From 1999 to 2002, I had a weekly column at Wired.com (
www.wired.com) reporting on the publishing industry. All too often the facts I discovered about this business sounded more like fiction than the novels I was writing. But that's a subject for another blog post altogether.
It was during those years that I had to overcome a certain innate shyness and approach total strangers to ask for interviews.
No one was more surprised than me when they'd say yes.
But no one I've ever asked has mattered to me as much as the man who agreed to answer this questionnaire for this blog. He's a true inspiration who has radically changed my perceptions over the years and someone who has himself written extensively about the subject at hand.
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Deepak Chopra
www.deepakchopra.com
Most Recent Book:
Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment
Q. Do you believe that reincarnation is possible?
A. I think consciousness outlives the death of the physical body through which it expresses itself. Also, the universe is constantly recycling itself while evolving to higher levels of creativity. Because we are a part of the universe, we too recycle ourselves and continue to evolve to higher levels of creativity. As a result, there is no such thing as a person. What we call a person is a constantly evolving confluence of memories, desires, imagination, relationships, meanings, contexts, and archetypal stories.
Q.What books on the subject have made an impression on you or do you recommend people who are interested in the subject read?
A. Life Before Life by Dr. Jim B. Tucker, Life After Death: The Burden of Proof
Q. What is your most marked characteristic that you believe could be a holdover from a past life?
A. As I mentioned, I do not think of myself as a person. We are wisps of memory, and threads of desire latching on to chunks of consciousness and participating in a cosmic dance. The only solution to all of life's conundrums is enlightenment ? to move to a domain of awareness beyond the personal self to the universal self. Any holdovers that I have from the past are part of my collective karmic inheritance. These include attachment to outcome and need for approval.
Q. What is your principle defect that you believe might be inherited from a previous incarnation?
A. As I mentioned, I do not think of myself as a person so I am unable to answer the question.
Q. Which of your favorite heroes do you think you actually could have been and why?
A. I believe that we all have relationships with archetypes but since we do not have a separate self, our heroes are archetypal energies that we karmically resonate with. My heroes include Jesus, Buddha, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa, Krishna, amongst others. But I do not believe I was one of them because as I have shared before, there is no such thing as a separate self.
Q. What three people from history would you like to have over to dinner for a discussion about reincarnation?
A. Jesus Christ, Buddha, Hitler; not to discuss reincarnation but to understand what made them who they are.
Q. What do you think happens when we die?
A. We upgrade or downgrade the illusion that we call reality as a result of the state of consciousness we are in.
Q. When you come back next time, who would you like to be?
A. Don't plan to return.