QHHT Session ~ A Soldier's Life

A couple of months ago my daughter left Vancouver to move to the Kootenays. She lives much closer to me now, which I am very happy about. The day after she arrived here, we had a chance to do a QHHT session. I was a bit nervous because sometimes it's harder to get the people closest to us to open up enough to have a great session, but that was not the case this time! 

She has generously allowed me to share her past life from the session, and so I have transcribed it here. It shows the life of a wealthy soldier with a desire to help the common folk, but whose good intentions lead him to take a regretful action. 

His (her) reflections on his surroundings and his life in general show the inner workings and emotions of an otherwise stoic man. The Super Conscious wraps it up in the end with an explanation of why it showed her this life and how her recent move will be good for her soul. 

Note: My questions are italicized. I have left some of my questions out for better flow of her answers. 

What do you see?

I see a market. People selling some things. Fish, swords, carpets, jewelry, spears, weapons…People have armour. They look like gladiators, or Romans.  Old. All men. I can’t see any women… People selling things and talking to each other… I see walls of marble. I saw the, I think it was Parthenon or something. Some structures are still intact but some of them are ruined. There’s graffiti on the walls, it’s carved into it. People wearing robes. Talking to each other… I’m wearing sandals, a white toga, with a rope belt. Gold cuffs on my wrists. A chain around my neck.

What do the gold cuffs signify?

I worked, I earned them. Maybe through battle.

And the chain around your neck?

It was given to me by a family member.

Are you wearing anything on your head?

A wreath.

What does that signify?

Knowledge.

Are you carrying anything your hands?

I think I’m holding a spear.

What is the purpose of that?

I use it when I need to. It keeps people away. It’s intimidating. It intimidates people. 

Why do you need to intimidate people?

It’s just the way it is. Everybody’s protecting themselves from what everybody else is doing. 

What are you doing in the market today?

I think I’m just walking around. I don’t have anything to buy in particular. I’m just going out to see how people live. 

What are you noticing about how people live?

They all have to sell things to make do, to get by. But I don’t have to do that. I might be, not royalty, but, wealthy. I’m a man. I feel, older, like in my 30’s and 40’s. 

What are you noticing about the people in the market, and how they live?

I respect them. I wish I could make things easier for them. I’ve fought a lot of battles to try to make things easier for them. 

And do you think that’s helped?

No. Just keep fighting.

How do you feel about that?

I want to talk it out instead of fighting but everybody else seems to want to just fight.

So what do you do next?

I’m walking through the market, leaving the market, i’m walking through a narrow ally way. There are children playing in the streets, in the alley way. I have to stop because somebody’s pouring their shit out the window. And then I walk onto the raised bit, sort of like a sidewalk but it’s too narrow. You can walk on it, but, I’m scaling the side of the wall to avoid the shit. My staff helps me keep my balance. Or, my spear. 

Where are you going?

I’m just walking. Going for a walk. I’m going to see a woman. She’s in her home. She’s a mother. She’s got a child, but it’s not mine. The father might be dead. I’m going to see her. I’m listening to hear what she needs, to see if I can offer her any help. She needs olive oil. She needs it to keep lights burning. And she needs more candles. And she wants some tea or coffee, so she can keep her energy up. She’s offering me some bread and some meat.

Do you accept it?

Yes, but I don't take too much because I want her to have it. I tell her I’ll see what I can do. I want to hug her, and embrace her, but I don’t. I keep walking, I say goodbye. 

Why is it that you don’t hug her?

Because I want to be strong, and stoic. I don't want her to, get too comfortable. But, she knows she can trust me, anyway. 

Why is this woman important to you?

The father of the child was a friend who was killed in battle. 

Tell me about the friend. 

Brown hair, young man in his 20’s. 

And you cared about him?

We fought together, comrades in battle. I watched him get stabbed with a spear. And I, killed the man who killed him. Avenged him immediately. And then I watched him die, and I took the spear from his chest and now it’s my spear. 

How do you feel about carrying it around? 

I feel like I wear it as a trophy for avenging his death, in honour of him and as a trophy.

Describe the place where you live.

The entrance is round. There are stairs. It’s a big building. It’s a whole household. Everything’s marble. Columns. I go inside and there’s a courtyard with a waterfall. A fountain. I’m inside the courtyard and I’m looking up and there’s levels. It’s a whole household, with staff and servants. My mother and father live here. They’re very old. Not about to die old, but like, in their 60’s or 70’s. I think there’s one brother and one sister, but they’re not there right now. 

See yourself eating a meal. Where are you?

A dining hall with a long table. There’s the people who made the food and are bringing it to me. There’s somebody standing there guarding the dining hall, I’m at a very long table by myself. There’s lots of different food for me to eat but I don’t want that much. Just eating rice and meat. 

Are you using anything like utensils to eat your food?

Bread.

How do you spend your days?

I walk around a lot. Sometimes I listen to people talk. It’s like a public forum. Philosophers exchanging ideas. I’m very inspired by it, but, I don’t know how to contribute because all I know is how to fight, so I just listen.

What do they talk about?

They talk about democracy, politics, how to distribute fairly to the people. They talk about art and they talk about the plays that they saw and what the plays mean, what they represent. 

Who are these people that are talking?

They’re the philosophers, they’re trying to establish new ideas for how to govern ourselves. People come to listen to them talk, but they’re not particularly wealthy, they’re just respected for their intellect. 

How do you feel about them?

I feel inspired. Like I said, I want to talk with them and contribute but I feel like I don’t know enough. Sometimes I ask them to explain things better, and they use analogies that make sense. They’re very patient, but I don’t want to talk to them too long because I don’t want them to realize that I don’t really understand. They're very old men.

Do they treat you with respect?

Yes.

~Moving forward to an important day~

What is happening?

There’s lots of people that are crowded around one person speaking. He’s trying to rally the people, the citizens.

What is he talking about?

He’s talking about overthrowing something. Overthrowing the, monarchy. The king.

How do you feel about that?

Angry. Everybody is yelling in agreement with him. It’s in a big public courtyard with old buildings around. 

This is one of the philosophers?

Not one of the ones that I usually talk to, he’s different.

What makes him different? 

He’s younger. More… he’s too eager, to get everybody to believe him, but he doesn’t even seem to believe what he’s saying. It makes me frustrated. 

I cut through the crowd. I stand face to face with him and slam my spear into the ground so hard that the rocks crack. I tell him that he needs to respect our king, our ruler. But he’s telling me that the kind does not respect me. And… I stab him with the spear. Right in front of everybody. I feel immediate regret. I think about his family. And I realize that he may be the fool but I am the fool for letting it get the better of me. 

I drop the spear and I try to run but the people are stopping me, trying to surround me and grab me. The guards are taking me. They throw me in front of the king to explain myself to him. 

Did the guards see what happened? 

All they’ve heard is that I’ve killed someone. But, I don’t know if they heard what he was saying, but I feel like there’s no point trying to defend myself because I know what I did was wrong. 

So now you’re in front to the king, what do you do?

Nothing. I feel frozen, paralyzed. He’s yelling at me to speak. I tell him what happened but I can’t look him in the eye because I can’t stop thinking about what the man said just before I killed him, that the kind doesn’t respect me. 

Did you tell the king that he said that?

No, I just told him that he was speaking ill, so I killed him in his honour. But deep down I feel shame… He gives me a piece of gold and then lets me go. I feel like it’s dirty money. I feel a bit angry because I don’t even need the gold because I’m already rich, so I feel a bit patronized. I can’t stop thinking about what he said. And now the people, going back, I have to face the people that I wanted to help. They don’t respect me anymore. It feels sad. 

Do you still have the spear?

The spear’s gone. I want to leave. I say goodbye to the woman, tell her I’m leaving, I’m sorry. 

What do you do with the gold?

I keep it with me. I should have given it to her but I knew I was leaving and I thought I might need it. 

Where do you go?

Going to another town. I’m walking through desert right now. 

~Moving forward to another day~

What is happening?

I’m older. I’ve started a new family. There’s children. I have a wife, but I haven’t known her for very long, I barely know her. I have two children with her, and she has children from before. She is like a stranger. She’s different than… She’s foreign, it’s not what I’ve grown up with. 

Do you speak the same language?

Different dialects of the same language. Sometimes it’s hard to understand. 

Tell me about the children.

I feel slightly indifferent to them. I’m trying to find it in my heart to love and care for them, nourish them but all I feel is numb. I’m done feeling sad, just numb now. 

How do you spend your days now?

I’m farming. I have a small farm, I grown my own food. There’s some sheep, goats, I make their cheese, we sell it at the market. My wife sells it. 

How do you feel about that life?

It feels mechanical, like I need to use my body to forget about the pain that I left behind, I feel like it keeps me from losing my temper to anger. I’m just worried about losing it like I lost it on that man. I don’t want to lose it on my wife or my kids so I keep myself at a distance from them. I keep myself busy working on the farm. 

~Moving forward to another important day~

What is happening?

I’m older. My children are grown up and my son has graduated some sort of school, I think it’s  an army school, to learn how to be a soldier. I feel like I don’t know how to… I want to warn him about war and violence, I think he won’t listen to me. 

What would you say to him?

I’d say that death, losing your friends, sticks with you, and I’d want to remind him at the same time that death is not… even though it looks brutal to us, it’s peaceful for the person experiencing it. But I don't know how to tell him that because it feels like it contradicts each other. 

What do you tell him?

I decide to tell him that death is the most compassionate thing you can give to someone. 

How does it feel to say that? 

It feels, strange like it’s not quite the sentiment I wanted to give him. He doesn’t really  understand it when I say that. 

~Moving to the last day in this life~

What is happening?

I’m sitting on a fountain. I’m just there because I want to be. Because I’ve left the farm to go see the people like I used to do, but I’m very very old, my body’s failing. 

I notice that the buildings are newer. There’s lots of undeveloped rocky desert space but there’s newer buildings going up around me. I can see the ocean far off on the horizon. I feel peace. I know death is coming soon.

How do you pass? 

It’s a heart attack. While I’m sitting on the fountain. I fall into the water, but the heart attack has already happened. 

~Moving to the other side~

What did you learn from that life?

I learned that there were opportunities, where I could have… I missed out on opportunities to engage myself because I was afraid of being seen as ignorant or unwise, and, I stayed loyal to what my parents expected of me, stayed loyal to the structures that my family helped to uphold instead of questioning them for myself. But, I wanted to… I thought that doing that would help everybody else around me but I don’t think I really helped anything. 

What was the purpose of that lifetime?

I feel like it’s just a baseline level of… establishing the baseline of where my… compassion and support and loyalty means to me, but not really ever… having a curiosity but never really knowing how to engage with it fully because of, baseline. And I felt like I had to live that life to learn how to engage more in the next one. 

~Moving to conversation with the Super Conscious~

Why did you show her this life?

SC: To help her understand why she feels paralyzed, to help her understand the guilt that she feels around compassion. To help her understand that when you run from something, you don’t always run to something better. Sometimes the more distance you create between you and your true self, the more distance you’ll have between the people in the new place. 

What does that have to do with her life now?

Her paralysis is the guilt from stabbing the man in the street and the fear that everyone’s always watching and judging. And it’s time to let that go. 

What does she need to know in order to let that go?

Now, she’s putting less distance between her and her true self, so that she can be closer to the people around her. 

What does she need to know to be even closer to her true self?

She needs to know that she’s surrounded by love, that she’s safe, strong, she can take care of herself, and that, the energy of the trees and the mountains will guide her and energize her.