The most common question I hear before a Life Between Lives session is not what I will see — it is what will actually happen. How long it takes. Whether I lie down or sit. Whether I speak out loud. Whether I will remember.
This text answers those. It does not describe what you will experience, because nobody knows that, myself included — but it does describe the frame the experience takes place in.
Preparing: what you do beforehand
Preparation begins the moment you decide, not on the day. The Newton Institute recommends two things: quietening the mind (meditation, silence, whatever works for you) and preparing a list of questions you want answered.
That list matters more than it sounds. An LBL session is not a screening you watch passively — it is a conversation, and questions give it direction. Let them be about things that genuinely occupy you: relationships, repeating patterns, decisions you are facing.
Beyond that:
- Sleep well. Tiredness makes it harder to hold concentration in trance.
- Avoid alcohol and stimulants for at least a day beforehand.
- Go easy on caffeine on the day.
- Come alone. Sessions are fully confidential and take place without companions.
- Eat something light. Several hours is a long time.
The full list of recommendations is on the session information page.
How the session runs
The whole thing takes up to four and a half hours. The Newton Institute gives a typical range of 2.5–5 hours. It is not measured with a stopwatch — we finish when the session is complete.
1. The opening conversation
We start by talking, not with hypnosis. We go through your questions, your history, and what brought you here. We check whether the list of questions is what you actually want to ask — sometimes it turns out that underneath the question written on paper lies a different, more important one.
This usually takes 30–60 minutes and is real work, not a formality.
2. Induction and deepening
You lie down comfortably. Entering trance happens gradually, through releasing the body and narrowing attention. There is no pendulum and no moment of “falling asleep” — this is a state of focused attention, not sleep.
Throughout the session you stay conscious and speak out loud. You will remember it the way you remember a vivid dream or a strong memory.
3. Back to childhood
The first regressive stage is neutral or pleasant childhood memories. It is a warm-up: your mind learns to move through memory in a trance state before we reach further.
4. The prenatal period
The next stop is the time before birth — in Newton’s method, the moment of first contact with a consciousness that extends beyond the current life.
5. A past life
From there we move into one of your past lives. You do not choose it consciously — what appears is the one that matters for your present situation. We move through significant scenes of that life until its last day.
6. Passing through death
This sounds heavier than it feels. The moment of death in a past life is, in this method, a point of transition — and, to many people’s surprise, it is often experienced as releasing rather than frightening. This is where a classic regression ends and the LBL part begins.
7. Meeting your guide
After the transition comes contact with a spirit guide. From this point the session stops being a tour of the past and becomes a conversation — and this is where your prepared questions come back.
8. The soul group and what follows
The session then leads toward meeting your soul group — people you recognise, even if they look like nobody from your current life — and on to further “stops” in that space.
Worth knowing: the Newton Institute itself notes that contemporary sessions are often less linear than the original protocol, and that no two LBL sessions are ever the same. What I describe above is a frame, not a script. The Institute stresses that the most valuable part of the experience is not the content of the images but reconnecting with your own enduring identity.
9. Coming back, and talking it through
Bringing you out of trance is gradual. Then we sit down and go through what happened, while it is still fresh, before the details have time to fade.
How you feel afterwards
The most common reactions are tiredness — physical, like after a long journey — and a kind of emotional thinness that lasts a day or two. Many people describe it as “physically exhausting, spiritually cleansing”.
So it is worth not planning anything demanding for the rest of the day and, if possible, not driving immediately afterwards.
Some of the material only settles weeks later. That is normal, and worth allowing before you decide you already know what the session meant.
What definitely will not happen
A few worries come up often enough to be worth disarming directly:
- You will not lose control. At any moment you can stop, open your eyes, ask for a break.
- You will not “fail to wake up”. There is no state you can get stuck in.
- You will not say anything against your will. Throughout the session you decide what you say.
- You will not forget it. The memory of the session stays.
More on this — including what the research says about the safety of hypnosis and who is advised against it — in a separate piece on whether regression hypnosis is safe.
When to book
If after reading this you feel curiosity rather than unease, that is a good sign. Write to me and we will sort out the details.
You can also read accounts from people who have been through it — they describe it far better than any set of instructions.
Sources
- LBL Frequently Asked Questions — Michael Newton Institute. Session length (2.5–5 hours), recommended preparation, the note on contemporary sessions being less linear.
- Life Between Lives — Michael Newton Institute. Description of the method, the deep relaxation state and the facilitator’s role.
- Find an LBL Facilitator — Michael Newton Institute. Public register of certified practitioners.