Imagine if Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung were studying not ordinary dreams but lucid ones. Perhaps they would have been able to peer into the depths of their personalities, discovering not only the familiar layers of the psyche but also past (and perhaps future) lives. Both concluded that our “self” is a multi-layered system. But in lucid dreams, is it possible to delve into even deeper layers? Such philosophical questions were posed by American researcher Robert Waggoner.
He cited a number of stories in which people saw their past lives in lucid dreams and claimed that these details could often be confirmed. For example, a person recounted unusual details about the culture of long-gone eras. There are also “probable lives.” Waggoner once saw himself in a dream as the author of a psychology book, although he was only just beginning to write a book about lucid dreams in real life. In that other world, he was a full-figured, balding professor on a university campus.
While modern physics allows for parallel worlds to exist, there is also evidence of the reality of past lives. For example, cases have been recorded in which children recognized relatives from “that family” and could recount details about the death of their “other self.” According to Waggoner, this confirms that reincarnation is real, and lucid dreams, in turn, give us another way to explore this phenomenon.
Have you ever seen your past life in a lucid dream? How did you determine that you were indeed viewing a past life?
The report was presented in June 2025 at the 42nd Annual Conference of the International Association for the Study of Dreams.
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