Memory Recall Meditation

[Kaarsty]

I'm writing this out as this has been one of the few moments in my life where I had some real progress, and I'd like to see what you all think.

Many times I've sunk into meditation in an effort to recall previous experiences, or even past lives, if there is such a thing. I've never been successful in this, and had largely given it up when an interesting evening came along. The girlfriend and I were in bed, later in the evening and we were discussing childhood memories and the impact they have on us as adults, when I explained that I only remember little flashes of my childhood memories, and nothing more. She insisted that with a little effort, I could recall the entirety of the memory.

So, thinking she's going to be disappointed, I close my eyes and begin to relax. She tells me to recall a particular memory I have of being in the car with my father, the day he explained how the gear shift works. I couldn't have been more than 5 or 6 years old at the time, perhaps younger. As I remember this image in great detail, she says "what happened just before that?" and the experience really starts to begin. She's successfully able to walk me back through this memory to my babysitter's house, additional conversations had before and after that, a distinct memory (just before this event) of an Acorn, and how its like a little world in there, and finally, the ringing in my ears after my father got out of the car to walk around to my side. She starts walking me forward to school, and then the memory gets fuzzy and it feels like this process is coming to an end, I can feel it wearing off.

The memory stops here, and I didn't have any more success that evening or since. I've tried a few times, but never had that level of control since. What do you all think? Was this a matter of circumstance; being that it was later, I may have already been in a theta(meditative) state, or some combination of foods and lack of stress caused this? Or, do you think it had something to do with this female that I'm so close to, so open to, so trusting with. In the back of my mind, I feel its something to do with her, but we don't have these kinds of results on the regular, so I'm not sure. I can say that her and I have always been in tune.. we hear each others thoughts a split second before they come out, we can feel each other no matter where we are, and would be perfectly happy being left along together in a cave somewhere. Perhaps its her? Perhaps its cognitive bias, and I was just REALLY relaxed. What do you think?