The above title only makes sense when the term Karma is misunderstood to mean Fate. Something from which you cannot escape. For a long time I have observed that many people use certain terms such as the term Karma without a full understanding of what the word actually means.
According to the late Alan Watts, when Hindus and Buddhists use the word Karma they are using it as meaning action, from the Sanskrit root meaning to do. Watts offers a meaning of Karma as being that “this arises” “that becomes.” He notes that due to certain seldom unexamined assumptions prevalent in “Western Thought.” Western interpretations take it as meaning a law of Cause and Effect or Cosmic retribution.
Watts notes that in a fuller explanation in Buddhist philosophy there is a concept of the interdependent origination of all the forms and phases of life. Thus, what you do and what is happening to you and to every other person or thing is inseparable.
In one form of viewing Karma it is seen as a chain, often equated to bondage. Simplistic interpretations see it as “Good” Karma and “Bad” which then equates to the idea that if you do good things then good things happen to you and if you do bad things then bad things happen to you.
Watts adds .”Now, you may say, ‘I did not mean to do that.’ One school of thought will explain events by saying, ‘You did something in a former life, or at a former time, that is now having this consequence.’ However, that is a very superficial understanding of karma. You do not need to believe in reincarnation to understand karma …
With one aspect you are doing what you call the environment and with the other aspect you are doing what you call the organism, this living body. Since you cannot possibly conceive of the existence of a living body with no environment, there is the clue that the two are basically one. As with the two poles of a magnet, north is quite different from south, and yet they are both part of one magnet.
In precisely the same way, you are both what you do and what happens to you. You have a little game in which you play that you are not responsible for what happens to you, you are only responsible for what you do. (emphasis mine) … Basically it comes down to the fact that you are responsible for everything …
The place in life where you are is where you have put yourself. Just as on the surface of the sphere every point may be regarded as the center of the surface, so every place may be regarded as the true place.
Everyone is in their true place.
In whatever language you say it, everybody is a manifestation of the divine, playing this game … Your not knowing it, if you do not know it, is part of the game … ” ~Alan Watts…
This Wednesdays evening at 7:00 pm we will look at practical ways to make your life work better for you.
