I feel as though this hasn't been my first time around the mortal coil; and it is as if past struggles or hiccups are still ruminating and existence in this lifetime.
I ask so I can rid myself of this and try to start a new beginning but it's hard because I don't know what to look for and I only have a couple of flashes to go off of . . .
I have done a couple of iterations of a meditation for accessing past lives, and I think it worked very well, and explained a lot of my present incarnation.
Something deeper than a preference, something that you feel is intrinsic to your inner self, that you currently hold or believe, can often be attributed to past lives . Also an uncanny ability to do something 'you're not supposed to' at a young age, or know something incongruous, can point out to what it may have been.
My funny one is my very first trip to a Chinese restaurant at age 4 or 5 , apparently I knew how to use the chopsticks right off the bat, and everyone was kind of stunned.
I did this meditation called Thisharb, or the Hebrew word Berashith, backwards ('the beginning' ) ; essentially it involves remembering backwards to before you were born. You take a trip. You will know when it is 'seeing' and not pure fantasy.
If done properly you can see your deaths, which aid greatly in overcoming various fears and complexities.