Memories, Past Lives, and Enlightenment

Are we our experiences?


From what I understand from spiritual philosophies, we are nothing more than a point of awareness centered in an infinite ocean. every point in the ocean is its centre. The centres are often referred to as our egos, and most forget that they also include the rest of the ocean.

As pure awareness, we have no memories, no thoughts, and only a state of pure bliss. I accidentally stumbled upon such a state after hypothetically smoking a huge joint of medicinal grade substance layered with hash after a long break from it. I was not prepared in any way. I left my friend to be alone and while having a shower started losing the ability to stand as my legs shook. Then I sat in bed and battled with my own thoughts. Eventually I let go and just let the thoughts flow and observe them and suddenly I felt as though I was approaching a singularity in a black hole(at least how I imagined it would be like based on scientist's speculations). As I approached the singularity I felt like instead of my body being ripped apart by gravity it was as if my thoughts were being pulled away. Eventually I was a singular point higher than my general perspective in relation to the inside of my head, and then I started coming back down as I was relieved that I didn't die(it felt like I was dying).

As much as the experience was unpleasant, for a moment nothing mattered and all I was was a point of awareness in a blissful state. I do not suggest doing drugs to reach such states however I believe they can give great insight at times. Almost like a sneak peak at what can be achieved by safer and less addictive methods through meditation and such.

On the topic of drugs, I once read a trip report of somehow who did dmt which I have never tried, but the experiences have always interested me. The individual talked about being consciousness squeezed into a body which always exists in spacetime and we can leave and visit whenever. Although I don't think the individual communicated clearly what was meant, it made me think and I believe i understand why I was so intrigued and how it relates to enlightenment and memories.

I realized that we are not our experiences, but I still believed memories to always be with us. While thinking about past lives and people with amnesia, I realized that all it takes to become a past life is one moment/memory. As most of us are now we believe we are like a substance that carries memories and some even say our memories are in our aura. What we are though is just a point of awareness in spacetime constantly moving. We are not the kid we were growing up or the teenager in high school. We are who we are at this moment which is like a spotlight moving across spacetime.

When we think of an old memory we think of the last time we remembered it, or remembered that we remembered it and so on. We are always thinking of just a moment in spacetime. As we are now we are obsessed with being our memories and so we think mostly of the moments our current bodies are a part of.

What if you could remember someone else's moment? Or their whole life? Would that make you that person? In a sense it makes you that person, but not the point of awareness that experiences that person.

Someone who is enlightened often talks of the now(along with self proclaimed spiritualists who butcher its meaning). Like Walt Whitman who writes about filling and emptying the future and past in a poem.

I've come to believe that clearing karma means breaking connections to your current life. Past and future projections. Karma as in an attachment and not as in doing good or bad deeds. The result being able to connect to any life. Any moment future or past. Buddha could experience his past life memories but he didn't identify with them. He could experience your past or anyone else's. He could have even experienced this moment of typing this.

We of course still have a certain continuation of the point of awareness that we are and so we are reborn and evolve as humans to eventually living on other planets or whatever. But upon enlightenment we are able to experience anything and in a sense become everything as the ocean of potential and nothing as the singular point.

People often want to remember all their past lives and be a certain continuum of memories, but we were never those memories in the first place. I can think "I want to remember this moment in a future life and then my present self will be preserved". But the more I think that the more moments there are that I am expecting to remember and anyone can experience them so if you identify with memories then anyone can become you, so why does it matter if you specifically become those moments.

I don't know if what I'm saying is very clear, but I just thought I would share that.