' Roger Castillo satsang - Reincarnation from the non-Dual perspective'...

Q: Do you believe in reincarnation of the soul reincarnating to another birth or do you think it's the end of it, every birth is over.

Roger: I think that there is no soul. There is just impersonal consciousness that is functioning through each human being and when the body dies then that particular incarnation, which is the result of impersonal consciousness functioning through a body and creating the personal consciousness which we can say is the incarnation, the personal incarnation. Once the body dies then there's no question of a carry-over of a soul. There is the same impersonal consciousness which was functioning through that body which will then function through another body and create another experience and what is evident is that within a particular experience of life, let's say Rogers experience of life there arises memories of what seem like past lives and so when those memories arise in this experience of life the conclusion is, 'Oh, then there is a soul and I lived a previous life but to me I see a memory of a past life that arise in this moment and it is part of the experience in this moment. It is maybe going to demonstrate why there are certain behaviors in this moment that previously were not understood, the rationale of why certain behaviors existed in our life were not understood so the memory can be the explanation of that so it still doesn't prove that there was a previous life that some entity here has lived. It simply means that in this moment the experience includes a memory of a previous life. So Roger can have an experience of a previous life that's a memory of being Mary or John but that is just a memory of John or Mary's life. It doesn't mean that its Roger that lived John or Mary's life previously.

Q: Why I am asking is normally people talk about reincarnation here in India but a mystic of the stature of Osho has also written in his biography written by somebody else that 700 years ago he was born an certain thing happened. When a mystic talks about it I mean, it's very difficult to, I know it's unusual opinion but it's very difficult to wish it away. I just wanted to tell you this.

Roger: If there is a memory of say being a soldier in a past life I don't dismiss the memory and I don't dismiss the memory is there possibly because a past life was actually lived but it doesn't then conclude that I was that. So when Osho says he was born 700 years prior, who is he talking about when he says 'I was born 700 years prior?'

Q: Not only Osho but alot of people talk about it. They say that the combination of the ego plus the mind, the thoughts and desires, they keep incarnating though different lives till they get enlightenment.

Roger: That's right. The thing is that the ego is simply a set of beliefs and so what I suggest is a description for people who are wanting to understand past lives is that, I suggest that when a human incarnation comes to an end the story of life dissolves the body but what it doesn't dissolve is some unfulfilled desires, some unresolved fears, some unexpressed talents and so the body dies and yet there is an energy of these as yet unresolved, unfulfilled and unexpressed talents, fears and desires and that blueprint which you could call the sense of personal doership, that blueprint is stored and then redistribute. Because it's a blueprint it actually just a set of beliefs, of attachments. It's not an individual and if so they then get redistributed into a new birth, it's basically just data being distributed into a new birth. Its conditioning, that birth can come into life with but the new birth that has this conditioning is not actually an entity that lived a previous life. It's a new birth but with some conditioning from a previous life. That conditioning is simply the unresolved desires, fears and talent and so that life will then unfold with those unresolved fears, unfulfilled desires functioning, until such time as there is a realization of the falseness of those attachments, etc. The dissolving of them and that is my description of what you just described. There is a carry-over and there is a working through of what is carried over until there is nothing to carry-over any more but what is carried over is the remnants of a previous life and not necessarily my previous life.