What happens after you die?

JUPITERASC

Well-known member
I think nothing happens.

Or at least we don't go to heaven or hell.
Opinions vary :smile:

if we keep in mind that ours is an International Forum
not limited solely to western concepts of “life” and “death”
and
that not all those interested in "what happens after death" are necessarily motivated by fear

but instead

many are motivated quite simply by a common sense need to prepare for the inevitable

and so


for many the Tibetan Book of the Dead is a kind of Baedeker for the afterlife

and like the best guidebooks
its reassuring refrain is
"Don't panic!"

According to Highest Yoga Tantra
from which The Tibetan Book of the Dead derives
only during the process of dying can we achieve liberation from the cycle of existence.
Advanced yogis can make trial runs
by inducing a deathlike state
but after death the rest of us
must try to remember what we've read in The Tibetan Book of the Dead
and put it into practice.
Even the totally unprepared needn't despair, however
provided a qualified guru is on hand to read out the relevant bits to our corpse.
Ideally, he should have a soothing, melodious voice, to calm us down.
The stakes are high:
either we become enlightened and attain buddhahood
or we are reborn to experience all over again the sufferings of birth
old age, sickness and death,
stranded in "the swamp of cyclic existence".

The first complete translation of this classic Buddhist text
on the journey through living and dying
is graced with opening words by His Holiness The Dalai Lama
and the Penguin Deluxe Edition of The Tibetan Book of the Dead
is: "immaculately rendered in an English both graceful and precise."
Translated with the close support of leading contemporary masters
and hailed as “a tremendous accomplishment,”
this book faithfully presents the insights and intentions of the original work.
It includes one of the most detailed and compelling
descriptions of the after-death state in world literature
and practices that can transform our experience of daily life
as well as guidance on helping those who are dying
and
is an inspirational perspective on coping with bereavement

Currently available on amazon
The Tibetan Book of the Dead: The First Complete Translation
by Padmasambhava, Karma Lingpa, Gyurme Dorje (Translator)
Graham Coleman (Goodreads Author) (Editor)
Thupten Jinpa (Editor), Dalai Lama XIV (Contributor)
Namka Chokyi Gyatso (Contributor)

alternative perspectives include being Agnostic aka undecided :smile:
 

dr. farr

Well-known member
There was a consistent theme in the Classical world, that initiation into the various "Myseteries" prepared one to be in control when the time came for the initiate's own death. It is argued that the various Egyptian "books of the dead" and the Tibetan "book of the dead" were (are) not mere funeary guides, but were primarily intended as texts of initiation so that initiates would later, at the time of their death, know what to expect, and what to do for their own spiritual advancement through the death experience...
 

AppLeo

Well-known member
How do you know that? Can you prove it with substantial arguments? No, so, until then it is best to keep those judgments inside.

Why don't YOU prove to me that your belief exists, instead of making believe in something that has no evidence.

Are you going to tell me the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists even though there is no evidence for it?

As Ayn Rand said, "You never have to prove a negative; that is a rule of logic."
 

The Piscean

Well-known member
Try to imagine what it would be like to go to sleep and never wake up... Now try to imagine what it was like to wake up having never gone to sleep.

- Alan Watts
 
I have attempted to zone into what it was like before i was born, and all i remember is complete nothingness, and the more i look i just get **** scared. :sad:

Perhaps live the life you have, your time will come when it comes early or not.
 

LeoLady22

Member
AppLeo

Can you prove these beliefs?

No.

Neither can you (or anyone else) prove that they don't.

So what we have is a stalemate.

This is why I have respect for others' belief systems.* I also respect those who choose not to have a belief system.

*When I say "belief systems" I mean that - not "cults".
 

conspiracy theorist

Well-known member
There is a class of knowledge that cannot be gotten purely from reason and discussion.

Describe sex with most evocative and descriptive language you can muster and the virgin will still not know what sex truly *is*. You can philosophize all day long about fighting techniques, but combat takes on a new reality when you're bleeding from your nose.

Anybody who was able to experience death and is still walking the Earth will not be able to make you believe anything. What you see as empty words and analogies is to them a grasping of something barely explainable through language.

Nothing trumps direct experience.
 
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