C H A P T E R 29 §
Karma Management
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A Step-by-Step Guide to Help You Effectively Deal with Your Karma§
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B Y S A T G U R U B O D H I N A T H A V E Y L A N S WA M I
HE CONCEPT OF KARMA HAS SPREAD BEYOND THE CONFINES OF THE ASIAN RELIGIONS that conceived it to become a core concept of today’s yoga and New Age movements. It is now mentioned regularly on American mainstream television programs and in the movies. Last year in discussing the concept with a junior college class in Hawaii, a student expressed contemporary culture’s astute definition of karma as “What goes around comes around.” Unfortunately, most individuals’ understanding of karma is at best limited to thinking about it as an abstract principle without applying it to their own life. This is equivalent to a student’s learning and understanding all the laws of nutrition, being able to get an “A” on any test on the subject, but following a personal diet of junk food three times a day. What he learned is not influencing how he lives. The study of karma is effectively approached in a three-step process: 1) dispelling common misconceptions about karma; 2) acquiring a correct intellectual understanding of karma’s key concepts; 3) managing your own karma by utilizing the correct understanding of karma to refine your actions and reactions in life. §
Two Misconceptions
You have no doubt heard the most common false concept about karma on a number of occasions. It goes something like this: “Nothing but bad things happen to me. It’s my karma, and even when I strive to do better, my striving has no effect upon it. So why should I even try to make my life amount to anything? It’s truly hopeless.”§
This misconception must be rejected for two important reasons. The first is that you can actually change your karma through the principles of effective karma management. The second is that how you live in this life creates the karma you will face in your future lives. So, why not consciously use the law of karma to create a future that is filled with pleasant experiences rather than painful ones?§
A second common false concept about karma, which you have probably also heard, goes like this: “My life is in a state of chaos. Everything is going wrong, and it all started three months ago when Saturn entered Taurus and my karma changed. I have been advised that if I can successfully appease Saturn through having a priest do regular Sani puja, my problems will go away. Therefore, that has become the entire focus of my religious life at this time.” The fallacy of this attitude is that, yes, karmic difficulties indicated by your astrology can be mitigated, but not simply by paying a priest to do Sani puja. If that is all you are doing to work with your situation, that’s not enough. In working through the trying times of life, your primary powers are willpower, devotion and understanding. Such karma can be mitigated through specific actions performed by the individual, such as those outlined below, but not merely by giving over such duties to others. §
A second reason this misconception must be rejected is that it attributes the cause of our problems to the planet Saturn rather than to our own actions in the past. It is like pleading with the jailer to release you from your cell simply because being incarcerated is an unpleasant experience, having forgotten about the crime you committed that put you in prison in the first place. Planets don’t determine your karma, and neither do the actions of others. It is self-created, and you are the source of it all—good, bad and mixed. §