Should any potential clients want to fly to the moon and play among the stars, they need only to book an appointment, settle into my office and adventurously fly backwards into the past or jet forwards into the future. Past life regressions and Future life progressions are becoming commonplace and quite in demand in my hypnotherapy private practice.
Crazy you say! Admittedly I, too, used to think so. I thought especially crazy after I read a couple books by Brian Weiss M.D., MANY LIVES MANY MASTERS (1988) and MESSAGES FROM THE MASTERS (2000). When I first read these books I discerned them to be corny and quite non-academic; my second readings years later, I discovered I quite liked the concepts and themes but alas, still somewhat corny and still quite non-academic. But so what. Who am I to judge Brian Weiss in any regard.
Factoid: Besides his medico creds of being a psychiatrist and now hypnotherapist, he’s also a best selling author who writes mainly about past life regressions. I’ve read that his consumer queue to schedule an appointment with Brian is over a thousand clients long. Can you imagine! To seek counsel from Brian Weiss you’re in a line with over a thousand others in front of you!
Another (obvious) factoid: Brian Weiss is the readers’ guru of past life regression. And I must admit, dear reader, that I’ve given his books to some my past life regression clients as gifts, and also that I’ve read even more of his books as of late.
Crazy again you say? Well, dear reader, if you think past life regression is too far out-there, then what do you think of the beliefs of most major world religions. Astral travel and other out-of-body experiences that transcend both time and space seem key to the faithful followers of most, if not all, the world religions. Whether it be the resurrection of an actual body in the flesh, or an eternal reckoning for a wandering soul, life after death is the fundamental concept for our world religions.
Let’s dance, or rather, trip the light fantastic over a few examples. Over two billion followers of the Christian faith believe that physical death does happen, and when it does, those who live a good life and believe in Jesus Christ will be rewarded with life eternal in Heaven. And those who reject Jesus Christ will be sentenced to a life eternal in Hell. (Catholic Christians also believe in Purgatory, the place where one’s sins are stayed and purified before entering Heaven.) All this is written in the Christian good book, the Bible.
Two billion followers of Islam, too, believe in life after death. They refer to this as Akhirah. In the Muslim faith it is Allah who decides when a person dies. Similarly, as in Christianity, those who’ve performed more good deeds than bad deeds, get an eternal pass into Paradise, a place of no sickness, no pain, no sadness; while those who’ve performed more bad deeds than good deeds shall enter an eternal Hell, a place of forever physical and spiritual suffering. The Muslim book of religious authority is the Qur’an.
Hinduism, too, teaches an afterlife. Most Hindus believe that when a person dies, their atman (soul) is reborn into a different body. Some Hindus belief that this rebirth happens directly at death, while others believe that an atman may exist in other realms or even other animal forms. Whatever the case, a positive or negative rebirth is the consequence of good or bad actions in the present life. This is called Karma, and explained more in The Vedas, the religious writings of Hinduism.
Shuffling my last card in this religious dance, I’ll briefly discuss the fifteen million people following Judaism. Jewish followers, too, believe in life after death. Living the good life, according to their scriptures, results in the human soul returning to God. Again, those faithful to Judaism are of the belief that the human body can transcend both time and space, the Jewish notion of a soul and an afterlife, just being a couple confirmations. Dedicated Jews follow the readings in the Torah.
So much for the world religions.
Transcending time and space, as a consequence in life after death is not restricted to the religious faithful. The secular, too, experience out-of-body experiences. Whether this be a study in neuroscience or the paranormal, or dabbling in any of the mystical arts, any intentional out-of-body experiences having an astral traveller visiting other realms, can all be achieved through mind power. Such altered states of consciousness, including even remote viewing, as coined by the military and mentalists, are very possible. This not-so-strange ability to travel through time and space and other dimensions, where one’s ethereal body (or soul) can leave a breathing, existing physical vessel to explore in another vessel, other worldly planes, is readily and often consummated via such practices as meditation and HYPNOTHERAPY!
Meanwhile back in the physics and philosophy departments …
Physicists, generally, believe that the dimension of time is as real as the dimension of space. Einstein thought time to be an illusion. He calculated that the only real time is the present, whilst the past and future are imaginary. Our past is but a memory, often hazed through romantic nostalgia; whereas, the future is but a supposition, often times a delusional or uncertain belief. Without such practices as meditation and hypnotherapy, our time on earth would really be just a one-way street. But by employing hypnotherapy, we are able to have our return-flight travel tickets stamped for all past, present, and future destinations.
To simplify, this mode of direct travel is a linear flight plan on the human continuum starting left of the present to memory recall, and further left to past life regression. Still travelling along this continuum, directly to the right of the present we have memory forecast, and then even further to the right, future life progression. And so, from the extreme left to the extreme right on our linear continuum we have in this order: Past Life Regression, Memory Recall, the Present, Memory Forecast, Future Life Progression.
Note, dear readers, that all of the aforementioned travellers, as referenced from the labels of their experiences, believe, too, in life after death. Here are the logical assumptions: A past life suggests a life that has passed. A present life suggests a life as distinguished from a life elsewhere. A future life suggests that another life will exist after the demise of the present one.
Past Life Regression is the method using hypnosis to recover memories of past lives or incarnations. Past Life Regression is typically undertaken for either a spiritual experience or some psychotherapeutic elucidation. In my own private practice, most of my past life regression clients are simply seeking adventure, reminding me of Arnie Schwarzenegger on his virtual vacation to Mars in the movie, Total Recall. (And total recall could be certainly an apt descriptor, and also the perfect synonym, for past life regression.) Arnie, however, kept the same body in his Total Recall; whereas, my clients having past life regressions are never in the same skin as the one seated before me in the session.
Memory Recall, moving more toward the middle toward the present, represents any memory of the past, but in the same body. So far in my practice, this has always been a memory from yesterday or yesteryear. My very first client who sought me for a memory recall, during our session, travelled back from his present state of being a 70-something male, to when he was a ten-year-old adolescent, living in England. It just happens that my very first time with this client was my very first success story in the delivery of memory recall.
As quickly as one is aware of it, one blink and the Present is gone and in the past. Now you read it, and now you’re reading the next sentence. Being in the present is especially important for anyone seeking the way of Zen, or to bring this thinking into the current and commercial enterprises, for anyone seeking Mindfulness. Call it Zen or call it Mindfulness, the focus of both being on the contemporaneous now, and right now is already gone.
Memory Forecast can be simply defined as practically anything you know that is about to happen. Such forecasts can be for just around the corner or somewhere down the line. When I’m climbing the stairs I can predict with (almost) certainty my destination. When I am walking home from work, I can envision where I’m going. I can also predict that darkness will end this day and a morning light will start a new tomorrow. Our age, too, is in progression. Every dawn begins a new day and every new day ages us chronologically and biologically; thus, maybe the essential reason for seeking other lives.
Future Life Progression is to reappear into the future in another body. So far I’ve nary a client seeking a future life progression. But when this client does come along, I’m guessing the purpose shall be to determine or confirm the fate of a loved one. Whether this loved one is a spouse or an offspring, this search will be prompted by love; hence my phrase, loved one. Or it could be that this client may simply be seeking adventure. And I would be certainly up for that.
Admittedly, this particular topic is for a rather esoteric readership that can link the notion of time travel directly to the religious notion of life after death. Factoid: To appreciate this type of link demands more than just a routine perfunctory, moment of wonder. Fortunately for me, such a client-hypermnesia can be achieved, the particulars of any recalls becoming very popular in my private hypnotherapy practice.
To conclude, I’ve a couple personal proclamations with respect to hypnotic time travel:
We can choose to be here or there or anywhere we’ve ever been or will be, backward into eternity or forward into forever.
We are aging – yet we are ageless; our bodies are finite – yet our minds are evermore.
“Fly me to the moon
Let me play up there with those stars,
Let me see what life is like On a-Jupiter and Mars.”
