Past Life Memories are memories that a reincarnated character gains from previous incarnations of their soul.
When
Reincarnation and
Past Life Memories are presented as being real within the context of a story, It often works in a way similar to
Genetic Memory, by giving the character knowledge and skills that they would otherwise be unlikely to gain for themselves.
Past Life Memories often manifest as
Dreaming of Times Gone By. On rarer occasions, an entire identity from a past incarnation my start to emerge, resulting in a
Split Personality. Sometimes a character will undergo a
Split Personality Merge, with their current identity combining with that of a previous incarnation, giving them complete access to the memories and skills of the previous incarnation and resulting in a major
Level Up.
In most works with
Reincarnation, the majority of characters do not gain
Past Life Memories, so having them is often a sign of being a particularly important soul, perhaps even
The Chosen One.
Of course, in other works,
Reincarnation is presented as not being true, and claims to having memories from past lives are treated as a sign of eccentricity or even insanity. A character making a claim to having
Past Life Memories still invokes this trope.
Real Life public figures that can be verified as making claims to experiencing
Past Life Memories are acceptable examples, as long as it is clear that these are claims only and this is not the place to debate whether or not these beliefs have any foundation in reality.
Troper Tales should not be included under the
Real Life heading.
Compare
Genetic Memory.
This is a spoiler trope, so expect unmarked spoilers ahead.
Examples Include
Anime and Manga
Film
- In the film version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it's said that each new Slayer is the same Slayer, reincarnated as long as there are vampires to fight, and Buffy has dreams of her past lives.
- In The Mummy Trilogy, the second film has Evy having flashes of insights and memories that make her think she's hallucinating. Turns out, they're memories of her past life from ancient Egypt.
- The film Dead Again has a hypnotist who specializes in Past Life Regression hypnotherapy of his subjects — to help them overcome psychological obstacles, and to help him find and procure antiques they encountered in their previous lives. He even does it to the film's protagonsists.
- There's a film called Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives.
- Patton. The title general claims that he remembers scenes from his past lives as a warrior. This was based on beliefs that have been attributed to the Real Life Patton.
Literature
- In The Wheel of Time many male channelers develop a form of insanity that results in a breakdown of the barriers between their past lives and their current life. For most, this results in simple insanity. However, Rand, who The Hero and The Chosen One of the series, is able to take advantage of knowledge and skills gained from his past life even as it is slowly driving him into a Split Personality insanity. Rand eventually undergoes a Split Personality Merge, causing him to gain all the memories and knowledge of his previous incarnation, making him much more powerful.
- Childe Cycle contains an example The Hero Donal Graeme first travels to the past to take over a dying body, and then reincarnates himself as an infant in the future. In each case, he starts out with no memory of his original life, then manefests a few memories, and eventually gains full knowledge of all of his lives.
- Cinderheart in Warrior Cats has memories of her past life as Cinderpelt, but she has only ever shown signs of remembering them in her dreams, or recalls her past life subconsciously; for example, Cinderpelt's former apprentice Leafpool notes Cinderheart flicks her paw in the same way Cinderpelt did, as well as another character once thinking she was acting Wise Beyond Her Years, and Cinderheart remembering the distance between the Great Sycamore and ThunderClan's camp in the Forest, even though she had been born after the Clans had left the Forest. Eventually - after a night of dreaming about Cinderpelt's life - she is told/realizes who she really is.
- In the Discworld novel Thief of Time, the abbot of the History Monks is a master of serial reincarnation, currently in the body of a toddler. He retains the wisdom of his years, but his speech is often interrupted by the demands of the child. "...Bikkit bikkit wanna bikkit. Unfortunately, young bodies have a mind of their own BIKKIT!"
Live-Action TV
- In one of the Thanksgiving episodes of Friends, Phoebe is asked what her worst Thanksgiving memory is. She recalls the time she was a nurse in World War One.
- In one episode of The X-Files the [Something] Of The Week claims that she and Mulder were lovers in a previous life during The American Civil War. He goes under hypnosis and seems to confirm it.
- The Reincarnation of Peter Proud
. A man has nightmares about being murdered. He investigates and finds out that he was indeed murdered in a previous life. Later made into The Film of the Book.
- On Red Dwarf, Rimmer says that he once underwent hypnotic regression, and found out that in a past life he was Alexander the Great's chief eunuch.
Tabletop Games
- Exalted: The Spark of Exaltation (the godly thing that allows you to kick ass and chew bubblegum) attaches to the soul of its recipient, receiving the Exalt's memories in the progress. When an Exalt dies, the attached memory is normally removed by Lytek (the god of exaltation) because human souls aren't meant to house memories other than their own. However, the Sparks captured by the Yozis aren't purified this way, so a Green Sun Prince can draw upon the memories of the previous Exalt his or her spark is attached to, gaining sudden skill as a result. It has its dangers too: due to the potential depth and vastness of the tapped memories, the previous Exalt's personality might overwhelm the current, obviously-younger Green Sun Prince. An official example was a (male) Infernal letting go of an elder Sidereal*
kung fu ninja who controls fate
instead of dealing the final blow, because that Sidereal was his/her husband in previous life. That's an override of gender, allegiance, and possibly sexual orientation.
Video Games
Webcomics
- El Goonish Shive: Actually "Parallel Life Memories". Ellen was given memories of a version of herself from another universe to alleviate the stress of being an Opposite-Sex Clone and, supposedly, prevent her from going insane due to how souls work. She gained great singing skill from this, as well as the experience of losing her virginity. She is still technically a virgin in the main universe, though.
Western Animation
- In the Daria episode "Psycho Therapy", Quinn accidentally got hypnotized and dream that she was Cleopatra who was famous for inventing eyeliner.
