Distinguishing Between Past Lives and The Active Imagination How could anyone recognize the difference between experiencing a past life recall and simply experiencing a vivid imagining of the mind? While meditating I often slip into states that take me outside my current sense of self and into another experience. Though I don’t believe this to be a past life recall, I often wonder if I experienced this 2000 years ago in Indian society, would I have consider this a past life? Just like past lives can be consider endlessly varied so can these vivid experiences.



It’s seems a typical answer to this question is, either, 1. Your not meditating good enough... or 2.There is no self and hence no past lives. I feel these are insufficient answers.  

In regards to 1, I think maybe people misunderstand my interpretation of imagining. I do not mean an intentionally based conjuring of thoughts or day dreaming. It is in deep stillness that these conditions arise, taking on the appearance of life experiences, and they appear  distinct from my current life situations.

In regards to 2, I take non-self or the emptiness of self and things to mean the impermanence of states of being or existing. We are confined to bodies, that is to say, the neurons in my brain control the movement of my thumb typing this. Of course we are socially, biologically, and environmentally interconnected and none of our actions goes uninfluenced by the actions of others as a hole. Yet at the end of the day my bank account number belongs to me and I am legally responsible for my actions within society.
According to the sutta below, one has to have a bright, spotless, rid of taints, pliable, steady and imperturbable mind immersed in concentration that can be directed towards the recollection of past lives. A mind full of imagination does not fulfill this criteria.

From MN 4:


  When my mind had become immersed in samādhi (concentration) like this  —purified,
  bright, spotless, rid of taints, pliable, workable, steady, and
  imperturbable — I extended it toward recollection of past lives. I
  recollected many kinds of past lives.
  
  That is: one, two, three, four, five, ten, twenty, thirty, forty,
  fifty, a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand rebirths; many eons
  of the world contracting, many eons of the world evolving, many eons
  of the world contracting and evolving. I remembered: ‘There, I was
  named this, my clan was that, I looked like this, and that was my
  food. This was how I felt pleasure and pain, and that was how my life
  ended. When I passed away from that place I was reborn somewhere else.
  There, too, I was named this, my clan was that, I looked like this,
  and that was my food. This was how I felt pleasure and pain, and that
  was how my life ended. When I passed away from that place I was reborn
  here.’ And so I recollected my many kinds of past lives, with features
  and details.


According to SN 22.79, the purpose of recollecting past lives is simply to become disenchanted with the change in the five aggregates, and the suffering associated with it, in the past and the future. It does not matter what is the content of the recollection. This can also be found in this answer. 

If you wondering whether this refers to literal physical rebirth or metaphorical thought rebirth, perhaps this quote from the same sutta can help you:


  When my mind had become immersed in samādhi (concentration) like this — purified,
  bright, spotless, rid of taints, pliable, workable, steady, and
  imperturbable — I extended it toward knowledge of the death and rebirth
  of sentient beings.
  
  With clairvoyance that is purified and superhuman, I saw sentient
  beings passing away and being reborn—inferior and superior, beautiful
  and ugly, in a good place or a bad place. I understood how sentient
  beings are reborn according to their deeds: ‘These dear beings did bad
  things by way of body, speech, and mind. They spoke ill of the noble
  ones; they had wrong view; and they chose to act out of that wrong
  view. When their body breaks up, after death, they’re reborn in a
  place of loss, a bad place, the underworld, hell. These dear beings,
  however, did good things by way of body, speech, and mind. They never
  spoke ill of the noble ones; they had right view; and they chose to
  act out of that right view. When their body breaks up, after death,
  they’re reborn in a good place, a heavenly realm.’ And so, with
  clairvoyance that is purified and superhuman, I saw sentient beings
  passing away and being reborn — inferior and superior, beautiful and
  ugly, in a good place or a bad place. I understood how sentient beings
  are reborn according to their deeds.