Regression Therapy

There are thousands of Regression Therapists throughout the Western World and they claim two things for their treatment. 1) It proves that experience in previous lives can cause health problems, particularly mental health problems in this life. 2) By reliving those past life experiences, patients can have their health restored.

I accept these claims but do not place the same interpretation upon them as the therapists appear to. Once a person is hypnotised, they enter an altered state of consciousness that is identical to that experienced by trance mediums. One therefore has to be extremely careful about how one interprets any utterances made whilst in that state. I believe even people who have no previous history of trance mediumship, can under such circumstances, be used by those in spirit to recount their own experiences whilst on earth. It is by no means certain that the details given are accounts of past lives on earth experienced by the patient.

I have never been hypnotised but I do know the early trance mediums such as Andrew Jackson Davis were 'magnetised' into trance using mesmerism which is a form of hypnosis. Once entranced and in that altered state of consciousness, with the hypnotist taking the patient back to previous lives, I see no reason why a person from spirit could not move into the picture and begin relating their life on earth. After all nearly every person who undergoes regression therapy knows nothing at all about trance mediumship and in entering trance they offer themselves for use as trance mediums. People in spirit have so few opportunities to contact the earth, that when such opportunities present themselves, they jump at the chance. The therapist asks questions and from my knowledge, spirit will always respectfully answer such questions, so any mystery about why they would describe their life on earth can be explained in that way.


Allan Kardec, the founder of Spiritism, obtained all his information for the Spirits Book and the Mediums Book, with their emphasis on reincarnation, through trance mediums that he had personally magnetised into trance using Mesmerism and he refused an offer from Daniel Dunglas Home (the leading trance medium of the day) to work as one of his trance mediums. The reason? Home insisted on entering the trance condition on his own as he normally did. He refused to be magnetised because he claimed Kardec would thus impose his personality upon the entranced medium and would receive from spirit exactly what he was looking for. How can that be? There are many in spirit, who believe absolutely in reincarnation and because of this, when they are asked about it, they affirm it is so. Hence the biblical caution to “test the spirit”. Many believe in it to such an extent that they insist on reincarnating. The mind is supreme in the spiritual world. Just as those who are convinced they will not awake after death until the sound of the last trumpet, remain asleep until more enlightened souls in spirit can help them to see otherwise, so the reincarnationist will seek to reincarnate and from all accounts, will succeed.

My position on this is dictated, I admit, by being uncomfortable at the idea of compulsory reincarnation and its effect of reducing the spirit world to a mere waiting room. I know from conversations with spirit people that it is not like that. Life moves forward in spirit, there is no question of hanging around near the earth waiting for an opportunity to reincarnate. That some people might choose to do so, I am willing to accept but regression therapists maintain everyone they treat gives accounts of previous lives. Please don't misunderstand me I am not saying that past life regression has failed to prove it is a viable way to treat certain people. I am sure many have recovered their stability following such treatment. All I am saying is that it is misleading to regard what is said by patients under hypnosis as invariably proof of reincarnation and that therefore reincarnation is a natural part of human spiritual growth. There is another way to look at it.


As I have said there are many in spirit, convinced they must reincarnate and do so many times. There is a school of thought that holds such people will do so but their objective can only be achieved at the expense of the spirit/soul who was intended to live in the body they have commandeered, If this hypothesis is true, regression could be helping to deal with the conflict and inner guilt caused by the stronger of two spirits forcibly preventing another from properly using its rightful home. The theory goes that this condition is possession (a condition dismissed as superstition by most, these days) and the possessors will coarsen their spirits by successive incarnations, rather than strengthen and purify them, as reincarnation theory asserts. By this theory therefore, regression therapy may well be proving reincarnation occurs, but it needs to think again about the reasons reliving past life experiences cures people of phobias etc. In failing to draw the conclusion that reincarnation is unwholesome and retrograde, rather than progressive, they are missing an opportunity to demonstrate the fallacy of reincarnation. Were they to do so, many may be spared the agony of having their physical bodies possessed by these zealots.

I write this as an alternative view in an attempt to persuade thinking people to accept there are other ways to look at the question than that put forward by ardent believers in reincarnation. Once a theory becomes part of religious belief, (as reincarnation has in Spiritism) objective thought is discouraged. I realise that to many, the idea of reincarnation brings great comfort, especially if they lead a life of deprivation or it seems to them that luck is always deserting them. They can blame it on their karma. I do not wish to remove comfort from anyone but believe it important that, before accepting any theory as truth, one should examine the alternatives with great care and also look at the possible disadvantages of unquestioning acceptance of the theory.

Too many of us are persuaded to look at life only from the narrow viewpoint of life on earth and I believe reincarnation theory reinforces this approach. To look at life in this narrow manner means it appears grossly unfair in countless ways. On the other hand if one views earth life as a small part of one’s life in eternity, the apparent unfairness of life on earth disappears. Earth life is not an end in itself; it is a means to help our souls evolve because the effect on the soul of being constrained by a physical body is similar to the effect on a stream of forcing it into a narrow channel. The strength of the flow is increased