be life-threatening.

Maybe the same applies to the other realm? If that's the case, then it's clear why we have to be very particular about the path we choose to follow.

Your heart is your lodestar, they say. But how do you know your heart is not clouded?

My answer is: Meditation.

How do you know you are on the right path? My answer is: Don't choose a path yet, as long as you still have that question. Just be "watchful". Watch out, in particular, against two things:

Greed
Ego

Religion is attractive to many for two reasons:

(1) It offers an attractive proposition/deal.
(2) It fills a vacuum

By the same token, people go to religion for two reasons: either seeking to change their 'rotten' life (it's a transaction, with tangible benefits expected) or looking for something to eliminate a void in their life (once that void is gone, the believer will go back to being a non-believer, although he/she will never admit it). Or both.

Adopting a religious faith is not as easy as it sounds. One has to be very, very careful, if one is serious about one's spiritual well-being. If you are not serious about it, then why go to religion in the first place? Family heritage? Peer pressure? Fashion? Force of habit?

That's frivolity, if you ask me, and frivolity is an even graver danger, because you render yourself vulnerable to misguiding influences. Because you don't REALLY care.

Meditation should be made very simple. Strip it down to basics only and remember:

惟灭动心，不灭照心
但凝空心，不凝住心

The first line is an antidote for GREED and the second line, for EGO.

Through meditation, questions start to emerge. The right spiritual guide for you is the one who can answer those PARTICULAR questions of yours convincingly. Don't go for the "famed" grand master at the very beginning. If you do, it'll be little more than blind faith. In time, different guides will present themselves to you, when you are ready. As you stay the course, by bearing the two-line "mantra" in mind, your heart, and therefore your vision, will remain unclouded and you can see more and more of the "truth".