This past life recall came to me after asking for clarification on a relationship I was a part of several years ago. The person in question was a challenge to deal with, and required quite a lot of patience and unconditional support. Frankly, I found him perplexing and somewhat annoying in his blind arrogance and inability to let go of experiences regardless of the fact that he wasn't a particularly 'successful' person in this lifetime.
This lifetime places me in ancient Japan well before modern times as the wife of a prominent upper-class statesman. He is a subject of a feudal king, as we all are, but his station in life keeps him well immersed in the politics of the time.
One thing that stands out is that my husband is an expert at wielding a device known as a naginata (I wasn't even aware of the existence of this type of weapon prior to this past life recall). As a warrior he is more than expert at the art of using this weapon and his expertise is well admired by the people in his circle as well as the higher royalty-types. He spends a lot of time perfecting his abilities with the weapon and he teaches other warriors how to use the naginata both in competition and in battle.
As the daughter of a fairly well-off family, for me this marriage is viewed as important and successful. We have many children and they are all healthy and strong - and they are being educated as is appropriate for people of our class. My life is all about the home and family. Our living space is quite large and rather like a compound containing many smaller buildings. The grounds are diligently cared for and everything is perfectly in it's place. There is much energy spent on being proper and following, if not exceeding, the standards of expectation.
The husband is busy and away most of the time, involved in his role as statesman and teacher, and he spends significant amounts of time competing in the art of naginatajutsu. He is also bull-headed in his opinions and overly expressive about his feelings for the rulers and the conditions of the country.
This situation seems to build over many years and I find myself trying in vain to keep him from speaking his mind in public. The ruler of the land has no problem eliminating people who don't agree with him, and so this situation becomes more than a growing concern as time goes by. The possibility that my husband could bring danger to the family weighs heavily on my mind and heart, but there isn't much I can do to keep bad things from happening.
Eventually the ruler hears about an uprising among the local warriors and the attention is soon focused on my husband, who still cannot keep himself from expressing damaging opinions in public. So one day he is to set off on a competition - ready to defend his ranking among warriors. I am with him as he dresses for the event and my heart is heavy with concern because I feel that he is walking into a trap. But nothing can stop the future from unfolding. The robes he wears are gorgeous by any standard and today he is dressed in the finest garbs he has, preparing as he must, for death. Everything is done ceremoniously, and I stand by watching with trepidation. As he readies to leave we line up the children to say goodbye and he pauses at each one saying some small thing to each child in turn. Then he turns and walks with his men out through the compound gates.
The ruler-king has stationed men on the road to the competition and they dispatch my husband and his companions by beheading, leaving the bodies of the men in the thickets and my husband along the roadway. This could have been a huge disaster for me and the children particularly since we might have been seen as needing to be eliminated as well. But my family is well established in the hierarchy and my father takes measures to ensure that we are safe, though I don't know what was done now - I do understand that it took significant sacrifice to keep us from being thrown out into the streets and our homes demolished by the ruler's men - or worse.
The good news about this lifetime is that I did recover from the situation created by my husband, and actually flourished after his death, taking on a relatively significant role in the community and raising our children to adulthood successfully.
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From recovering these memories I realize that this man's attitudes are deeply ingrained and not something that can be changed, so I relax when I am around him and just give him the freedom he needs to be himself. Shortly after this recall I removed myself from this relationship altogether since I no longer felt compelled to remain in relationship - favoring sanity to repetitive dysfunction.