Past life exploration is an excellent process to use to help you understand present life patterns and spiritual work (karma).
Regression to a past life through hypnotherapy with a trained and expert hypnotherapist is the most common and trusted way to explore past lives.
You can also explore past lives using kinesiology (muscle testing) and working with a psychic, especially one who can tap into the Akashic records.
Past life exploration hinges on the idea that our souls reincarnate continuously over lifetime after lifetime. Rarely do we naturally remember these lifetimes, but they form our soul continuity, helping us grow into the fullness of human experience that we cannot grasp in a single, limited life, even if we live to be very old.
Reincarnation is a central belief in many cultures, especially Eastern and Middle Eastern ones, and has been part of their long histories. Reincarnation has been gaining in popularity in the West, due in some part to immigration, but more largely thanks to psychology, especially the branch is known as hypnotherapy.
Michael Newton, Ph.D. (1931 to 2016) provided groundbreaking work in regression hypnotherapy through a series of books, starting with his first best-seller, Journey of Souls: Case Studies of Life Between Lives (Llewellyn, 1994). In his work he discovered people, under hypnosis, could recall precise details about past lives and past locations they never studied or visited in their present lives.
More and detailed research has been done, especially with children, who have been able to recall details they would not be able to explain at their current age. Perhaps the best books to read are Children’s Past Lives by Carol Bowman and Children Who Remember by Dr. Ian Stevenson. Other excellent books on the subject include:
There may be several reasons why exploring a past life or many of your past lives could be helpful. The two most prominent reasons usually have to do with understanding a present-life issue or relationship that cannot be explained with only the knowledge and experience of your present life.
Irrational phobias, that go beyond a normal range of fear or worry, which are not found to have a basis in a traumatic present life experience, can be an example of a psychic or spiritual trauma from a previous life.
And the other prominent reason is to seek and understand your soul’s purpose, in this lifetime, and, often, as the common purpose of multiple previous lifetimes.
I began my career journey in this lifetime very dedicated to the teaching profession; it “made sense” to me and I found it very easy to do the job at a very high level (earning a Ph.D. in English and teaching at the college level for nearly 17 years).
Through two very specific regressions to past lives in different eras and cultures, I found that my role as a teacher was significant and recurring. I have also learned that I have tried other roles that did not “suit” me at all.
Hypnotherapy is the most common and in-depth way to explore a past life. At the deepest level, the hypnotherapist and the technique can “put you back into the past life.” You can “be there again.” As you might surmise, for some events and experiences such an in-depth journey might be more than you want to face or re-engage.
Not to worry, a regression can be guided and allowed at different levels of engagement. It is a common misconception and misrepresentation that a hypnotherapist can “take control” of you and get you to do things you would not choose to do under hypnosis. Hypnosis opens doorways, but you have to choose if you will go through or not.
In a very powerful session, I worked to regress back to one of my deaths, over 1500 years ago in India, where I committed suicide by swimming out into the Indian Ocean and allowing myself to drown. This session dealt with two significant issues, my irrational fear of the ocean and my relationship with my daughter.
As we were working to the moment I swam out into the ocean, the therapist asked when I wanted to leave and how I want to experience the moment. I could go all the way down and re-experience actually drowning, or I could observe myself from above, or I could simply know I committed the act and pull out then. I chose to observe, but not relive the experience.
After the work was done, I did not have the irrational fear of the ocean, but I did not want to become a sailor either. And I understood the deeply profound connection I have with the soul of my daughter in this lifetime because it was her soul, as my daughter, that was with me in that lifetime.
We were separated due to a plague that caused me to enter a state of despair which lead to my choice to end my life. Powerful and important shifts happened for me in that session that day, many years ago.
Another way to explore past lives is through muscle testing. There are numerous techniques; here is a site that explains different ways to self-test: https://www.healing-with-eft.com/self-muscle-testing.html. You can also do the testing with the help of another person, usually by holding your arm out to the side and having the other person push down after asking you a question or having you make a statement.
If the answer is true or beneficial, you can keep your arm straight. If the answer is false or detrimental, the other person can push your arm down with little effort, even if you “think to resist”.
Exploring past lives this way keeps you fully conscious and outside the experience of the past life, you need or want to explore. I could still get information about the past life I went through in the hypnotherapy session I wrote about above, I just would not “go there” – back to India, that body, that location, and go through that experience.
However, I could get the same information – where I was, when I was, who/what I was (a man who was a priest), and what happened to me.
Perhaps the foremost voice, and most recognized, is Ainslie MacCleod, who has appeared on Oprah’s Super Soul Conversations: https://www.oprah.com/own-podcasts/ainslie-macleod-living-the-life-your-soul-intended.
He believes “past lives explain everything. Which is why he explores past lives to help you make the most of this life.” (https://ainsliemacleod.com/). He uses his ability to tap into past life information for his clients to help with present life issues.
Some psychics specialize in access to the Akashic Records, which “are a compendium of all universal events, thoughts, words, emotions and intent ever to have occurred in the past, present, or future in terms of all entities and life forms, not just human.” (Wikipedia).
These individuals can help you access past life information and explain the present life thread and future life direction, depending on how you choose to deal with the issue in this lifetime.
So, if you do not want to go as deeply in as hypnotherapy, and you do not want to do the work on your own, with self-muscle testing, you can get someone with professional muscle testing experience and spiritual training/expertise or contact a psychic who specializes in past life information or Akashic Records access. No matter how you go about past life exploration, you will find the experience enlightening, interesting, and revealing.
