This post is to share a subjective account of what I observed in two experiences that could be called Past Life Regression.

I do not claim that these are past life regressions. I am describing these to expand awareness of unanticipated levels of consciousness that can occur under hypnosis.

In the first, I was presenting a keynote address in San Diego on reprogramming the mind for cognitive performance. As I always do during these presentations, I have my audience experience hypnosis. During this group hypnosis, one of the audience members stood up and started to speak in a foreign language. If anybody else in the group was experiencing hypnosis, his vocalizations snapped them out! His face was expressionless, and his speech was constant without any inflection. This went on for about a minute and then he just sat down and closed his eyes. As you can imagine I was somewhat surprised and caught off guard! 

I quickly made a light joke of it by saying, "everybody will have their own experience," and moved on with the presentation.

At the end of the presentation, a few people gathered around the gentleman. One of the individuals talking to him was an older Asian man who understood parts of what the first said during his hypnotic state but could not understand the context of what was said. The Asian gentleman stated the language spoken was a Chinese dialect not much used currently. He also stated that the sentences were broken and the thoughts without cohesive relevance. When asked, the subject as mystified as all of us, saying that he never learned a second language, and had never been to Asia. He also had no awareness of any Asian heritage. And, most interesting of all, he also had no idea what had happened.

My second experience happened with a gentleman that was already an acquaintance of mine. He was in his mid-70s, an extraordinarily successful businessman, and had always felt as though he had experienced something significant in his past. 

To be honest, his request was somewhat surprising as I had never imagined that he would be open to this type of concept.

In explicit detail, he experienced a dog fight with a triplane from what I presumed was from the first world war. He was in the middle of aerial combat and although he was seated for the session, his body was twisting and turning as though he was being thrown around. Then he said he had been shot in the leg, just before or simultaneous to snapping out of whatever was happening to him. His wife was there during the session, appearing as transfixed as I was. The only thing remotely connected to the experience was a lifelong leg pain the origin of which had never been diagnosed. At no stage during the session did I interact with him other than to guide him into hypnosis. The last I spoke to this man, years later, he maintained that the leg pain left that day and never returned.