Marcia Beachy, MS, LPC, CCHT

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By Scott Smith, The Pueblo Chieftain

November 1, 2007

She’s a believer — in soul, in self, in healing, in growth.  And in reincarnation and the power of past-life regression therapy.  For Marcia Beachy, it just makes sense.

The Pueblo resident first embraced the past-lives concept many years ago, after reading a book about the life of renowned psychic Edgar Cayce.  “I felt like I had come home to something that I knew and didn’t know that I knew,” says Beachy. “Suddenly, the way in which the world functioned made more sense to me. I understood the potential causes of suffering and how that works for us, and ‘as you sow, so shall ye reap’ began to make sense.  “To look at the soul as having a long journey of experiences made me feel like I had been given a lifeline of walking my own path — and I dove into it.”

Beachy became a professional counselor — and more. She has a master’s degree in counseling from Northern Illinois University and is also a certified clinical hypnotherapist; a specialist in past-life, present-life and between-life regression therapy; a certified massage therapist; a reiki master; and a trained bereavement facilitator.  She’s been a counselor for 23 years and has 13 years of experience in past-life regression and soul-connection work.

And, all the while, she’s been on her own journey, both physically and spiritually. She grew up in Cheraw, spent most of her adult life in the Chicago area (married, had three daughters, divorced), moved to La Junta nine years ago (“Colorado won’t let you alone — it’s always in your heart,” she says) and settled in Pueblo last year.

Most of her counseling business includes traditional psychotherapy, but some of her clients also choose to explore regression therapy with Beachy, who is adept at helping to guide their expeditions into their unconscious pasts.
> “I’ve always been drawn to uncover the deeper truths of who we are,” says the soft-spoken Beachy. “You could call that our soul, you could call it our true self, you could call it many things. But that’s where the juice is for me, where the excitement is for me in working with people.  “And my journey required that I do the same thing, so there’s no separation between my growth and the growth I’m able to support with my clients. So the deeper I go, hopefully, the deeper they are invited to go.”

Beachy stresses that regression therapy should not be viewed as a magical solution to an individual’s problems and issues in this life — but she believes that past-life exploration can yield genuine benefits in the area of self-realization. Basically, she says, people sometimes can better deal with existing trauma, drama and pain once they realize a problem’s deeper origin.  “People benefit by experiencing forgiveness, by experiencing relief of guilt, by experiencing insight, by experiencing a higher perspective of who they are,” Beachy says. “Sometimes, there’s even a release of physical symptoms, because the original cause is accessed. “It’s a wonderful additional therapy. . . . But regression therapy is not an escape. It’s a complement (to talk therapy).”   It’s also not just for those working on difficult emotional or psychological issues.

Some of Beachy’s clients are merely curious. “They want a venue for exploring more of who they are; they want to grow, rather than to alleviate pain,” she says. “And this therapy can provide growth on many levels that can be very satisfying.”  But regression therapy is not for everyone, cautions Beachy.  “It’s not for people who already have enough on their plates — they need to be dealing with the here and now,” she says. “And it’s not for people who have dissociative disorders and personality disorders; things are already jumbled.”

A regression session with Beachy usually lasts about 2 1/2 hours and costs $150; it includes a half-hour interview with the client, followed by relaxation techniques, hypnotherapy and a gently guided journey into the unconscious. There are no guarantees — not everybody can access past lives (“Some people just see black”) — but Beachy says that most people can connect, some more easily than others.  For some, it’s a one-time deal; for others, they return again and again to further delve into their past lives.

Beachy has written a book about past-life regressions, “This Divine Classroom,” which includes detailed case studies of three repeat clients. One of them not only experienced personal emotional growth, but also reported a cessation of physical pain after one session.  “She went into a past life in which she was a monk in a monastery who was very troubled about his sexuality and had a lot of guilt, and the despair drove him to throw himself over the wall, where he died,” Beachy says. “What he felt when he hit the ground were his bones crushing in his legs. She said, ‘That’s why I’ve always had weak ankles.’ She told me later that her ankles were much stronger now that they don’t carry that trauma anymore.”

Of course, not everyone is a believer in reincarnation — and that’s just fine, says Beachy.  “I’m not here to do any convincing,” she says. “In fact, having an open, skeptical mind is actually a very good approach, because there’s not the expectation of your ego needs being met by doing a regression.  “I don’t worry about whether you believe in past lives or not; my work is about healing and wholeness. I don’t care if (a past life) can be documented. What’s important is if it’s added to your own understanding.”

Beachy is now working on another book, and focusing more on the death and dying process and what we can learn from it. “We die as we live,” she says. “If our predominant frequency is love and wisdom and forgiveness, which is a high frequency, then we carry on with that; if it’s anger and rage and resentment, we carry on with that. When we die, it continues according to what we’ve built.

“It doesn’t matter what religious hat we put on. What matters is what’s in our heart.”

For more information, call Beachy at 542-0156 or visit her Web site, www.marciabeachy.com

Source:  The Pueblo Chieftain

Pueblo Chieftain, Nov. 1, 2007

Editor’s note: First, some background. This year, for the Halloween/Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) holiday season, we wanted to explore a different realm. Something beyond writing about the usual haunted houses, trick-or-treat candy, goofy costumes and sugar skulls. Something way beyond.

Writer-editor Scott Smith decided to explore the mysterious world of past-life regression. What follows is a first-person account of a session he had with Pueblo resident Marcia Beachy, a licensed professional counselor, certified clinical hypnotherapist and trained specialist in regression therapy. The 2 1/2-hour session was tape-recorded.

By SCOTT SMITH

I am Gregor.  More precisely, I was Gregor, a Catholic priest who lived — and died — in a small village in 14th-century Britain.  Or so I believe after undergoing a recent past-life regression session with counselor Marcia Beachy, a gentle woman who has been professionally trained to help individuals examine their souls by connecting with their former lives. And so how does one embark on such a journey into the deep unconscious? Well, it goes something like this . . .

For starters, it helps to have no preconceptions. I consider myself an open-minded skeptic (“That’s good,” Beachy says), and I believe that anything — and everything — is possible. I have no answers, only questions, especially concerning things like the afterlife. And although I happen to be a big believer in reincarnation (it’s a concept that makes karmic sense to me), I’m not exactly a crystal-hugging, Shirley MacLaine-loving, mantra-chanting New Ager. It also helps to have a good spiritual guide, like Beachy. She’s been doing professional talk-therapy counseling for 23 years and has specialized in regression and soul-connection work for the past 13 years. She seems to know what she’s doing. She has a soothing voice and a calm, reassuring bedside manner.

The session, which took place at Beachy’s new home on Pueblo’s north side, began with a half-hour interview. It was a chance for her to learn a little more about me, my family and any issues that might be troubling me in my present incarnation. And it was a chance for me to be the interviewee for a change, which was fun.  We briefly discussed my childhood, my professional life and my interpersonal relationships — including two wonderful marriages that ended suddenly, painfully and, at the time, inexplicably. And we agreed that the main purpose of my regression therapy would be to satisfy my curiosity about the past-lives business, as well as to perhaps learn something about my soul that I could apply to today’s reality.

After the interview, I stretched out on Beachy’s massage table, on my back with my eyes closed and my head on a comfy pillow; she covered me with a warm blanket, put on some nice, meditative music and began the session with a series of relaxation techniques (breathing, color imagery, etc.) and hypnotherapy. She guided me deep into my unconscious, using images of a hill, stairs, a path through a deep forest, a wall and a door. I followed her spoken instructions, and in a matter of minutes I was in an odd state of semi-consciousness. I also was immersed in the past.

WAY BACK
I heard Beachy’s voice. I answered her questions. And I swear I “saw” moments from one of my past lives unfolding somewhere beyond all my known synapses. I was aware of the present (I occasionally heard the wind howling outside Beachy’s house) and the past at the same time. It was strange, but not unsettling.

Beachy guided me, literally step by step, on my path of self-discovery. She asked me what I was wearing on my feet (straps of leather, held on by twine, with no soles — “rudimentary shoes,” I said) and my body (a well-worn, hooded robe), what the ground was like (dirt packed down by horses’ hoofprints), where I was walking (“toward a wooden building”), what I saw (laughing, barefoot children who were dressed in rags and chasing chickens) and how I felt after entering the building, which turned out to be a church (“I feel like I own it. I feel like it’s my church,” I said).

And so one of my past lives unfolded, detail by detail, with occasional unobtrusive prompting by Beachy. I was a Catholic priest named Gregor. He was short (5-foot-2), bald, old and tired. He was happy with his life’s work, but sad at the moment, because many of the villagers — his congregants — had died. The church benches were empty.  Gregor was especially sad for the deceased children — kids who barely got to taste life, harsh though it was in this village. The mourning for the dead youngsters brought me to tears; I could feel tiny drops forming in the corners of my closed eyes, threatening to spill down my cheeks.

On this overcast day, Gregor was preparing for a funeral. He was weary.  There had been many, many deaths — and enough burials to nearly fill the small meadow on the outskirts of town. And now, Gregor not only presided over the farewell services, he handled the burying part, too, because the town’s gravedigger had died.

As Gregor slowly walked out of the village and toward the meadow, shovel in one hand, he felt an apple in his pocket. He was looking forward to eating it later, after the burial. The apple was dinner. There was little food in the village.  He reached the burial site — a freshly dug hole in the meadow’s rich, dark soil — and waited for the funeral procession. The dead man was named Jacob; he had no family. Four of the village’s men carried the body, tightly wrapped in a blanket (there was no coffin), to the grave site. No one else attended. The men set the body into the hole. They prayed. One of them offered to help Gregor with the shovel work, but the priest waved him off. “You’ve done enough,” he said. “Thank you.”

When Gregor was finished filling the grave — it was hard work, especially for an old, tired man — he rested on the shovel’s handle and surveyed the meadow. At the far end, a red fox raced into the trees. Gregor smiled. Life goes on, he thought.

Beachy asked more questions.  Why did Gregor become a priest? (“God’s will.” And it was a decision made at a young age — after the death of his mother.)  What year is it? (“13 and 17.”)

Then she guided me to Gregor’s deathbed. The priest was 70 — ancient for that time. He was in no pain, but felt a great heaviness on his chest, “like an anvil.” Beachy asked Gregor how it felt after his final breath. How did he feel as his spirit left his body? The priest responded: “Elation. Freedom. Satisfaction. I feel like I’ve lived a good life. . . . I feel like life is everlasting.” Asked Beachy, “Things you taught as a priest and now you know?”  Said Gregor, “I don’t know them yet. But I believe in them. And I’m going on a journey.”

Beachy encouraged me to take that journey right now. But instead of following Gregor’s spirit into the afterlife, I instead found myself in another past life. I was dressed in Depression-era clothing — ragged shirt, dungarees and hat—  and had just awakened after sleeping the night by a large river. My stomach was full — fish that I had caught in the river, I think — and my bones were stiff from sleeping on the hard ground.

After realizing that I’d lost contact with Gregor and had dropped into another life, Beachy gently guided me back toward the dead priest’s soul. I grudgingly followed, but part of me wanted to connect with that middle-aged man by the river. I wanted to follow him and learn about him.

Once I reconnected with Gregor’s spirit, I felt a sense of total belonging. I was everywhere. I was a leaf. I was a tree. I was a rock. I was everything on the planet, and everything was me. My personal identity was gone.  Beachy asked me what I had learned while living as Gregor. My response: “It made me better understand people’s frailties. I learned about empathy. I learned about giving. I learned about honesty. I learned about selflessness.  I think they are areas in which I had been deficient previously, whatever that means.”

And what messages, what wisdom would Gregor give to Scott?

“It’s important to keep trying to improve . . . in areas of deficiency, because it’s attainable. Perseverance, I think, is the message. Focusing on others in a positive way strengthens yourself. But it has to be sincere. You have to believe.  “Just persevere. We’re all flawed, but we’re all individuals. Life is good. But life is not perfect. It’s not supposed to be.”

And one more request from Beachy: Anything else for Gregor to share with Scott?  “Just be thankful. Be thankful for all the good. Enjoy that apple in your pocket . . . because a lot of people don’t have one.”

And it was over. Beachy slowly brought me back to full consciousness. I felt woozy. Amazed. Peaceful. After a drink of water and a brief visit with Beachy, I collected myself and left the counselor’s house. With Gregor.

THE AFTERMATH

Some observations after the regression experience:  While transcribing the tapes of the session, I had to listen very  carefully to hear my words when I was immersed in Gregor’s life. I spoke slowly and deliberately, but I also sounded fatigued and weak, almost speaking in a whisper sometimes. Was that because Gregor was tired and worn-down? Or was it just the way I sound when I’m under hypnosis? (Hypnosis, says Beachy.)

I was fascinated with the detail of my descriptions when I was Gregor: the smell of my robe (sweaty and salty, but not unpleasant); the frayed twine that held together my rustic footwear; the musty smell in the empty church; the fact that there were not headstones or upright crosses in the graveyard— just a few rough-hewn crosses made of branches and lying flat on the ground; a hungry horse neighing in the distance; the distinctive feel of the apple, cool and smooth, in my pocket. Beachy says that details like smells are a good indication that “you’re really there.”

Most of the time, it felt like I was seeing life from Gregor’s eyes, but a couple of times I felt like I was outside his body, watching a scene unfold.  That’s just the difference between being an “experiencer or an observer,” Beachy says.

After the session, I Googled English history, circa 1317, and discovered that it was the final year of The Great Famine in Europe. It was a three-year span when an estimated 10-15 percent of the continent’s population died from famine-related causes. (The Black Death didn’t hit until 1338.)  That would certainly explain the many deaths in Gregor’s village, as well as the dearth of food.

And here’s a spooky coincidence. When I returned to my home to eat lunch after the regression session, I turned on my iPod sound system, which was set on “shuffle” to provide random tunes in a library that contains more than 3,200 songs. The first song that came on was a version of “Jacob’s Ladder,” by Bruce Springsteen. Yes, Jacob. The name of the man that Gregor had just buried . . .

Source:  The Pueblo Chieftain

Marcia Beachy, MS, LPC, CCHT, is a licensed psychotherapist, specializing in holistic, heart-centered therapies. Since 1984 she has committed herself to deepening consciousness and helping clients uncover their true nature. She works with adult clients both in individual and couple counseling and resides in Pueblo, Colorado.

Marcia’s experience and training:

• 25 years in clinical and private practice
• Master of Science in Counseling from Northern Illinois University, 1984
• Licensed Professional Counselor, State of Colorado
• Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist with Wellness Institute, Issaquah, WA
• Training in Guided Imagery, Yoga, Bodywork and Energy Work
• Specialist in Past Life Regression
• Specialist in Conscious Living and Dying
• Community College Instructor (Psychology, Self-Hypnosis, Stress management, Meditation, etc.)
• Author: This Divine Classroom: Earth School and the Psychology of the Soul
• Author: Going Out in Style: A Guide to Planetary Departure
• Member of IARRT (International Association for Research and Regression Therapies)
• Member Heart-Centered Therapies Association
• Past President of the Board, Center for Grief and Loss, Pueblo, Colorado
• Past President of the Board of The Healing Alliance, Maui, Hawaii
• Past Program Director, Sunburst Holistic Life Center, DeKalb, Illinois