Reincarnation Therapy - A Path Towards Wholeness

VIII

REINCARNATION THERAPY

- A PATH TOWARDS

WHOLENESS

Again and again you descend into the ever-changing

bosom of the world,

Until you have learned to read in the light

that living and dying are one-times-one

And that all time is timeless -

Until the wearisome chain of things

Comes to rest within you

as an ever tranquil circle.

In your will is the will of the world.

Stillness is in you -

Stillness and eternity.

• Manfred Kyber

REINCARNATION therapy, as I practice it, emerged from a series of experiments which I carried out in 1968. In these experiments, we succeeded by hypnotic regression in enabling the subjects to re-live not only their own birth, their development in the womb and their conception, but also earlier incarnations. My record of such experiments and my observations about the possible consequences can be found in other books of mine, such as Voices from other Lives (New York, M. Evans & Co.)

The technique used in these experiments was hypnosis, by means of which regression in time was made possible.

Experiments of this kind are not new. In the nineteenth century they were carried out by Albert de Rochas. Around 1956 the case of Bridey Murphy aroused great public interest. In England Arnall Bloxham and Denys Kelsey have publicized experiments in hypnotic regression which they carried out over decades. During the early stages of the purely experimental work in regression which I carried ou, I discovered that there was an obvious connection between current symptoms and previous lives. As this theory became more consolidated there emerged the idea that there was a possible therapeutic value in bringing earlier incarnations into consciousness. The decisive step towards realizing this idea came when I developed methods which made possible regression into earlier incarnations without the subject having to be hypnotized. By doing without hypnosis it was possible to open up conscious memory of past lives to everyone.

As already mentioned in the chapter on hypnosis the capacity of a patient to be hypnotized is dependent less on the hypnotist than on the patient's basic trust, and it is precisely in psychotic patients that such trust is least to be expected. Apart from this, there are numerous other reasons for avoiding a dependence on hypnosis. It is not for nothing that warnings and critical observations about hypnosis have been frequently voiced in esoteric circles.

The technique of hypnosis works by suggesting feelings of tiredness and sleepiness in the subject, and thereby goes against the very aim of esotericism. Man's problem is precisely the fact that he is constantly in a state of sleep and moves about like a marionette, instead of waking up and become conscious. Everything that happens in a therapeutic session should represent on a small scale what is expected of the patient in everyday life. Our goal is therefore to make people more awake and more conscious, to teach them to see reality with ever-increasing clarity, and not to encourage them further in their sleepiness and unconsciousness.

Besides, hypnosis is always bound up with the problem of power, which, as we shall see later, is the central theme of every therapy. Furthermore, hypnosis turns the patient into a passive consumer, who expects it to provide an instant answer to his problem. These considerations should suffice to show why I have tried, as far as possible, to dispense with hypnosis in applying regression for therapeutic purposes.

The result is that in our reincarnation therapy we make the patient aware of earlier lives without ever having to use hypnosis. The regressions take place in full waking consciousness. To those unfamiliar with our methods, this sounds so unbelievable that the public continues to associate reincarnation therapy with hypnosis. This no longer applies, for in the meantime reincarnation therapy has become independent of hypnosis.

It is legitimate to ask how these new methods work. To describe them is difficult, if not impossible. We always begin with a short period of relaxation which is intended to put the subject into a meditative frame of mind. The relaxation serves to diminish external stimuli and allows the person to listen in to himself. It switches the attention from the outer to the inner pole, without either fatigue or sleepiness entering in. Through the help of the therapist, sensations and images arise which the person learns to observe and describe at the same time.