In my early childhood, I had flashbacks to the time before incarnation – or between lives. The content of these flashbacks was very similar to many Near-Death Experiences. This lasted until about school-age when my mind probably became preoccupied with other things and trying to be as normal as possible.
The flashbacks brought me back to…. Being without a body and disincarnate. A sense of oneness – although there was also a sense of being a self as well. All of existence as infinite light, love and wisdom. A profound sense of being home. Timelessness with some vague sense of the passage of time (decades and perhaps centuries). There was also a sense of communication with infinitely wise and similarly disincarnate beings.
These flashbacks typically happened when I was outside and saw the sunlight on the ground filtered through moving leaves. I know this sounds very specific but it’s what I remember.
At the time, I didn’t have any particular thoughts about this, and I most likely didn’t mention it to anyone. I wouldn’t have known how to put it into words, and maybe I thought it was something everyone experienced. Most likely, I didn’t think about it one way or another. It wasn’t until the awakening in my mid-teens that I made the connection between this and the more typical near-death experiences.
My sense is that these flashbacks created a deep longing in me. During my later childhood, I didn’t know what the longing was about. But when the awakening happened in my teens, it was clear what it was about. The longing was about coming “home” to all as the divine, as it had been before this life.
For the next phase in my life, part of my process has been to notice that this is already here. What I longed for is already here. It’s what I am. And I can notice that independent of any particular content of experience. More accurately, it can notice itself through the changing content of experience.