The concept of reincarnation within the same lifespan is very moving. In such a process, is the person aware of it? Are there any physical signs? Does it occur in sleep or in a waking state?
The Guide: The change occurs gradually on the outer level and may not be immediately sensed by the individual. But there is definitely a change. It is instigated by the soul in the Spirit World during sleep when discussions with spiritual advisers always take place when a person is on a developmental path. So change is discussed and planned on another level of reality.
On the manifest, physical level, you may experience it first as a gradual change of attitudes, interests, activities, environment, or expression. Later on, retrospectively, you see that your life has become very different. But the difference is realized not abruptly but gradually.
Sometimes a deep crisis indicates the changeover, but this crisis is in principle no different from physical death and rebirth. They too, are often crises for those who are still in a dim state of consciousness. It is, of course, less traumatic in one way, in that there is no cut in consciousness that then must be regained through laborious search. And that is the great advantage of reincarnation in the same life.
New aspects that were not called forth in the first incarnation of that lifetime may come forth. New aspects may awaken that never have appeared in this lifetime. On the other hand, aspects that were emphasized in the first incarnation may die down after the rebirth. They are no longer of interest, they no longer serve a purpose, so they are put aside.
This is sometimes why a person completely changes his or her sphere of interest in the course of a spiritual path. It may not necessarily indicate an incarnatory process. It may also be that the person has veered off from his or her original plan, but later becomes sufficiently open to sense the deviation and thus changes course. Also, the same talents and interests can reappear, perhaps having improved very much or having been directed into a different expression.
Is it possible that fear of life is really a fear of dying and reincarnating within this life – the process of giving up the old and moving on to the new?
The Guide: Yes, that is addressed in Lecture #230 The Universality of Change – Reincarnative Process in the Same Life Span. Life is an intensely, constantly moving phenomenon. Therefore it is constantly changing. Now, if change is feared, then life is feared, and naturally death is feared as well. Death is only one aspect of life. It must be feared as much as life. They always go together.
Change and movement mean constantly dying from an old state into a new one, but always taking aspects of the old along in new form. One who completely accepts and embraces life cannot fear death, and vice versa. They are one and the same phenomenon; therefore, one and the same attitude must prevail about life, death, change, movement.
I’d like to know whether my current crisis is actually a rebirth for me at this point?
The Guide: My dearest friends – all of you – this question I will never answer. It is something you have to know and feel within and never need a confirmation from without.
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