Everyone has only one life

QUESTION: Masters, could you please explain to me about my past lives? If there is only ONE life how we can have so many past lives? My yoga teacher said that we only have this life. Then what am I experiencing during my past-life regression sessions?     ~Simona, Singapore

ANSWER: Within some belief systems there is a confusion concerning the number of lifetimes that a soul may experience. There is a segment of the human population that believes the only physical existence that a soul has is the very one it is undergoing at the time the question is asked. Most of these are followers of an organized religion that is based upon a system of reward and punishment—the end result of a life being a glorious ascension into heaven or an ignominious descent into hell.

Another segment follows a belief system where the soul enters a series of lives dictated by the bad karma it earns in one lifetime and must work off in others. This continues until a state of enlightenment has been reached, at which time the soul may return Home. Some feel there are a certain number of lives, rather like the proverbial nine lives of the cat, which they must endure before they can return Home.

Each soul does have only one life—a life in which it takes on human form over and over again to try many different types of experiences. The number of experiences—“lives” as human beings call them—is completely a matter of choice for each soul. It may choose to have a hundred or only twenty-five; it depends on how many Earth life-lessons it wants to complete. There are absolutely no requirements.

You have chosen to experience many varied lifestyles and lessons. This lifetime is all about using clarity to see the core issue of your lessons. You are also dealing with accepting your true essence and the magnificence that accompanies it. All of this you are doing by going inside and sensing the spark within. At the present, yoga is a major tool for you.