#past lives

When we realize that we were once an intelligent being different from humans, we tend to drift away to those distant times when things were simpler and much different. This happens for two reasons: the previous body had a number of advantages over humans, and we simply already know how to live in that other body. Even in the same lifetime, we may have a more localized situation where, in the face of difficulties, we do all kinds of things to escape back to a carefree childhood. So the fierce rejection of the current body is the same thing, but on a slightly different level. Yes, we were once animals and other humanoids and maybe even nature spirits, but that doesn't devalue the life we have now - it enriches it.

It is possible that we may sometimes be able to remember past lives as they were, but it would be foolish to argue with the fact that remembering is done through the brain that we have now. This brain has been developing its own associative map since childhood, and, in most cases, this very map will be used to decode the memories of past lives. From my own lengthy experience, I can summarize that the most reliable memories come in dreams. There, you can see images about which the current brain knows nothing, and then find these items in the Wikipedia and marvel at the fact that such things actually existed. If the objects you are looking for do not appear in the World Encyclopedia, the only thing left to do is to draw them… And it is possible that there is a huge benefit to doing so. After drawing some objects from dreams about past incarnations, one can compare them with the data received in dreams by other otherkin of the same type. Sometimes, a memory is triggered by something you have seen, heard, or read. But there's a good chance that such memories are running through our current associative map. When I practiced conscious dreaming some time ago, I discovered that the associative map is very important because disembodied objects often don't have images of their own, and the brain picks the most appropriate one to understand what it is dealing with.

[note: This article is in no way meant to debunk past life memories, so much as it is meant to address a potential problem with remembering and offer a sane and rational way of approaching and accepting the real stuff.]

Something I have observed in a number of communities where reincarnation and conscious memories thereof are accepted is the tendency to confuse last time with this time. This seems to be particularly accute in the otherkin communities where past incarnations become the basis for identity in this one.