Dhamma Wheel Buddhist Forum

Right, not sure where to ask this... but it's about rebirth.

It is possible someone could be more inclined to behave or think in a certain way because of conditioning before their 'current' life? I am often careful not to say 'past lives', but you know what I'm getting at...

I mean, could it be possible that I have always been more comfortable sitting in certain ways or thinking certain things BECAUSE somewhere back in this particularly Kammic stream there were other Buddhist practitioners? It's little things I've noticed, like my earliest memories are of me debating existentialism with my primary school teachers (although I didn't know what it was at the time... looking back it's clear what I was debating). As a child I used to sit in the full lotus position, now and I've only ever been able to sleep in the lalitasana position (which drives my wife mad because we don't have a big bed). I've always had this sense that the 'first person perspective' of the universe wasn't quite right. I have a clear memory of being VERY young and walking down the road and thinking "am I walking forwards or is the road moving backwards". Things like this have always ran through my mind. I've ALWAYS been a pacifist, always tried to avoid aggression (although anger is something I am always battling with).

Could part of my decision to be a Buddhist now be the result of Kammic conditioning in 'past lives'?

Could part of my decision to be a Buddhist now be the result of Kammic conditioning in 'past lives'?

And also the active present decision...
I could never forget In 1989, just a week after my Baptism, I had a recurring dream for over a month. In that dream, it showed me 3 things:
Firstly, it showed me an altar to the Buddha
Secondly, it showed me that by the time I start my career, I would have been a Buddhist.
Thirdly, there will be a very fierce persecution in store for me but encouraged me to be steadfast.
Today, It came to past.
My mom used to think I was possessed when I told her that I could hear chanting that sounded like Thai Monks or the Chinese Mahayana from nowhere, I could sketch Buddha/Bodhisattva figurines from mere Mind images, dreams/mind images of Avalokitesvara and the list goes on...
A link from the past perhaps? Merely strengthened by the present efforts....

Namo Amitabha Buddha!
(P.S Mawkish, wht happened to the rotating icon? )

Hi Mawkish,

It seems the same for me. Although I never have been comfortable cross legged. I feel that my general philosophical thrust was pointing to Buddhism for as far back as I can remember. I remember tying to meditate when I was about twelve and I cant remember where I got it from. Actually I think it was an Indiana Jones movie where he goes to Tibet. I have always been highly ethically sensitive although without any religious upbringing or conceptual reason why. I remember consulting my mother( I was an only child of a single mom) as young as six years old about how people are. I would tell her when she was crying over how people treat her that they were just confused and how everyone wants to be happy they just dont know how.

I finally came into contact with Buddhism in Thailand. I was on vacation with my wife and somehow the interesting thing to me was hanging out with the monks. I have never felt any draw to religion and it wasn't really a devotional interest I just liked it. It certainly baffled my wife. I still had no notion of calling myself a Buddhist or any thought about finding out what it was about. It was about a year later that I was sitting around feeling a bit pointless that the Buddha image on my mantel (which I had bought in Thailand) caught my eye. I went on Buddhanet.net and that was first time I got a coherent description of Buddhism from the Buddhism in 5 min page. It hit me like a Mack truck. I was a Buddhist. I yelled across my apartment "Honey... Im a Buddhist!!" to which my wife replied "Uh.. Can we talk about this."

Metta

Gabriel

I had a obsession for statues of the Buddha when I was little and one of my favourite games when I was about ten was to play "buddhist monks" dressed up in my mum's burnt orange bed sheets.

Mawkish1983 wrote:It is possible someone could be more inclined to behave or think in a certain way because of conditioning before their 'current' life?
...
Could part of my decision to be a Buddhist now be the result of Kammic conditioning in 'past lives'?

Yes.