Past life regression is a process ( praised by some psychologists and ridiculed by others) through which a person can explore his or her subconscious in hopes of discovering influences from previous incarnations on their present life. It is not hard to regress a person to a past life, provided you have patience; it is, however, something to approach cautiously, for there are some dangers. If you conduct a past-life regression, please read and follow ALL the following advice. I have put this together from several different sources over the years and it is a process that works well and safely for most.
Why Explore Past Lives?
There are dozens of reasons you might want to experiment with past-life regression, not all of them good. Simple curiosity is the most common reason — why not learn something about who you used to be?
A problem in your current life is one of the better reasons for trying past-life regression; for instance, you find yourself unable to concentrate during the day because feelings and impressions you don’t think belong to you are intruding. Exploring past lives might help you put these issues to rest.
It is not wise to explore your past lives because you think you were Cleopatra, or because you want to fiddle around with it. Like any paranormal or psychological experience, past-life regression should be approached with respect and faith that it will work.
It is also flat-out stupid to regress anyone who has a serious mental illness — particularly anything related to schizophrenia. Work only with stable subjects. Serious mental illness absolutely must be treated by a psychologist, and mind-exploring experiences like past-life regression should be conducted only under the care of a qualified professional therapist. Just don’t do it. Period.
Does It Work?
It depends on who you ask. I have conducted past-life regressions, and though I am skeptical that we really understand what’s going on in them, details given to my by those I’ve guided have been too accurate and too obscure to just be made up.
Still, there is no scientific proof of the persistence of the soul beyond this life. It is wise to be skeptical that past life regression involves real recovered memories from a previous lifetime.
What is known is that past-life regression can help people deal with troublesome issues interfering with their current lives. When handled by a sensitive and well-prepared guide, past-life regression can be cathartic and therapeutic.
How To Lead A Past-Life Regression Session
If you are inexperienced, do not try to regress yourself!
The participants in a regression should be a guide and a subject who is being regressed. Both should be comfortable with one another. Because you do not ever want to interrup this process, both should have taken care of all physical needs — eating, drinking, bathroom, smoking, etc. — prior to the session. In addition, neither should be intoxicated in any way.
The guide should have a cup of water nearby; because regression may involve a lot of talking, you may get thirsty. The subject should sit in a very comfortable chair or, better, lie down on a comfortable bed with a mattress that moves minimally (i.e., a waterbed is not a great idea.) The subject should be wearing very comfortable clothes, with nothing constricting him — it is acceptable to do this naked provided the room is warm enough. The less sensation the subject is feeling from outside, the easier it is to focus on the regression; for this reason, remove things like music, bright light, strong odors, etc., from the environment. The subject should close his eyes.
The guide should sit near enough the subject to reach out and touch him, but far enough to not disturb him. For at least the first session, there should be no one else present.
Once everyone is comfortable, the guide can start helping the subject fall into a trance. In a very calm voice, say:
Imagine the color red. See it with your inner eyes. Red as an apple, as a fire engine, as the sunset. Now eliminate images of any thing and just imagine the color red filling your mind and your body. If you have the color red in your mind, nod.
[wait for the subject to nod]
“Now move down a little, to the color orange. Pumpkins are orange, traffic cones are orange, oranges are orange. Allow the color orange to fill your mind and body. When you have the color orange in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now move to the color yellow. Yellow is happy, the shade of the sun or bananas or the center of a daisy. Let the color yellow fill your mind and body. When you have the color yellow in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now move to the color green, like grass, like frogs, like the ocean and tree leaves. Allow the color green to fill your mind and body. When you have the color green in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now move to the color blue. This is the sky on a clear day, water, bluebell flowers and the eyes of a baby. Allow the color blue to fill your mind and body. When you have the color blue in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now move to the color purple. Purple is the color of plums, of lilacs, of the robes of a king. Allow the color purple to fill your mind and body. When you have the color purple in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now, you have one more color to move to, the color indigo. This is a special shade of purple, somewhere between blue and purple, and it is the color of magic and the subconscious. Try to see the color indigo in its spot between blue and purple. when you have the color indigo in your mind, nod.
[wait]
“Now allow the color indigo to expand and fill your body. Now let it overflow, spilling out of your body and making you glow indigo. You are an indigo being. In your mind, open your eyes. You are standing before a door. Do you see the door?
[wait]
“Open the door, and describe to me what you see.”
At this point, your subject is in a light trance. If you wish to modify any of the preceding script, feel free; just remember that you have to go through these colors in the precise order they are in, and that you should always give examples of things that are in that color so that your subject has an easier time seeing them. In addition, the color must fill the mind and body.
After the door is opened, things will be very free-form. what you want to do is help the subject find a door beyond this one that will allow him into his past life. Because you are right now on the surface of his subconscious, the door can take many different forms: it can be an actual door, a mirror, a stairway down (this is good), a box, an amulet, a closet, a vehicle – you get the idea. In each subject, the door is likely to take a different form.
Maintaining the same calm voice, allow the subject to explore the world beyond the first door while he searches for the second door that will lead him to his past life. Have him tell you what he’s seeing and doing, and encourage him to explore. If at any time he starts getting “freaky,” stop immediately and have him return through the first door, then go through the colors backward from indigo up to red.
Chances are, though, that he will find the second door fairly quickly and be eager to go through it. Tell him before he opens that second door (or triggers it in whatever way it must be triggered) that as soon as he goes through it he will find himself inside the person he used to be. At no point should you suggest to him anything specific he should or could be seeing; allow him to take you through his world.
Inside His World
While your subject is exploring his past life, ask him to give you specific details. For instance, what does his clothing look like? His underwear? What manner of transportation do people use? What do dwellings look like? Where does he think he is? (you may have to work to get specifics on this.) What does he see around him? Ask for details.
If any of this is particularly interesting, write it down; or you can record your session, provided both of you are willing. Unique details that the subject should not know can be looked up later to help the two of you understand the regression, and determine for yourselves what degree of confidence to assign the past-life person.
Do not be afraid to ask exploratory questions — name, address, titles if any, what kind of life this person leads, whether he or she is married or has children, etc. As long as you don’t ask anything that has leading details, you are likely to get some surprising answers.
If at any point the subject gets agitated or nonresponsive, bring him out immediately. If possible, take him back out the door into his between-doors world, then bring him back up through the colors; this will eliminate any residual emotions. If this is not possible, touch him, shake him, or do anything else that will bring him back to consciousness of the present time immediately.
Once the subject is done exploring his past life, bring him back through the door, and allow him to explore this world again before bringing him through the first door and back up the colors, indigo to red.
Afterward, both of you should discuss what you found.
A Case Study
I once regressed a good friend because he was curious about his past life. We went down the colors, and his first door opened into a forest. Hanging on several of the trees were mirrors, apparently his doorways. He went through the first mirror — and I almost immediately lost control.
He started describing his clothing to me — a sword, high-collared shirt, vest, riding boots — and told me he was on a horse. We later looked up clothing details (because I sew historical costume, I knew many of the right questions to ask for this) and determined his vision took place around the Napoleonic era. He knew he was in England and that the coast was nearby but not so close you could see or hear it. He was riding down a dark road between dense trees, and at the end of the road, he could see a large house, at least two stories. In an upper window, there was a light, and the silhouette of a woman in the window.
And then he started thrashing about. It scared the bejeesus out of me. His hands were clenched before him, he was twisting from side to side, and his legs were flexing. I brought him out right away because he would not answer me when I asked repeatedly what was wrong.
When he came out, this normally-calm man was panting and wild-eyed, sweat beading on his forehead. It took him a few minutes to calm down, but it turned out he had fallen completely into the memory. He was on the horse, and he knew that he was the lover of the woman in the window, riding to see her. He lost it when he saw another man, silhouetted in the window with her, strike her. When she fell out of sight, and started “riding” toward the house as fast as he could.
Needless to say, we were both shocked at the outcome. We never got the rider’s name, and I was afraid to take my friend back into the memory for fear of what might happen if I could not bring him back out. Instead, he explored the other mirrors.
If you try past-life regression, be ready to pull your subject out if something like this happens. Never leave him or her in a volatile regression just to see what happens.
