From: pagemail@swcp.com   
      
   > >Do you feel you can elaborate on that a little?  I don't   
   > >want to pry, I'm just curious.   
   >   
   > I'm sorry I haven't replied to you sooner.  It was simply that your   
   > tone was that of teacher to pupil, and it annoyed me.   
      
   Oh, sorry!  I *am* a teacher, in fact, so sometimes I think that   
   tone creeps in when all I'm doing is musing "aloud" about a   
   subject.   
      
   > I prefer not to be specific about the nature of these contact   
   > experiences because they contain content that was shared privately   
   > between me and each different loved one.   
      
   Understood.   
      
   > >> >how long it takes.  After all, we've got eternity; there is no meter   
   > >> >running.   
   > >>   
   > >> Maybe there is (a meter running).   
   > >   
   > >Maybe there is!  But then -- who's driving the damn cab?    
   >   
   > That is the question. :-)   
      
   It is.   
      
   > Well, but my point was, in this incredibly vast universe, there are   
   > millions or billions of planets, physical life must abound, and at   
   > what stages are they in their journeys?  Every scrap of us includes   
   > them and I am not at all sure that every physical life entity will be   
   > completed with their journeys by the time a new universe could be   
   > created - and then what?  We start all over again?  Sounds horrendous!   
      
   Sounds like a good science fiction/fantasy story to me; but   
   it's not something I can wrap my mind around, really: the time   
   perspectives just seem incomprehensibly vast.  One scholar of   
   these matters tells me that there has already been, on this one   
   planet, a previous (to us) wave of self-conscious beings with   
   what we think of as souls who worked through their entire   
   spiritual development back in the pre-Cambrian age or there   
   abouts, in the form of some kind of big jellyfish creature.  If the   
   complete cycle is maybe around twenty thousand years, say, for   
   beings that have a life span like ours, that's just a drop in the   
   bucket of all time.  Many many animal species could have carried   
   many -- ah -- what?  Populations? of souls through their physical   
   phase just in all the time the universe has already existed, let   
   alone what's still to come.   
      
   As for starting over again, just the idea of having to come back   
   *here* a bunch of times more is enough to make me groan:   
   please, no, I've had enough!  Well, *I* think I have . . .   
      
   > >*Real* "meaninglessness* for me   
   > >would be an end without time for resolution, but I take the concept   
   > >of "eternity" to mean, time "enough" for all of it.   
      
   > All right - I'm not sure there will be enough time.  And even if there   
   > were, it is beyond me to imagine what would be the ultimate   
   > culmination - what we would do next.   
      
   Same for me; but I kind of think that all that is something that   
   just waits out there for us until we get to it, kind of like puberty,   
   when you're only eight.  Struggling to think about it is interesting,   
   but maybe it's just a diversion, at this point, from the job at   
   hand, which is the job we *can* do even if we don't understand   
   even that yet.   
      
   I was talking with a friend about sci-fi recently and bemoaning the   
   fact that at my age, I'm not likely to live long enough to experience   
   our first contact with an "alien" species.  He said don't worry about   
   it, it's going to be mostly wild misunderstandings anyway -- how   
   can we communicate effectively with aliens, when we still haven't   
   even figured out how to do that among ourselves?  I think it's still   
   baby-steps for us, but I also think we'll have more than all the time   
   we need; but I can't really justify that belief, I just *think* so.   
      
   > What you said in a prior post, about the urge to experience   
   > physicality - to be able to run in a strong body - many cannot!  To   
   > taste favorite foods again - I believe all one need do is remember it   
   > and the taste is experienced.  I don't believe at all that the   
   > prospect of physicality is attractive to the older discarnate soul or   
   > entity.   
      
   Well, but suppose you were unable to have an athletic or even a   
   fit body in this life, but then you're done and you realize that for   
   your next time around you can choose a body that's super-fit and   
   maybe is even going to be able to travel to the stars -- the   
   *physical* stars, not the vibrational perception of them that I   
   suppose non-physical beings would have.  That would be a pretty   
   strong temptation, wouldn't it?  I think it's a grass-is-always-   
   greener kind of situation: when you're in the body, you long to be   
   pure spirit, but when you're only spirit -- maybe then you long for   
   the powers of the body?  Why else would we keep coming back   
   (which I believe we do)?  Because of some kind of determinism?   
   Well, maybe -- but I'd rather believe that I choose to return   
   because there's something magnetic about being *here*, too.   
   And in the absence of proof either way, I think I'll stay with that.   
      
   > In any case, you didn't seem so condescending this time, and I   
   > appreciate that.   
      
   Thankyou!  I'm also an eldest child (of three sisters) who had a   
   working mom, so I was, in a way, a "teacher" long before I ever   
   stepped into a formal classroom.  Old habits die hard.  Just smack   
   me when I get on some high horse or other, will you?   
      
   C   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)