Anat and Ehud took about half an hour to talk about karma, sharing some of their thoughts, ideas and questions about this system.
Anat also wrote a blog about karma and has a talk about it and Marcel interviewed Venerable Steve and recorded a class around the theme.
A very interesting conversation, on many aspects of life, how to live and deal with life. Call it life or karma or whatever, through time people of all cultures have had this need to understand the things beyond our capacity, be it intellectual, emotional or spiritual. I doubt that any other living being on this planet have any of these thoughts and therefore I ofte think that our biggest challenge in life is to find a way to handle our own intellect, our ability to philosophise upon matters which we will never be able to find one concrete and solid answer to, without going crazy. I think the whole idea, the concept of Karma is much like religion. It is thought up by people because we need to feel some kind of connection to something because other wise we feel so small and out or control in life. The worst thing for a person to feel is probably to be convinced of insignigficanse. Thus our eternal quest for meaning and purpose. I even find it a bit funny when we start talking about life, as in human life, as something more special than the life of any other living being. Again, does anyone think that any other organism ever contemplate the value of its existence? We so desperately want to be important. And as for the idea of karma, multi lives spanning karma even, what is it really, at the core, other than the same thing we tell our children? Behave well and you’ll be better off, do onto others as you would like them to do to you. I am not disputing a word of what either of you are saying, but for me I like to simplify things, life in particular because it certainly comes with all kinds of challenges. I try my best to be good, to do good, and my experience is that what I put out does come back, but not always from where you might think it would 😀
As for health, I try to be on the safe side, as best I can, but have come to the conclusion that the best thing I can do for my health is to be nice, loving, patient and caring, and most of all to NOT worry!!! My mother in law scared herself to death, literally! Not a meal was consumed without a lecture about the health benefits of whatever she had hear about that week, without ever really getting into it and understanding what was supposedly healthy about it. As for food, nobody can argue her life style was healthy, but when your entire being is filled with an all encompassing fear of sickness and death, then this is what will manifest in your mind and ultimately in your physical being. Our brain is advanced, complex and complicated but also simple, it creates images and for us to use the words no and not will create the opposite effect. ” A will NOT get sick ” is not a thought of positivity or a statement focusing on health. ” I am healthy” is quite a different matter. What we say and do must match and fear should not be a motivational factor, it simply won’t work, not in the long run. And then the non attachment and the ability to be with what is. I will not say I am completely fluent in either but definitely more so now than in earlier times, thank God.
Very uplifting and inspiring conversation! Thank you both <3