If you want to donate, we have a thread with updated donation options here at this link: About Donations
Although the obvious answer is that belief does not affect gravity, to give a counterexample there is a demonstrable health benefit of simply believing in one's own healing / wanting to heal. Taking placebo as medication is also more effective than not taking it, because the mind is tricked into believing that the body may heal. Imo that means one's beliefs affect some aspects of the way one's whole body works, and I don't see how it stops at that point. To demonstrate my point: if I firmly believe that I will help millions of children have access to clean drinking water, then first my mind and body will adjust to my beliefs, meaning that I will find mental fortitude and motivation to physically work on that goal, which in turn will affect the environment in significant ways.
This is a valid point in its own right. In a sense, belief is extremely central to the human experience. It affects our everyday attitudes. An obvious example would be the misanthrope who constantly has his/her attitude reinforced by routinely manifesting hostile encounters with others.
Maybe on that level it doesn't even matter if one calls it life or death, the point is to realize that all is one and the same. I embrace death as my true nature, and I acknowledge the delusion created by the human body and mind for what it is: a corrupt projection of a mere fragment of actual reality. I don't know if that would be called the right view, or that's just how I interpret the teachings of early Buddhism.
I think you have a good understanding. The direct experience is said to be very liberating, as the burden of being a struggling human is exposed as a mere fiction.
Because you want it. Do you want it? And what do you mean by eternal life? The Christian version? In an actual Heaven? There are real problems with the concept of Heaven. For one an eternity in one place would get horribly boring, a torture eventually I would think. And there are supposedly no tears in heaven, no sadness. So do they erase our memories, because some memories are sad. There are whole lists of problems like that with heaven. Bhuddism has an eternal life, but not a personal one. But if its a choice between heaven, where you are stuck forever, and annihilation, annihilation I think might be better.
Revelation 14:1–5 speaks about the 144000 that have Jesus' and the Father's name written on their foreheads, singing a new song before the throne and the hayyot and the elders that no one else can learn and so on, but I don't see how that excludes others from occupying different places in the heavenly kingdom.
How a lot of people stereotype Heaven with endless singing, it would get boring, yes yes. However, I doubt it'll actually end up as they say! xD Because otherwise, it'd be boring and no fun at all! >_< In essence, not really paradise in Heaven~ There are tears in Heaven. He just wipes them away (Revelation 21:4).
Steroype? What evidence do you have that a heaven even exixts?
