No, despite what the title “Relative Karma” may suggest, this is not about our karma with family members (although it might). It’s about the relativity of karma as it plays out in our worldly affairs and the mysteries of its nuances and subtleties.
But first: the next monthly Bhagavad Gita discussion for paid subscribers is this coming Tuesday, August 18, 7:30-9:00 pm, Eastern. We’ll conclude Chapter 6 and move on to the very juicy Chapter 7. More beyond the paywall below.
So my wife and I were at an outdoor concert and, as the music was building to a climax, the skies decided to do the same. We heard thunder, saw flashes of lightning and felt some raindrops. We held off for a while hoping the music would beat the storm to the wire, but we ended up—along with hundreds of others—hastily gathering our stuff and dashing to the parking lot. The night ride home on a country road was treacherous, with fallen branches, difficult visibility, and strong winds. At first opportunity, we headed for a wider, better-lit, well-traveled road. Within minutes, however, we were waved onto a detour by police officers. Turns out a tree had fallen onto the road. The rest of the journey was as treacherous as the opening segment.
When we got home, greatly relieved, we lamented not leaving the concert when we first had the hunch to do so. Then we realized something: Had we left earlier, the tree might have fallen on our vehicle, not the road. Or another driver may have swerved to avoid the tree and crashed into us. Or … well, you can imagine the deadly scenarios.
The point being: When something undesirable happens we tend to ask, “What did I do to deserve this? How did I create the bad karma that led to this sorry state of affairs?” We rarely think, “What good karma I have to have avoided a far worse outcome!” Even the concept of karma is not in our vocabulary, we second-guess, we lament, we regret, we curse the fates, and rarely consider how much worse it could have been or how fortunate we are to have factors in our lives that mitigate the pain, whether caring loved ones, financial resources, skills, insurance policies, good neighbors who come to our aid, etc.
Great storytellers know this, whether or not they think in terms of karma, and whether they frame their tales in spiritual or secular terms. Here’s an example from the Western tradition, as I describe it in Karmic Relief.
Take, for instance, a Talmudic story that was retold in The Once and Future King, T.H. White’s novelization of the King Arthur tales. In it, the prophet Elijah returns to earth and embarks on a journey. He and his companion come to the home of a poor couple with meager possessions. The woman and man welcome the strangers, feed them milk and butter from their one cow, and insist that their guests sleep in their bed while the couple hunkers down on the floor.
Elijah and his companion awaken to the sound of weeping. The family’s cow had died overnight, leaving them even more impoverished.
The travelers spend the next night in a lavish home whose owner treats them with contempt. He feeds them only water and stale bread, and has them sleep in a barn with the cows. In the morning, Elijah notices that a wall is collapsing and pays a mason to fix it.
The prophet’s companion, a learned rabbi, is perplexed. He asks Elijah why the kind, humble couple had to lose their cow while the detestable rich man got to have his wall repaired. Elijah explains that the poor man’s wife had been destined to die that night, but because of their kindness God took the cow instead. As for the wall, behind it was a treasure chest the owner didn’t know about, and now, because of his heartlessness, he never will.
I’m not suggesting we assume a panglossian attitude of naïvely sugarcoating life’s cruelties (per Dr. Pangloss in Voltaire’s satire, Candide). It’s an argument for a balanced, realistic perspective and a recognition that karma—or your choice of mysterious forces at work in the world—is always a blend of what we experience as good and bad, pleasant and unpleasant, desirable and undesirable, and its nuanced complexity renders the exact calculus beyond the capacity of our little minds. In the final analysis, as Candide says at the end of Voltaire’s story, we just have to “cultivate our garden” without excessive philosophizing or rumination.
Funny thing about karma: it comes to us from the past and it points to the future, but it always takes place in the present, where we have control of what we think, say, and do. When a karmic package arrives at our doorstep, we have to deal with it as is, here and now, hopefully with skill and wisdom. The choices we make not only create our karmic future they can also mitigate the impact of past karma, just like earning more money can take the sting out of writing a check when a loan comes due, or good behavior can earn a convicted criminal an early parole or clemency.
In the commotion of that dark and stormy night in the concert parking lot, as I fumbled with my umbrella, the car key flew from my hand. Bad karma! It landed in the beam of a parked car’s headlights. Good karma!