Continuing from the karma of love, part one, this next installment will include some practical ideas on how to change your karma. But first, let's look into why you are in the position you are now in -- that mainly being that you lack that special someone in your life, and you want to change that. The method that is suggested here to fulfill that need may or may not have an immediate effect, but it will have an effect. A good place to start when endeavoring to change your luck in an area of need is to first take responsibility for how things are. This takes courage and willpower, but it is also empowering. Most importantly, this is an important step if you really want to change the pattern you currently live in. A way to do it is to try to remember your obvious mistakes of the past, and regardless of the details and who may or may not be more responsible for failed relationships, assume the results are in good part your own doing.
To help understand your own karma, let's start with my favorite teaching parable about of how karma operates. Once in India there was a holy man, a man devoted to God. He was a renunciate who gave up ownership of all material possessions in order to facilitate his pursuit of total devotion to God. This lifestyle meant he wandered from town to town having to find place to spend his nights and to beg for food. He came to a town and went to a temple to perform his favorite practice, which was chanting God's name. His chanting was of such fervor that many peeked in the temple to see who it was. A woman who lived in the village was so impressed with his devotion that she invited him to have dinner with her and her husband. When she invited him to have dinner with them, as opposed to just taking some food, he refused. This is typical, as renunciants like to stay in recluse. However, she was very adamant, and eventually he gave in to her request.
Later, the three had dinner, and it was quite pleasant. After eating, the couple had many questions, which led to an involved spiritual discussion. When this was over, they realized just how late it had gotten. The couple insisted the holy man sleep in their house, and he agreed. That night he slept on their porch while they slept inside. The wife was very impressed with the holy man's devotion to God and wanted serve him in some way. She couldn't sleep, so she came down and asked her guest if she could massage his feet. When she touched his feet, everything changed. He pulled away from her, but she was bitten by a strong desire for this man. He saw this in her and tried to diffuse the situation by telling her that he never allowed married women to touch his feet. With this, she became desperate and her desire was so intense that her mind snapped. She then went to her bedroom and murdered her husband. She came downstairs and told the holy man what she had done and now that she was not married his rule no longer applied. The holy man was shocked. He told her that what she did was stupid and that he needed to leave now. Her response was to start screaming. Soon, some neighbors came to her house and asked what was going on. She said the holy man they allowed to spend the night on their porch tried to rape her, and when her husband tried to stop it, the visitor murdered him.
The villagers then beat him up and tied him up. The next day, he was taken to the village wise men. The wise men were very familiar with the holy man, as he had come to their village regularly. They knew him to be a genuine holy man and thought perhaps this episode with the woman was an aberration. So instead of having him killed, they had his arms cut off at the elbow. This whole event had a curious affect on the holy man. He did not react in anger, even though he was innocent. Instead, he thought this must have something to do with his karma. This gave him a resolve to be even more fervent in his devotion to God then before. His prayers and his chanting became even more intense.
After a period of performing his practices with more intensity than before, his spiritual evolution was accelerated. Because of this, during his sleep, his deity came to him in a dream. The deity told him that he was very pleased with his efforts and that he would grant him a boon or a wish. The holy man asked if he would please explain why he lost his forearms. The deity smiled and touched his forehead. Then the holy man went into a deep trance. In the trance he recalled an event in a past life. The holy man was in a river performing an auspicious practice when a cow ran by him, and later a butcher followed. The butcher asked the man which way his cow had gone as it had run away from him. The butcher also said that he had to tell him the truth or he would be committing a sin.
The holy man wanted to do the right thing, so he reluctantly with his arm pointed the butcher in the direction the cow had run. While watching this past event the holy man now realized he had not been under any moral obligation to help the butcher find his cow. He also understood that the cow was reincarnated as the woman who lied about him attempting to rape her, and that her husband was the butcher. The husband was killed because he committed the sin of killing a sacred cow and the holy man lost his arms because he aided in that killing by pointing in the direction the cow had gone.
Karma is complicated and mysterious, to the point we rarely understand exactly what we have done to be in difficult situations that occur in our lives. The next installment of the karma of love will show a method to possibly break through this veil of mystery. For now, here is a relatively easy way to relieve yourself of some of your karmic debt. The way is to feed others, especially loved ones and acquaintances. The more feeling you have for a person and the more you genuinely help them, the more good karma you create for yourself. This action is a high calling that creates very good karma. Sustaining, which includes feeding humanity, is one of the important functions God is responsible for. When a hungry person eats a satisfying meal and you provided it, this pleases God, and that's good karma for you. Its their feeling of satisfaction that creates the good karma. Their satisfaction was a need fulfilled by your actions. This endeavor takes some time, effort and money, but its a relatively easy way to build up the positive side of your karmic ledger.
There is more to be shared on this subject in future posts as well as more thoughts about this and other topics found at www.karmapoliticspop.com.