💫Episode 68 : How to Clear Karmic Contracts & Break Soul Patterns

"I have been spiritual my whole life. Not the kind of spiritual where one day you pick up a book and think, 'this all makes sense.' The kind of spiritual where, as a little kid, something inside of you just knows there's more going on than what you can see."

That knowing has guided Charla Goodnight for as long as she can remember. And in Episode 68 of Collective Guidance, she brings one of the most personal, grounded, and practically useful conversations she's ever had about the topic that sits at the center of so much of her spiritual life: past lives, soul contracts, and how to finally clear what you've been carrying.

This is the episode for anyone who has ever asked: why does this keep happening to me?

What Is a Past Life — and Why Does It Matter Now?

Across Eastern religion, Western mysticism, and countless spiritual traditions spanning thousands of years, the belief is the same: our souls don't just live once. We return, again and again, each lifetime a different semester of what Charla calls Earth school.

And we don't come in empty-handed.

Every soul carries what are known as Akashic records — a kind of cosmic library that holds every lesson learned, every gift developed, every wound unhealed across all previous lifetimes. Before we are born, we know what we need to learn. We choose the experiences, the relationships, and even the challenges that will give our soul the best opportunity to grow.

And then — as Kari Samuels described in Episode 67 — we cross through the river of forgetfulness. Our conscious mind is wiped clean. We come in as if for the first time. But the subconscious? It remembers everything.

That's why déjà vu is not just a strange glitch. It's your subconscious sending a signal: this is not your first time here. You have been in this place, with these people, doing this work before.

Why You Keep Ending Up in the Same Situation

Have you ever noticed that your relationships — across different people, different years, different circumstances — tend to carry the same feeling? A controlling partner becomes an overbearing boss becomes a suffocating friendship. The faces change. The feeling doesn't.

That feeling is the thread. And that thread leads directly to the pattern your soul is asking you to heal.

Charla offers a reframe that is both simple and profound: the pattern is in the feeling, not the circumstance. The circumstance is just the stage. The feeling underneath — not being safe to be yourself, not feeling seen, not feeling enough — that is the pattern. That is the karmic energy asking for your attention.

And here's the key: when you can identify the feeling, you can trace it all the way back. When's the first time I felt this? Often, the answer is childhood. And beneath that, past lives. The same soul lesson, showing up again, in a new costume, saying: are you ready to heal this now?

What Is a Soul Contract?

A soul contract is an agreement your soul made before this lifetime — with specific people, for specific purposes. Some are joyful. Some are profound. And some are the hardest experiences of your life.

Charla shares a beautiful example of instant soul recognition — the moment she saw her friend Jennifer walk into a birthing class and felt an immediate pull: I know that person. I want her in my life. That's what it feels like when a soul family member arrives.

But not all soul contracts come wrapped in warmth. Some of the most important ones are the ones that push you hardest, stretch you furthest, and ask the most of you. Those are often the agreements your soul made specifically to force growth that couldn't happen any other way.

Charla's take is generous and grounding: the hardest soul contracts are often the most sacred. They're the ones that made her who she is. And the work — the real spiritual work — is not to escape them, but to learn from them, clear them, and move forward without carrying them forever.

Soul Purpose Is Not Your Job Title

Building on her conversation with Kari Samuels, Charla returns to a reframe that deserves to be said again: your soul purpose is not your profession.

Your purpose is to live in alignment with source. To clear your soul contracts. To correct your Akashic records by cleaning up your side of the street — taking accountability, forgiving yourself, offering grace to others, and doing the inner work that elevates your soul to a higher state of consciousness.

When you do that — when you stop asking why does this keep happening to me and start asking what is my soul trying to show me through this — everything shifts.

How to Clear Karmic Contracts and Cut Energetic Cords

This is the part Charla knows people need most. And she offers several practical tools:

Cord cutting with intention: Simply take your hand and physically move it across the front of your body, then the back — cutting the energetic threads. This can be done in combination with prayer, Palo Santo, or an energetic clearing spray. The physical gesture matters. It signals to your body and your subconscious that you are choosing to release.

A prayer for clearing soul contracts and Akashic records: "Spirit, come forth — spiritual board of advisors for clearing contracts and Akashic records. Clear any energy that does not serve us well. Let them go back to source in love and light. We are no longer part of this contract. Neither soul has to play this out anymore. We are free to live in harmony. Clear them, release them. Amen."

If there is someone you can't seem to shake — a pattern you keep repeating, an energy you can't move past — say this prayer. Repeat it. Mean it.

Tracing the feeling: When a familiar feeling arises — tightness, smallness, invisibility, not-enoughness — pause. Ask: When's the first time I felt this? Let yourself go back. Hold that younger version of yourself with compassion. Then ask: How am I keeping this pattern alive? How am I participating in it? Not to blame yourself — but to see it clearly. Because clarity is where the clearing begins.

Choosing differently: Once you see the pattern and understand the feeling underneath it, the final step is the most powerful: make a different choice. Set the boundary you didn't set before. Say the thing you've been swallowing. Choose the relationship or situation that reflects how you actually want to feel, not the familiar one that confirms the old story.

You Are Not Broken — You Are Mid-Correction

Perhaps the most important thing Charla says in this entire episode is this:

You are not a victim of your patterns. You are not cursed. You are not broken. You are not a bad person because these things keep happening to you.

You are a soul on a long journey — accumulating wisdom, healing wounds, growing across many lifetimes. The things that have been hardest for you are often the seeds of your greatest gifts. The wounds you've worked the hardest to heal are often exactly what allows you to hold space for others walking the same road.

And when you look back on this lifetime — when you cross back to source and see it all clearly — what you'll find is that every hard contract, every painful pattern, every moment of growth was exactly what your soul came here to do.

The book Charla recommends for going deeper: Many Lives, Many Masters by Brian Weiss — a stunning, accessible entry point into past life understanding that she returns to again and again.

A Final Invitation

Stop asking why does this happen to me.

Start asking what is my soul trying to show me and heal me through this?

That question — that shift — is what changes everything. That is the kind of wisdom that doesn't just change your mind. It changes your life.

✨ If this message resonates with you, please share this post with a friend, subscribe to the Collective Guidance podcast, and join me on Instagram @charligirl7 or @collectiveguidancepodcast . Let’s create a world where sensitivity is celebrated.

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Sending love, remembrance, faith, and creativity,

Charla ❤️