What is past-life regression therapy?
Regression simply means “to go back in time.” As one can infer from the title of the process, past-life regression means to go back in time to a life you had prior to your current life. The “therapy” part relates to information recalled from a past life or lives which has relevance to a particular challenge you have in your current life. This challenge can be of a psychological, emotional, or physical nature, and in fact usually all three layers of your Self are ultimately involved in any condition. The mere act of becoming aware of past-life information is in itself therapeutic for many people. A far deeper understanding of your current life circumstances can occur which can be both mentally and physically liberating.
What’s involved in the process of past-life regression?
To begin with, hypnosis is used to bring the individual to a state of focused concentration whilst being deeply relaxed. Many people become anxious on mention of the word “hypnosis” because of preconceived ideas and beliefs about what it is and what happens to you when hypnotized.
- Hypnosis is not a form of sleeping – although on some occasions the process can cause the client to fall asleep if they are particularly exhausted.
- You may be anxious that you cannot emerge from hypnosis back into full conscious awareness. The fact is that all you have to do to regain normal consciousness is to have the slightest thought that you don’t want to be in this state anymore and it will be instantly over. You cannot become “stuck” in the hypnotized state – you open your eyes and return to normal consciousness when instructed by the hypnotist or of your own volition.
- You do not give up your power or control to the hypnotist. You are always in control. Any hypnosis is actually self-hypnosis. The hypnotist is facilitating the process of recall and in so doing may make suggestions whilst guiding your experience. There is no coercion for a suggestion to be followed, you can readily refuse a suggestion and even take the opposite route to a suggestion.
- You cannot be made to do anything that is contrary to your personal set of ethics and morals.
- Hypnosis, in itself, is not harmful.
- Hypnosis does not act like some kind of truth serum. You are always in control of the situation, including what you divulge to the hypnotherapist. You can withhold or falsify information if this is your intent.
Difficulties may arise from a session because of the clinician’s inability to effectively guide the client. The same conditions exist in any helping relationship where one person is in distress, vulnerable, and seeking relief. (Michael D. Yapko, Ph.D. Essentials of Hypnosis.)
Falling into a hypnotic trance is different for each individual. In general, around 20% of people can be hypnotized fairly easily; 65% (the majority of people) can be hypnotized on a light scale, however with practice and experience, many can go on to experience deeper levels. The remaining 15% of people may experience a light level of trance occasionally or not achieve any recognized level of trance.
Past Life Regression primarily utilizes hypnosis in order to bring the subject into a very deeply relaxed state of focused concentration before guiding them through the recall experience. In this state, you are able to access your subconscious store of information. This subconscious store holds every detail of your experiences in your current life – from what you had for breakfast this day three years ago to the feeling you had when you won that race at the school sports day back when you were nine years-old.
Your subconscious library.
You might want to picture your subconscious store as a huge library with thousands of shelves of books that contain all the information you could possibly require. The books that contain information relating to your current life are nearest to hand for the issuing librarian at the customer enquiry desk of your subconscious library.
The librarian is well used to continuously issuing “current life” information booklets to your enquiring conscious-mind. What most people’s conscious-minds don’t realize is that the issuing librarian can, if instructed, access shelves of books from the farthest reaches of this majestic building. Books that contain the autobiographies of lives that are particularly influential to the current life of the individual. Instructing the subconscious librarian can only be done whilst your ego-self takes a well-earned break from its focus on the physical world – when it is relaxed for a few moments. Suggestions on what books to look for can then be made and the contents of them revealed to your conscious-mind. Gently and intuitively instructing your subconscious librarian to make available these autobiographies to your conscious-mind is part of the skill of the regressionist.
Another lifetime?
Of course for many, such a notion of past or other lives – let alone being able to access the information contained within these debatable tomes – is something that is regarded as pure fantasy.
However, provided the subject has an open mind at least to such possibilities then the process of past-life regression can progress with this essential mental lubrication. With practice and a skilled guide, this meditative process can bring an expansive confidence to your current life as well as a far deeper understanding of your total Self.
Resources and Recommended Reading:
www.brianweiss.com – website of the foremost pioneering psychiatrist in past-life regression.
Many Lives, Many Masters; Messages from the Masters; Through Time into Healing; Same Soul, Many Bodies. Brian L. Weiss, M.D.
Past Life Therapy in Action. Dick Sutphen and Lauren L. Taylor.
Discovering Your Past Lives. Gloria Chadwick.
Life After Life. Raymond A. Moody.
Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation. Ian Stevenson.
