Instant Karma

Sit and think a minute, I bet £1000 you have a friend or acquaintance who has a perfect life. I mean every so often you come across someone who is for example, a straight A student, a perennially popular person, has a wonderfully exciting job, the perfect family, a wealthy husband, travels the world and generally lives a life that most of us would kill for. This person really does seem to be so incredibly lucky at times you have to wonder at the justice of it all. These are people to whom nothing bad or unfortunate has ever ever happened and who's life has always gone according to plan and never deviated. Make you sick don't they?!

Not that I'm jealous, actually such things don't really bother me, but I am slightly amazed that some people have just incredible good fortune. Having said that I bet you also know someone who's life has been one tragedy after another and who has never had that one piece of luck we all need at times. Sadly life doesn't seem very just for some and is more just for others. However I'm a big believer in karma.

The philosophical explanation of karma can differ slightly between traditions, but the general concept is basically the same. Usually it is understood to be a sum of all that an individual has done, is currently doing and will do. The results or "fruits" of actions are called karma-phala. Karma is not about retribution, vengeance, punishment or reward; karma simply deals with what is. The effects of all deeds actively create past, present and future experiences, thus making one responsible for one's own life, and the pain and joy it brings to others. So in a nut shell, I think you can basically say what goes around comes around.

I'm positive that we all have difficult times in our lives, for some it comes early on, and for those people you know who have those charmed lives, well its just a case of seeing it come along in later life, but it pretty much catches us all at some time or other. Ive known people who have trampled over others all their lives, only to find that later life brings a certain reckoning, whilst I know people who have had great struggles in life suddenly find that they get a wonderful opportunity and go and do something fantastic. Life is like that, so there is no point in dwelling too much on things, as it can all change irrevocably in a second for good or for bad. No one has everything forever.