LITMIR.BIZ

       INTRODUCTION INTO THE PAST

      Do you believe you have lived before? Many people do.

      Do you wonder if you might have? You are not alone.

      More and more people are opening up to the intriguing prospect of having previously lived, and died. An increasing number seek aid in ‘going back to other lives’. They may simply want to explore the possibility that they have lived before, they may be looking for evidence of past lives, or they may have a more pressing reason for wanting to know what happened to them. In a recent poll, a surprising 49 per cent of people in southern Britain said they believed they might have lived before. In parts of the USA the figure is no doubt higher. In the East, almost everyone believes in reincarnation.

      Reincarnation is the belief that, having inhabited a different body, in another time and possibly another place, and having then died, someone returns again to earth in a new body, in other words reincarnates. Knowledge of past lives may be accessed through spontaneous visions, flashbacks, dreams, or déjà vu; or it can be induced through hypnosis and other techniques.

      A flashback is a spontaneous vision of, or a remembering of, a past-life experience. It may come out of the blue or be triggered by a place or a person, or by touching the part of the body where the memory is stored, or it may surface during meditation. Flashbacks may be experienced by more than one person, either at the same time or on different occasions. Such spontaneous memories may have started in childhood and carried through to adult life, as in the case of Jenny Cockell.

      Yesterday’s children: Jenny Cockell

      Throughout her childhood, Jenny Cockell had dreams and flashbacks of living in another place. She drew sketch maps of her ‘other home’. Over the years she gathered an enormous amount of material. She was convinced that she had been a mother tragically separated from her children by an early death with terrible consequences for those children. She was determined to find them again.

      Though she is English in her present life, Jenny Cockell’s search led her to Ireland and to a moving reunion with ‘her children’, who by now are much older than her. Her ‘son’ said that, whilst not totally convinced about reincarnation (he had been a Catholic all his life), Jenny Cockell had knowledge about his family that only his mother could have. Events had taken place exactly as she recalled them. The house was as she had drawn it all those years ago. The family had been split up following her death, which had been traumatic.

      Many celebrities believe in reincarnation. Richard Gere, Tina Turner, Shirley MacLaine and a former Chief Constable of Manchester are just a few of those who have spoken publicly about their belief. General Patton, a Second World War hero, believed he had been both Hannibal and Alexander the Great in addition to several other lesser figures on the war stage of history. Interestingly enough, Alexander himself was a great believer in reincarnation, as was Plato. The Spanish painter Salvador Dali remembered life as Saint John of the Cross. Napoleon Bonaparte was convinced that he was the reincarnation of Charlemagne, head of the Holy Roman Empire. Henry Ford and Benjamin Franklin were both firm believers.

      Having lived before implies a continuity of consciousness: the continuous existence of the human soul. After all, if you have lived and died before, the implication is that you will do so again … and again. This may well explain the imperative urge to ‘prove it’ that many people have. An urge that is now being catered for by television and magazines.

      Actress Paula Hamilton was hypnotically regressed to a former life as a man, Ashley Brown, for a British TV programme. When questioned, Ashley gave his name and details of his family, including an address in London. He said he had sailed to Ireland from Parkgate, a little known, long disused port near Liverpool that once handled the bulk of Irish sailings. Paula Hamilton had never heard of the place, nor, in her present life, been to Ireland. In her former incarnation, Ashley ended up as a baker in Dublin, giving details such as the name of a (now vanished but verifiable from old maps) alley in which his shop was situated and the Protestant church close by in which he was married. He died of a lung disease due to ingested flour: a common cause of death in bakers of the period.

      Hypnotic regression

      Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness during which previously inaccessible memories are accessed. In hypnotic regression, the subject is taken back, or regressed, to another lifetime. There are other methods of regression.

      A researcher employed by the programme was able to verify many of the details in this obscure person’s life, although it was not possible to actually prove Ashley’s existence as many of the relevant Irish records have been destroyed. The researcher did find someone named Brown at the London Kensington address, who could well have been a relative, but of Ashley himself there was, unfortunately, no mention.

      This is one of the difficulties. It is not easy to prove beyond doubt that the apparent memories and experiences of past lives mean that reincarnation is true. But this does not stop people trying. It occupies serious researchers, sometimes for years as with Professor Ian Stevenson. There is a popular magazine devoted to past life memories, and many people have a vested interest because they believe they were historical personages. Tina Turner,

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