I want to go to heaven after a hard life

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As I get older, more isolated and cut off, my thoughts turn to what comes after.

I've watched many videos of near death experiences, and I would prefer heaven to hell. However, my life been lived on the dark side of things. Anger, despair, heartbreak, even suicides attempts are my history. These are not the loving and helping others type of lifestyles that gets you an admission ticket to the pearly gates.

Someone once said at work to a former boss of mine, when speaking about death, he said 'I'll be going to the other place'. My boss replied, 'How do you know that- you're not there yet are you!'. (He was a great guy)

As an Aspie I have barriers to living 'the good life', what can I do to move in the right direction? Any aspies here who've had NDE's, that can give guidance?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgF_iwUNqFU[/youtube]

(A ten part series of an atheist who went to heaven- worth watching all ten parts)

I'd really like something like this after death as well!

As an aspie you may have barriers to living the good life. However you can still be a good person. Try and do things for other people, pray to god to guide and console you. When you die and meet your maker, you will only be asked how you treated other people around you, what you did or did not do for them.

I will share a spiritual experience I had when I first started thinking I might have Aspergers. I was very upset and had cried out to the Lord (I am a Born Again Christian) "Why would you create someone who is incapable of being saved?" Shortly after that, I felt the holy Spirit come over me and He gave me the impression in my mind that I should not ask such questions! Of course He would NEVER create someone who could not choose to follow Him! After that moment, I was at peace with it.

From the Christian perspective, salvation is not dependent on the actions of the individual other than to make the choice to surrender to the Lord. Salvation was paid for at the Cross and cannot be earned. If it could be earned then man can have a part in salvation and take the glory away from God. As God does not like to share the glory with anyone, He would not make salvation dependent on the actions of man to atone for his own sin. In fact, the whole act of Jesus dying on the cross was a substitutionary sacrifice to pay a debt of sin that no man could ever do by himself. This satisfies God's need for holiness in His presence and makes man capable of being in the presence of God for eternity. So, do not fear that your life is not good enough for salvation. No man's life can EVER be good enough for that. Just give your life over to Him and you will be saved.

I like to think that God gives points for effort. None of us are perfect, we all do wrong things. In the Quran (I'm not a Muslim, I just liked this quote) it says that if God had wanted to make us all the same, then He would have done so. But He didn't, He knew what you would be like as a person. If you believe that God does not make mistakes, then the person He made (you) is a good person. Perhaps you have made some bad choices, but that doesn't mean you will go to Hell. All you can do is try your best with the situation and life you have been given. I too have attempted suicide, but I'm sure that God understands how anguished I felt when I did those things. I know I have tried my best and I am confident that this will be enough (if it isn't, then what would that say about God?).

I've recently been reading a lot about The Baha'i Faith. Their idea of Heaven and Hell is different to the one shared by Christians and Muslims and is based on how far you soul has progressed in this life. If you have worked hard to be close to God you will be close to Him in the afterlife and if not then you will be further away. But you can still improve after death and move closer to Him. This is a similar view to that held my some Sufi Muslims who believe that 'Hell' or separation from God is simply a temporary state and that in the end Hell will be empty. I also read something from a Jewish source, about the World To Come. They too see things as being closer to God or further away, rather than a place of acute physical suffering. The writer described Hell as 'the cheap seats' - still there, but not as near to the main event as one would like. I think the Jewish philosophy of focussing on this world rather than the next will serve you well. Continue to try to be the best person you can be, examining your conscience and decisions. Try not to obsess over where you will be going or when - that is truly out of your hands.

What scares me the most is the possibility of reincarnating time and time again as the person that I am now, as myself so to speak.
What a frightening thought. I don't really believe in reincarnation but being here just the once is more than enough for me. I don't want to come back a second time let alone countless times No way!

According to the Catholic Church, mortal sin - which is the sin that seperates us from God - requires knowledge and intent. In other words, it would require you to think something along the lines of "Hey, I know this will send me to Hell, but I don't care and I'm going to do it anyway!".

Also, do you really think that any God worthy of worship would send someone to eternal punishment for their thoughts and emotions? Do you think you would be doomed forever for suicide attempts? Those aren't exactly made when you are thinking your clearest or are in your right mind. I know, I've tried it myself.

Why not look more toward the loving nature of God, rather than the vengeful stories?

I'm not going into my belief system now, because this isn't about mine it's about yours. Look at the story of the prodigal son. Look at the story of the good thief on the cross.

Also, one of the books that did not make it into the Bible was written by St Peter. In that book he says that Jesus told him that eventually everyone gets into Heaven. I'm assuming this means that will be after some do their time in Purgatory. It was a toss up between that book and Apocolypse (Revelation to some) and they thought that Peters book would discourage people from trying as hard, so they put in John's instead.

_________________
I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
My forum is still there and everyone is welcome to come join as well. There is a private women only subforum there if anyone is interested. Also, there is no CAPTCHA.

The link to the forum is http://www.rightplanet.proboards.com

You're already in heaven when you treat others the same way you would have them treat you!

Heaven is in the moment, as is hell, we make the choice to live heaven or hell in each moment. God watches with infinite Love as we make our choice.


As an aside, I was talking to my hubby last night and I realized, it's not US that lack social graces, in fact we can be extremely considerate of others because we know how it feels to be mistreated. That's compassion right there, a straight ticket to Heaven! We lack 'fake' social stuff, the 'patting each other on the back, inflating each other's egos, ' and what not. We can learn to give comfort to others when we read the signal (distress is pretty damn universal, learn to pick up on it and you will always support someone else if you choose to make the gesture).

Basically in a nutshell, we can still choose to do what we can and push some of those limits to really be there for our fellow humans.

Remember we're all cut from the same cloth, autistic or NT and we are all Love itself living Life through God's grace. Only those who fall and turn away are denied that grace. Still, it's a choice, we always get one.

the knowledge that i have heaven waiting for me, is what enables me to put up with this life for as long as i have to.

I used to be a Christian, and didn't believe in reincarnation or out-of-body-experiences, but as I got older I realized that the God they talk about in the Bible couldn't possibly be the true creator, the biblical God was angry and jealous and vengeful. God is supposed to be full of mercy and love. So pondering this I decided to simply ask. "God, I know you're here, and all I want to know is the truth about you."

In answer I had a dream. In this dream, unlike all my other dreams, I was present as a participant in the first person and could not control anything. It was also vividly realistic, like actually being there. The first thing I realized in the dream was that I was not in the same body, and I was not the same gender. I knew I was Jewish and living in Germany in 1943. The SS was storming the building and we were trying to hide, but there wasn't enough time and they found me. The SS officer pulled out his pistol and shot me between the eyes.
That's when I knew that I had been that person and that I had lived many lives before that. Over time, I had other similar dreams, all of them exactly the same feeling, but with different bodies. Again, I asked, "What's this mean if we live more than once?"
The answer was simple "There is too much to experience in the universe to only live once, you can't possibly learn all there is to know in 70 years, so you come back."

If you really think about it, why would an all-powerful, all-knowing creator make us with the knowledge that billions of souls would be sent to a place of punishment for not thousands or millions or even trillions of years, but FOREVER? What loving parent would throw a child into a prison cell for the rest of their life because they made a childish mistake?

My suggestion to you is to research lots of different religions and then see what really makes sense to you. For me the only religion that made sense was none so I made up my own.

I believe that the universe was planned by a powerful entity we cannot imagine for reasons we cannot comprehend, and that the only way this being could experience this creation was to live as a part of it. And so this Being we call God divided into innumerable parts which, individually, could live and act as separate beings. Being of one original soul, we can pass from one life to the next, through space and time, so that each part of the whole can experience that of any other part. We are given the choice of our next life so that we can grow. We are made to forget previous lives so that our experiences are not skewed by what we were before. If it were so easy to recall our past lives it would make each life worth a bit less. If you have one car, it is very important to you, but if you know there are hundreds more in the garage you are less likely to take care of the one you're driving now.

In my religion, God expects us to act as if every other life is just as important, if not more so, than our own. We're all in this together and so we should work as if we are. Each moment is an opportunity to learn and grow, even if the lessons aren't pleasant. No matter what we do, however, God understands that we are tiny, stupid, insignificant creatures in the grand scheme of things and that we will mess up. We will NEVER be punished because we aren't doing anything wrong, we're doing exactly what we're supposed to!

Organized religion was created by humans in order to control humans. Fear is a powerful tool and what better way to instill fear than to tell people that they're going to burn in hell for eternity if they don't do exactly as this book here says. People who are afraid are easy to manipulate.

So, stop being afraid of death and God. I'm sure He has better things to do than plan out how to torment you because you didn't measure up to some other person's standards.

Honestly, this is my truth, but yours may be different. I feel peaceful knowing that an eternity of heaven or hell does not rest on the decisions I make in one life.

I've had an NDE from an overdose and also have had a few meditative breakthroughs (jhana experiences) that have lead me to believe:

NOTHING MATTERS, really. When 'you' are gone, it IS heaven, right here, right now.

Now for the real answer, everything does matter, relative to this current incarnation. Think of your life's purpose as "do no harm". This is more than getting your ego all twisted up into what you 'should' be doing, to get into some mythical place (a place!) that means nothing to this world. If you don't have a social life, you're not gossiping, you're not slandering, you're not doing any ill-will towards your fellow man. All GOD or anything religious asks of it's practitioner's is to lead a 'no harm' life. Do not intentionally harm yourself or others and you're good! It is really this simple. Do no harm. Compassion is not harming you or others.

Live life respecting life and heaven is within for you always, it's the refuge from suffering in this life.

to repent, check out my blog under my sig. Jesus said to the thief on the cross next to him, that tonight he would be with him in paradise.

I don't think reading about death really helps you get your mind off of death. If you got your mind off of death you'd probably feel less depressed.