No one knows yourself better than you do, yet there are moments when self-understanding does not suffice in solving recurring issues in one’s life. So, the real question is, how well do you know yourself? What if the root of your problems is you, yet not you? That’s when you take a peek into who you were in a previous life.
Past life regression puts the client under hypnotherapy. As the conscious awareness regresses into its past lives, one can often find the roots of current problems in one’s past. A rather intriguing subject, it would sometimes baffle the uninformed to a sense of disbelief. As upheld by present day co-owner of local wellbeing center Third Eye Wellness, Maisha Chulani explains that past life regressions, while a more unconventional form of therapy, are indeed able to help pinpoint the root cause of an issue in an individual’s life, explaining that, “Often the root cause can be linked to memories beyond the current life and need to be accessed by a regression to get a deeper healing.”
Mind over matter
Chulani had previously worked in the financial planning industry before practicing alternative healing. It was at that point in time that she had begun to question her life, a strong sense of discontentment and incompleteness had washed over her, as she began to wonder about her true purpose in this world. With that, she set off on a quest of spirituality and self-discovery, starting her journey by learning about hypnotherapy, sharing that, “It [hypnotherapy] teaches you the very basis of how the mind works. From there on, I never stopped as I continued to explore and add more healing modalities to my repertoire of skills.” Chulani found purpose in trying to understand the deepest facets of the human mind.
A session begins with the practitioner conversing with the client to understand more what they want to understand from the experience. “Usually when one asks to be regressed to a past life, there would be an issue or situation, which the client senses could be coming from a past life,” shares Chulani. One of the goals for each session is to access memories from previous lives that the mind had long ago tucked away into the subconscious. However, the mind will only show the person what it feels they are ready to see.
Close encounters of the past kind
At the beginning of a session, several meditative techniques are performed in order to induce deep sleep, as the conscious mind must first be fully relaxed to enable the probing of its repressed memories. The experience was like watching an out-of-focus motion picture, wherein one could see the environment they lived in and the people they interacted with, although there was no way to see all of the tiny details. Maybe uncovered a past life as a woman whose humble abode was a red clay house in the early 16th century, and getting a general idea of how she lived and died[wat dis], uncovering our past lives through regression therapy requires a great deal of courage to relive both the joyful and painful memories you think you might not be ready to face.
One of Chulani’s more notable sessions with a client was when a woman came in for a past life regression to address her situation of struggling to let go of being in an on-again-off-again relationship. During her session, she regressed to the point of entry of four different lives. At first the woman saw her life as a cavewoman, the next as a shy milkmaid, which was then followed by her life as an introverted little boy, and lastly, she saw her life as a French politician.
In all four of those lives, she faced the same recurring issue of loneliness upon death since she could not find the love she needed in any of those pasts. With regards to this session, Chulani explains that, “Reliving these lives through the regression brought on the awareness as to why she found it difficult to let go—the fear of being alone was so strongly etched in her soul as she had experienced it many times before.”
The religious debate
Even with the increasing curiosity towards alternative healing, religion proves to have a strong hold on society up to this day. A whole understanding of life being present after death has been embedded in Catholics since baptism; a soul in the afterlife, whether it be heaven or hell—not reincarnation[incoherent pero I get the point, word it better]. “…there are those who are more rigid in their beliefs,” Chulani acknowledges. It is true that there are many doubters of the authenticity of this form of hypnotherapy, but it goes without saying that there is still respect for those who remain faithful.
With that in mind, Chulani emphasizes that there is no friction in her practice “as a practitioner we does not discriminate and respect all religions.” She also pointed out that clients do not participate with their faith in mind. “A majority of our clients believe in the existence of past lives and they are the ones who contact us for sessions, and hence there is never a need to ‘convince’ anyone otherwise.” Although a clashing of ideas may contribute to many objections, religion should not be the sole culprit for misconceptions either.
Hypnosis misconstrued
It could be misconceptions brought about by the media that makes people wary of past life regressions. Cartoons depict hypnosis as putting a participant in a fully submissive state, with the fear that a person could be hypnotized permanently. Chulani explains that no one has ever been stuck in hypnosis as “it is a naturally occurring state that we enter and exit during the normal course of the day.” She elaborates that we “switch” between alpha and beta brain waves occurring in everyday actions such as watching TV and conversing.
She further denies the claims that it would place the client in a submissive state reassuring that the participant will always be in control in rejecting suggestions. “The practitioner is merely a guide or facilitator; in fact, during a hypnotic session you are fully aware of what is going on,” she says.
Open-mindedness
This form of hypnotherapy may hold many misconceptions, but in reality, it promotes deep reflection and self-actualization. In its true essence, it is a way for people to reconnect with themselves as looking into our past lives provides us with a more well-rounded understanding of who we really are and how we came to be.
While there may still be skeptics, Chulani explains that there should be nothing to fear from the concept of past lives and soul reincarnation, going on to state that, “The idea of our soul being immortal and knowing that we are more than just our physical bodies creates the understanding that we have many opportunities to learn our lessons in order to master this experience of life.” There are some questions we can’t answer, but are we brave enough to view the life you thought you had forgotten?
