“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

The physical self as you know it is a focus of consciousness that forms a personality in response to that focus. It is very difficult to make analogies here, but I am foolhardy enough to try it. (Pause.) It seems to you that any naturally aborted fetus has no physical life at all, that such life has been denied to it for some reason. Instead, the fetus experiences another level: physical life at a different scale, that in your terms would apply to the distant past.

The soul within the fetus cannot be destroyed by any kind of abortion, for instance. Its progress cannot be charted, for it will always escape such calculations. Its history is in the future, which always creates the past.

I think it very likely that aborted fetuses and those infants who die early in “life” — say within a few months after birth, especially — never intended to stay long within camouflage (physical) reality to begin with; the consciousnesses within those small human structures came just to momentarily sample our world of matter, whether from inside the womb or out of it. Considering their viewpoints, it’s not tragic that they “die” unborn, or at such young ages, although in ordinary terms the parents involved will almost certainly mourn deeply. (Perhaps these notions will be of some limited comfort to those who have written us with related questions.)

[...] Man was acquainted with death, and many children were stillborn, or were naturally aborted. [...] Nature aborts it. [...]

[...] This does not mean that the consciousness of a child was annihilated, for example, if it was naturally aborted. [...]

Many natural abortions are caused when the new personality is having difficulty constructing the new form, projects to others for advice, and is advised not to return.

([Ingrid:] “Seth, isn’t it somewhat of a waste if people have abortions all the time? To me it just seems like a waste to become pregnant when all along, whenever you just thought of becoming pregnant, to have an abortion. [...]

[...] And if the consciousness picks a mother who wants to abort, then the consciousness is only here for a short trip. [...]

[...] Plants will react quite sharply to an abortion. [...]

([Gert:] “Do you condone abortion?”)

[...] If you believe that abortion is evil and have one—it will be an evil. [...]

([Florence:] “What about the life that is aborted?”)

[...] An understanding of these issues can greatly help throw light on the question of early deaths and diseases, and spontaneous abortions.

They may leave the system then (pause), sometimes as aborted infants, but if they grow through childhood the first time, in your terms, then they must work out their development within the system.

[...] She made a few aborted attempts at tears, but they didn’t come. [...]

[...] Ruburt, incidentally, had a natural abortion because the message was already in the body, and all of his worries and concerns were unnecessary. [...]

[...] She had also been aware of the same feeling as she sat quietly just before the session, she now told me; both attempts had been abortive however.

Many abortions, natural ones, are caused when the new personality is having difficulty constructing the new form, projects to others for advice, and is advised not to return. [...]

[...] She did then obviously decide to have a child, abortions or no, for in this case they did not work. [...]

Plants will react quite sharply to an abortion. [...]

[...] They are aborted. [...]

On the part of any human personality, therefore, it is extremely important that methods be learned to let action follow its normal directive bent within the personality, therefore avoiding these abortive offshoots that impede main directives and purposes of the unit as a whole.

[...] Any attempt to so rigorously and precisely express inner reality is bound to be abortive, highly misleading, and in your terms sometimes dangerous; for you do create your own reality and live it according to your inner beliefs. [...]

[...] Questions abound involving amniocentesis (examination of the fluid in the womb to detect genetic defects in the fetus); therapeutic abortion; artificial insemination; reproduction by in vitro fertilization; embryo transfer (surrogate motherhood); the responsibilities of the legal, medical and religious communities; whether mentally retarded, genetically defective people should receive life-prolonging medical treatment, and so forth. [...]

In a natural state, many children would die stillborn for the same reasons, or would be naturally aborted. [...]

(Notes on an abortive projection attempt: I lay down for a nap after supper on Friday evening, January 14. [...]