Quite often it’s hard to understand why bad things happen to good people. Have you ever tried to justify a bad accident that leaves someone paralyzed for life? Or have you been guilty of judging a loved one who has embraced a life of drug or alcohol addiction? What about when you lose someone close to you — particularly a child — and it just seems so darn unfair?
            These questions are the premise of Robert Schwartz’s book, Courageous Souls, in which he interviews a number of individuals who share their stories and allow their souls to be read by various psychics and mediums, who are able to extract information from the “other side” as to why they chose the life experiences they did.
            I remember an instance in my teen-age years when a neighbor woman’s husband died, and then a year or two later her daughter suffered with the fatal disease leukemia. A Catholic friend disclosed to me, “She’s being punished.” I didn’t buy it then, and I don’t buy it now.
            In Courageous Souls, Schwartz stresses that we are mistaken when we consider ourselves victims of the universe and blame others for the “bad” things that happen to us. He suggests that many of the events in our lives were pre-planned, along with the cooperation of other souls who agree to help us, before our birth. In collaboration with four chosen psychics who showed extraordinary abilities in mediumship and channeling, he interviewed people who replied to messages he posted on the Internet who were willing to talk about their challenges in a metaphysical context.
            After each interview of a courageous soul, Schwartz follows with one or more sessions with the mediums, who explain what went on at the pre-birth planning session, through spirit guides or the person’s higher self.
The book makes interesting reading, starting with two cases of physical illness, including a homosexual man with AIDs. It also includes the story of a parent with handicapped children, persons who suffer with lifetime deafness and blindness, and a woman whose son died from an overdose of drugs. A man talks about his alcoholism. A woman who suffered the loss of a child, and then the man she was engaged to, has insights that are enlightening and hopeful.
            Not everything is predestined, however. In one case in the book, things went wrong for the soul in the beginning and he had to either “bow out” or change the course ahead of him. I found that to be most intriguing, and was happy to see that free will still overrules every situation.
To me, the most profound examples in the book were the two people at the end of the book who had pre-arranged major accidents that completely changed the courses of their lives.
            Why would anyone want to experience such devastating events in their life? From a metaphysical standpoint, there is a very good answer. But it takes a lot of soul searching and cutting through our stubborn mindsets to grasp the understanding and to come to a point where we can accept this idea.
            I found I had trouble absorbing some of the ideas at first. By the end of the book, I was convinced, however, that these individuals were indeed courageous souls, and it has given me a whole new perspective on people around me, especially those in my life who have chosen certain lifestyles that society frowns upon, or who are alcoholics. I realize I was wrong to look at such people and label them, in my mind, as the “dregs of society.” They may very well be more highly evolved than some so-called spiritual leaders!
            Forgiveness, compassion and gratitude are the key elements here. You’ll have a better understanding of soul growth by reading this courageous book.

            Ann Ulrich Miller is editor and publisher of The Star Beacon.