Michael Newton, Life Between Lives and Mark Johnson's Training

Mark Johnson with Michael Newton.

The Training That Changed My Direction

In 2007 I traveled to Chicago to study Life Between Lives with Michael Newton. I had already been doing hypnosis and past life work, but that training helped me see more clearly where I was going. It was the moment I decided I wanted to specialize in spiritual hypnotherapy.

Life Between Lives, or LBL, is the name Michael Newton gave to deep hypnotic work centered on the period between incarnations. The Michael Newton Institute describes it as a process intended to explore an individual's experience of the inter life, including the client's sense of identity, guidance, and meaning.

For me the training was not only about learning a sequence. It was about discovering a larger context for the work I was already drawn to. The idea that a session could move beyond a past life memory and into a deeper exploration of the soul's perspective changed how I thought about hypnosis.

Learning by Doing

To complete my certification I had to submit five written LBL cases and one recorded session. That meant I needed people who were willing to explore this work with me while I was still learning how to guide it.

I remember going to a party at the office of my first hypnosis teacher and talking to anyone who would listen. I was explaining LBL and doing my best to drum up interest in sessions. Looking back, it was one of those early moments when I simply had to put myself out there, talk about something I believed in, and let the right people find me.

That process taught me an important lesson I still carry today. Every practitioner begins by learning the structure, but the real learning comes through the people who sit in front of you. Every session is different. Every client brings a different history, a different question, and a different way into the experience.

A Conversation With Michael I Still Remember

A few years later I was invited to a strategy meeting at San Damiano in California with Michael Newton and members of the Newton Institute board. At the time I had been helping with the Institute website after a new site had been released with serious security problems.

One morning I went to breakfast. It was a buffet, so I got my food, looked around for a place to sit, and saw Michael at a table with the Institute administrator. I joined them.

Then I went completely blank.

What do you say to Michael Newton?

Finally I blurted out that I had done an LBL session online. Michael looked at me and said, “You did what? I would never do a session online.”

I felt small for about half a second. Then I explained that the client was a family friend, a hypnotist herself, and someone who read and taught Akashic Records. I did not feel concerned that she would lose the connection, and she had an amazing session.

I believe that may have been my first online LBL session. Today, almost all of my work is online.

That memory stays with me because it reminds me how much this field has changed. What felt unusual then has become an everyday way of connecting with people around the world. The technology is different, but the essential work remains the same. Creating a safe, focused space where someone can listen more deeply to what is within them.

Mark Johnson with Michael Newton at a personal gathering

A personal moment with Michael Newton during Mark's years of training and involvement with the LBL community.

Time at San Damiano and With the Institute

My connection to the LBL community continued beyond the original training. A few years after my Chicago experience I served as a teaching assistant for an LBL training. Michael was not there for that particular training, but being part of the process gave me another perspective on how the work is taught and supported.

In 2011 the San Damiano strategy meeting gave me the chance to spend more time around Michael in a smaller setting. Then in 2014 I returned to San Damiano for LBL teacher training. Michael was not there that time either, but it was still an amazing experience and an important part of my development.

The work Michael shared with the world reached a wide audience through books including Journey of Souls, first published in 1994. The Michael Newton Institute describes the book as a collection of case material focused on experiences between lives, drawn from clients in deep hypnosis.

What I Took From the Work

Michael's approach gave me an enduring respect for going slowly enough to let the experience unfold. In an LBL session I often begin with happy childhood memories, then the womb, then a short past life experience. From there the session may move through the transition and into the spirit world, the part of the work that is central to the LBL experience.

But I have also learned not to force a script onto a living, responsive person.

Sometimes a client needs to spend more time in childhood. Sometimes a past life opens quickly. Sometimes a deeper spiritual connection comes before the past life material. The structure matters, but the client's inner experience matters more.

That is one reason I value the different teachers who have shaped my work. Each gave me a framework. Years of sessions taught me when to hold that framework lightly.

Journey of Souls, a Book That Opened a Door

Journey of Souls by Michael Newton.

Journey of Souls remains one of the best known introductions to Michael Newton's work. It explores questions many people quietly carry. What happens after death? Why are we here? What might we learn from the relationships and experiences that shape a lifetime?

For many readers the book is their first introduction to the idea of a journey between lives. For me it became part of a much more personal path, one that led through training, certification, clients, teaching, and eventually online work with people from far beyond Dallas.

The Work Continues

Michael Newton's work helped me recognize that spiritual hypnotherapy was where I belonged. I am grateful for the time I spent learning from him, the people I met through the Newton Institute, and the conversations that still stay with me years later.

The most meaningful part is that the learning never stopped.

I continue to learn from every client, every student, and every session. The methods give us a way in. But the real answers, as I have seen again and again, come from within the person sitting in the chair, or these days sitting comfortably in their own home on Zoom.

Michael Newton and the Moment I Chose Spiritual Hypnotherapy