Question regarding Birth Choice and Birth Defects

[Xanth]

http://unlimitedboundaries.ca/2010/10/14/question-regarding-birth-choice-and-birth-defects/

I had an interesting thought the other day as I was thinking about how we come into this world and how we choose certain aspects of this life.  I fully believe that we work out a 'basic' path for ourselves, but whether that path gets fulfilled or not is entirely upon our life choices WHILE we're here.

But then I got to thinking about people who are born with what we, humans, would call birth defects.  Some of these people, literally, can not care for themselves as they get older and require outside assistance.

My question is do we CHOOSE this kind of life for ourselves?  Or, upon entry to this physical reality, do we expect perfectly working physical bodies?
When we project, we have perfect forms.  Did we expect this to be in reverse when we came here?  Or, one could ask if there are imperfect nonphysical forms?

If we choose that kind of life for ourselves, then there must be some kind of value sought by your nonphysical consciousness.
However, if these defects are unwelcome by our nonphysical consciousness, then something PHYSICAL, here on this planet, is causing these defects and they go against our chosen path plan.

I'm curious what other people think about this.

Are birth defects caused by choice or by physical environmental factors outside our nonphysical nature?

[Stookie]

It could be that the higher self needs a certain aspect of physical life that couldn't be gained through previous lives, or previously failed attempts at physical life, and could be a kind of forced situation. Maybe there is some truth that what is achieved or not achieved in this life is carried over to the next. Not as punishment, I don't want to give that impression, but something important that can arise out of a tough physical experience.

Or, one could ask if there are imperfect nonphysical forms?

I consider the physical body, etheric, astral, & ego all to be a conglomeration of the physical self or "wider-reality" of the physical. It's what's beyond physical that is perfect. In other words, even when we're what we normally call "non-physical", we're still imperfect.

(There's some great occult/theosophical literature on the subject of reincarnation and the higher self, like Steiner's "Life Between Death and Rebirth". Free copy: http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/LifeBetween/LifBet_index.html )

[personalreality]

Firstly, you've drawn a line in a place I don't know if you can.

It seems like you're trying to include a sense of "pre-destination" without saying "everything happens for a reason".  Like when you consider the possibility of defects being an environmental issue that went astray from the original "plan" set forth before incarnation.  I feel that this subject is kind of an either or.  Either this life plan was chosen (with possible variation depending on how you respond to life events) or there was no plan and it just is what it is.

Anyway, in the flipper baby, I mean birth defect scenario, it might not be the deformed person that the experience is for.  If before we come into the physical reality we inhabit, we are truly able to provide for others with no ulterior motive, then it's possible that a being chose to come into this reality with a defect for the mother or father.  Perhaps your mom needed to experience that life.  Or what about still births, or babies who die within a year?  Maybe they only needed to experience life in the womb, or maybe the mother just needed to experience pregnancy.

[Xanth]

Now that is certainly a different angle on things. 

Can we come to the Earth not to help ourselves grow, but to assist others in growing.  Can we be here for a reason other than helping ourselves.
Good point, indeed.

The stillborn is also a good point, but it would also go back to my original question...
Was the stillborn a consciousness that only wanted to experience physical life in the woom, OR was there some kind of physical, environmental issue that caused the unexpected end to that consciousnesses physical journey?

Obviously, we'll never have an answer to these questions.   I guess I'm just interested in hearing opinions and thoughts on it.

I do believe that we plan out these physical lives, even in some kind of basic way... a general bullet-point list or something.
And I also do not believe that we need to ever "suffer" in the hopes of "learning" things.
With those two points said, I find it very hard to believe that someone would come here with the desire to suffer in such a fashion.  But that's just MY opinion on it. 

[moondreamer]

I agree with PR.

Also, we may choose to experience a disability just to have that experience....the experience of seeing how others look at those who are different, the experience of pain, the experience of not being able to do what others do. 

And this is just my opinion, but my own understanding of the universe is such that there is no time and space, and therefore, everything is happening at the same time, and therefore all of the limitless possibilities are already known.  I am having trouble wrapping my brain around this concept, but it is what I sense and feel.

Angie

[Stookie]

Have you ever heard of Kaspar Hauser? To keep it short, here's a brief from wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaspar_Hauser

According to this story, he had, for as long as he could think back, spent his life totally alone in a darkened cell about two metres long, one metre wide, and one and a half high, with only a straw bed to sleep on and a horse carved out of wood for a toy.

He claimed that he had found bread and water next to his bed each morning. Periodically the water would taste bitter, and drinking it would cause him to sleep more heavily than usual. On such occasions, when he had awakened, his straw had been changed, and his hair and nails had been cut. Hauser claimed that the first human being with whom he had ever had contact had been a mysterious man who had visited him not long before his release, always taking great care not to reveal his face to him. This man, Hauser said, had taught him to write his name by leading his hand. After having learned to stand and to walk, he had then been brought to Nuremberg. Furthermore, the stranger allegedly had taught him to say the phrase "I want to be a cavalryman, as my father was" (in Bavarian dialect), but Hauser claimed that he had not understood what these words meant.

So anyways, all he could really remember is being raised in a dark room & never having any human contact. The person that brought him food never let him see his face.

Some occultists say that Kaspar was incarnated to become a great man, but some evil people at the time did not like what was in store so they forced him into darkness through the early development of his astral body, which slows in development at adolescence as the ego begins it's growth, keeping it incomplete so he could never attain his greatness in life.

Of course, I have no idea the truth to this part of the story. My point in bringing it up is, there may be a multitude of factors involved in physical life outside of what we understand, including human intervention. If you think about it, we're all vulnerable as children, as we don't have much choice or say in life then.

[EscapeVelocity]

I think it's all the reasons you guys have described.

Michael Newton, using regressive hypnotherapy, has studied hundreds of people and their descriptions of soul and soulgroup interactivity. He's published 2 books,"Journey of Souls" and "Destiny of Souls", both of which I thought were pretty good.

What he basically concludes is that we are all here to learn and develop through various levels of physical/mental/emotional/spiritual experience; we commit to these experiences voluntarily, with advice and encouragement from our teachers/guides/higher aspects; some of these experiences are individual lessons, others are for the soulgroup we are each a part of; each soulgroup is composed of souls that are approximately at the same level and speed of development and spend lifetime after lifetime returning to Earth, like actors in a play, to perform in various roles and relationships for one another, supporting, contrasting or,  even conflicting if needed. I may be his grandfather in this life, and his son in the next. Next time I may be her son who dies of fever at  3 years of age to give her the experience of losing a child and learning to cope with it...in the meantime I may be releasing some "karmic debt" by agreeing to such a short life given to help educate another soul. And so on, apparently.

I dunno, it does make me look around at my family members and close friends (and enemies!)...and wonder.


Best regards to all,
EV

[Capt. Picard]

I dont have much to add, as I dont find much basis for pre-life theories and stuff like reincarnation and karma, I just wanted to thank Stookie for the interesting read. The wiki article also mentions that Kaspar could feel a sensation like wind blowing when magnets were pointed at him, maybe that was due to his overdeveloped astral body or something?