A:

Some people speculate that we as human beings had the ability to choose when, or even if to be born, or even to choose our parents. We are somehow supposed to be able to do this while we are as yet not even physically conceived by our parents.

I can understand this desire to be somehow included in the factors that make up our own existence. I have wondered things like this, too.  It is difficult to imagine a time when we did not exist; but the teachings of The Urantia Book tell us that this life we are now living is our first life. 

39:4.13 To the inhabited worlds the quickeners of morality portray mortal life as an unbroken chain of many links. Your short sojourn on Urantia, on this sphere of mortal infancy, is only a single link, the very first in the long chain that is to stretch across universes and through the eternal ages. It is not so much what you learn in this first life; it is the experience of living this life that is important. (bolding is mine)  

To imagine that we somehow had a say in when we are born assumes that we must have had a conscious existence before this one. It implies that we must have had a conscious personality that could make such choices as time and place of our birth, our parentage, etc. But we know from the teachings that personality is a gift from the Father and “it is associated only with living energy systems.” I think it’s safe to say that before this life, we were not living as differentiated personalities, nor able to choose such things.

It is tempting to think, after looking back on our life…the things we have experienced, the lessons we have had to learn, the people and relationships we have had…it’s tempting to think that these things are so personally meaningful that we must have had something to do with planning our own existence. Our own spiritual growth is one such mystery to me, and maybe to you, too. Would it be different had I been born at a different time? But I do think that this is purely enjoyable speculation.  

In the end, I believe that all successful spiritual growth leads to the same place: Consciousness of God and acceptance of sonship with him in the family of God and the kingdom of heaven. And this kind of growth is available to anyone, anywhere, and at any time. We may not have chosen when to be born, but having been born, we do have all the choices about the direction our lives will take. 

Thanks again for this interesting note. Please feel free to write again!