Do You Believe In An Afterlife?

Do you believe in an afterlife,

If so.. do you have poems about it?

Discuss:

I am not sure if i believe in afterlife.
People live on in our hearts once they die, so this is an afterlife in once sense, when we die I bodies are buried or cremated but our soul lives on in the world.
I dont believe that we are someone different after we die, that we are born again as someone else. Although I have met people who are remarkably like people who i know who have died.

I have no poems about it, but maybe one day I will.
I write poems about angels, and in a way, when we die, we become angels and look down on our loved ones and keep them safe.

love Tara-Kay

Yes I have one called Life after Life

I'll write about it soon. Thanks for the inspiration! Hehe.

I believe that believing in the afterlife creates the afterlife. If you don't believe in it, there isn't one. I also believe you will experience the afterlife you anticipate.

I had a few poems posted about some kind of afterlife, but took them down. I only left one called "Sitting On My Tombstone" (an no funny guys, I don't mean the pizza)

Although I write about it, I'm still a little skeptic about an afterlife. It's hard to believe that we will go an as individual entities with intelligence and all.

Mr. Henderson, Interesting theory, but aren't you giving to much credit to the power of thought?

David, I'd like to pick up on your query to Ed... the power of thought is far more potent than you give it credit for... we create our lives through the power of thought. Ed is absolutely right in my mind, if you believe so you will experience... as for the afterlife... yes I am a believer but not in some heavenly or hell based idea... I believe that we live again, in a soul way, to experience that which we have got wrong until we're at such a stage of growth that our perception is raised to another dimension...
love and light

I believe that if you spend today thinking only of tomorrow, you have wasted for the most part, today, and therefor, will not have a full tomorrow.

That about sums up my thoughts on the afterlife.

NuovoVesuvio,
I am aware that there is no definite answer to this question. This question don't have an answer, it just has theories. Interesting nontheless.
My goal is not to find an answer, that would be like looking for God in a bottle. My goal is just to share experiences and beliefs. If want to or need to, even.

Mr Murray,
"I believe that if you spend today thinking only of tomorrow, you have wasted for the most part, today, and therefor, will not have a full tomorrow."

This is very refreshing. Thanks

I think, in all honesty, that life is less about "yes/no" and more about "what if". If you think of things in terms of yes and no, black and white, on and off, you are assigning logic to a completely illogical species. Meaning us. Ya Vulcan. ;-)

"just because you do not understand something it is no reason to dub something 'illogical'"

Wrong. Not everything is the result of some definite scientific process. Not understanding something is EXACTLY the reason to dub something illogical.

NuovoVesuvio,
On the contrary, I understood you perfectly, and although I respect your beliefs, I just happen to believe the opposite.

The truth is that no one has been there. There is no proof of an afterlife, just speculations, ideas and theories. And as much as we want to believe that our version is the correct one, as passionate as we might be with this belief. Sadly that's all it will remain.. a belief.

You say there is a definite answer to this question. Please post it in details, or at least point me in the right direction so that I might research it myself.

While you are at it you might want to include the explanation to :
How plants move towards sunlight. lol

I'm at a lost on that one. No ligaments, no muscles. hmm

Look inward for all answers you seek of outward manifestation.

As a side note, in my creek there's this vine that grew downwards to water. That's more impressive than the light thing, I'd say; how would it know?!

Yes I believe I will be judged on my actions in this life and then welcomed to paradise...as for what paradise may be in specifics I do not know and could never dare to dream.

"I do not understand the way plants move towards sunlight."

Well shit. I don't understand how thousands of years of beating the crap out of each other has culminated in us... uh... beating the crap out of each other. I don't understand how love STILL can't be proved in a laboratory. I don't understand why we can put a man on the moon but we can't cure cancer. I don't understand why cigarettes and alcohol are legal, but driving fast isn't. I don't understand why toast always lands butter-side down. I don't understand why people always harp on about all the hate in the world, offer no love, and then complain about the inherent apathy prevalent in society.

Not understanding why plants move towards sunlight is like not understanding why falling over is funny.

Nuovo,

you sound like you are well read on the subjects of mataphysics, the paranormal and spirituality. You don't however sound very experienced, bucause if you were, you would admit and realize how little there is to be sure of.

The best we can have is an idea, and I've been astral several times, so I know there is something beyond this world of hard things, but I can never say exactly what is is or isn't, despite what many books and people tell me.

So please, no more hollow calls to absolute definition...if you cut everything up so much with that sharp mind of yours, you won't recognise what is left in front of you.

Yes I believe in the afterlife..I also believe the stories I hear of people who have had a NDE (Near death experience) they all seem to be the same...they were drawn towards a light...some say they've seen their body on the operation table and heard what the doctors were saying...Thats crazy and makes me question..but still I believe..I don't believe God created us to be on this Earth just to die, so there has to be a place he created that lets his people be at rest and peaceful when we die...

For some reason I knew the whole plant thing would attract the tree-hugging-queen Sunny. lol

Here is a question for you Sunny.
Do you believe that animals and plants have souls, and an afterlife even?
(can't wait for the answer, *giggles*)

I believe in a roundabout way, that plants and animals, being made of the same stuff as we, have soul stuff inside them, say like divine energy that is alive in a similar manner as we.

But then, if you look close enough, rocks and bits of dirt are the same, so who knows....not I and I doubt any of you.

It's a bit quantum physics, which is nebulous to say the least....

Cognition ends when the brain dies. Afterlife is cognitive. Therefore there can be no afterlife.

Don't tell me that insects have souls too!
If so, I am the grim reaper of many souls.

Mel, prove it.

Obviously you can't, and I know it would seem that many people cling like fools to the hope that there is something after this life, because in many peoples opinion, that are too scared to accept this is all there is.

However,there are many serious academics, parapsychologists and the like, and almost every quantum physisist, who also believe in life after deaht enough to investigate it, investing serious money and time into the matter [no pun intended]

I'm sure they are intelligent people, there must be something to it...though I can't say for sure what that might be...neither can you, so don't.

i believe we are like ginue pigs we dontk now for sure if there is an afterlife heaven/hell because we all would be good and god wouldnt be able to know who is good and bad :)

My belief is that god is a natural machine of trial and error and the resulting product -- evolution. I believe that we've evolved to this point and are sort of stuck in life; spinning our gears in these chains of concepts -- good and bad, life and afterlife -- and once we transcend them, we can then begin to transcend our mortality. From here I think time and space will be abandoned and we'll evolve into what some may call our afterlife, and from there keep riding this chaotic spiral of our consciousness further and further.

"There is no order in the world around us, we must adapt ourselves to the requirements of chaos instead. It is hard to adapt to chaos, but it can be done. I am living proof of that: It can be done."
~Kurt Vonnegut

bump

I'd like to go back to Ed Hendersons original point, as it was pretty much overlooked but it'a a goldmine of discussion, potentially.

He said, and I'm paraphrasing, that people experience the afterlife based on their beliefs about it prior to dying. So a Christian would experience heaven or hell, a Wiccan the astral realms etc.

I find this interesting as a point of view from Ed, because, firstly it speaks of a very strange personal viewpoint from him, but it also implies that there must be something after death that responds to our beliefs and creates something to match them.

Do you get what I'm saying? There must be a place, or time or something something that allows us to create our own heaven...

there is definetly life after dying aaa DUHHHH!!!!!!

In my opinion eternity and infinite space cannot fit into the cognitive function of the human brain. This makes it impossible to speak of eternal life from a scientific perspective. The reason is that, science is the observation of natural events. I believe that if I told you that I have experienced eternal life that many of you would question my credibility.

Anyone that has been involved in the decision making process of life support for the dying knows how difficult it can be to let go of the hope that a loved one can return to life as we know it. I know a woman whose son is buried in the cemetery, yet his heart is still beating. When my sister was on life support three years ago the doctors were not offering much hope that she could ever return to life as we know it, yet she did
Many have a difficult time determining at what point life begins, and what point life ends
My mother’s sister devoted over seventy years of her life to a contemplative order I have thought about the choices that lead to many beliefs and determined that we become what we believe. I have written many poems on this subject that have been read anywhere from convents to prisons. The bad news is that anyone can die a spiritual death by choice. The good news is anyone who can accept divine love can be reborn.

no

lol, short, sweet, and to the point---

Do I have a belief in an afterlife?

Ofcourse I do, no man/woman can bear to think of a life in which we toil and be nothing more than food to bacteriums and maggots.

But there are different degrees in belief of afterlife, for example: A Christian belief may be more complicated than a wiccan belief.

So the question you posed can be questioned indepth:

Is it Nature vs Nurture in that do we believe because society tells us to or do we believe because it is another means in which we justify our survival.

Thank you sluvious I hope not to wander too far off topic but my personal friends even state that I have a way of manipulating a topic in a conversation

“Mike Nalley, I'd love to meet you in person, because seriously I have nothing but the utmost respect for anyone who seemingly can not be shaken in their philosophy, no matter how screwed up the very existence of its originality...You rock bro.....”

This reminds me of a pop rock song released by Mac Davis

“Lord it’s hard to be humble”
{Refrain}
Oh Lord it's hard to be humble when you're perfect in every way
I can't wait to look in the mirror 'cause I get better lookin' each day
To know me is to love me, I must be a hell of a man
Oh Lord it's hard to be humble, but I'm doin' the best that I can”

I in no way wish to intimidate your creator sluvious because I see him as an inspired author also
My editor seems to have even stronger convictions than I do on the subject of life after death, and even communication with the bereaved.

She wrote a poem for me she says was inspired by my aunt Agnes whom she never met in person. She wrote the poem after my aunt had passed away

Latter she published it with many others like it in ‘Crowning Touches of Bereavement’

Dorothy entitled the poem that was inspired. and dedicated to the relationship I had with my aunt ‘Humility with Honor

There are several quotes on humility, my favorites are ‘
’It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles. ~Niccolo Machiavelli’
‘If I only had a little humility, I would be perfect. ~Ted Turner’
‘When science discovers the center of the universe, a lot of people will be disappointed to find they are not it. ~Bernard Baily’
“Lord, where we are wrong, make us willing to change; where we are right, make us easy to live with. ~Peter Marshall’

May we all be in heaven two hours before the devil knows we are dead.
lmao

i think it all depends on your beliefs, i mean i agree with if you're of a certain religion, you will believe that. i personally am i christian, and my belief is that there is a heaven and a hell. but it all comes down to what YOUR beliefs are, and thats why this topic can have so many answers and explanations....

i do believe in afterlife but no i haven't wrote any poems about it

what I believe doesn't matter, but I did write about existential thought. It's called Drunken Philosophy

I do believe in a sort of afterlife, where you get exactly what you deserve after what you've done on Earth. If you generally tried to help people, then you get a pleasant afterlife. If you were pure evil, you face the brunt of that after you die.

I think it's just karma. As for religion, I think that no matter what/who you believe in, that if you've been a decent person you'll end up somewhere good.

As for the toast landing butter side down, I've seen a MythBusters episode about that. They showed that, when dropped from thirty feet up, it usually landed butter side UP. Something about the bread curved in and made it a little parachute thing. But yeah. Just so you know... :P