In 1991 while attending ITP, working on my Master's in Counseling Psych, I took a course on Past Lives. We were guided through a visualization. Asked to picture myself flying off the ground, up into the stratosphere and imagine myself looking back down at the planet from outer space. The prompt then was to allow myself to land somewhere and once touching the ground, to look down at my feet. I saw mud covered feet, very thick, sturdy, hairy, with reddish toned hair. I felt like a primitive man.
The story line with this past life journey was that I had been ostracized from the clan, the group, due to the death of my mother during childbirth. It seemed I was blamed for her death or considered bad luck somehow. I was not allowed to join the group, but was allowed to follow them and live in its perimeter. I was alone, I felt the pain of being cast out and the group's active disdain. They threw rocks at me if I got too close, some left food for me but no one let me back in.
One day I am at a river, sitting near the shore on a rock in the water, drinking water and throwing my whole body into the water. Seems I enjoyed this solitary activity and was deeply engaged. Then I see out of the corner of my eye a luminous thin being with a larger head and eyes, much like the stereotypical image of an alien, yet this being was luminous and graceful. I felt soothed by its presence. The being reaches out and I do the same, to touch its hand. Once we make contact, I feel a difference in my awareness of my surroundings. I am looking at things differently, my consciousness has somehow been activated or raised by the Being's touch.
I set out to test my new awareness and over time apply it in creative ways to tool making, hunting and other activities. The tribe takes notice and eventually I am allowed back in. Due to my newly found penchant for group oriented ideals vs. the established survival mode of operating, I eventually rise to become a leader in the tribe. I see myself inside the cave, not only allowed to sleep and eat with the group, but they gather around the fire and isten to me impart the importance of my newfound ideas.
Now that in and of itself is semi interesting but what makes it poignanct and worth anecdoting is that in 2015, almost 25 years later, I'm watching the movie Lucy with Scarlett Johanssen and there's a scene in the movie that is exactly like my past life experience. Lucy travels the space time continuum as she gains more access to a greater percentage of her brain capacity and has a physical contact experience with a primitive ape, reaching out to touch it, instantly raising its consciousness.
I'm watching and I have a familiar full body somatic reaction, like a volt of electricity rushing my veins, and a memory sensation of what I can only describe as Knowing. I recognize the image and have a mixture of amazement that it's so close to my own "past life" experience coupled with a sense of acceptance and knowing that there is absolutely nothing amazing about it at all. I feel myself thinking from teo different sides of my being, one is my personality Self, amazed about the similarity in experience and wondering what this means or how it happens, and anothe part of me that is more ancient and just nods in deep knowing.
So is this a collective image, an archtype that I accessed that day in class during the visualization, or is it a personal experience, a real past life memory? Or both? How does this work? What do you think?
The story line with this past life journey was that I had been ostracized from the clan, the group, due to the death of my mother during childbirth. It seemed I was blamed for her death or considered bad luck somehow. I was not allowed to join the group, but was allowed to follow them and live in its perimeter. I was alone, I felt the pain of being cast out and the group's active disdain. They threw rocks at me if I got too close, some left food for me but no one let me back in.
One day I am at a river, sitting near the shore on a rock in the water, drinking water and throwing my whole body into the water. Seems I enjoyed this solitary activity and was deeply engaged. Then I see out of the corner of my eye a luminous thin being with a larger head and eyes, much like the stereotypical image of an alien, yet this being was luminous and graceful. I felt soothed by its presence. The being reaches out and I do the same, to touch its hand. Once we make contact, I feel a difference in my awareness of my surroundings. I am looking at things differently, my consciousness has somehow been activated or raised by the Being's touch.
I set out to test my new awareness and over time apply it in creative ways to tool making, hunting and other activities. The tribe takes notice and eventually I am allowed back in. Due to my newly found penchant for group oriented ideals vs. the established survival mode of operating, I eventually rise to become a leader in the tribe. I see myself inside the cave, not only allowed to sleep and eat with the group, but they gather around the fire and isten to me impart the importance of my newfound ideas.
Now that in and of itself is semi interesting but what makes it poignanct and worth anecdoting is that in 2015, almost 25 years later, I'm watching the movie Lucy with Scarlett Johanssen and there's a scene in the movie that is exactly like my past life experience. Lucy travels the space time continuum as she gains more access to a greater percentage of her brain capacity and has a physical contact experience with a primitive ape, reaching out to touch it, instantly raising its consciousness.
I'm watching and I have a familiar full body somatic reaction, like a volt of electricity rushing my veins, and a memory sensation of what I can only describe as Knowing. I recognize the image and have a mixture of amazement that it's so close to my own "past life" experience coupled with a sense of acceptance and knowing that there is absolutely nothing amazing about it at all. I feel myself thinking from teo different sides of my being, one is my personality Self, amazed about the similarity in experience and wondering what this means or how it happens, and anothe part of me that is more ancient and just nods in deep knowing.
So is this a collective image, an archtype that I accessed that day in class during the visualization, or is it a personal experience, a real past life memory? Or both? How does this work? What do you think?
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