3 Past-life Dreams that Helped Me Heal

Reading Time: 6 minutes

By Pichaya Avery

“Many of our dreams relate to past lives. Once we come to that realization, we can begin to access the experiences that lie hidden within our memory banks. And yes, it is possible to bring hard-won lessons from past lives into the present for a better understanding of our situation in life today.”
—Harold Klemp,
Past lives, Dreams, and Soul Travel, page 73 

For as long as I can remember—dating back to 1972—I have always been fascinated by dreams. While there were several sweet dreams—talking to animals, floating in clouds, and flying through the air—there were countless nightmares as well. I was continuously chased by a man with a knife and often died in those dreams. In the middle of the night, I would wake up screaming and wondering, Who am I? and Why am I here?

One day, I was granted a gift—a memory of my past life—while waiting for a school bus in northeast Thailand. Suddenly, out of the blue, a vivid flashback appeared in my inner vision. 

I witnessed a tragic scene—a sinking ship. Hundreds of passengers were drowning. Among those unfortunate Souls, I recognized a hopeless white man. He looked familiar, and somehow I knew that he was me before reincarnating in this lifetime. 

I was perplexed by the very brief, yet dreadful scene and thought to myself, “If I am this man and I am dead, then how is it that am I here in Thailand?” I stared down at the body of the little girl where I now resided.

Then, the bus arrived and carried me off to pre-school. Wondering how it could be that I had changed so radically—a man then, and a girl now—I was very confused. 

Those moments passed, but the memory lingered on, accompanied by those important questions—Who am I? and Why am I here? The nightmares continued, and more past lives surfaced. 

The Deep Blue Sea 

At the age of six, I remember how I panicked when a friend invited me over to swim in a private pool. I didn’t know how to swim, but he graciously offered to teach me. Instead of feeling happy and excited about this new experience, I felt nauseous, suffocated, and terrified. 

“I hate water!” I shouted. My heart raced as I began to sweat profusely. Neither my friend nor I understood my peculiar response to his kind and generous gesture. That night, I had a vivid dream. 

As an observer, I saw a woman standing on a beach. She looked serious and pensive, gazing out at the majestic ocean before her. After a long period of time, she crossed the sandy beach and paused at the edge of the surf. Then, decisively, she walked into the water. I watched in horror as her body slowly disappeared in the depths of the deep blue sea. 

I woke up wondering about the meaning of this dream. And then, suddenly, the memory of the white man in the sinking ship returned. Recalling that past-life memory allowed me to understand the origin of my intense fear of water. 

Through this realization, I was able to overcome my fear and fully embrace what life had to offer. This included a swimming lesson from my friend.

An Abusive Soldier 

“You are ugly, stupid, and poor. Look at those Laotian refugees living next to us.” Our neighbors in Bangkok repeatedly antagonized my family. We have dark skin and flat noses. My ancestors came from Laos. My mother and grandmother spoke Isaan dialect, therefore, we were considered “uneducated, unprosperous, and low class.” Unfortunately, we were surrounded by a community where the rich looked down on the poor. 

Whenever my sisters and I ran around the neighborhood, we would hear those boys calling us names: “You are ugly, stupid, and poor. Look at those Laotian refugees.” Their greatest pleasure—to make us feel like dirt beneath their feet—was our greatest pain. 

I was crushed, and my heart crumbled when they called us “refugees.” In their eyes, “refugees”meant “worthless.” Our neighbors were richer and, even more significantly, they had lighter skin. Thus, they claimed themselves to be more superior than those of us who had flat noses and darker skin.

As a little girl, I didn’t know how to stand up for myself and my little sisters, let alone my beloved ancestors who came from Vientiane. Consequently, I lived in shame and believed in the names my neighbors had given me. 

Our family was in the lower middle class, therefore, we were the perfect target for such labels, which seemed to be the norm among my peers—not only in the neighborhood—but also in school. 

Every night, I flooded my pillow with tears of self-pity, sorrow, and condemnation, in addition to feelings of guilt and shame. Since there was nowhere to turn, I often found myself kneeling before our family’s Buddha shrine asking, “Why me?” 

One night, I was shown a past-life dream where I had been an abusive Japanese soldier. I had oppressed others to an unimaginable degree. This dream answered my question, “Why me?” The Law of Cause and Effect is timeless.

The Mean Captain 

Many things happened when I was six years old. In first grade, I wore octagon glasses with a golden frame—a thick blue lens on the right and a thin blue one on the left. My vision was 20/800 in my right eye and 20/200 in my left. 

With these imbalanced lenses, I felt dizzy and nauseous every time I wore them. Worse yet, my classmates laughed at me because my right eye looked smaller than the left, and they thought it was funny. 

I was mocked by the way I looked, the color of my skin, the way I wore my hair, and the sound of my name. My birth name was Somsamon, which in Thai rhymes with “worm.” I changed it to Pichaya right after high school as a result of being called names.

It was one thing to be ridiculed by those outside the family, but quite another to be condemned by my own father. He called me “rotten face” because I never smiled. I had no reason. There were other hurtful words—blind, dumb, and ugly—that pierced my heart so severely and deeply. Sadly, I believed them all to be true. 

In the years that followed, the relationship with my father deteriorated even more, and my heart continued to shatter as time went by. Enter the pirate…

The Root Cause of a Troubled Relationship 

Even though I knew about the Law of Karma and its basic principle, I was still in a state of denial. I refused to accept that I deserved such hostility from the father who was supposed to love me. Then, one night, I had a dream.

The scene took place on a pirate ship in a stormy sea. I, as an observer, saw the Captain (me) standing at the stern of the ship arguing with another pirate (my father). Emotions overflowed and then exploded.

The fight was brutal and flew out of control. Suddenly, the Captain reached for a combat knife and stabbed the other pirate, first in the eye and then in the stomach. The battle ended when the dead man was kicked overboard into the raging sea. 

I am grateful for the memory and those three past-life dreams. They opened the door of knowingness and facilitated the healing of my emotional wounds.

I realized that my ferocious cruelty in my previous lives was the cause of my nearsightedness, especially in my right eye, and why I became a target for ridicule. They were the effects of the boomerang—what I gave out came back to me, not for punishment but for a better understanding of this Spiritual Law.

From these experiences, I learned self-awareness, self-respect, self-compassion, and self-responsibility, which empowered me to transcend guilt, shame, blame, condemnation, and judgement. Most importantly, they awakened my heart to remember who I truly am—a Divine being—and enabled me see everything through the eyes of love.