Past Life Wounds – Present Life Problems

Past life issues that carry into the current life are often thought of as being the result of karma. The Western notion of karma can sometimes be simplistic in this regard, implying that if something bad happens to you it is because you did the same thing to someone else in the past. This idea of karma as a sort of Old Testament ‘eye for an eye’ justice is not the whole picture. Eastern traditions on the other hand, that have reincarnation and karma central to their belief system teach about an aspect of karma called Samskara.  Karma literally means actions, and many of those actions come from the deep impressions of habit that are called samskaras. Samskara then is intrinsically tied into the laws of karma that govern the cycle of rebirth. Keeping in mind the nature of traumatic imprints and how they cause continual recreation of the original traumatic event, one can also look at samskaras as trauma imprints re-manifested from life to life. It is the essence of karma to bring forth the actions of the past to the present. The inability to complete even the simple action of ‘fight or flight’ as a result of trauma in past lives is also carried into the present as the soul continues to create from its own wounded place in an ongoing effort to heal.  Our past life physical, emotional and mental bodies are not wiped clean in-between lives, but continue to recreate themselves in each incarnation through the subtle bodies. This transmission of past physical, emotional and mental wounds constitute a large part of what Past Life Regression Therapy is meant to heal in the present lives.

To understand how past life wounds impact us in the present, we need to look at how trauma affects the psyche in the current life. A traumatic event is any overwhelming experience (physical, emotional, mental or spiritual) that has caused an inability in the psyche to integrate it fully and continue in the same manner as before the traumatic event was experienced. Thus trauma leaves a lasting and damaging impression that manifests as a combination of symptoms.