Filmmaker John Waters once said famously, "Without obsession, life is nothing."
But what if these obsessions aren't just amusing personality "quirks" to laugh about with your friends, but rather, unhealthy or debilitating phobias that get in the way of actually living?
For example, what if you have an extreme fear of--
Heights/Falling
Water/Drowning
Fire
Storms/Lightning
Electricity/Electrocution
Large crowds/Mobs
Driving/Car crashes
Hospitals/Doctors
Needles/Injections
Starvation
Attacks by animals (including dogs, bees, snakes and spiders)
Explosions or other loud noises
Flying/Fear of plane crash
Weapons: guns, knives, or other blades
Heavy machinery
Being trapped in a confined space/Claustrophobia
Wearing constricting clothing (especially around the neck)
And not to mention OCD-type behaviors like--
Obsessively locking doors and windows (fear of home invasion)
Cleaning/washing hands (fear of infectious disease)
Hypochondria/becoming convinced you have a terminal disease
Hypochondria/fear of being poisoned
As you can see from this list, one thing all of these fears have in common is that they're basically the fear of death--and not just any death, but the fear of a very specific form of death.
The specific nature of these fears is the first clue that they could easily have been created in a past life. Most past-life regression therapists operate from a very simple premise: that fears generally make sense--once you know where they're coming from. And all if takes for the average person to jettison these fears is a past-life regression session or two. That's because, after re-experiencing a traumatic death during a hypnosis session, people will generally come to a very simple conclusion--"That was then, this is now." They realize that the things they've been fearing aren't some weird "premonition" of how their life will ultimately end...but rather, a half-forgotten memory of how another one did. And this insight alone changes everything.
In my case, I was obsessed by the Titanic story. Like, really, really obsessed. And this obsession manifested itself in a number of ways. For instance, I developed an irrational fear of drowning in a motor vehicle. In fact, it became so intense I insisted on buying vehicles with manual, roll-down windows...long after the technology had become antiquated. And, for some reason, I was also terrified of spending any length of time in the shadow of a tall building; I had this very real fear that the thing was gonna topple over on me.
Both phobias were mystifying--until I underwent that first past-life regression. And when I saw the sinking Titanic looming almost directly over my head, I was able to figure out where these fears were coming from, and very quickly release them.
Today, I drive a vehicle with power windows. It’s the first one I ever owned. (I was 44 when I purchased it.) And sure, hidden somewhere in the console of my truck is wrench-like doohickey that’s supposed to shatter glass with a good whack. However, I honestly have no idea if it actually works, and, more importantly, I don’t worry about it.
And that’s a pretty significant change.
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Paul Amirault is a recovered Titanic obsessive and author of The Man Who Sent the SOS: A Memoir of Reincarnation and the Titanic.