Reincarnation

I'm with a friend who's watching a film called "Waking Life." Interesting film. But the opening scene talks about reincarnation as the collective memory-the idea that you aren't born just yourself, but the collection of what has come before you. This is very interesting considering that I currently live in a country where nearly every person's actions are governed by the belief in reincarnation-women who are in prostitution don't deserve help to get out or shouldn't hope to get out because they were bad in a past life and this is the price they pay, victims of motor crashes need not be helped because this is their fate and a bi-product of something done wrong in a past life.

I don't believe in reincarnation. The Word tells us clearly that we were each knit together in our mother's womb. But I do think it's a bit megalomaniac to believe that our experiences are all our own, that nothing came before us to make us who we are or to create the environment that we currently inhabit. I'm not sure each of us believes this fully, but to some extent I believe this is an American ideal. We're used to the New Frontier, creating our "own" way. But so much is lost in this way of thinking. This is when elders become useless in society, this is when community becomes a weakness.

So perhaps not reincarnation, but I think we could all use a dose of collective memory, collective experience, to in habit a bit more of our thought process.