Exploring the Soul’s Wider Journey
A Conversation with Marilyn Hargreaves
Interviewed by Savarna Wiley
Certified Life Between Lives® Facilitator, USA
Across cultures and spiritual traditions, there have long been suggestions that human life may be part of a much larger tapestry of consciousness. In recent decades, work in regression hypnosis and Life Between Lives (LBL) exploration—pioneered in part by researchers such as Michael Newton—has introduced intriguing reports from individuals who describe their soul’s journey as extending beyond Earth alone.
Within these accounts, terms such as visitor souls, hybrids, and more recently starseeds have entered the conversation. These ideas invite reflection on questions of identity, belonging, and purpose—particularly at a time when many people feel that humanity is moving through a period of profound change.
In this interview, Marilyn shares her perspectives on these emerging themes, offering insights from her own experiences and working with individuals exploring the deeper dimensions of the soul’s journey.
Defining the Language
SAVARNA: In recent years we’ve begun to hear terms such as hybrid visitors, visitor souls, and starseeds. From your perspective, how do you understand these terms, and how might they relate to one another?
MARILYN: I would like to first acknowledge that language can be troublesome when trying to define that which cannot be defined, especially from our limited human construct. So, I encourage you and your readers to substitute whatever word that feels right for what may be referred to as a larger field of intelligence that is unfolding into what we call the Universe. And that this universe includes all of creation – the physical and non-physical realms or dimensions. I tend to use the descriptor “Divine” or “Source,” avoiding the word God, as it has been so divisive on this planet. I will use ‘souls,’ as Michael did, to describe the individualized consciousnesses that we use to self-identify.
Now to the terms you have used. I would like to add in the term traveller, as that is what some of the souls, I have met, call themselves through their LBL experience, as they perceive having travelled to Earth from their ‘home.’ Visitor seems clear, a soul who would not call Earth their home. Michael’s term, hybrid, is one that I, and many of my fellow practitioners take a little exception to as it feels a little like a mutation, but more specifically isn’t descriptive enough. Michael described both the visitor soul and a soul who ‘recreates’ on another planet as hybrid. To me these are different, so I don’t tend to use that descriptor.
Another term that I would like to include is lightworker alongside with starseeds, star inferring both a Divine Light (read codes) seeded here from souls oriented to other stars than our sun – or other galactic homes. I resonate with this metaphor. I rarely run into a visitor soul that hasn’t had a burning sense of mission, a feeling that they are here for an important purpose in assisting humanity and our Earth at this important time of transformation, that is bringing knowledge of the ‘Light’ of the ‘Divine’ essence. They identify strongly with the term lightworker – their role – to bring light, wisdom and love to assist humanity. But that said, I wouldn’t limit the term lightworkers to the visitor or starseed category, as I have met many beautiful ‘Earth-based’ souls that haven’t, or just have yet to remember, their existences in other star systems, galaxies, realms, and dimensions, or insist that they have been incarnating here for so long they are Earth souls.
A Personal Path of Inquiry
SAVARNA: What first led you to explore the idea of hybrids or visitor souls more deeply? Was there a particular moment or experience that drew your attention to this aspect of the soul’s journey?
MARILYN: After reading Michael Newton’s two books, Journey of Souls and Destiny of Souls, I couldn’t wait to take the Michael Newton Institute (MNI) training. Everything he described resonated so deeply. My first LBL was during the training and it wasn’t exactly what I expected. I wasn’t greeted by my guide. I didn’t get to meet my Council and my Soul Family told me they were my Team, with only three of us choosing human incarnation. Regardless, I did receive the most beautiful experience of incarnating on a water-planet in the form of a dolphin-like being. At first it was quite disorienting. I was me, as in the same consciousness, but I was also this beautiful form that glided and leapt through the vast sea with such speed and grace. I could actually feel my skin and blubber rippling as I swam and leapt though the warm waters. It was like I had ‘zipped’ myself into a dolphin suit. Thankfully, later in that LBL, I would experience myself as soul in energetic form. After discovering my soul’s name, my fellow student guiding me asked what it meant. Without hesitation, I said “traveller”. They then asked where I travelled and I said, “everywhere,” with such enthusiasm, I just knew it to be true.
About six months later, I thought that I had better have another LBL to connect more fully with my soul-essence in a ‘between lives’ way, before I got too far along working with clients. I booked a LBL with a local practitioner ready for the ‘real’ LBL experience. I easily slipped out of my human body to find myself in some sort of cavern. At least this time a Guide (of sorts – she had a jumpsuit on) was there to assist me to understand and navigate what I was to discover was actually some sort of inter-planetary spacecraft on a mission to Earth. Our mission – to assist at a time of great transformation. I had been trained and was ready for this great adventure. My ‘team’ was all there and we were excited to be on our way.
When my partitioner asked if I wanted to meet my council (still thinking this was a regular LBL), I found myself on the bridge, the command centre, of the craft. I was relieved when the ‘council’ felt very familiar and welcoming, but turning to face me in their command chairs didn’t feel very like a typical LBL council. I left the session disappointed and confused. Was this a metaphor of the afterlife that I was failing to comprehend? Did I have an overactive imagination? Would I be able to guide clients in their life between lives experience? Well, I decided I was on this path, so I opened my practice to include LBL sessions using the method Michael had given us.
You asked what led lead me to explore this idea of visitors. It was after the sixth or eighth client who, deep in trance, would exclaim, “I’m not from here,” or “I came here [Earth] on a mission,” having visited their home planet during their LBL, that I could accept that it was a thing and perhaps my own experience had meaning – at least in the sense of ‘coming’ to participate in a great time of transformation on Earth. In those years, about 50% of my clients turned out to be visitors, or more specifically starseeds, and my ‘mission’ if you could call it that was to be a open, trusted guide to validate others in their discoveries of their origins.
By this time, I was confident enough to propose broadening our understanding within the MNI community and volunteered to be a member of the MNI research team, while encouraging my fellow partitioners to open conversations about these souls of whom Michael had only given us a few tantalizing cases, calling them hybrids – souls with both Earth and other-worldly memories.
A Spectrum of Incarnational Experience
SAVARNA: Thank you for clarifying some of these terms. In addition, you mentioned that there is a vast array of ways in which souls can express. Would you share a little more about this?
MARILYN: Yes, I would be happy to. But first a note about classification and orientation for clarity. For purposes of this conversation, I’ll remind that I define ‘Soul’ as a spark of light or fractal of the Divine, Source or Unity Consciousness, individual, yet inseparable from a larger Source.
There are so many, perhaps infinite, ways in which Souls can express consciousness that it would be impossible to speak to that diversity here, nor do I believe it possible to speak definitively about that which is ineffable. So, I’ll elaborate only briefly on a few ways I have encountered other soul expressions.
Souls that exist purely in energetic form, no longer incarnating for their own learning and growth, like ascended masters and those of the angelic realm, as well as guides and teachers assisting us individually or collectively abound. They are pure beauty, benevolence and vast in their knowing. I always treasure the luminosity on my client’s face and the stillness in the room when my client meets one of these beings. I can only imagine what lies beyond our human awareness. Were one to incarnate here on Earth, and I believe they can by choice, we would know them by their presence and be humbled by their grace. Perhaps those esteemed teachers in our various religious traditions are of this expression.
I am aware that the visitors to Earth come with a diversity of soul lineages. and a variety of intentions behind the choice to incarnate as human on Earth. Earth is an amazing learning laboratory. My primary interaction has been with what I define above as starseeds and what I will share mostly about. But not all visitors are starseeds by the definition I provided. Some I have encountered are on Earth purely to observe and learn in order to take this information back to their ‘home’ planet to address issues and evolve based on what we are experiencing here on Earth. Despite all that we see as wrong about Earth, our capacity to love, our ingenuity, and our fortitude is admired, in spite of the challenges and horrors that occur here. Because Earth’s evolution isn’t their primary orientation, I wouldn’t call them starseeds.
Another group that I would still consider visitors, though not starseeds, are those whose intentions may be perceived as more nefarious from a human perspective. My sense is that, as expressions within a larger field of consciousness, even these presences may play a role within the broader experience of duality on Earth. While I have had limited direct interaction with this orientation, it has led me to reflect on how encounters with what we experience as fear-based or separating can bring greater awareness to what is not rooted in love. In that way, even these experiences may contribute to the ongoing process of recognizing, healing, and integrating the aspects of ourselves and our world that feel divided.
Now for those starseeds. In the beginning of my practice, I would say that most of my clients that explored non-Earth-based memories, described a physical existence within our, or a similar, galaxy. Most were in forms that were somewhat humanoid in appearance. You know, very much like you can find through a web search of pictures of Pleiadeans, or Asturians, Greys and the like. Some of my clients were able to affirm their origin from these communities, others provided names and descriptions new to me. Some of the planets were similar to Earth, often with quirky differences. In fact, one of my standard questions when a client seemed confused, as to whether they were experiencing another Earth incarnation, was to ask them to look up and tell me the colour of the sky. I remember one client replying, very startled, “It’s purple. This is not Earth!” Once they had settled, we would go on to explore the planet with more curiosity and openness. I love it when an insight or discovery is so unexpected. I am very careful not to ask leading questions so my clients really feel their experience comes from within. Others descriptions of planets included beautiful crystalline constructs or vast deserts of red sand.
SAVARNA: It is interesting to think about how the science fiction writers of our time found their imagery. Maybe there is a connection there. What other differences do you notice?
MARILYN: One of the more common differences to an earth-based soul, one in the cycle of death and rebirth with an afterlife more like Michael described, was the council structure. Once client described their council as a geodesic dome, where every intersection was an intelligence where that they could merge into. Collectively this formation was a ‘council in form.’ I wonder now if this is not related to the sacred geometry that holds and codes vast amounts of information? Another client’s ‘council’ was a pulsating, light-filled, crystal orb that many souls could connect to telepathically to both transmit and receive information, wisdom and guidance. Again, this was more like a collective intelligence.
As my practice evolved and I became more open, curious and accepting, I began to get a new wave of clients. Clients that experienced existence in non-physical form. I remember one client very clearly because it was very challenging for me and for them. After completing the relaxation and childhood phase of the session, they entirely skipped the past life and became disoriented when I tried to open the portal to a past life. It took a bit of tricky questioning and navigation, but we were to discover together that he was a very large ‘field of energy’ in proximity to Earth. Delving deeper, he learned he was actually part of a collective of three soul essences observing Earth for the purposes of learning and supporting Earth/human evolution energetically. He agreed to incarnate to get a more direct experience of what it was like to be human, and explore physicality, while forgetting his non-physical, energetic expression and connection to Source. This was his first incarnation, hence no past life to observe. Life on Earth was a very challenging and disorienting experience. Knowing his origin helped him to make sense and navigate his life more skillfully.
These are just a few tidbits about my experiences of visitors. I would offer that your readers can find more information in the Michael Newton Institute book I co-authored with my MNI research colleagues called Llewellyn’s Little Book of Life Between Lives .There is a whole chapter on visitors and they will be able to read more detail on some of what I have shared and other sessions.
Feeling at Home on Earth
SAVARNA: It sounds like the experience helped your client find more peace here. In the writings of Michael Newton, there are references to the possibility that hybrid or visitor souls may find it difficult to feel fully at home on Earth. Many people describe a sense of nostalgia or longing for another place. As more individuals today identify with the idea of being starseeds, what might help people integrate into Earth life in ways that are healthy and constructive, both for the individual and for the culture?
MARILYN: It’s actually that “not fitting in” feeling that is my first clue that I might be dealing with a starseed. Many starseeds describe feeling aghast or disappointed in how humans treat each other and our beautiful planet. Oh, that is the second clue – describing their fellow Earth citizens as ‘humans,’ as if they themselves aren’t actually human.
That sense of longing or nostalgia for a better world can run very deep. I have met many starseeds that feel quite lonely, despite having many friends, describing it as “not having people to connect with that get you.” Many starseeds I have met are highly empathic, and struggle with emotional and environmental sensitivity. It’s like their systems come tuned for a higher frequency. Energy work, healthy fresh food, and being mindful of their environment and company is very helpful. But, I would also highlight there is a high degree of variability. Some starseeds come from very ‘intellectual’ systems and can feel aloof, overly analytical and disconnected from heart – one of the human superpowers. I have noticed that it is never a one-way mission, that is a visitor or starseed is equally here to advance their soul’s evolution, perhaps they have come to learn how to be heart or love based, or learn about the separating force of fear?
Starseeds tend to come from places where metaphysical abilities are common, abilities like telepathy, lightwork or energy healing, or they can morph between physical and non-physical expression, and access past lives more easily where their ‘Earth’ they have accessed these skills. Having these abilities can be a clue to those with star origin. Often these abilities may begin to express more easily once they have awakened to their origin and mission. The ability to journey in consciousness and channel, once awakened, can be helpful in maintaining contact with their team and relieve some of the loneliness or sense of abandonment. Sensing these abilities like telekinesis or bi-location, but not having access to them in human form can be incredibly frustrating for some visitors. Things usually don’t work like they do at home – constrained by gravity to name an example.
While it can be tough on planet Earth for any sensitive soul. Once starseeds discover that they have chosen to incarnate for a very important mission, it can greatly shift that feeling of being different. They can embrace their differences with a sense of purpose. Similarly with the loneliness, knowing that they have a team supporting them, even if not incarnating with them, builds a feeling of connection and becomes a resource.
Souls Who Arrive in Times of Change
SAVARNA: In regression work, some individuals describe themselves as specialists who enjoy coming to civilizations during periods of significant change. Interestingly, their early lives may sometimes be marked by challenges. Have you observed this pattern in your own work?
MARILYN: Yes, I have observed this but I have also observed the reverse. I think it may relate to the purpose of their mission and their ‘programed’ time of their remembering. Let me relate both aspects from what I have observed.
A starseed may be drawn to the LBL experience because they seek understanding and healing from the abuse, abandonment or neglect they experienced in their Earth-family or community. Their soul remembers what living in harmony, kindness and respect is like, yet they can feel broken and disillusioned. Interestingly, although they may be nested in a family lineage of abuse, addiction, power-over or narcissism, they themselves somehow know it is wrong and do not get drawn into to these lower vibrational vortexes. It doesn’t, mean that they are okay, if we incarnate on Earth, we experience life as human. We are all souls and need the nourishment of love. Somehow, they seek to heal themselves, to understand the patterns of fear that drive these behaviors in others, and to become the healers. In turn they bring their healing gifts and wisdom to the lineage. It’s like they have inserted themselves into a lineage that needs help. This is a very brave and tough starseed mission, but one so desperately needed on our planet. Once they understand their mission, and that it was their choice to incarnate for this purpose, their perspective often shifts from victim to one of empowerment – but the process does take the commitment to unwind the trauma, conditioning and beliefs, none the less. I’m not sure a starseed can do this alone, which is why it is so important that they find support within an open and knowledgeable community – likely other starseeds.
Familial trauma or abuse is not the only difficulty that instigates the awakening. Some starseeds are often repulsed by the fear, greed, envy, jealousy, hatred among humans, and the disregard and abuse of Earth and its inhabitants. In their Earthly mission, they may be drawn to environmental or humanitarian activism. Or, they may be drawn to careers in the fields of health, healing, counselling, environmental restoration, for example. And yet, some may be single lights burning on an isolated island, in a quiet bed and breakfast, where the disillusioned or those in existential crisis come for rest and retreat. Their gentle listening and wise council are gifts of their soul’s otherworldly or other dimensional experiences they offer to those in the dark night of the soul. Many do not even know, or need to know, they are starseeds, they are beautifully completing their soul’s mission through the gifts they lovingly and selflessly offer.
And then there are the curious—those with an inner drive to know. They ask why and seek answers, often leading them onto a path of spiritual discovery. Many times have I facilitated an LBL where the burning question is, “I want to know my soul’s mission? Or why can’t we all just be love?” This driving sense of mission is the other, perhaps most clear clue, that I sit with a starseed ready to remember. While no life on Earth is without challenge and hurt, many of these souls where not impacted by their upbringing or life events in disabling ways. Some were prepared for this quest though supportive and loving parents, offering their children kindness and opportunities to play and connect to nature, to receive an expansive education, to embrace human difference of belief and, ultimately, to grow into adults that are ready to explore and serve. I sometimes wonder if I am not observing a starseed family in these groupings, whose mission is to bring the wisdom, leadership and inspiration that is needed in these challenging days.
Expanding the Conversation
Savarna: There is increasing discussion in some circles about the possibility of disclosure—the idea that the history of contact with non-Earth civilizations may eventually become more widely known. Do you think hypnosis, and particularly Life Between Lives work, may play a role in helping people approach these possibilities with greater openness and less fear?
MARILYN: That’s a fun and interesting question. What is the difference between a “non-Earth soul” incarnating or arriving in their ‘other-worldly” form by spaceship or teleportation? By choosing the incarnation route, there is no sense of ‘other.’ Those with non-Earth civilization memory and knowledge can assist without the human fear response being evoked, because the starseed is human. At the same time, if we as humans can get comfortable with the idea of starseeds, perhaps we will be more open to the possibly of ‘ET’ contact without the human fear response kicking in and invoking an interplanetary war! Perhaps the starseeds are preparing the way.
Support from the Spiritual Realms
SAVARNA: One phenomenon that sometimes emerges in regression work is the sense that individuals feel a great deal of support in the spiritual realms—guides, helpers, or perhaps even beings connected with other dimensions or planetary origins. Have you observed this kind of spiritual support?
MARILYN: Yes, absolutely. If everyone could only imagine the support we are receiving from those of other planetary origins and, in fact, beyond the time and space, in other realms and dimensions that we hold in our human/Earth construct of consciousness. I have witnessed this awareness awakening in many of my starseed and non-starseed clients when they meet these beings. Their face is soft and glowing and the room is filled with a beautiful, peaceful stillness. I have seen this as well as amongst my friends and collogues who explore consciousness in a multitude of ways, including LBL. At times it can feel as though there is an entire team supporting a person’s life here. If only we could fathom how loved, supported and admired we all are, as souls incarnating on this beautiful blue pearl of a planet in physical existence.
Returning to the Human Experience
SAVARNA: You have shared a lot about your experiences and your clients of with starseed oriented souls incarnating here on Earth. As we conclude our interview, let me ask you one more question. What do you see as the trajectory of ‘human’ oriented souls here on Earth at this time?
MARILYN: Thank you, Savarna, for asking this beautiful and timely question. This is really important to me and my I can feel my heart opening so tenderly.
As I reflect on these experiences—my own and those shared by clients—what stands out is not a single explanation, but a widening range of possibilities in which consciousness appears to express itself. Some describe deeply Earth-rooted journeys, others recall experiences beyond this planet, and still others encounter forms of awareness that are not physical at all. Rather than pointing to separation, this diversity seems to suggest that consciousness may not be confined to a single form or location, but expressed across what we might think of as multiple dimensions or states of being.
In that context, the distinction between ‘visitor’ and ‘human’ begins to soften. Perhaps we are all visitor and human, multidimensional souls at different stages of remembering our wholeness. It may be less about where a soul comes from, and more about how awareness is currently being experienced. What I have noticed—again and again—is that regardless of origin story, these experiences often lead to a similar realization: a deepened sense of connection, meaning, and care for one another.
SAVARNA: Yes. A deepened sense of connection, meaning and care is certainly called for in these times. Thank you for the work you do and for sharing your perspective with us.
Marilyn is a devoted explorer of consciousness, and an Emeritus member of the Michael Newton Institute (since 2025), living in British Columbia, Canada. She served on MNI’s Research Team and Board of Directors from 2015 to 2021. As a volunteer for MNI, she co-authored Llewellyn’s Little Book of Life Between Lives (2018) and Wisdom of Souls (2019). Marilyn holds a degree in biology, and is a certified hypnotherapist, past life regressionist and LBL practitioner. She has keen interest in Celtic Druidry and Christian mysticism, along with herbalism and shamanism, from multiple indigenous traditions. ♥
Savarna Wiley is located in Santa Cruz, California, USA, and sees clients in-person and online worldwide
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