In our identity-obsessed culture, it is easy to think that who we are is determined by what we see in the mirror. But what if we open our minds to the notion that we are souls journeying through many lives over time? How would it change the way we think about ourselves now to remember how we lived before?
Our dear friend and frequent guest, Expert Life Coach, Master Intuitive, Past Life Regressionist and Author, Michelle Brock has helped thousands of people discover the stories of their previous lives—their traumas and triumphs, losses and loves—and has witnessed incredible results. What she’s seen first hand and what we’ve learned is that when we learn our stories from the past, we can reach unprecedented heights of self-awareness in the present.
In Michelle’s new book, Who Do You Think You Are? An Interactive Journey Through Your Past Lives and into Your Best Future, she guides you to manifest the happiness and satisfaction you desire in the present by reconnecting you with your experiences from your past. And we mean she really guides you! The book is full of just the right prompts to encourage real self-reflection and compassion to help you heal from the ordeals of previous lives and embrace a joyful, emotionally fulfilling existence in the here and now.
MORE FROM MICHELLE BROCK
Visit theseekingcenter.com for more from Robyn + Karen, plus mega inspo -- and the best wellness + spiritual practitioners, products and experiences on the planet!
You can also follow Seeking Center on Instagram @theseekingcenter
In our identity-obsessed culture, it is easy to think that who we are is determined by what we see in the mirror. But what if we open our minds to the notion that we are souls journeying through many lives over time? How would it change the way we think about ourselves now to remember how we lived before?
Our dear friend and frequent guest, Expert Life Coach, Master Intuitive, Past Life Regressionist and Author, Michelle Brock has helped thousands of people discover the stories of their previous lives—their traumas and triumphs, losses and loves—and has witnessed incredible results. What she’s seen first hand and what we’ve learned is that when we learn our stories from the past, we can reach unprecedented heights of self-awareness in the present.
In Michelle’s new book, Who Do You Think You Are? An Interactive Journey Through Your Past Lives and into Your Best Future, she guides you to manifest the happiness and satisfaction you desire in the present by reconnecting you with your experiences from your past. And we mean she really guides you! The book is full of just the right prompts to encourage real self-reflection and compassion to help you heal from the ordeals of previous lives and embrace a joyful, emotionally fulfilling existence in the here and now.
MORE FROM MICHELLE BROCK
Visit theseekingcenter.com for more from Robyn + Karen, plus mega inspo -- and the best wellness + spiritual practitioners, products and experiences on the planet!
You can also follow Seeking Center on Instagram @theseekingcenter
Robyn: I'm Robyn Miller Brecker and I'm Karen Loenser. Welcome to Seeking Center, the podcast. Join us each week as we have the conversations and we, through the spiritual and holistic clutter for you, we'll boil it down to what you need to know now, we're all about total wellness, which to us needs building a healthy life.
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And for the best wellness and spiritual practitioners, experts, products, experiences, and inspo, visit theseekingcenter. com.
Robyn: In our identity obsessed culture, it is easy to think that who we are is determined by what we see in the mirror.
But what if we open our minds to the notion that we are souls journeying through many lives over time. How would it change the way [00:01:00] we think about ourselves now to remember how we lived before? Our dear friend and frequent guest, expert life coach, master intuitive, past life regressionist and author, Michelle Brock has helped thousands of people discover the stories of their previous lives.
their traumas and triumphs, losses and loves, and has witnessed incredible results. What she's seen firsthand and what we've learned is that when we learn our stories from the past, we can reach unprecedented heights of self awareness in the present. In Michelle's new book, Who Do You Think You Are? An interactive journey through your past lives and into your best future.
She guides you to manifest the happiness and satisfaction you desire in the present moment by reconnecting you with your experiences from your past. And we mean she really guides you. The book is full of just the right prompts to encourage real self reflection and compassion to help you heal from the [00:02:00] ordeals of previous lives.
and embrace a joyful, emotionally fulfilling existence in the here and now. There is so much to discuss. Let's get going.
Michelle: Hi, Michelle. Hi. This is a great reunion. I am so glad to see you guys and be back with you.
Robyn: Same. And this subject in particular is one we could talk about forever and probably have talked about in previous lives.
Yes.
Michelle: Absolutely.
Karen: we should tell listeners to that, obviously, robyn and I have both had past life regression experiences with you, and I have to share I didn't even share this while we were talking getting ready. But literally a couple of days ago, Facebook reprises those memories.
There were pictures of us literally going through our past life regression at your apartment, Michelle. And it still is with me so profoundly that experience that we had with you. And I know we'll get into it, but once you've had a past life regression, you [00:03:00] never forget it. is a memory that like any of
Michelle: your
Karen: current Life memories. You can see it. You can feel it. Just like it was yesterday. So anyway, I just wanted to share that because it just brought it all back for me.
Michelle: It feels like yesterday that we met and worked together and also a million years ago too. That's true.
Robyn: And this book, we've talked about this book with you, which has been being birthed over the last several years.
so important. We just are so excited to be able to talk about it today.
Michelle: Thank you so much. And
Robyn: so for those who haven't. Listen to our previous conversations or really don't understand what we mean about past life regression. Can you just talk about that at a high level before we really dig in?
Michelle: Sure. So we're talking about reincarnation, Which is the idea, the concept that we have lived before in a different body and after death. The part of us that survives death or a soul or spirit or [00:04:00] higher self, or whatever you want to call it, actually comes and decides to reincarnate and have another life in a new body.
And the idea behind past life progression is that we can recall memories from our previous existences because we're carrying them with us. Unconsciously and that we can tap into those memories from our past and use them to navigate our complicated lives today.
Karen: I love that. And I think that for so many people that still might be hard to understand in a way like how we're carrying things from our past lives.
Can you give us an example or two of maybe some things that we might be experiencing now in our present day lives that might give us little clues to our past life experiences
Michelle: yeah, you're talking about things that I call like past life clues, Where anytime you feel really drawn to Something like, like you're saying, like a culture or food, or there's some music from a different culture that moves you on a deep soul level, but also the things that you're repulsed by and can't [00:05:00] really explain why, right?
Like certain foods you'll have a visceral kind of reaction to, I just don't like it or smells or traveling to a place you felt like you've been there before. So I think that most of us do carry unconscious clues as to where we'd been before by our strong likes and dislikes.
So if you're just neutral about something, you may have had a past life in that culture, but it might not be something that you felt is impacting you in a certain way, which, leads me to the first part of your question. What it is that we carry with us. It's not the past life itself.
That impacts our lives today. It's the way that past life made you feel. So these emotions that we experience. We carry with us energetically, we bring them with us into the next life unconsciously. So this can show up as phobias triggers, right? I get people that have PTSD symptoms that they can't track to any specific circumstance that happened in this life.
And in the same way that our past in [00:06:00] this life informs who we are right now, meaning our childhood. The circumstances of our childhood. some of us had good childhood. Some of us had not so good childhoods, That kind of forms us into the person that we are today. To me, I like to invite people to open that curtain a little bit wider and look at our past as a little more all encompassing and include our previous incarnations and our past lives in that story of our past that has made us who we are and informing us today.
Yeah, is it like an
Karen: imprint almost that you have on your soul? Is it a memory that you carry with you from your past life? Is it both?
Michelle: that's interesting. You're the first person that's used that word imprint with me. And I had to sit with that for a second, because to me, an imprint is something that strikes us deeply.
And I think that it's possible to have a past life. That's yeah, that was. pretty nice or good or okay, where we do have these experiences that really resonate and strike us deeply or wound us deeply, So when I think about imprint, it's like [00:07:00] that. Spouse you had in a past life.
That's your ultimate partner that you imprinted on that experience and not that you're necessarily looking for that particular soulmate to be back in your life, although they can, it's to have that experience that resonates like that kind of love right. In the same way like if you happen to be 14 years old and drafted into a war that you didn't want to fight and had a terrible.
Frightening experience on the battlefield that could also be an imprint. So I think that what you're talking about are the things that are a little more intense emotionally, whether negatively or positively, those tend to be the things that do stand out the most. And those are the things that need to come up in order for us to release them, let them go or process and understand them so that they're no longer running our lives.
unconsciously, Because that's what a past life can do. If it's unresolved trauma, whether it's from this life or the past life, it will run your life. It will inform your decisions. It will rule your behavior, your attitudes. It'll [00:08:00] form prejudices about people or situations. So the idea is that once we understand that it's unconscious and that it comes from the past, similar to doing childhood work, we can let that go and heal from it.
And then it no longer rules you
Robyn: I just also want to focus for a moment on that title of your book again. I know I brought it up in the intro, but that question of who do you think you are. I don't think most people really take the time. Think about that. On any level. In this discussion, where we're talking about who do you really think you are on that soul level, I think that was just such, and I know when you had told me and Karen about that title I just remember it really resonating. I just, had to say that I
Michelle: felt like that title hit with the overarching theme that I wanted people to reflect on, which is, you are a soul, not a body, right? So The book is a look at identity through the lens of past lives, and I really wrote the majority of this [00:09:00] book, during this weird 2020 21 period of COVID and, Black Lives Matter protests and a lot of divisiveness, political divisiveness.
And, I just kept thinking to myself, if everybody could see what I've seen, after working with thousands of people doing passive regression, we would have no reason to feel this division. And because we would have that understanding that who we all are is a soul and therefore. We are equal and that perhaps if we had this knowledge widespread that we could create a society that reflects that belief and that we could create a more peaceful society that features true equality for all people.
So I know that I have lofty goals. I'm working hard It's so true because
Robyn: when you do actually experience that regression for yourself and you feel it and you see it for yourself. That you've been and we're going to talk about that that soul has no gender So that's [00:10:00] really like I want to intro that for a moment because personally I saw myself as a man I've seen myself as women and in different lifetimes And when you are able to feel and see that you do look at both yourself and everyone around you to your point differently.
Michelle: And I make this analogy in the book, it's like going to the optometrist, And they get all these different slides can you see better now? Can you see better now? It's like going from zero to 100 in a minute where you're all of a sudden oh, wait, the world is completely different than I thought it was previously.
So thank you for sharing your own personal experience with it because it is, it's completely challenging to your previous notion of who you thought you were, and that's the title of the book.
Robyn: And so talking about the gender and roles, can we expand on that a
Michelle: little bit? Like
Robyn: how
revisiting can really help
all of us better understand gender and roles. So
Michelle: it's about 50 50 what, gender and gender expression. And I think that one of the [00:11:00] conversations that we're having today is how nuanced gender is anyway. And, I think that's a beautiful kind of reflection of the idea that so much of us are tapping into this kind of sense that who we are is not this binary like You were born with female traits, and therefore you're a female, and you should be a girl, and you should play with girl toys, and boys should play with boy toys, and boys should marry girls, and not boys, and all of this is so antiquated, once you actually understand how nuanced gender truly is and that we reincarnate over many lifetimes with many different gender expressions and sexuality and sexual preferences as well. So that's something that's incredibly eye opening to many people. I get people who are cisgender straight people who remember being gay.
Or other genders in past lives, and that brings compassion like sometimes it takes us actually understanding that we experience something ourselves directly in order to [00:12:00] truly have that compassion and empathy. And what I'm offering people is the chance to experience that directly, To be like do you think you're a cisgender woman?
Cause you're probably not right. And if you identify just in that way, you're limiting yourself to. All of the richness that comes with this expansive idea that you have lived so many different past lives as so many different ways, and that includes roles right in some lives were mothers and some lives were not and some lives were spouses and other lives were not as fortunate to be or, we have bosses and siblings and all these different roles and a lot of us do identify with roles, particularly when we're talking about familial roles, Caregiver roles like being a mother. Is that who you are? Sometimes it feels that way. That can be very all encompassing at times. But, one of the things I talk about in the book is that if that is the only way that you identify yourself when your children leave home. And start their own [00:13:00] families, then you have to rethink that role.
We're constantly when we're attached to certain roles. if You're specifically like I'm a wife and then what if you're widowed or divorced and then you have to redefine that role. So that happens naturally throughout life anyway. So to look at being more than your role, and that your role does not define you, although your role can be very important. in, how you express yourself and how you live this life, it's not limiting to you. So that's something that also you can discover through past life work . I haven't always been this. So why would I limit myself to thinking of myself in just that way? Oh, and I think
Karen: in our experience when we had regressions you, Michelle, I think for me, one of the most eye opening things that happened was understanding the whys of me today because of those past experiences that shed so much light on Things that I knew deep down in myself might be not shortcomings, but challenges and [00:14:00] why that was.
So for example, I remember robyn and I being together in past lives and me being a caregiver for her. So it explains to me just the huge connection that I have for her and that deep level, or another one for me was being this. Native American and having to lead
through this whole, unexpected journey that I had to take over and the fear that I had
Michelle: of
Karen: stepping up and leading.
There's just so many aha moments. that come out of these experiences that you do carry with you from lifetime to lifetime, I believe on purpose, because your soul's journey is an ongoing learning experience. that's
Michelle: what it's all about. And I love that you bring that up because Sometimes we can channel our past life personas and I remember that experience really well.
I was like of course you and robyn are soulmates. And that I've got my soulmate who's helping me step into my purpose as a leader. There you go. So it's oh, I have an inner leader in me, right? And this is something that my soul is familiar [00:15:00] with. Yeah I think that's really well said that, it always informs you as to where you are right now today.
And it makes sense because it's More of your journey, It's more of your story. It's your backstory, Yes. Oh, that's a great
Karen: way to put it. Yeah. And even this whole idea of soul family, we just, we're talking with Lisa Nitzkin about that and how sometimes it can be confusing. Like why we have the parents that you were saying that earlier, why we
have the parents that we have or why
we chose the spouses that we did or why we not be able to get along with our bosses, but that's very intentional.
And that we carry still those relationships from past lifetimes as well. Can you talk about that? How all that impacts
Michelle: our past life? I 100 percent agree with everything that Lisa says that, in our limited viewpoint in this life, we're like, Wait, why is this my family? I believe that we have a soul contract.
You can actually dive into these past life memories and find out more about the soul contract, Oh, this [00:16:00] is what happened before in a past life. And it makes it make more sense. Now, I always tell people this, the past life, isn't the answer to navigating a difficult relationship. You're like, Oh, that's right.
I can't date this person anymore. They killed me in a past life or whatever, And that's a true story that happens sometimes we're really drawn to people that we have karma with. So sometimes the answer is, yeah let me get as far away from that person as possible. And sometimes it's maybe I need to forgive this person and give them a chance to forgive me or whatever it is.
It's just more information that you need to know in order to make a more informed decision about your soul contract, or even just show up and be present and honor the soul contract in a deeper and more loving way. Because that's what it's about. It's about being more loving and honoring the fact that we have crossed paths with these people before.
They're back in our lives now for a reason, and there's something that we need to learn from them. And there's ways that we can grow from those [00:17:00] experiences.
Robyn: that's so good. And it's so true because it really does help having Some context. I love the word you used, backstory. It's very helpful in this lifetime.
To your point, it doesn't solve everything But that understanding, it gives you compassion, that context. And when you see it in your mind's eye, when you have a regression, you can't unsee it or unfeel it. that's what I think Karen and I talk about all the time.
Michelle: And it's important to note too that some people see, and some people don't see as much as they sense it or feel it and I try to walk you through this in the book and give a lot of different opportunities that are different ways I call them ways of seeing or like the Claire's, different ways to stimulate your unconscious mind either through journaling and prompting but it's always emotional whether you see it or you sense it or feel it and I think both of you can attest to that.
There's something that resonates and you can't unfeel or see or know it, That once you're changed, if [00:18:00] you allow yourself to be, because we are humans , we can be like that was weird. I don't know what that means.
Yes.
Robyn: Well, another word that you brought up earlier in our, this, in this conversation is soulmate.
Can you give your definition of soulmate?
Michelle: So over the now many years I've been doing past life regression, I have come to define soulmate as anyone you've known before in a past life. And this is because I think that a lot of times we get caught up in these romantic notions of I'm searching for the one or there's someone out there for me or.
Categorizing soulmates by importance, , but that doesn't change the fact that some people that we have difficult relationships with are still soulmates. I completely do not like The words like twin flame or twin soul, because I just think that sets people up for thinking that they're looking for some kind of primordial other half that will complete them.
I have found that to be a complete and total myth. So one of the things that I like to challenge people to do is to [00:19:00] look at. Everyone in their life as a soulmate and honor them in that way, equally, whether it's an easy relationship or a difficult relationship. And none of this stuff that I'm suggesting is easy.
These are difficult practices. I don't mean to sound glib and just be like, everyone's a soulmate. Just love everyone because that is not easy at all. We have. Incredibly challenging relationships, life is a school and that's why we're here, And remembering that can sometimes help you navigate those difficulties and get through the dark times, this is school and I must be in grad school because this is a challenge. And that's what it's all about.
Robyn: And when we think about the way that you define soulmate, we're all soul family. Each one of us, we're soul family, which is what we've talked about before.
And this gives it even greater context.
Michelle: And I want people to even challenge themselves to open this even wider that all of humanity is your soul family. I agree. That leap and yes, of course we start with our [00:20:00] closest loved ones. And think that there's a meditation practice I do in the book where I invite you to focus on the closest person to you and then expand that love outwards to, Your family and your community and your town and your country and all of humanity.
That's a really powerful practice because once you start to recognize the soul in another person, then you can actually recognize every single person you meet as soul family. That we have this shared humanity. And like I said, that's the key, I think, to compassion and love and equality.
Also, if you look at it,
Karen: like we've all come here at the same time for a reason, this whole world that we're living in, there's a reason why we have Social media and all of this access to understanding everything that's going on in the world so that we can make a preference of how we want to live within that.
That world. And so from the politicians to the, kings and queens of social media, they're all there for a reason so that we can [00:21:00] learn and choose how we want to be in the midst of that. So you're right. They are. All part of our soul family in a way and have taken on that role. And I also wanted to mention for me one of the biggest ahas about thinking about soul family was in the fact that there are people who have chosen who are in our love group have chosen to be the really difficult, nasty, hard person that we have to learn from.
And they came at that from a place of love before we all came To this planet right together that before we all incarnated that they made that choice to take on that really difficult role to help us learn. So it helped me really look at some of those pain people in my life completely differently.
Yeah.
Michelle: And that we have these pain people in our lives and we have these pain people in the world. And actually I will eventually write an entire book on just soulmates because that's a whole topic in of itself. I have a feeling that's my second book. We'll see. Although I do talk a lot about soulmates and roles and relationships in this book.
But [00:22:00] what you're talking about is I usually call the disruptors. The people that kind of come, they have these difficult lessons and it's important to honor the purpose and the role of the disruptors as much as it is to honor the people who are the loving, kind, compassionate guides. And I love what you said at the onset of your last comment we are made for these times.
we decided to be here and all of us and a lot of people ask me like why the population of the world is so much bigger today because we all want to be here there are many tremendous opportunities for growth and yes through technology, we're able to connect with each other on the other side of the world and watch people suffering.
On YouTube in a country that we've never been to, And actually, we're able to connect. There are a lot of negative things about technology and social media, but one of the most amazing things is how we're able to really connect and understand that shared humanity. So yeah, each of us decided to be here for these times in order to participate [00:23:00] in what I believe is a really important pivotal moment in our growth as humans and our evolution and, we're doing it as hard as it is and painful as it can be.
We are doing it. actually
Robyn: have talked about before how getting a ticket here to this life school. It's a really fortunate ticket, we really wanted that ticket to get to come here and experience all of this, so that we could help all of humanity evolve.
Michelle: And I keep getting people that ask me, they're like when do we get to be done reincarnating?
And because I'm such a student of nature, I'm like never, cycles. Repeat and we evolve and we change and we go like maybe there are other places besides planet earth where we can eventually reincarnate but people talk about achieving it like I did it. I mastered life, but I think that there are always more lessons that we can learn.
We're not getting out of this anytime some people are like can I just. Exit, and and be done. I'll just be someone's spirit guide for a little while. Maybe [00:24:00] you can for a little while, but that's just to chill. And then you've got to come back and keep going. Cause there's always more to learn and ways to grow.
Well,
Robyn: and speaking of a spirit guide. What is your definition of a spirit
Michelle: guide? So my definition of a spirit guide is anyone who actually is helping you on a spiritual level. And that can include people that are your loved ones who have passed, people you knew in this life, ancestors. People you didn't know in this life who maybe were connected to you in a physical plane in a past life.
They also represent ascended masters or teachers or there could be archetypes, right? People that use energy of certain people that were embodied here on planet earth like Jesus or Gandhi or Muhammad, or you're right, you can use those energies because the energies exist on a kind of spiritual level, but you can also have somebody who's currently living inform [00:25:00] you as a spirit guide, because I believe that.
It's possible to have connections with people on multiple dimensions. I have people that tell me they're like, you came to me in a dream last night. And I'm like, oh, good. I'm not going to build them for that hour. I don't think, but or I get people that come and visit me in dreams or tell me messages.
I get people that are after their. past life regression, I'll invite a spirit guide to come give them a message. And they're like, Oh, my husband came to tell me something. And their husband was in the next room. He's not dead, but his spirit or his soul wanted to come and tell them something.
Again, this is a new agey term that a lot of people throw around, but I think it's anyone who can serve as a guide on a spiritual or soul level that can give you insight into your journey. And wisdom that you find valuable, We don't need to label these things and limit to what that could possibly look like or be.
Karen:
I love as part of your regression process, when you start out in the meditation, you [00:26:00] invite us to invite our spirit guides, whoever that is. to join us before we actually go through the regression, to be with us, to guide us, to let us know that we're safe through that experience. And for me, that was one of the most beautiful parts of the experience because the way you do it, Michelle, I want to say it feels so real.
It is so real, but it does really put you in that place where you can open yourself up. And for some people, I'm sure it's the first time
they've
seen or really
Michelle: thought about who their spirit guide is and I think that's a really important part of the process because I actually believe that.
These images and thoughts and feelings, they're coming from your unconscious mind, but they're also being facilitated in a certain way by your spirit guides. Like it comes from spirit and it's because time doesn't really exist. So the realm of spirit is this vast space that transcends time and experience, and that we're able to tap into that.
Space by doing a passive progression. And we have people who [00:27:00] love us and care for us and are guiding us to
help kind
of facilitate or support us, I guess is the word that I'm looking for as we embark on this journey. And it's a beautiful thing.
Robyn: In your book, I would say it's almost like a soul assessment
are really guiding someone to both look at their soul right now, all their beliefs, which then help them look back at their past lives. And throughout the book, when people pick this up.
They will see their own depth because you help them see that and then what you talked about how we all relate to one another. And so I just want to say thank you for that. Number one. also, when just talking about our soul, one of the things that you talk about is the term old soul and what you actually
prefer
to look at that as, because people always say, usually younger children or teenagers and they'll say, Oh, they're really old soul. do you make of that?
Michelle: I write about this in the book, but you guys know I've been talking about this for [00:28:00] years. I don't believe that age guarantees wisdom. I really don't. You can spin your wheels, you can be old and ignorant, many of us are.
So the term that I like to use is evolve soul, because what it implies is that it's not just time spent. It's the work you do, and there's an intentionality that comes with that as well. Some of us just want to be like la ignore my childhood trauma. I know I have triggers, but I'm just going to make them go away and other of us, really decide to put in the work.
What is this about me that keeps repeating this pattern? Or, how can I be better? How can I understand more? So to me, when we assign that quality, which Feels like wisdom, It feels like wisdom earned. And I tell this to people all the time. If you've already grown old and wise many times through many past lives, why can't we tap into that wisdom and use it in our lives today?
Because like we were talking about earlier, these times are calling for some [00:29:00] wisdom and we have it inside of us. So one of the. Things that I would like to invite people to do with this book is to open themselves up to their own already hard earned stores of wisdom that are inside of them to help them make more progress.
So it's not just be about being an old soul. It's about doing some work while we're here and becoming more evolved, which in my opinion is more wise, but it's also more loving and more compassionate.
Karen: you do talk about this also in the book , Michelle, is about the fear of going through the past life regression.
I know I was nervous about it too, cause you're just never sure what door you're going to open and where you're going to end up. So can you just share a little bit about how you help people with those fears in your sessions and how the book can help too, as they're thinking about that experience?
Michelle: Okay. So the two most common fears I hear when people talk about wanting to explore their past lives or do a passive regression is number one that they can't do it, Am I doing it right? So this book really [00:30:00] is designed to be a gentle guide, And it gives you lots of different ways to look at it and frame it.
And maybe it doesn't happen the first time, but it'll happen the next day, or maybe this exercise will speak to you more than another. So I believe that you can do it. I believe that everybody is. People are not always capable of having this experience, as long as they're willing to learn more about how it works and do it and approach it.
The second biggest fear I get is that people will learn that they were a terrible person in a past life. And, historical figures that were terrible aside I haven't found any of those yet but the truth is that we were all kind of terrible people in a past life right because. That's the whole point.
we made mistakes, we learned and we grew and we became the person that we are today and I talk about this a lot in the book that, looking back at your past lives and judging yourself for things that you've done in a past life would be like getting really angry at a kindergartner for not knowing calculus.[00:31:00]
Because that's how it works. So when you're looking at your past lives, you're actually looking at a younger, less evolved version of yourself. And it helps you see how far you come as well, where you're like, Oh, I used to be. Really crappy, or I've made this mistake before and what happens is sometimes we end up in these patterns because we reincarnate in order to challenge ourselves to disrupt these patterns, I keep being too materially obsessed and ignore my family. That's a less loving energy. I would like to get better at that. So maybe over many lives, maybe you have five past lives where all you do is work and your wife really suffers for it and your kids don't even really know who you are.
And so you keep repeating that pattern again and again until you learn to change it and you learn to become. Better balanced with yourself because it is really about balance, so the other way might be there were past lives where you just really didn't want to have a job and all you wanted to do is hang out with your wife and kids and then they were [00:32:00] poor and your family suffered, So that's going the other way as well. So that's just one example of how it can work with these patterns where we keep repeating and sometimes we have themes that will show up in several past lives in clusters in order for us to get that lesson.
I have not met like Napoleon Bonaparte or Hitler or, any terrible Roman emperor in a past life. they're probably out there. I don't know if they're exactly. My demographic for clients because they might have a little work to do, but no judgment. my door's open.
Come on in. Even if that were true, if somebody saw themselves being someone who had committed atrocities in history, again, the disruptor, like I said before, there's a certain purpose. for that person, that role that helps actually serve humanity in a certain way. So that doesn't mean we need to honor these figures in a certain way, as much as honor their presence and the role that they play in forcing us [00:33:00] out of our comfort zone, we have to be pushed sometimes.
And that's what's happening, I believe, right now on planet Earth is there's a lot of. Ways that we're being pushed the ways that we have been living just are not working. They're not working anymore with this society with different kind of demographics, having power over others. And, supremacy and racial division and religious differences and hate and all that these systems are not working.
And they haven't been for a few thousand years. So we need to start to figure out how to change the way that we live so that it can feature, peace, love, equality for all beings. And I believe that this experience that I provide in this book is one of many ways that we can break through these.
old patterns of behavior. I would like people to be able to see themselves differently, see others as different and also see their lives as a constant work in progress that you don't [00:34:00] have to die to reincarnate. You can reincarnate now. You can change your life at Any moment and that's the biggest message of this book is that you can look back at the past and see the mistakes you've made before things that you regret and decide to change and be different moving forward.
And that's the most important element of the book is that it really is about creating your best future, the future that represents your highest potential and the highest potential that we can actually create as one united humanity together. Wow, that is
Karen: really a big thought. And as you're talking, I had an aha moment around the whole idea of why things repeat themselves, It's because we're carrying around these imprints, either a fear of speaking out or hatred that we carried with us from a war zone that we sat in, or, fear all of those things. And Why so many people may be not willing to go through the
work because of
the fear of that sort of inner [00:35:00] remembrance of past lives when if they spoke up bad things happened or they were in a war and they got killed so I can see in a way why this perpetuality continues to happen.
And yet, as you were saying before, this is such an opportunity now in the history of the world, we have more opportunity to be seen safely to really do the things that our soul really wants to do. So that's why now is so important. That's why books like these are so important because there's so many people who don't even understand that we've had.
past
Michelle: lives before. And in your always wise and compassionate way, you're pointing out the fact that this process is a compassionate one. We don't have to get it all right in this lifetime, And certain lives, Are meant to be a break, right? This is why some people just like, why do they have such a charmed life and other lifetimes?
We choose to challenge ourselves more. The process itself of evolving is a compassionate one and it's self driven too, So we're not in a hurry. And a [00:36:00] lot of people kind of associate karma with like punishment. You did something bad in a past life. So you're going to. Pay for it. And I have not found that to be true at all.
It's this beautiful, kind, loving, gentle process as we grow, evolve, and learn over many lifetimes. And I think that you're exactly right, Karen. It's not about just getting it right. That we need to lose that notion. We all make mistakes. We're human. And that's the whole point. We're here to have those experiences and those failures or ways that we didn't step up are actually just as important as when we do get it right.
Because that's the process of learning. Yeah.
Robyn: And as you go through this experience, or you use the book to have this experience, that in yourself. And then, as we were, as you were both talking about, history repeating itself think what we're all in agreement is that we want to break those cycles that are no longer working and if you pair this perspective of looking back and having the opportunity to change things and [00:37:00] You
Michelle: also
Robyn: add in something like astrology, which I know Michelle, you're very interested in as well.
Michelle: We're in this
Robyn: age of Aquarius, right? Where things can really change, if you do believe in that at all, there is energy right now that will allow things to really transform, to really change so that we don't repeat the same things and that we can have an actual society that is of peace
Michelle: and love. love that you bring that up because and I am super interested in astrology and when people ask me if I'm an astrologer, my snarky joke is not since the 1500s, it's true. I love that. But what astrology shows us are these cycles. There's these smaller individual cycles, there's moon cycles, there's Venus cycles, there's even Pluto cycles that are generational and that it is about kind of different energies that will return [00:38:00] and repeat like a refiner's buyer, Like we keep doing things over and again, but that it changes and it gets different and it evolves and that there's karma that each generation has to move. A us forward, and you can actually track that and astrology is one of many ways you can understand the totality of our human existence.
And I remember in 2012 there was all this kind of stuff about 2012 and the end of the world and whatever and people would talk about like the Mayan calendar the world is ending actually have a Mayan calendar above my TV there. Can you see it? Yes. There's no end. It doesn't end. Wow. And what the main calendar actually shows, like, how do they decide 2012 is where it ends?
Because what the calendar actually shows are these eras or epics. In human experience and in the experience of the world and each of the different kind of energies that change and what we're supposed to step into and feel pushed towards in each of them. So similar to astrology, which is [00:39:00] also a very ancient divination method.
I'm a history nerd, obviously. So anything that's ancient that we can use in our lives today, I'm totally down for, but yeah, it's important to get ourselves out of these kind of Blinders that we have where we're just like just trying to get through the day or trying to focus on what's going to happen next month where we can open the curtains wider and actually see that our existence is so much more expansive and larger than we ever previously thought.
And that shift in perception alone has you looking at your life through a totally different lens. And that's what I'm inviting people to do, through this book.
Robyn: Exactly. And I would say for those that are listening to this specific episode of our podcast and or who pick up your book or find themselves with your book in their hands or someone suggests it to them.
It's on purpose. They're ready for it. So if you're listening to this, you're ready for it. You're listening to this on purpose. I would imagine it is Sparking curiosity. If [00:40:00] you have never heard of this before or have not done a past life regression, what Michelle is offering you is this opportunity to really start to investigate your own soul and how we all work together in this greater way.
Michelle: Thank you for seeing me and my intention behind the book, which it really is. Not to provide all the answers, but to give you more questions. ANd what
Robyn: I will say, you do weave a ton of history throughout Karen and I love that about you.
We always get some sort of really good history lesson. Whenever we talk, because you have done that research.
Michelle: I've always believed that in order to figure out. What's going to happen in the future. We have to look at the wisdom of the past. And there are a lot of really important conversations.
I think that we're having right now about the way that we tell our history, what lens, right? who gets to control the narrative of the story of history. And so telling the truth about history is a really [00:41:00] important part of figuring out how we got here. And what isn't working and what patterns we need to stop in order to create a new future.
This is my contribution to that conversation that's happening on a larger kind of collective level, looking at what kind of books people are allowed to read and, what people are allowed to say. think it's really important that we tell the truth about history, that we own up to our mistakes and our failures, and we figure out what we need to do in an honest and real way in order to become the person that we need to be, should be, and ultimately want to be.
Michelle,
Karen: how come, do you think, that we don't come into this lifetime, With an understanding or
maybe part of our culture to do these past life regressions like this is not a new
thing, right? It's not something that you just invented. Why is this not part of
Michelle: our culture?
Why is it not a rite of passage
Karen: when you're [00:42:00] becoming a young adult to have this opportunity because it really is. A tool to understand your purpose that's really connected to that. what is your thought on that?
Michelle: I love your question. And my answer is because we forgot that it's supposed to be because indigenous cultures worldwide.
Believed in reincarnation. And in fact, I talk about this a lot in the book, like different cultures there's certain tribes in Africa that when a child was born, they would chant welcome back. So 85 percent or 89 percent of the world's population believes in reincarnation. And actually almost 40 percent of Americans believe in reincarnation and of that 40%, 65 percent are under the age of 35, So this is something that we don't talk about openly in this culture, but we need to because the beliefs are there. And you're right. it should be like, okay, it's a certain age. You know who you are in this life. And I don't generally work with children because I think that you should figure out [00:43:00] who you are in this life before you start adding past lives on top of it.
But many children talk about things that I believe are connected to their past lives innately. And. Depending on the culture and the belief of the family, a lot of times that gets shut down. Like people are like, Ooh, what are they talking about? They're scared. Where maybe we can stop being so closeted about these beliefs.
And that's the thing. I'm the one that everybody tells. Oh, I had this experience or had this dream and I looked like a different person. And we're not trading these stories. enough to be like, wait, you too? Right? It's a different kind of conversation once we start to acknowledge that this is very common and a very widespread belief.
And it's different than religion. I think a lot of people are worried that they're going to have to reject their previous held beliefs in order to add past lives and reincarnation into it. And that's absolutely not the case because actually reincarnation as a belief, as a tenant can be traced to every single [00:44:00] world religion, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam.
Early Christians did believe in reincarnation because it stemmed from Judaism and you cannot understand esoteric Judaism and Kabbalah without understanding reincarnation. And the same with Islam. Islam actually comes from that same ancient root. And so they have these beliefs in a lot of mystical traditions, Sufism in particular, very much talk about reincarnation and what's happening is that we have all these different religions that are like we believe this and we believe that and it's like we're all Trying to do the same thing.
We're just not trading notes in the same way. And we have this idea of like divisiveness and other, and this person believes that, and this person doesn't believe that, and this is my identity around my gender or my ethnicity or my race or my religion. And what I'm introducing in this book is that those are false identities. and that doesn't mean you have to reject. your culture [00:45:00] your identity, particularly if you do come from a marginalized culture, that people work so hard to preserve their ways and their cultures. That's important. But what I'm asking is to leave room to add more. It doesn't have to be so limited.
So people are like, Oh, I would love to do a passive regression with you, but I'm a Christian. Okay. Did you know that the Dead Sea Scrolls contained a lot of writings that actually talk about things like, reincarnation and actually. Reincarnation was an official tenet of the early Christian church until I think the year 363 because that was when the Roman Empire became the Holy Roman Empire with the conversion of Emperor Constantine into Christianity and they voted.
They were like we need to all decide what we all believe in because there were all these different sects. They needed to codify the rules and they voted out reincarnation. And the story is that it was Emperor Constantine's mother who was like if people believe they have more than one chance[00:46:00] in this life, maybe they won't obey the rules as well.
So that was really about power and control.
These religious traditions and the way that created wars and capitalism and like I could go into a whole thing with history and I remember being in my high school history class and this is one of the first moments I had with these kind of thoughts and ideas, learning about the Crusades.
I was like, this is messed up. Is anybody else think there's and and I remember my teacher like really enjoyed my kind of thought process on it like why would you want to, but it was about politics and power and control and all of this patriarchal kind of systems, ways that I'm talking about that aren't working and I'm not saying that it's anti masculine I use patriarchy like females can be patriarchal to.
But we need to return to a [00:47:00] more feminine, earth based, loving kind of way of life. It answer to your original. This is a long answer to your question. Why we don't do this. It's because we've forgotten that this is an important part of our spiritual journeys right to acknowledge our spiritual self and that there can be spiritual journeys that happen within the confines of religion and that's super important for some people.
But there are other ways to experience that connection to your soul and your purpose. And things like integrity and love and humanity outside of religion, and that's one of the reasons that I wrote this is a guidebook as how to navigate that you don't have to negate your previously held beliefs for any reason.
You can always add more.
Robyn: I also want to point out that term soul, which we've used a ton in our conversation and always will, but I don't know why I didn't know this, can you tell us what the word soul is in ancient Greek? Because honestly, I didn't know
Michelle: this.[00:48:00] So in ancient Greek, the term for soul is psychikos, which is where we get psychology, Psychological. And then also psychic. And , what it means is of the soul, right? Psychology is basically like the study of your soul. And we
Robyn: never talked about that. I felt like.
Michelle: What? And again, in this culture, there's a forgetting. It's like we're replacing science. with, this is a science, not spiritual process where ancient people understood that any healing of the mind and the body also had it to include the soul.
And what's happening today is that we are returning to those ways, right? I had a conversation with somebody not long ago about, Native American wisdom, about calling the rocks, the grandfathers and, here in Central Park, in New York City, these rocks are ancient glacial rocks that were Millions [00:49:00] of years old that are here in the park.
And I was like, isn't that interesting? They call them the grandfathers and science has actually proved that they are millions of years old. So both things can be true, right? Science didn't negate the fact that native Americans had this innate understanding of the ancient ness and the wisdom contained in these rocks.
So we don't have to be like one is mythology and therefore not real. And the other is science and it's. real, we can actually acknowledge both of them. They can both be true and they don't need to cancel each other out. And I think that's an important conversation that we need to continue to have moving forward.
Robyn: what's one thing that everybody listening you can do right now to remind them of one of their past lives.
Michelle: Ooh, okay. One of my favorite exercises in the book is to go through your lists of likes and dislikes, the things that you're drawn to look around your house.
And you guys have both been in my apartment. I have clues to [00:50:00] my past lives as far as like things like that I've collected from travels all over the world or things I've drawn to music films. mY son is obsessed with war movies and it doesn't matter what time period, whether it was civil war or world war two, he watches.
Braveheart and all of these, he loves war movies. And I asked him one time, I was like do you think that you've maybe been a warrior in a lot of past lives? And he was yeah, probably. So things like that, that we have clues. And what that does is it starts priming your unconscious to notice to open, right?
We end up being closed off. It invites dreams to come. It just opens up. Your mind to possibility. And then you start to notice things more. So it's about changing the filter by which you look at things once you acknowledge past lives are real. And you're right, Karen, I did not invent this past life regression.
This has been around for a long time. But what I'm looking to do is to take that huh. [00:51:00] Gotcha. Out of it. And okay okay, past lives are something that is a widespread belief that a lot of people believe in. And now what? Now what do we do with it? How do we use it in our life?
So it's no more about the woo, or oh, wow, it's my past life. How do we move this work forward? So yeah, I would suggest that to everyone. Take stock of what you're interested in, what you're drawn to, certain styles of clothing that you wear. Things that you collect and also the things that you really don't like, right?
Like things that repulse you or you find scary or, those are also clues as well. And what it does is it's just inviting your past lives. To connect. You're inviting them in. You're inviting those past versions of yourself to inform your life in some way today. And that alone, just that intention can be a really powerful shift that can invite even more information in.
Robyn: .
It's all in the noticing. It is that awareness. Yeah.
Michelle: I think we
Karen: can all relate to that.
Michelle: I think that most of us. aNd again, it's about [00:52:00] giving people an entry point wherever they are. Some people have done a ton of this work and they'll still like this book, I hope, Because it'll give you new ways to think. And I also wrote this book for people who've never even heard of this, who've never even thought about it.
Exactly. And it's again about entering where you're at. And it's just about beginning and deciding to embark on this journey wherever you're at in it and honor the process as it comes very organically and naturally because it might surprise you and
Robyn: normalizing. I love what you said about your son you're already starting to normalize that for him at his younger age.
I do that with my daughter, she's obsessed with all things French, all things. From france and it makes no sense to my husband and I that is so not On our radar never has been but we honor that for her and we've been normalizing for her Affinity and we'll say to her.
You definitely had a past life in france Like yeah, you were definitely [00:53:00] something there, and she loves to think about that and it makes her interested And is inviting those experiences hopefully to come to her or her dreams or by visiting and feeling that out and it's pieces to your larger soul puzzle.
Michelle: And I love that you're reminding us of that, that it really is young people who are being born with more of this knowing and they're so open minded. And I always tell people, I'm like, if you're worried about the future of humanity, spend some time with some like Gen Z kids, they're activists they're listening, they're open, and they come in with these kind of Knowings that we didn't have in the generation above us didn't have we were talking about this earlier about astrology and epics and different generational karma.
And, it's our job to Open the door for them and hold it they don't need any help going through it, but we've got to pave the way for them. And they're the generation that's going to actually be the change[00:54:00] that we really do need and we just need to give them ways to do it to accomplish it.
That's my belief. One of the things I
Karen: love that you do throughout the book is give examples of people, not naming names, but you give examples of people that you have had really impactful sessions with you, Michelle, can you maybe share one or two of those transformations that you've really seen from your clients who have gone through a regression
Michelle: Yeah, I love that.
there are so many examples. I have so many stories, but the one that's jumping out, for me. to bring up is, there was a woman I worked with who had just gone through a terrible divorce. And I think this is in the chapter about the roles and responsibilities that, she'd been a wife and a stay at home mom for so many years.
And all of a sudden, the same year her kids all left for college, her husband left her for a younger man and she's what do I do now? And she remembered a past life as an impressionistic painter and like a renowned one also I was like, Oh, okay. [00:55:00] I think I've seen your work in museums.
And that was incredibly empowering to her because she realized that yeah, you know what? Before I drowned myself in this role of wife and mother, I always wanted to be a decorator. And she was able to start her own decorating business. And now I've seen her stuff in, she's been in an architectural digest.
She's a very renowned decorator. And it was that. moment where she had the confidence to be like, I know what I'm doing with color form light. And so it's not just that she had to be a painter again, cause she probably could have been, but using those gifts and skills and knowledge in this life.
And. As that impressionistic painter she actually was not wealthy or powerful or famous until after her death. And so she realized she's I'd like the accolades in this life. I'd like to make money doing this. So There were a lot of layers to it, but. It was really about seeing that her role did not need to define her and that she was able to reincarnate [00:56:00] herself now with the knowledge of who she'd been in the past in order to move forward into the future that she wanted to have.
So that's one of my favorite stories. And I follow all of her work and I'm always like, yeah, when I see her do something, but it, she just really needed That boost that confidence, but also the insight and the perspective. We get these blinders of that we're just living this moment right now.
When you open that curtain wider, it's incredibly empowering and can be life changing.
Karen: Yeah, what I'm feeling like what robyn was saying about Bella and what you just said, it's that acknowledgement that what's in there is real and it like waters it. It's waters the seed of what has already been there in a completely different way.
It affirms that it gives reason for why it is there in your life. And I think we all need that. It's like having a spirit guide. Really come through.
Robyn: and to that point. Also, you can help heal something that may be a trigger. Like I have severe claustrophobia [00:57:00] and I don't know where that comes from in this lifetime.
So I believe it is from a past life. And so it's healing trauma from a past life with all of the resources that the three of us. So there's energy healing that can happen. There's different ways of moving that out, but it's acknowledging it. So it's even the triggers that if you acknowledge and can clear that can also help you have a more joyful and fulfilling present
Michelle: life.
Yeah, it is. It's about healing and overcoming, And we need to work on that claustrophobia.
Robyn: I'm making progress. I can get in elevators and I can go to the bathroom on a plane.
Michelle: Okay.
Robyn: Without complete panic, some panic.
Michelle: When it is, it's about recognizing that not everything comes from this life that our existence is vast and varied.
And then once we're able to heal the things that have happened to us in the past and we're free from that, Like you're no longer dealing with that same trigger and pattern. And so I'm sure that we can find other [00:58:00] things, like I said, to work on and there's always more to heal. But usually people find that it's a really big relief to drop that load that they've been carrying sometimes for thousands of years over many lifetimes.
It's just a relief to just let it go.
Robyn: I'm so grateful for you. I'm so grateful that we're soulmates. We're soul family.
Michelle: And that you've really, you've translated
Robyn: this all in a way. That is accessible to everyone.
Michelle: Thank you for taking the time to read it, both of you, and for your thoughtful questions and for seeing me and, giving me a chance to talk about my passion and my love and helping share it with, your audience and, hopefully they'll enjoy, delving into their past lives and opening up new stories for their future.
By way of this book and more, so thank you. It's going
Robyn: to be transformative for so many people. It's going to be fun. That's the other part. You're going to have fun doing
Michelle: this.
Karen: And that's what's so great about the book too. [00:59:00] It's not a one and done.
Michelle: Exactly. You can go back.
You're right. Yes, it is. So it's it's a real guide
Robyn: that you can honestly just have by your side. And so speaking of, you can pre order Michelle's book, Who Do You Think You Are? An Interactive Journey Through Your Past Lives and Into Your Best Future Now.
We'll have the link to the pre order in our show notes. And if you do pre order Michelle's book, she is giving you a free bonus gift, which is a full length past life regression meditation. And take it from us. You want that. It works. We've done it both in person as well as using the meditation. So we know it works and we would be so excited for you to experience that as well.
So once you pre order, you'll use a special link that will also be in our show notes to get that exclusive download. And you can also find out more about working with Michelle as well as her upcoming events at michelle brock. com and that's m i c h [01:00:00] e l l e b r o c k. com and you can follow michelle at pastlifemichelle on instagram.
Thank
Michelle: you so much! Love this conversation. Thank you guys.