God does not predestine some to become His chosen ones (elect) while rejecting others. It is His desire that no one should perish. (2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.) However, He does know beforehand (He has foreknowledge) who will come to him and who will reject him, because He is omniscient (all knowing). Nevertheless, God gives all humans “free will” to choose, as they may. We may either chose to believe that Jesus Christ is Lord of all, as the Bible says, or we may reject that idea, and live out our lives here on earth, as best we can, in our own strength. Every human being is composed of a spirit, a soul(mind) and a physical body. Every human soul is alive and possesses the ability to develop self awareness at the moment of conception. It communicates with this natural world through the five senses. It also possesses the ability to communicate with the spirit world. The human spirit, however, though it is the living breath of God, (Genesis 2:7), does not have self-awareness or unique personality at the natural birth. The bible calls it the breath of God and it returns to Him when we die, without confessing Christ as Lord. (Ecc. 12:7) The soul, on the other hand, goes straight to hell, unless we make a confession unto Jesus Christ, between the age of accountability and our natural death. (Mat. 10:28) If our spirit were a self-aware personage, at our natural birth, then Jesus's words to Nicodemus would have made no sense, when He said the following. He said that we must first be born of water (natural birth) and also born of the spirit (John 3:5) to see the Kingdom of God. No where does the bible say that we are automatically born of the spirit at the time of our natural birth. Yes, our spirit is alive, like the egg in the womb, because it is the living breath of God, but it has no will to think, or choose right or wrong, until it is united with the Spirit of the redemptive Christ, becoming the new creature Paul talks about. Many believe we have a twisted or dead spirit at birth, inherited from Adam, but the scriptures do not support that notion. What Jesus told Nicodemus would not line up with what Paul said in 2 Cor. 5:17 if we had received a twisted, sin laden spirit at the natural birth. Many other statements in the bible also do not line up with this idea, but that is much too involved, to cover here.
We become born of the spirit when we make the heart felt decision to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord over everything that is. (Rom. 10:9) This assures us that we shall receive eternal life, instead of residing in hell forever. Jesus explains what his definition of eternal life means in John 17:3. Briefly stated, eternal life is knowing God in a very personal relationship. Obviously, everyone is going to have a certain amount of self-awareness throughout eternity. However, that is not the definition of eternal life found in John 17:3. The time span to be able to take advantage of this gift of eternal life, is commonly referred to as the "age of accountability". During this time period, The Holy Spirit urges us, through our thought life, to repent (of our unbelief), and believe that Jesus Christ is who the bible says He is. (Mark 1:15 And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye and believe the gospel.)
The scriptures do not tell us to repent of a list of sins, because we are not able to understand the scope of our sins at this point. Instead, they tell us to repent of our unbelief. What if repenting of our sins was the prerequisite for receiving eternal life and we missed confessing one sin? The bible says, that anything, which is not of faith is sin. (Rom 14:23) As I have said, it would be impossible to confess the endless list of sins, which we are guilty of committing. The bible makes it very clear that we are only required by God to repent of the unpardonable sin of unbelief in Jesus Christ as Lord of all. It's easy. We simply confess to God from the heart that Jesus is Lord of all, including us. The Holy Spirit urges everyone to do this. Some isolated peoples of the world may respond to The Holy Spirit's urging by addressing Christ, using a different name. For instance, they may call Him The Great White Spirit or The Unknown God. Never mind that. A rose by any other name is still a rose. Semantics or labels do not change the one requirement, for receiving the gift of eternal life. I repeat; the only requirement to receive eternal life is that we confess from the heart that Jesus Christ (by whatever label we give him) is Lord of all. The message to do this can be communicated directly from The Holy Spirit, or through the gospel preached by Holy Spirit inspired believers. Jesus, Himself, personally delivered this message to Saul. (Act 9:5,6) It's a message which is delivered to every person on earth, during the age of accountability. Those unable to reach that age of accountability are covered by God's grace. (1 Corinthians 12:3) Eternal life begins the very second, an unbeliever choses this action. At that instant, we become born of the spirit, which makes us a completely new personage, not in mind or body, but in spirit. When we become born of this new spirit in Christ, we then have the capacity to understand things of the spirit realm, but it takes time to reprogram our mind. This new birth actually makes God our father. (Luke 20:36) (Jesus explains more about what I have briefly described here in a conversion with Nicodemus in John 3:1-17) (Step Two)