Past Lives

[Brittany]

I take any past life recollection, either "remembered" in meditation or given to me by psychics, with an enormous grain of salt. I think in most cases such things are more of a distraction than a help, though on occasion remembering the karma you share with another person aids in resolving that karma.

Upon meeting a certain individual in this life, we shared an instant recollection of one another, his immediate reaction being one of recoil. We both perceived that I had owned him as a slave in a previous life, and had been cold and abusive toward him. Working through that karma and becoming the best of friends was one of the more satisfying experiences I've had in this life. I've met another individual who murdered me in a past life, and in this life he has been one of my primary teachers in honing my psychic skills. Enemies of the past can really make the best of present allies.

I have vague recollections of being a samurai in feudal Japan, or perhaps a sword maker. Perhaps both in separate lifetimes, as I feel I probably spent several incarnations there. My perceived memories of at least one Japanese lifetime are of having a wife and several children, and spending an entire lifetime unable to properly express my emotions to any of them. Though I loved them to the point it hurt, I was often cold and detached from my loved ones because I feared being perceived as weak by my superiors if I was openly emotional. I died younger than I would have liked, feeling that I had failed as a husband and father, and the spiritual wound caused by this carried through several lifetimes.

I've had a fleeting glimpse of being a servant girl in what I assume was a Chinese palace. I remember no emotional impressions from this life.

There is also what I call the Black City- one of the most vivid visions I've ever had, of myself in a huge palace that appeared to be made out of black stone, along with most of the other structures in the area. It was obviously no place on Earth. I was wearing black robes, and at one point stood in front of myself and looked into my own face. I was not human, though I was mostly humanoid in appearance. My eyes were black, and my skin was a greenish shade, with a texture to it that looked a little like lace laid across the skin. Instead of hair I had what looked to be numerous thin antennae. There was an immense sense of power in that place, and it was a great inspiration for several of the stories I've worked on. I wound up developing a whole culture for these beings in this city I had seen in my mind, though I've long since abandoned holding to this "memory" as if it were fact. The images could easily be symbolic, or even simply imagined, yet they inspire deep emotional impressions within me.

I've had multiple psychics give me all sorts of stories of who I've been, though the closest thing to a famous name that has come up is one woman telling me that there are still swords in museums today that bear my mark. Two readings that particularly struck me were of me being 1. A Vietnamese monk who was betrayed and killed by some people that wanted the land he was on, and 2. some sort of astrologer who spent a mostly solitary life studying the stars. One thing that has corroborated with more than one psychic is that I do not often incarnate female, due to several extremely traumatic experiences suffered during past female incarnations. This resonates with me strongly, and often in this lifetime I have felt like a male trapped in a female's body, though over time I've come to very much enjoy my femininity.

I have also astounded MANY psychics with the apparent amount of physical trauma I've accumulated over the lifetimes. One woman almost started crying, seeing violent death upon violent death- everything from being stabbed to being mauled by a wild animal. I can only assume this was for karmic reasons- likely my continual returning to the negative path in spite of setting my overall will toward becoming positive. I get the sense I beat my head against the wall for a long time.

Speaking of violent deaths, I also had a very vivid experience of being a young villager who was tortured to death in what I think was the Vietnam war, judging from the uniforms I saw those around me wearing. I literally began screaming and thrashing about as these memories surged through my head, to the point my husband had to hold me down, and I continually shouted in what sounded like an Asian language. I couldn't understand the words, but I knew I was begging for mercy. The pain was mercifully blocked out as I experienced this, though I could feel the intense well of fear and sorrow in the heart of this person. In the vision I finally relented and told them whatever it was they wanted to hear, and then they continue to torture me until my body gave out and I died. I died with a heart full of fear, hate and pain. I felt cleansed after having this vision, as if it was something I was finally able to forgive and lay to rest.

Ultimately though, all of the above is just a trivial curiosity in the back of my mind now. I'm more focused on this life and where it is going, and I think I'm doing just fine.