Journey of Souls — A Well-Told Story or Just Another Layer of Illusion?

 

Opening Note

This is a personal reflection on Journey of Souls by Michael Newton. I approached the book not as a believer or skeptic, but as a seeker trying to peel away illusion and see what remains. What follows isn’t a literary review, but a journal entry from my ongoing self-enquiry.




If the soul is already complete and eternal, can it really be damaged, healed, or guided? Or are these just more projections from the human mind, shaped by cultural myths and our craving for meaning?

The book presents hypnotic case studies where people describe their experiences after death: floating through tunnels, entering bright lights, being welcomed by soul groups, meeting spiritual guides, attending soul schools, facing councils of elders, and preparing for reincarnation.

At first glance, it sounds comforting. Structured. Familiar. But the more I read, the more it started resembling a celestial version of human institutions — like we’re repeating the same classroom-discipline system, only this time in the “spirit realm.”

This raised a fundamental question:
Are we really remembering something… or just fabricating comforting stories from what we already know?


As someone drawn to Jiddu Krishnamurti, the Ashtavakra Gita, and the lens of Advaita Vedanta, this narrative felt off. Not because it’s completely false — but because it may simply be mind dressing up the unknown.

  • The soul, in non-dual teachings, is changeless and whole. It doesn’t “heal.” It doesn’t need “counsel.”

  • The mind is a master storyteller. It weaves myths to protect itself — angels, tunnels, teachers, karma.

  • These hypnotic regressions could very well be archetypal memories or culturally embedded images, not literal truths.

What the book offers is perhaps a symbolic reality — one that reassures the ego more than it liberates the self.


This book made one thing very clear:
The ego’s need for spiritual storytelling is subtle and persistent.

Enlightened sages don’t describe post-death landscapes. They don’t speak of councils or light tunnels. They ask us to turn inward and question:

  • “Who is the one who wants to know what happens after death?”
  • “Who is the one imagining this journey?”
  • “Is that self even real?”

This is where Journey of Souls falls short for me. It gives beautifully detailed answers… to the wrong questions.

I respect the book for what it is: a psychological or metaphorical exploration. But it’s not a roadmap to the truth — at least not for me.

I choose to remain with not knowing, rather than replacing one illusion with a more colorful one. I will continue the journey of unlearning — letting go of stories, even “spiritual” ones, in favor of direct seeing.

Comments

Popular Posts