As you climb toward the pinnacle of complete idiocy, remember that you do not make this journey alone. All around you are the spirits of people even dumber than yourself, an army of invisible morons dating back to five million B.C., the historical beginning of cretinism, when humans first began to eat the chips off of cave paintings. Yes, throughout time you have been born and reborn again and again and again. Unfortunately, you have also died and re-died again and again and again, thus leaving you pretty much where you started.

        But just who did you used to be?

        To find out, you will have to undergo hypnosis. We suggest consulting your Yellow Pages and personally interviewing several hypnotists before making your choice. Needless to say, it is best to find one with a darkly mysterious manner, a foreign accent, and large bulgy eyes that seldom blink. Though more expensive, such hypnotists will induce a far deeper trance and sometimes serve kielbasa in their waiting rooms.

            Be sure to avoid any hypnotists resembling Richard Simmons.

        In the hypnotist's office you will be seated in a large, comfortable chair. Then a trance will be initiated by using a pendulum of some sort--often a watch and chain, or less commonly, a Barbie doll suspended from a hangman's rope. As you watch the pendulum move back and forth, the hypnotist will make suggestions to your unconcious mind. These suggestings should involve feeling relaxed, sleepy and going into a deeper and deeper state of trance. Any suggestion to go around the corner to pick up burgers is highly unethical and should be reported immediately.

        You will know you have reached a state of deep trance when your arms and legs feel heavy and numb and you are no longer concerned about the hypnotist's preposterous hourly fee. From the shimmery cloud on which you seem to float, you will hear a distant voice asking you to travel backward to the time when you were fifteen... then ten... then five... then one. (Though prices will be very low, resist the urge to buy anything.) Soon you will be unborn and floating in your mother's womb, a feeling not unlike hot tubbing. From here the hypnotist will direct you back even further...

        Garth W., a sanitation worker in Muncie, Indiana, had a vivid experience of his previous life in the mid-1800s, as a sanitation worker in nearby Bloomington. After learning of this recent incarnation, Garth had new insight into his present circumstances, particulary his fondness for untreated waste. (Alas, his request for a salary increase based on past job experience was denied.) On a subsequent visit to his hypnotist, Garth travelled back even further, this time to experience his life as a medieval catatonic. Garth has since uncovered past lives as a slave, a sanitation worker, a serf, a sanitation worker, an unemployed Hun, and as Chief Latrine Orderly under Ramses II.

        The story of Henrietta S. is no less extraordinary. Tormented throughout her present life with an irrational fear of midgets, Henrietta was regressed back to 19th Century France to discover she had once been a Parisian prostitute, relentlessly hit on by Toulouse Lautrec. Without a doubt, all of our present tastes, attitudes, and prejudices are shaped by past lives. Henrietta also learned that her strong aversion to sausage patties could be readily explained: she had once been the mistress of Baron von Link, famed inventor of a rival sausage format!

        It should be noted that past life regression does not always produce such happy results. Sales clerk Mary V., plagued by terrible flatulence since childhood, went back in time to learn that, though she had had several past lives in positions of esteem and privelege, her most formative incarnation was spent as an ordinary pinto bean. Such discoveries can be extremely damaging to the psyche and for this reason alone, the exploration of past lives should be approached with extreme caution.