It's about time that human beings stopped asking the question, "When am I going to die?" They should instead imagine themselves asking, "When will I be born?"
After having lived a certain number of years enjoying the pleasures of life and suffering its tragedies, we must ask ourselves: "Had I known that these things would happen to me while I was still an embryo, would I have chosen to be born?"
Imagine pondering this question as you splashed and kicked in the warm liquid that surrounded you in your mother's womb. The darkness wasn't frightening; it enveloped you in comfort and security.
You knew you couldn't remain in this state. A decision loomed before you, to be born or to face oblivion. Your parents, bless them, placed you in this peculiar predicament by falling in love and marrying. They created the very circumstances that led to your dilemma.
You didn't want to choose death, but what was in store for you in life?
Imagine, for a moment, that God decided to show you all the events that would take place in your life. Every single event was laid out in front of you as you lay in your mother's womb.
After each picture, you asked yourself, "Should I go there and experience that?" Or should I refuse and die or wither away and make this an unborn child?
Imagine that you knew what would happen; you couldn't deny it. You wouldn't be able to say, "I didn't have a choice; I was born against my will" I knew the horror and the pleasure that would be my life, my world, the world I would choose to live in.
Choose to think that you had the choice. Think that you can't say, as everybody says, "I didn't have a choice" Think to yourself ", I had a choice".
I imagined this. I don't know about others. I speak only for myself. I imagined that I could choose.
In front of me lay a turmoil of teachers, rugby fields, cricket fields, friends, and enemies who would punish me, who would chase after me and want to beat me, and I would be running away from them. Everything was there. I saw myself going over the sea to Israel, the land of my ancestors.
Everything stood there in front of me. The difficulties, the failures at school, the shortcomings in work. Everything was laid out in front of me.
It was a difficult path, full of rocks, mountains, trees, and cliffs, down which I would tumble and have to pick myself up again. And I made the choice.
I said, "Yes, this is what I want. That is the world I'm going into." I could have said, "No," "No," "No."
I don't want that world, I said. Can't I return to wherever I came from and wait until another better world presents itself? There are things I'd like to leave out and others that I'd like to add to make a more attractive and comfortable world.
But that wasn't the choice. The choice was this or no world.
I said yes, not wanting to waste any more time.
I wanted to be there and see what was going on in this world. I knew what was going to happen, and I knew how difficult it would be.
I knew the frustrations. I knew the happiness. I knew the sadness.
And I said, well, give it to me. Give it to me. The same way as a convicted criminal says to the executioner, give it to me.
Lay the chopper on my neck. Hang me from that pole. Give it to me.
Beat me. Do whatever you have to do. I will see what it's like.
Let me have the experience. I'm forever on the lookout for new experiences. I always try to imagine, for example, what it will be like to suffer.
I want to experience joy. Seeing the future is one thing, but experiencing it is different. I wanted the experience.
Experiencing all those horrible or pleasant things is another thing. We can't compare the two.
The first is reality. The other one is imagination. And I had imagination.
Before I was born, I had an imagination. Imagination showed me the difficulties in the world ahead, and I was not satisfied living in an imaginary world.
I lived in the real world to see what it's like. And it is horrible. I can tell you now, after having experienced all those things, can I advise other people on their way to being born, not to get born? What should I do? I am duty-bound to warn them about what awaits them.
That is why I'm writing this story. The path that you, who are waiting to be born, must follow is challenging. Some people will have some help in proceeding through the suffering that the world has to offer.
They will be born into wealth and aristocracy, which may help them. But I see all kinds of other things that will disadvantage them.
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