Have you ever exclaimed while grasping your hair, “Why does this keep happening to me?!” Probably all of us have at a point in our life thought or even said it aloud to others. Then we brush it aside with “life is a bitch” attitude (avoid), wallow in self-pity (repeat) or become aware of the pattern and do something about it (change).
We are all born with DNA, or blueprints from our ancestors, which make up our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual body. Like a microchip that holds information, we can at times seem more like a robot running on autopilot. But does this mean we have no control? So often I have heard, “It runs in my family,” from depression to cancer. Yes it is true that the traits we share with our ancestors make us more likely to have similar issues. Also people may have a disease that the family did not share. So what is this? Buddhism terms this as karma, an effect related to a cause. We are all born with a will, a freedom to choose action or inaction. We are fortunate enough to have the ability to create self-awareness; hence we can begin to open the door to new opportunities. Instead of giving our power to doctors, societal norms and family belief systems we can create the life and health we want and as recent studies have shown that with spiritual growth can even change our DNA.
As a young girl I had the medical term, IBS, or irritable bowel syndrome. I love how this term syndrome is used so frequently in western medicine, makes it sound more official how messed up we are. As some family members suffer from the same, it seemed quite normal to suffer along with them. To clarify a bit for those unfamiliar, one has to go the toilet as one finds oneself in uncomfortable situations. In my early teens, I came to the realization when I went to big places like big shopping centers (stimulation galore) I would be afflicted by anxiety. When I became aware it was from my own emotion, I decided to calm my self down mentally. That was the day that I took control of my own health and I stopped identifying with this "syndrome."
A lot of people mistakenly think if you have something bad happen in your life, you must have done something bad. Karma does not have judgment, it just is. It is possible that you think you deserve “bad” subconsciously hence attract more situations that validate what you feel about your self. It could also mean you are attracting what you have done to others in the past. In my case, I was also very sensitive to others energy, possibly my karma was learning how to be less affected by external energy. There are so many variables because karma is not good or bad, nor black or white. Since we have a choice, why not create more good karma while we are on this earth. There are as many ideas what good is as there are people on this planet. All I can suggest is try to create from love or that which benefits all. Be authentic and true: speak, think and do from your heart.
Meditation and Reiki (Energetic Holistic Healing) is a powerful tool that can bring more awareness to our karma and create patterns which lead to more understanding of our purpose, forgiveness of self and others and achieve more inner peace. Like rings of an old tree, karma can become too heavy for our physical bodies to carry. Even if the tree dies, the essence lives on through its seedlings, just as our soul will never die. Karma is not about blaming others, or our self, but more a lesson in this university of life, when we choose to accept it only then can we let it go.
