Cosmic Cradle: pre-birth memories

The interesting thing about this book, is that it describes evidence that relates quite closely to the reported by Michael Newton:

https://www.newtoninstitute.org/publicat...the-souls/

It's significance is that it at least answers at some level what reincarnation is about. it Also ties in to certain Eastern beliefs, and of course to the evidence for reincarnation unearthed by Professor Ian Stevenson and others.

Any moral reason for people's lives is going to hit the difficult problems, such as the ones Nbtruthman describes.

I am just not sure those questions invalidate this sort of enquiry - particularly since such research seems to be quite productive.

His detailed memory of his conception was validated by his parents (e.g. his baby sister in the back seat with her arms up with her feet toward the driver side, while the parents were making love in the front seat, stopped on a country road). (p. 73)

That case is followed by that of Lania, who had an extremely abusive mother, and who punished her for having clairvoyant gifts. She says she picked her mother in order to go "through hell", that she needed to "transcend her abuse" and had "come into this life to resolve certain issues and move forward" (p. 77). With this perspective, even though she compares her mother to Hitler, she loves her, and she had a dream in her thirties, after a car accident, when her mother had died 7 years earlier, in which her mother appeared as a radiant being and told her they had set this up in the after(pre)life.

I was struck by a phrase she says about that dream: "Human experience has nothing to do with what is 'real'." (p. 78)

Both of these cases seem to indicate bizarre to negative parenting?

I guess that doesn't necessarily make them false, though I'd be curious about the evidential record of these pre-birth memories...I guess they are generally verified by parents? I am still not sure what to make of the at times contradictory or at least alternative afterlife and pre-life realms that we get from all these accounts.

Just going off what's being discussed in this thread so far, to me it could also be a case of us simply being too human to understand the motivations of people who pass on. To me, a lot of who we are as people is confined to the environment we find ourselves in, the bodies we live in. If that's suddenly removed and we've gone off to some ethereal place, who is to say that we will think the same way about the horribleness of severe autism? It certainly has disturbing implications, but that might just be the way things are.

I think even in this life things like wealth and health will make a difference in what use you get out of this world...entirely possible there are varied areas on the "other side" that might influence what value you get out of incarnating into this world.

Just going off what's being discussed in this thread so far, to me it could also be a case of us simply being too human to understand the motivations of people who pass on. To me, a lot of who we are as people is confined to the environment we find ourselves in, the bodies we live in. If that's suddenly removed and we've gone off to some ethereal place, who is to say that we will think the same way about the horribleness of severe autism? It certainly has disturbing implications, but that might just be the way things are.

The trouble is, any analogy I can think of in which the basic persona of the person remains after physical death, would imply that something like selective amnesia automatically occurs in this process. But why selective amnesia, other than for the system to delude the just arrived soul that a next physical life is desireable, rather than what it really may be in the worst cases, another visit to a terrible prison rife with unimaginable (from the afterlife standpoint) suffering. 

The human Earth analogy of such worst cases would be a prisoner just released into normal society from a supermax prison staffed with brutal and sadistic guards in which he had spent many years of suffering. 

Would this former prisoner then sit down and start reviewing all the possible and desirable due to unique learning opportunities prison life plans, that he could choose in order to get back into that terrible place? I don't think so. In fact it is a ridiculous supposition. One way this supposition could make sense is that the released prisoner automatically has his memories of prison totally wiped out with the exception of whatever snippets of experience in prison that could be termed as positive. Otherwise, the released prisoner would very likely vow that he would rather disappear into nothingness than to endure another such episode.

The only other scenario making any sense to me that I can think of at this moment anyway is that on release from the supermax prison the released prisoner's basic persona automatically assumes the identity of a much more advanced being that though it has the full memories of the brutal prison experience (and all prior ones also), these memories are at one remove from being personal memories - they are more like information in a store that can be retrieved at will - not intimately personal memories of personal experiences. In such a state of consciousness this higher being can review the past experiences objectively and rationally and make choices of the next prison life.

Then, of course, the question emerges, in what sense is this higher spiritual being really the human former Earth prisoner?

Then, of course, the question emerges, in what sense is this higher spiritual being really the human former Earth prisoner?

Yeah it does seem who we are now would have to be rather different from who we are when we die...which seems to go against at least some of what we find from reincarnation and mediumship...if not some NDEs.

I'll admit I think a lot of this "suffering was planned" stuff feels more like either a way to comfort one's self for suffering endured or a means of justifying suffering of others. That is definitely a certain bias given I am more ready to believe a father reincarnates as a son to keep his promise to stay by his daughter's side in this life...I guess to me that seems to suggest more capacity for meaning and virtue than if this life is just a very realistic video game...

There is a phenomenon called Hyperlexia, is which very young children (e.g. aged about 2) show a precocious ability to read. This is interesting, because a child must obtain the relevant information for his/her language from somewhere. I wonder if this is related to the phenomenon of remembering previous lives.

A very interesting new article on pre-birth memories, especially the between lives life-choice variety, in the latest issue of Edge Science, Society of Scientific Exploration's magazine, issue #51 December 2022, at https://www.scientificexploration.org/ed...e-issue-51 . (web address edited)

From Andy Hilton, Pre-Birth Memories, pgs. 8-13:

"A full NDE commonly involves a desire to stay in the otherly realm and not return to Earth that is not permitted, although individuals sometimes feel a pull and choose to return (and occasionally can choose not to, as mentioned). Similarly, pre-birth memories (PBMs) may also involve a positive desire to incarnate while other individuals want not to. This is reminiscent of the response to Kardec’s (1875, p. 73) Question 184, “In passing from one world to another.... Has the spirit the choice of
the new world...to inhabit?” which begins “Not always, but [they] can make this demand, and it may be granted.”

There is a parallel here between NDE and PBM in terms of choice; issues around freewill and its limits are features
of both. PBM choosing (and its limitations) may include selecting aspects of one’s character and appearance, parents, and families, in addition to the tasks and challenges (life purpose), with key decision points previewed in a life tree graph of probable futures. These choices are made with the guidance of nebulous, authoritative individuals, such as light beings, guides, and angels, perhaps in an empty space or ethereal realm. For the incarnation, a distant light is the target. There is a sense of the time to go being due and then the entry itself, which is fast and sudden. In this full narrative, there are often only one or two memories from the womb and after birth; the numinosity is paramount. Thus, people with a full PBM tend to have a certain awareness of their spiritual Self, they come in already enlightened, as it were. When the recollection is (re)gained later in life, that is the enlightenment experience, just as a full NDE is an enlightenment. Another parallel: in physical death, it is observed that the spirit may leave the body some time before the shutdown of biological systems, while in birth, entry may occur after biological (sperm-ovum) fertilization.

.........................................

...mediumistic reports on pre-birth planning have progressed from Kardec with Robert Schwartz’s Soul trilogy, which follows a similar methodology. Schwartz’s work further develops PBM, suggesting that our life-plans default to love (we pass “God’s test” by taking the most loving option for any decision), suffering cultivates the “divine virtues,” and soul-families co-plan, taking into consideration things like parallel selves and interdimensional parenting (Wisdom from North, 2017).

The metaphysical mechanisms of this model are those of spiritual law, involving karma and a teleological evolution in which more difficult life-tasks offer greater developmental potential on the path toward universal self-realization. The long-established phenomenology of heavenly realms, a hierarchy of beings, and the primacy of love and light are all maintained, as well as God or Source, of which we are individualizing expressions. Impelled to testify, many people are uploading their PBM stories nowadays, and several social media and website spaces have sprung up dedicated or oriented to PBM—such as Jeff and Jody Long’s (1998–2000) research/testimonial site and community group. Some accounts share interesting details—for example, of a “pool” or “basic technology” in the preparatory “entry room” (used as an immersion for incarnation practice)—while others feature supernormal and paranatural experiences in subsequent earthly life, which may be wonderous or difficult (e.g., A People Experiencer, 2013a, 2013b; Pre-Birth Memories, 2020; DivineInside, 2021)."

One observation concerning this article is that with only a couple of exceptions neither the author, or any of the writers and investigators mentioned, are mentioned to have had any reservations over the metaphysical implications of these stories. This is particularly with regard to the objections and reservations I have expressed, based on the difficulty in imagining the actual human individual personality in the pre-birth state (as opposed to some other entirely different spiritual entity) ever making the choices that obviously must be being made to undergo next physical lives of very great, even overwhelming, suffering. None of the writers and researchers seem to have thought of this objection, unless they quickly suppress it as being too uncomfortable a question.

[Ninshub]

I guess that doesn't necessarily make them false, though I'd be curious about the evidential record of these pre-birth memories...I guess they are generally verified by parents?

Sorry for being late to respond to this thread, I had family visits in the past week.

As I'm reading the book, several (most?) are verified by the parents, sometimes including actions that occur before the conception, e.g. "memories" (from the soul's perspective before it incarnated and was watching the future parents) of what the future parents parents were doing, how they were dressed, etc., on a particular occasion, like when they got together on the first date. I haven't run into any where the memories related to the parents contradicted their experience.

There's several cases where the parents just can't believe what the child first says about having lived before, or chosen them, etc., until at a certain point in time they relate something extraordinarily specific that leaves the parents speechless.

For me, another "evidential" aspect of these pre-birth memories, that gives them weight, is that the pattern or general facts don't generally contradict each other. They pretty much all involve souls choosing parents. There's also lot of memories of the soul approaching the Earth sort of like using Google Earth.

It's very frequent also that the child or adult that remembers being in the womb remembers it as being extremely difficult or unhappy, part of it being suddenly losing connection to the light or a sense of connected bliss, and another having the veil imposed on your previous memories (which is the experience Christian Sundberg recounts also, so that he made the fetus abort one time, and recounts there being "veiled experience simulators"* to help the non-incarnates prepare for the experience).

The authors cite parallels to NDEs in terms of that "reluctance to exit the bliss" (as well as in some cases pre-life reviews paralleling the life reviews in NDEs).

At one point the book also brings in certain cases by Stevenson and Tucker that also involved pre-birth memories. I never read the book about James Leininger so I didn't know the case involved pre-birth memories as well. The boy told his parents he had "found them in Hawaii", describing in detail their celebrating their 5th wedding anniversary at a big pink hotel on the beach eating dinner at night (1997), which the parents had never told them. James was conceived five weeks later (1998).


---
*Here's one place Sundberg recounts the womb experience and the simulators.
Starts at around 8:50.

A very interesting new article on pre-birth memories, especially the between lives life-choice variety, in the latest issue of Edge Science, Society of Scientific Exploration's magazine, issue #51 December 2022, at https://scientificexploration.s3.amazona...xdfybE8%3D .

From Andy Hilton, Pre-Birth Memories, pgs. 8-13:


One observation concerning this article is that with only a couple of exceptions neither the author, or any of the writers and investigators mentioned, are mentioned to have had any reservations over the metaphysical implications of these stories. This is particularly with regard to the objections and reservations I have expressed, based on the difficulty in imagining the actual human individual personality in the pre-birth state (as opposed to some other entirely different spiritual entity) ever making the choices that obviously must be being made to undergo next physical lives of very great, even overwhelming, suffering. None of the writers and researchers seem to have thought of this objection, unless they quickly suppress it as being too uncomfortable a question.

I'm not sure we should make that sort of deduction for at least four reasons:

1)        We really need to avoid rejecting evidence because it is uncomfortable.

2)        Think of mercenary soldiers that engage in war as a way to earn money and as something that is exciting! Is it necessary to point out that soldiers may have to endure an excruciating slow death, and they know in advance that this is possible.

3)        Some people will also endure appalling burdens because they feel they have a duty to do so.

4)        Many more people are willing to risk injuries up to and including death for much more trivial reasons - a quick drug thrill, a teenage dare, climbing a mountain because it is there, dangerous sports, etc etc.

All of us here (I'd guess) are so far removed from such a mindset that we can't conceive e that it motivates many people (particularly men) - but it does.

Thanks for the link, because I get the increasing feeling that at some level these stories are leading us in the right direction.

Unfortunately your link to the scientific exploration article doesn't work for me.

[Ninshub]

For me, another "evidential" aspect of these pre-birth memories, that gives them weight, is that the pattern or general facts don't generally contradict each other.

Just went through this video by a PBMer, and he makes the same point at the beginning and the end. That these experiences/memories are very specific and detailed and yet usually follow a general common pattern. He plans to write a book on the topic.



In his case, he remembered around 8 or 10, after vaguer impressions when he was younger. His memories don't involve choosing parents, but are pretty detailed about waiting in a queue with guides, seeing the Earth, and the fear he experienced. He did not want to come and had to be coaxed into it through the compromise that he would be able to retain pre-birth memories. (I've heard that before, and there are some cases in the Cosmic Cradle book that have people who were "forced" into it, although they seem to be a minority.)

He's very rational and scientifically-minded, so it's an interesting video. He goes on about the energies perceived on Earth and different type of vision involved in the non-incarnates.

This other video is a shorter one which does involve the person choosing his parents (he comes down to Earth or near and chooses among some he sees). He also details the physically painful experience of being birthed.