Karma and Tasting Our Consequences

There’s probably no person on this planet who doesn’t understand at least a little about karma. We all know that when a jerk cuts you off in traffic he’s got some reallll bad karma headed his way, right?

Yes, that is the basic law of karma and an easy access point to understand it. We reap what we sow. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Don’t cut off others in traffic unless you’re willing to be cut off yourself. Or something like that.

But the truth is, karma goes much deeper. It has it’s roots in both Buddhism and Hinduism and shows up in most of the major world religions in one way or another. Karma also has a lot to do with choice and free will, two things I love to use as much as possible. Me being me (i.e. a mega religion scripture nerd), I discovered the root of the word ‘choice’ is even older than Greek, which shocked me. It’s the root word geus which simply means ‘to taste.’ As in, to taste with your physical body the flavors of your action.

Now, I’ve tasted many flavors in this life alone. Some were delicious and heart-meltingly good. Some were sour like milk I’ve been drinking past its due date. Some were powerfully bitter and intense like fresh horseradish root but medicine nonetheless.

Some flavors I’ve tasted - like regular phone calls to long distance friends - have been sweet and dynamic beyond measure. These flavors are also nutritous and it’s obvious they come from healthy fruit - to extend the metaphor a bit more - and so I love eating them.

Other flavors, usually having to do with trying to enforce my will on other people (usually people I’m dating, eek sorry!), turn out rather sickening, akin to rotted meat that my body tries to reject, thankfully.

But all of these flavors are part of the great buffet of life, and are the inner weavings of choices, consequences, actions, and karma.

Of course, Jesus was also a master of choice and karma as well. So was his lifetimes-long pal, the Buddha, though they each approached it a little differently.

There’s also an opportunity when we encounter karma. We’re invited to fine-tune our actions, to understand the quantum connectivity of all frequencies - including thoughts, beliefs, and feelings. Through karma we can actually bestow great blessing and create great healing not just for ourselves and those we have karmic ties to, but for the whole planet and actually the whole universe.