Thoughts on Abortion

Eckhart Toole, author of A New Earth, contends that "when the brain gets damaged, it does not mean you lose consciousness. It means consciousness can no longer use that form to enter this dimension."

That made me think of aborted life. The soul of the unborn child is waiting for its body to form in its mother's womb. And when that body is formed in full and all the parts are developed and ready for earth life, the soul slips in and a new life is born. In the body, including the workings of the brain, the soul has a means for mortal expression. If the body is aborted before the full development, the consciousness (as we, in human form, can understand it) of that soul has to wait before it can come to earth. Abortion is human intervention into the path of the soul. It does not end the soul; rather the soul's journey is diverted by human choice. Herein lies the great abortion debate: is it "right" for mere mortal choice to alter the journey of an unknown soul? This choice certainly affects the organic consciousness of all of humanity because all souls are interconnected.

It is not my intention in this article to argue one side or the other of this debate, but to simply present another dimension to thoughts about the soul's existence, both inside and outside of the human body. If consciousness does not have the human form to enter into this dimension, as Toole suggests, it does not necessarily mean that the consciousness itself does not exist. It simply means that it does not exist in a way that the limits of the human mind can recognize. Consider then, the possibility that the unborn soul is expressing it's consciousness in other ways, on other levels, in another realm.

When the soul does eventually come to earth, it will have another name and another set of DNA, and the circumstances of its life will be different from what it would have been if its entry into earth had not been aborted before, but does any of that really matter?

This phenomenon is really just a bigger and more cosmic manifestation of all our decisions in life. We choose schools, academic specialties, careers, jobs, lovers and mates; we choose the foods we eat and all our lifestyle activities and each decision affects the development of our experiences in life. Each choice alters our path and eventually, we become either one kind of person or another based on all those decisions and factors. Some of the things that affect who we become are the result of our own decisions; some however, are the result of decisions that other people make for us, not unlike the power that human choice has over the soul that is not yet active in a human body.

The movie, Sliding Doors, perfectly illustrates how the concept that one small choice, or chance happening, can dramatically alter our path. The movie is two stories shown simultaneously of the main character, starting with her step onto an elevator. In one version, she catches the door and a series of events unfold as a result of who is on that particular elevator ride, who she meets when she steps off the elevator on the ground floor, and so on. The other version follows another set of circumstances because she doesn't catch the door, and therefore, her life takes a different direction.

This happens to us all everyday, we just don't have the ability to see anything other than the results of the choices we do make. The other version of our stories goes silent, undeveloped, "aborted".

I forget which version of the character's story is "better", but perhaps that is because either version leads to the same resolution in her life. Ultimately, we come to a place of peace about our lives. I think the journey of the soul is no different. It only appears to be different because, in human form, we are unable to comprehend the infinite dimensions of the soul.

In Tolle's attempt to explain this, he says that "the brain does not create consciousness, but consciousness created the brain, the most complex physical form on earth, for its expression." How does the consciousness of the aborted life express itself? Perhaps it doesn't. Maybe it remains silent like all the paths we never take. On the other hand, perhaps it does express itself in ways we can not hear or see or sense in any way. Perhaps it is even in us like the invisible toxins in the air, or the subtle brush of a butterfly that lands on our shoulder though we never notice it.