Why are we in the place we are in our life? If you accept the concept of free will, that we can actually make choices in life that actually make a difference to us and to the world, does it follow that we chose our place on earth?

why are we in the place we are in our life? if you accept the concept of free will, that we can actually make choices in life that actually make a difference to us and to the world, does it follow that we chose our place on earth? our society, our social and economic class? our race, ethnicity, or gender?

make a further acception: that reincarnation is a reality, that it makes sense when applied to the question of who we are and what we are becoming. this is another post entirely, i think.

if we reincarnate, if we come back and back and back to this place, does it follow that we choose our life circumstances before we come? in my training at rsc, one child development class indicated that we are concious in that place between births on this planet, that we maintain our freedom and our ability to act. even, that as we begin to make our way back to the earth, that we make the choices that i listed above, and one more: that of our parents.

my wife yesterday raised the question to me: what then does anthroposophy say about those who are born into abusive families? i could honestly say that i didn't know, but that the question had come up in some of my classes. one answer that resonated with me was that as spirits waiting to come to earth we are incredibly optimistic. perhaps someone choosing to be born to someone with those tendencies hopes that through the love they have for their parent, and which they hope their parent will have for them, the abusive cycles can be beaten and overcome.

my wife was shocked. what i said sounded to her like children in those situations chose to go into that situation. and i can see where she was coming from, it does appear, from the answer that i gave, that that is the case. so my question tonight is: is that the case? because the more i think about it, the more it seems that that's really what my answer boils down to in the end.

first of all, i think it's important to point out that the children aren't making the choice to be abused, the parents (or other abusers) are making the choice to abuse. maybe it's a question of semantics, but it's there nonetheless. part of accepting the concept of free will is also accepting that you can't be responsible for the actions of others. from this it follows that some part of what happens to you is not under your control: in fact, it is under the control of the people around you, your society and your place in it, etcetera. these outside influences affect our choices. i'm pretty sure this means that not everything we do is based on a completely free choice. this in no way excuses any of our behavior, on the contrary, the more we are able to overcome these outside influences and make choices that are truly ours, the more human we become. truly, the more we submit to our environment and lack the courage to go against the flow, so to speak, the less human we are.

if not everything in our earth lives is under our control, perhaps not everything in our non-earthly existence is either. perhaps it isn't a cut-and-dry choice of who we choose for our parents. i know one individual who claims to have known that there was a child waiting for her to conceive so that it could incarnate into a body, but she refused it. what happens to that spirit? i would assume it has to make due somewhere else. perhaps there are many such factors that enter in to our choice of a life on this planet. maybe an abusive family is all some children are able to find.

then again, this entire discussion is based on the premise that a spirit can see into the future and know what their life will be like on the earth. i don't really see any reason to believe that that is true. maybe at best they can know the people they are choosing to be their parents; maybe they even know they have violent tendencies or short tempers. but it's not true that every person with a short temper abuses their children. and i know from personal experience that some who were abused are able to break that cycle and not abuse their children. maybe their optimism is well-founded in certain individuals.

maybe the desire to live and do and be on the earth is strong enough to overcome the fear of abuse, or poor living condition in general, for that matter. after all, what are we to say of the millions and billions who have chosen to come, knowing probably better than those who are born into abuse, that they will face war and starvation and calamity and ignorance? what if a spirit just feels that it's worth it?

which isn't to say that i write off abuse victims, or victims of any social or economic or political injustice, as having chosen their own fate. even if they have, it is incumbent on me as a free being to do everything i can to help those in need. i take real issue with people who claim that karma or choice or whatever has decreed certain circumstances for certain people to live in, and we ought to do nothing to help them. on the contrary, perhaps our karma, and certainly our choice, leads us into situations where we can help those less (or more) fortunate than ourselves. we have opportunities every day to aid our fellow beings. ought we not take the chance that this is a chance to improve our karma, at the very least? and if we're bigger than that, shouldn't we help others just because we can? just because it's the right thing to do? perhaps there are instances in which we can do nothing, or what we can do would cause more suffering for us than it would relieve on the part of another. but shouldn't we do what we can?

more later