Past Life Regression

Past Life Regression is a therapy that uses hypnosis to recover memories of past lives or re-incarnations. It is mentioned in Upanishads and discussed in details in Yoga sutras of Patanjali. According to Patanjali the soul is burdened with accumulation of impressions that are a part of karma of previous lives. He called the process of Past life regression as Prati-prasav which means “Reverse birthing”.

Past life regression is typically undertaken either in pursuit of a spiritual experience or in psychotherapy. It involves dealing with current problems through memories of past lives. The concept behind regression is that whenever we experience something intense, on the physical or emotional level, there is an imprint of that in our soul memory which we carry forward in our future life affecting our state of mind, desires, preferences and behavior.
For e.g. if someone dies of drowning in a certain life, there is a possibility they carry a fear of water or a choking sensation in their throat or maybe both in their current life. Past-life-regression works on the principle of cause and effect and helps removes the effect by addressing the root cause.

The technique is not taught as part of any medical internship. Skeptics allege that the source of the memories is more likely cryptomnesia and confabulations that combine past experiences, knowledge, imagination and suggestion from the hypnotist than recall of a previous existence.
Psychologist Robert Baker demonstrated that belief in reincarnation is the greatest predictor of whether a subject would have a past-life memory while under past life regression hypnotherapy. Furthermore, Baker demonstrated that the subject's expectations significantly affect the past-life regressive session.

He divided a group of 60 students into three groups. He told the first group that they were about to experience an exciting new therapy that could help them uncover their past lives. Eighty-five per cent in this group were successful in "remembering" a past life. He told the second group that they were to learn about a therapy which may or may not work to engender past-life memories.
In this group, the success rate was 60%. He told the third group that the therapy was crazy and that normal people generally do not experience a past life. Only 10% of this group had a past-life "memory."