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Disolving a karmic bond

fiziwig

fiziwig

moderator emeritus
I just read something very interesting by psychologist Stanislav Grof regarding karmic bonds. Working with his patients he has found that a karmic bond is released when three conditions are met. 1) complete acceptance of responsibility for the attitude that created the bond, 2) complete forgiveness of ourself and the other soul involved in the bond, 3) being forgiven by the other.

Now here's the really odd thing he discovered.

I have observed that many individuals experienceing karmic scenes identified the protagonist in these scenes as specific people int heir lives -- parents, children, spouses, superiors, and other important figures. When they completed the reliving of the karmic pattern and reached a sense of resolution and forgiveness, they often felt that the respective partner was in some sense involved in the process and must have felt something similar.

When I became sufficiently open-minded to make attempts at verification of the relevance of these statements, I discovered to my great surprise that they are often accurate. I found out that in many instances the person whom the subject denoted as the protagonist in the karmic sequence experienced at exactly the time a dramaitc shift of attitude in the direction that was predicted by the resolution of the past incarnation pattern.
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He goes on to point out that the other person in the karmic bond had undergone the same experience of release from the karmic debt, but for a completely different reason. Person A might have been lying on the analyst's couch in deep hypnotic regression while person B was riding a bus to work 600 miles away. At the moment person A felt the karmic bond had been resolved person B might have looked out the window at a beatiful sunrise scene and suddenly and inexplicably felt a deep and mysterious sense of relief and release from a burden.

This is some pretty startling and significant evidence for the reality of the karmic bond.

He also points out that in his work with past life karmic bonds it seems as if both the victim and the agressor suffer the karmic consequences. They are bonded by the experience. This explains something that has always puzzled me; why is it that past life therapy seems to discover so many cases where the victim is punished in the next life? Apparently the intensity of the experience is what creates the bond, and the bond continues to affect both souls involved in the incident until it is resolved.

The victim is not being punished. The vicitm is holding onto the experience of pain and the experience of anger or hatred toward the agressor. It is the negative effects of his own response to the incident rather than the incident itself that holds him in bondage. If someone wrongs me and I hold agrudge I create a karmic bond. If someone wrongs me and I respond with compassion and forgiveness toward him no karmic bond is created.

The implication is that not only should we seek to resolve old karmic bonds, but we should also avoid creating new ones that will have to be worked out in future incarnations.
 
HI,

Yup yup - this was my point in the "Why the abuse" thread - I just didn't express it like you did here. Good job!

The victim is not being punished. The vicitm is holding onto the experience of pain and the experience of anger or hatred toward the agressor. It is the negative effects of his own response to the incident rather than the incident itself that holds him in bondage.

------------------
Deborah

"I have no more words. Let the soul speak with the silent articulation of a face." ---Rumi
 
If you forgive yourself, all others follow!

Deborah, I love your quote from Rumi. I wonder how many know he is a Muslim? Or for that matter, his tomb is the most visited place outside Mecca and Medina!
 
Yes, yes yes - a thousand times yes, Fiziwig! I couldn't agree with you more! Forgiveness is just so very important! And my own PL experience proved that to me in pretty dramatic fashion. A comment someone made to me somehow seemed to trigger a sense that he needed and wanted my forgiveness for something. This feeling came from out of nowhere as far as the actual conversation was concerned, but I sensed it DEEP in my heart, like it had been buried so deep I hadn't even realized it was there.

Later on I read that forgiveness is related to the heart chakra - and it WAS in my heart area where I'd felt this need for forgiveness! Whereas I think that in a normal, superficial conversation - like the one I was actually having with this man - my thoughts would have been coming from my brain, you know what I mean?

I immediately sent this man my forgiveness through my mind, since I couldn't express it out loud. That sending through my mind was an instinctive act; it just seemed like what I had to do. (Couldn't have said what I wanted to out loud; the man would have thought I was nuts!)

Now, I don't know if this lightened his heart, but it had a dramatic, positive effect on mine! I felt much more confident and wasn't afraid to speak out in a group anymore, which I was before. It was like something that was holding me back wasn't in place anymore.

However, we moved over the summer and I felt my newfound confidence slipping away. The whole starting over bit, having to make new friends - always hard for me.

And then I realized that I had a lot of present-life forgiveness issues to work on too - releasing a PL hurt wasn't enough, at least not in my case. So I've been trying to work on these other issues too. It's become a big pyschological theme for me, and not an easy or pleasant one.

How current forgiveness issues are related to the PL one, I don't know, but I do very much agree that the consequences of not forgiving someone will, indeed, carry over to future lives! So best of luck to anyone out there who needs to put out forgiveness. It can only help...
 
Hello Fiz,
I find that theory very interesting. We are responsible for our negative/positive feelings and there is a consecuence to them. But, what happened to that theory of karma that says that if someone did something bad to you you both come back and this time you'll do it to him (maybe not on purpose, but he will still have to go through it ). I'm working on forgiving someone who really damaged me in this life to the point where my whole life changed and I even had to leave that country, the organization, my "friends", my religious beliefs, and I'm trying not to wish that she pays for it, but then, .... if she doesn't.... where is justice? Again, I don't want to fall into feeling like a helpless victim, althoug I was back then as is anyone who is back stabbed, but.... if we all forgive and forgive and forgive and the wrongdoers never "get" anything back,.... are we just supposed to be bearing the pain and just bearing and bearing...?? That makes me feel like just giving up on life! The other option would be to be strong and strike back to defend yourself, but there are times there's no chance to defend your self or the damage is too big already to be reversed. If we all just forgive.... what happens to the wrong doers?
 
Zuzee, I don't really know all the answers about forgiveness, just that it's often VERY hard to do but also very necessary. And I know what you mean about someone else's wrongdoing really screwing up your life. In my case, my husband ended up on the wrong side of some nasty office politics at his 1st job out of grad school. It ended up with him getting fired and us having to move to another place, halfway across the country and a completely different lifestyle. The whole mess really damaged my husband psychologically; it's been over 10 years and he's still wounded.

But yes, upon beginning the forgiveness work earlier this fall, I realized I had to forgive these people too, and I had been very bitter toward them; it was shocking to see how mean people could be.


I'm no expert on the subject, but I really do think the people who are cruel to others will pay for it eventually, whether it be in this lifetime or the next. Another case from my life: I was the target of merciless teasing for several grades school years, which contributed to self-esteem issues that I still have to fight off at times. One of my chief tormentors went on to become a CEO of a major corporation in my native state. Since we grew up about 50 miles from the company HQ, he was trumpeted in the papers as "local boy made good". A charmed life, right?

Well, within a year he and the other top brass ran the company into the ground - bankrupcy, store closings, the FBI looking into illegal activities, etc. It was all over the news. So while my humiliation was within the confines of the school, his is all over the country!

Now, I'm not suggesting that just because he was mean to me in grade school he would have troubles later in life - I'm just pointing out that "what goes around comes around" at some point. We don't know when, but I don't think anyone gets away with anything ultimately. (and yes, he and his buddies - yet another group of people to forgive!)

Just work on yourself and what's in your own heart, and like Jerry Johnson said, the rest will follow. Good luck!
 
zuzee,

This is a very complicated problem, but I can't help thinking there is a bascially simple answer to it. I'm still searching for the answer. The whole problem of the nature of karma sort of has me in its grip right now and I'm digging through tons of old books on the subject trying to see which theories make sense and which ones don't add up.

I think, at this point anyway, that evil-doers are harming themselves and making themselves unhappy and they must eventually realize this and forgive themselves before they can transform themselves into good-doers.

As for justice, we all desire it, but I'm not entirely sure that "justice" is what karma is about. If someone has been wronged I think there are some important things that ought to happen.
  • The person who was wronged needs to find what positive lesson can be learned from the experience.
  • The person wronged needs to take steps to protect themselves and others from being hurt in a similar way.
  • The person wronged needs to avoid dwelling on the experience, or becoming obsessed with it. Let it go and move on. This is what forgiveness is for; it is for the forgiver, not for the forgiven.
  • The person who comitted the wrong needs to care that someone was hurt. If the evil-doer doesn't care then he will learn nothing and will repeat the offense and go on making himself and others unhappy.
  • The person who comitted the wrong needs to understand and empathize with the painful consequences of his action.
  • The person who comitted the wrong needs to realize that by changing his attitude he can avoid creating pain for himself and others.
  • The person who comitted the wrong, after correcting his attitude and becoming a more positive person needs to forgive himself for his past mistakes and move on.

I don't really see the need for revenge, retribution or punishment. I see only the need for compassion, empathy and forgiveness. Retribution only perpetuates the karma. If the slapper in this life gets slapped in the next life the sum total quantity of love in the universe is not increased. Nor is the sum total of wisdom and enlightenment. As long as someone is still getting slapped around there is still negative karma being perpetuated.

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that." -- Martin Luther King. Jr. (Although I think the Buddha said something similar a few years earlier.)
 
Hi Bishopk and fiz,

Thanks for your replies. They helped me a lot. Basically I agree with everything you said, but... my issue is... even if I manage to forgive.... nobody will erase those things I went through and nobody will return the time and make things happen in a different way. The scars will always be there.
Oh well, but as you said, I should just focus on what I have to do: forgive. And it helps when I think that maybe in a previous life I did something similar to this woman and this life it was my turn. ... Forgiveness, I'm working on it, I'm working on it.

Thanks again.
zuzee
 
zuzee,

my issue is... even if I manage to forgive.... nobody will erase those things I went through and nobody will return the time and make things happen in a different way. The scars will always be there.
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Ah, but forgiveness is what makes the scars go away.
 
To forgive...... is divine.

This is a wonderful thread started by our friend Fiziwig.
 
Thank you for bringing this up again. I have been noticing for years that I, and the others I have identified as the crucial players in my past lives, constantly go through these shifts that are simultaneous and seem very pointedly connected.

Unfortunately, few of these shifts have yet reached the point of letting go from either side, though we each have stayed busy with separate lives. We are not ready to resolve, I feel, from either end. The ones that have involved forgiveness, however, seem to have completely closed, on both sides.

Sandra
 
Karmic Bonds and Enlightenment

Hello Fiziwig
In the Edgar Cayce meditation program "In Search of God" many folks have such karmic releases as you describe and also feel that they have an experience of "Original Identity" (God-merging) that they can return to as an empathy that makes future forgiveness much easier to practice. In fact "forgiveness" becomes a quality much more like Buhdist Non-atachment. Forgiveness and non -atachment are such basic insights to Spirituallity/Theology ,do they really need scientific varification to have value in society or are they experiences much like art that have value as a private knowledge??
Yours Truly
John R.
PS How is your new Biz going:).
 
I especially liked this part -

The person wronged needs to avoid dwelling on the experience, or becoming obsessed with it. Let it go and move on. This is what forgiveness is for; it is for the forgiver, not for the forgiven.
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JohnR; I think that humans need to validate their spiritual experiences. The arts reveal something to look at, to review and ponder. The artist can talk about the work and the public can view it and learn about the artists intentions. Spiritual experiences and knowings are personal and very subjective. There is validation in sharing experiences and striving to understand them; it is a commitment to knowing oneself as well as others.

So yes...I think the scientific community needs to study the patterns, the outcome; It is very important that they look into the possibilities and reflect on the evidence in order for the masses to eventually understand. It also gives comfort to those who have these experiences - knowing they are not "crazy." A term so often used with regard to the spiritual.
 
Wow, I have to reply this one because the same question bothered me a lot and still bothers a little now.

First I think the fact, the "whatever"(not sure if linked by karma) bond found by Stanislav is true. Sometimes I see people calling it soul group. The same people you spent life together will come again together. Everything has changed but you are still able to tell it's them. The inside never changes, sorry to say this, but I didn't see a big improvement, in personality or knowledge....maybe they are approaching the fundamental truth in their secret ways, only the still silly little me can not see how.

There are three to five persons have been identified by me as acquintances from one same past life period. Two of them not 100% sure. I found them out in 5-6 years after the reincarnation awakening, although some of them have been known for long. They used to be my lover, friend, son and brother. Now one family member, classmates and a one-year date.

Second, the consequences. Shortly after I found them, I was in a state of ecstasy. I realized I shall never be lonely again. But soon things turned out not so tempting. The main reason is that everyone seems to want to stick the past life pattern relationship. Somewhere deep inside, no one wants to move on. Forget and forgive are simply not in the dictionary.My son from past hates me and avoids me, as usual. My lover from past, now the family member apparently has an over edge passion, annoying sometimes. My brother is kind and nice as before, though I don't know what really happens in his mind.

Then why do they come back to me? If nothing better, we just live the same life agagin and again, pursuing the same goals, indulging ourselves in the same bad habits over and over? In my mind I was so bored and wanted to yell at them: Can you just leave me alone? What do you want? You guys can have fun anywhere else! But I could not, they don't know a thing.

Now, over a lot of thinking, I finally got relief. For me, the best thing to do is to persuade meself that we never know each other before. ....No past, no future, only today counts. Anything good or bad happens, just try to get the best out of it.
 
This is a fabulous thread -- with a wonderful way of looking at things. I hope everyone takes the time to read it though -- and I hope it makes you think. ;)



Ailish
 
Ailish said:
This is a fabulous thread -- with a wonderful way of looking at things. I hope everyone takes the time to read it though -- and I hope it makes you think. ;)

Ailish
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I'm thrilled that you revived this thread Ailish. I've reading The Holographic Universe, in which Stanislav Grof's work is discussed, and I find it intriguing. I agree with Fiziwig's conclusions, that forgiveness is for our benefit, which I'm said in several other threads. I see anger, hate, and a need for revenge as a Festering Sore on our soul's psyche. Unless we forgive ourselves and others, the sore will only get worse, infecting our spirit, and our current lives. The effects of all our reactions to the” injustices" done us are accumulative, and will worsen our mood and life if not relieved.

I believe that the same Festering Sore is present within everyone, almost as a spiritual Karmic marker. So there really is no need for us to hold onto the anger and negative energy, not plot any sort of revenge. Unless the other person adopts a forgiving nature, their Festering Sore will sour their spirit, their attitude, and their lives. I live by the Forgive And Forget credo, and it has enriched my life. Give it a try, it's a freeing and energizing experience.

John
 
fiziwig said:
I just read something very interesting by psychologist Stanislav Grof regarding karmic bonds. Working with his patients he has found that a karmic bond is released when three conditions are met. 1) complete acceptance of responsibility for the attitude that created the bond, 2) complete forgiveness of ourself and the other soul involved in the bond, 3) being forgiven by the other.
Click to expand...

I only doubt about number 3.
Because the other soul who is involved in this karmic bond might not be interested at all.
Most of all you have to do it by yourself, the acceptance, the letting go and the forgiving.
Waiting for the other soul to do the same might take ages.

This psychologist says releasing might happen spontaneously, but I doubt that.
If someone sees a beautiful sunset, how much this person is aware that the karmic bond is broken?
You can't let go without being aware of what you let go.

And it's most of all the "victim" who feels the urge to do something about karma,
the victim already suffered too much.
The aggressor also could feel uncomfortable, but it might still be bearable.

I think it's very important to realize that we don't (always) need the other soul to let go
and to continue our own lives.
We can start any day resolving our karmic bonds and debts.
Because there are people who are never willing to forgive,
if they don't want to, fine, but we can move on if we want to.

Curious Girl.
 
A great thread - with some wonderful insights. Do any new members have thoughts to add to the discussion?


Aili
 
Who or what am I that thus span space and time?


I agree with most everything that has been posted on this thread and more particularly that the three key points are: 1) direct recognition of one’s own transgressions; 2) acceptance of responsibility for one’s own part therein; 3) the expression of deep and heartfelt compassion towards those negatively affected by one’s actions; 4) forgiveness expressed towards those that you feel harmed you.


To support this viewpoint I would like to tell a little story. To begin with, 12 years or so ago, I started out to try to understand why I had been driven to do certain things in this life (involving heavy pro-environmental activity – got myself “fired” from a university as a result). Eventually I succeeded in recovering a couple of past lives and they all involved incidents where I had behaved negatively, mostly in military contexts. I was devastated by the extent and impact of the first three occasions. Suddenly I was presented with personal evidence allowing me to see and appreciate that an aspect of me, perhaps my soul or an essence thereof, extended beyond time. This happened as I contemplated the three lives and related the connections among them to include the standpoint of my present life. Seeing, as it were for the first time, why I had been driven to perform certain actions in this life with a dreadful logic of certainty (my Karmic “track” as it were).


I began exactly to meditate upon the meaning that had to lie behind these lives and “unbidden” the question “who or what am I that thus span space and time?” arose within me. As I continued to view these collective lives, with the question held firmly in place with all the strength of my being, I began to feel disoriented. Then, at once, a feeling of terror gripped me and my I-consciousness started to break apart, to atomize, as I considered the impossibility of the consciousness that I found myself in (completely untenable from the perspective of ordinary 4 dimensional space-time). Still I held on and suddenly found myself floating above all of the lives. I was then immediately aware in some sense, I, that is a Self, a direct identity, ascendant to the lives and somehow beyond them, had all along been involved in creating everything about them for they were mine. It was as though I hung suspended above four different worlds spinning in an identical location in space. Yet there were no worlds at all and nor was there any space in which they could spin and I encompassed them entirely! The contents of the three solid and distinct lives, contained a terminal feeling, and these together with the perspective of my current, life simply hung there within the scope of my comprehension.


As I considered the “vision” I was aware that any one of these lives was capable of involving my complete attention to the exclusion of all others yet I did not allow this to happen and in an instant I knew with hard certainty that the essence of me that stood beyond these lives did so for the simple reason that it had created all of them. I had direct ownership of each and every one of them. This feeling of authorship suddenly expanded to include not only the self-feeling in each of the lives, but also the infrastructure, the "so-called physical reality" that had cradled the lives. This is/was a comprehension of an "ascendant self" which I now call the “Higher Self”.


From that point I went off into higher consciousness, that of executor. Now that consciousness I recognized as a summation.


But the point of this tale is to suggest how the ability to recall past-lives is a blessing for it provides one with a tool to potentially break-free of the clutches of Karma. In that one instance of ego-self atomization (above mentioned), an old being, a being as old as time, broke-apart and simply “died”, ceased to exist. In its place arose a new comprehension. I say arose but the truth is that this new entity was older than time itself. It was always already there.


While engaged in that ceaseless round of incarnation and “death” (of the body) that ancient old-I had completely forgotten its true state. It took me weeks, months to reassemble the world, to pick-up the worthwhile remnants of that shattered, atomized being and to wrap them into the authentic shape I carry today.


So, yes, understand the dynamics of Karma as much as one can but use the past-life material that you have recalled to “break-free” and take up life within the Profound. Eternal being that thou art. Think only on: who or what am I that thus span space and time……….:thumbsup:
 
Very cool insight Robin. If only everyone could keep such a 'helicopter view' in the 'heat and dust' of the arena of life!
 
Get there first


Hmm, yes, well that is quite a trick in itself, yes. But what I am saying is, to those with recall of past lives, first try using them to get to the state of being that presupposes these lives. The way to do this is to adopt the phrase "who am I that thus spans space and time" as either a mantra or a meditation focal-point. Do it as if your life depends on it (which it does). Once you obtain the resultant transcendent state (for your self, in yourself) you are free to do as you will. Either return to your body or stay where you are.


If you do return, the phrase and the response are enough to clear-away all such dust-storms, maybe not in short-order, but always unerringly for one still has the earned Karma of the current life to contend with. For that last, at least, you will know the "why" of it and you will also know the adjustments which have to be made, regardless of "apparent cost". Then one can be truly free and turn to whatever one feels "has to be done".


Even if your insight into yourself eventually triggers regret and shame, you can rest in the knowledge that that such waves of feeling, although self-earned, eventually subside sooner rather than later. Keep your strength up, eat good nourishing holistic food (organic, grain-based), concentrate on the answer to the question "who or what am I that thus spans space and time?"..........:coffee:
 
mix with friends of like-mind


Oh, one other thing, mix with friends of like-mind - support is very gratifying..... reduce contact with the vexatious: angel
 
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