JUST WHO DO WE THINK WE ARE?
by Shari Harris
The Past Life Perspective
by Ann C. Barham
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Just Who Do We Think We Are?
Ann C. Barham Says...
"Like the proverbial cat with nine lives, we've faced death many, many times, only to see our spirits live again in another lifetime. Indications are, we've more than equaled those clever felines, and we're still counting! It's just that in each lifetime we show up in a different body and personality, and most of us don't remember what's come before without some assistance. That's where past life therapy comes in."
Ann C. Barham, The Past Life Perspective, p. 1
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Greetings
As you most likely know by now, one of my favorite topics to share is past life stories. To me, knowing that life continues, that we chose to be alive on the earth at this time for a reason, and we are not here by random accident makes this current life that much more important. But also, knowing that this is not our only life takes away some of the pressure to "get it right!" We have eternity to get it right. This is not "one chance and done." So, we can relax, do our best, and try to enjoy each day!
Ann C. Barham is an author I love. She is a licensed therapist and a certified regressionist, sharing her clients' astounding stories of past lives which show how life continues and how our past personalities can influence our current life.
I hope you enjoy this sampling of her book, The Past Life Perspective: Discovering Your True Nature Across Multiple Lifetimes. I've included a fun short video of Barham describing clues we can use to suggest possibilities of our own past lives.
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Be well and enjoy your amazing life!
Sending my love,
Shari
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Ann Barham's Story
Ann Barham is a licensed marriage and family therapist and a certified regression therapist. She writes that when she was in graduate school studying for a masters degree in counseling psychology at Santa Clara University in California, she was introduced to past life regression in a class about guided imagery. Although a conservative Jesuit school, one her professors, Dr. William Yabroff, was an eccentric man who developed a class called Therapeutic Imagery detailing a guided imagery technique to use in counseling clients. Barham was stunned when Dr. Yabroff mentioned that visions from guided imagery could sometimes be an actual past life memory. He asked for a class volunteer to be hypnotized in order to demonstrate a regression so students could recognize past life memories. Barham later found that he was very interested in past life regression, and this course was his way of quietly introducing his passion into the straitlaced university setting.
Barham volunteered to be the subject, and as she lay down on the carpeted floor in front of the class, she answered Dr. Yabroff's preliminary questions by explaining that she had had problems with her feet for years, especially her "pinkie toes" for which she had had surgery for "hammer toe," and which still bothered her. Dr. Yabroff guided her into a hypnotic state, and she began to tell the story of a young girl with Asian features.
The girl in Barham's regression was very upset because her family insisted on binding her feet. Being headstrong, she planned to run away to avoid having her toes broken, folded under her feet, and having them bound tight for years, however she was caught while trying to leave. The defiance of her parents was such a disgrace for the family that they disowned her and sold her into servitude. She worked as a servant in a kitchen for a while but eventually felt so humiliated by the disgrace she brought upon her family, that she used a kitchen knife to kill herself.
During the hypnosis, Barham's legs quivered uncontrollably. She stated in her book that she has had clients who had the same physical reaction, and she has learned that it's a way for the body to release stored energy from past lifetimes. After that cathartic event in class, she was able to be back playing tennis the next day with no pain at all, never to be bothered by her feet again.
After graduating and practicing traditional private therapy in family counseling for several years, Barham writes that she had the chance to attend enlightening regression workshops by Dr. Brian Weiss and Dr. Roger Woolger which led her over time to use past life regression as a therapeutic tool. She eventually began using hypnosis almost exclusively because of the often immediate benefits which can sometimes take months or even years of traditional therapy to accomplish.
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Past Life Stories from Ann Barham's Clients
in The Past Life Perspective
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Chapter 9: Life is Suffering
Lori was a lady in her early 50s who was suffering from anxiety, terror, and dread, especially every morning. A psychologist who had been working with Lori referred her to Ann Barham for past life regression work. Lori worked at an office job but lived a reclusive life otherwise. She felt safe only in her apartment, especially in her bed.
Lori had had a difficult childhood, feeling responsible for her father's death when she was seven. Her mother had not allowed grieving for her father, and although her mother was abusive, Lori felt that she was also responsible for preventing her mother from dying.
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When regressed, Lori saw a young Jewish girl of eight or nine who was happily playing. However, one day when the girl returned home from school, her whole family was gone--her father, step-mother, and three older brothers. Lori was able to state in her regression that it was 1939 in Krakow, Poland. The girl, who was wandering alone looking for her family, was eventually taken by soldiers and put with a group that was made to bury many bodies that were being shot and put into a mass grave. The girl felt guilty to be alive when so many were dying.
Later she escaped with some other children into the woods but was eventually again alone. She stole food from farm houses, and found safe places to hide. Finally, she was found by the troops, stabbed with a sword and died. In the regression after her death, she was enveloped by a bright light and then finally felt safe. After that life, still hypnotized, Lori realized that everyone was a victim, even the perpetrators.
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Ann Barham gave Lori exercises to do to help alleviate her fears. A month later, when she came for a second appointment, she was somewhat better but leaving the house was still a threat to her, and she was now suffering from acute tendonitis in her Achilles tendon as well. In the second regression, she relived a life as a man who was in a boat with other men, naked, seated at oars, and shackled at the ankles to the others. The men were from the crew of a ship which had been attacked and the men taken prisoner and enslaved. The attackers had used hot iron rods to burn the Achilles tendons of the men so they could not run. Lori's current tendonitis was felt to be due to feelings carried over from the lifetime as the man enslaved on the seas. |
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In a third past life, Lori sees herself as a young girl in ancient Rome during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. She is trying to shield her sister from the lava. She believes that she has angered the gods, that it is her fault, and that she doesn't deserve to live. She and her sister die in the eruption.
Lori realized that some of the beliefs and the fear from those lifetimes had been carried forward into her current life. Barham writes, "When accessing guidance from the spiritual plane, Lori was told that 'the feeling of morning dread, guilt, abandonment, sadness, depression--these all relate to the inability to protect your sister in Pompeii....The only person you can be responsible for is yourself--not the world and not volcanoes. It is not your fault.'"
The potential for a new approach to life was opening for Lori as she integrated the information from this life and the earlier ones in her work with Barham. (pp. 80-92)
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Chapter 17: When Our Bodies Carry Our Past |
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Barham explains that our physical bodies can carry traces of trauma that occurred in past lifetimes from incidents concerning physical, emotional, mental, or spiritual energy. Often, finding a link to a past life incident or condition can heal or improve a current problem. At the least, it can provide understanding and perhaps loosen energy that may relate to other areas of the current life. Following are some examples that Barham gives of physical complaints that had a past life connection. |
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Allergies and Asthma
One client suffered from allergies and asthma and was often not able to breathe through her nose. Under hypnosis, she described a lifetime in which she was a man who took care of neighbors who were sick to the point of wearing himself out. Unfortunately, local priests accused him of heretical healing practices. He was put into a dungeon where his allergies worsened and he died.
The conditions of his unnecessary death were carried over to the current lifetime, and the lesson the soul learned was that she must help herself before she can help others. She shared with Barham that she also had diabetes and found it difficult to eat correctly. Her goal to open a healing center, she realized, could not be accomplished until she addressed her diabetes in order to not repeat her prior mistakes. (p. 146)
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Insomnia and ADHD
A twenty-year-old student consulted Barham about her insomnia, saying that the most she could sleep at night was about four hours. In addition, since childhood she had had recurring nightmares about dying.
Under hypnosis, she recalled a lifetime in France in the 1300s. Her father was an important man who insisted that she stay indoors to protect her complexion and to be a lady. She was married off to an older man who had similar requirements. He hired an abusive guard to make sure she followed directions when he was gone. The young wife became terrified of going to sleep for fear of attack or of missing an opportunity to escape, and she became a prisoner in her own room. In a struggle, she fell out of a window to her death. This lifetime was an obvious link to her sleep issues, and her being boxed in was felt to be related to her ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder). (p. 147)
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Foot, Ankle, and Back Pain
A fifty-year-old woman came to Barham for regression work due to chronic pain in her feet, back, and one ankle for which doctors couldn't find cause. In her regression, she recalled a lifetime as a teenage boy who went exploring in the woods and found a crevice in a large rock. Inside the darkness, he fell and got trapped by his foot and hips between rocks in an uncomfortable position that wrenched his back. He could not get free, and no one knew where he had gone. He died in fear and guilt that he would not be there to help his mother and sister. Barham explains that it is not uncommon for intense feelings at the time of death to carry over into another lifetime. (p.150)
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"Ann Barham discusses nine clues that can help you enhance your awareness of possible past lifetimes for yourself. By paying attention to people, talents, and even travel locations in your current life, you can stimulate your consciousness of past life influences operating now." From YouTube.com/Ann C. Barham
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Insights from The Past Life Perspective
We Are Eternal
- Barham writes, "Modern past life therapy is based on the premise that we are all eternal beings who experience physical life on earth in a series of human bodies and their associated personalities. As eternal souls, we carry forward the experiences and lessons learned from one human lifetime to another. On a deeper or soul level, we are involved in choosing aspects of each life as a means of expanding our experiences, learning the lessons we have set out for ourselves, and continuing our ongoing involvement with various other souls with whom we are strongly connected." (p. 12)
- After having a past life regression, "people often come away with a greater realization of the eternal nature of their being.... There is nothing like going through your own death, realizing that your awareness continues past the existence of your physical body, and finding yourself reunited with loved ones and the incredible love that permeates eternal existence." (p. 13)
Past Life Regression vs NDE
- [A past life regression] "is a much less traumatic way to have a near-death experience that transforms your view on life than having to actually experience a serious illness or life-threatening accident." (p. 13)
Fear of Death?
- "I have many clients tell me that after a regression they have lost their fear of death. The experience of going through the death of a prior personality, realizing that their consciousness continues,...and seeing the past life connections with loved ones from the current lifetime--all of these personal insights alter one's understanding of that mysterious transition." (p. 4)
Expanding Our Perspective
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"My mission in writing The Past Life Perspective...is to help advance your understanding and demystify past life therapy, as well as demonstrate how recalling and integrating the knowledge of our own prior lifetimes can heal and propel each of us forward in our own personal development.... I also hope to contribute to the evolving consciousness that there is no true foundation for the divisiveness between people on the planet, in short, to expand our perspective on the human condition." (pp. 5,6)
They are Us!
- "The understanding came to me that past life therapy is one of the best ways to reestablish that sense of human commonality.... We see that we have been both male and female; Christian and Jew and Muslim and pagan; wealthy and privileged as well as a beggar on the streets; violent offender as well as victim. Across the many centuries of our experience, each of us has probably been on both sides of every fence. 'They,' indeed, are truly 'us.'" (p. 5)
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Many Early Christians Embraced Reincarnation
"Why is it that Christian religions appear to be so opposed to the concept of reincarnation? As it turns out, this attitude is a departure from the origins of Christianity. Nowhere in the Bible is reincarnation repudiated, in fact it appears to be a concept that Jesus and his followers took pretty much for granted. Jesus himself speaks of John the Baptist as the return of Elias (Matthew 11:14 and 17:11, Mark 9:11-13). We must look to the development of the Roman Catholic Church and its doctrines to understand how the concept of reincarnation lost favor in Christian tradition."
"Reincarnation has never been in conflict with the tenets of Christ’s teachings, merely in conflict with the control wielded by the church."
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Wisdom from Dr. Brian Weiss: |
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"You are not here by accident or by some coincidence of nature.
You are a spiritual being learning lessons of love in this earth school."
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Low-level, non-violent crimes will no longer be prosecuted in Baltimore. The city temporarily suspended prosecution of drug possession, prostitution, and misdemeanors to limit the spread of COVID-19 in jail, but after recording a 36% drop in property crimes, a 20% decline in violent crimes and a 39% decrease in the number of people entering the criminal justice system, officials have decided to make the measures permanent. NBC
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A federal court in Alaska has rejected approval for offshore oil and gas activities due to potential noise pollution that would cause harm to the critically endangered Cook Inlet beluga whales. The court ruled that National Marine Fisheries Service failed to consider the direct impact when it approved activity in the area. WAN World Animal News.com
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The bald eagle has quadrupled its population in the past decade with more than 300,000 birds soaring across American skies. The recovery is a testament to the relentless work of scientists and conservationists who fought to ban pesticides and put the eagle on the endangered species list in 40 states. AP
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Just Who Do We Think We Are?
Shari Says...
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I believe we are eternal spiritual beings who are currently living one
of our many lives on Earth and who are the co-creators
of our experiences through our thoughts and beliefs.
Shari Harris
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I believe that if people understand that we live many lives and that our current identities will change in our next lives, it will help the world to be more accepting of all people. I believe that if we realize that we chose to be here and helped to plan our circumstances, we will avoid feeling like victims of fate or accident. |
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Previous Issues of
"Just Who Do We Think We Are?"
are available on
2021 Issues
1-28-2021: Just Who Do We Think We Are? Vol. 2, #1/Bob Olson-Afterlife
2-23-21: Just Who Do We Think We Are? Vol. 2, #2/Natalie Sudman-NDE
3-30-21: Just Who Do We Think We Are? Vol. 2, #3/ Lessons from the Other Side
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