The Karmic software

When we sit down to play a computer game, say PubG, we know very well the program is nothing but miles and miles of code. The logic path being traveled by the player is being depicted in space and time on the computer screen.

But tell me, before we start playing we know that the program contains this space and time, right? Are they real, or do they exist as a potential?

The Karmic program is shimmering all around us, already written in all possibilities, and we trace decision-based-paths that become real for us. Whatever could happen, whenever it could have happened, exists as a potential already. As we live the moment, our chosen paths become reality to us.

Or it could be that all possibilities are not written out in the Karmic program. Imagine PubG written as a condition-fulfilling AI that keeps writing out the next step of the program based on the set of decisions taken by all the players every moment. Saves storage, right? The past program can be wiped out, the future program yet to be written, so that the program itself reduces to a few lines of rolling code defining the reality of the consequences of the current action. Logic paths reduce. For all we know, our karmic program may be working that way too.

In either case, existence seems like a manifestation of program outcomes with space and time being manufactured constructs of the same program. Nothing is real except the decisions being taken by the players at the particular moment.

KARMAtoon

Actions are the cause and the happening is the effect. That is why both the action and the happening is called karma. Happening being Sigma karma is FATE. The choice of next action is FREE WILL. The Sigma of all these instantaneous actions are the next momentary FATE.

Of course the cycle need not roll second by second. Karma or action is not necessarily a physical action alone. The lesser mental involvement in a physical action, the faster is the karmic response. If the eating is not wise, there is a tummy-ache. If the action constitutes an emotional decision, the karmic response would take longer to fructify. If it was an intellectual decision alone, the aftermath may take lifetimes; there may be none at all if it was dharmic.

Since FATE is an effect, it is always perfect. Imagine a giant clothes-hanger with many people hanging from the bottom wire. Depending on where they are positioned, the tilt of the hanger keeps changing. As the people shimmy about (individual actions), the tilt of the hanger is determined perfectly by laws of gravitation and the physics of balance and is a resultant effect. They either go up or down depending both on their own position on the hanger and the hanger's tilt. Similarly, in life, individual fates may vary. The person can choose to shimmy to the higher end of the hanger; that is his free will. But in spite of his effort, he may still be down because of the actions of all others. He who understands this physics, does not blame FATE, viz the hanger, for his plight.

Bounce

Karma and free will.
The wall and the ball.
Things happening just now, the present moment, is immutable.
What we decide to do just now is flexible.
Sometimes we are deluded into thinking it is the other way around.
Instead of trying to change the wall, let's learn how to bounce the ball.

The lotus leaf

Like water falling on a lotus leaf, events fall on our mind.

Our mental make-up is like our fingers holding up the lotus leaf on our fingertips. Like our fingers have different lengths, the balance of our value systems, virtues and vices, define the tilt of the leaf, towards the right or the wrong.

Events keep falling on our mind as an endless stream of water drops. Which way they roll off (ie which way we react) depends on the tilt of the leaf.

For the reactive person, his tilt is set. If he is "naturally" good, his reactions are always kind and generous; else it is "naturally bad" - always selfish and arrogant.

For the person with some attempt at self-knowledge, he tries to be good by adjusting the fingers -- imbibing good values, not reacting without contemplating which way his mind is tilted.

For the jnyani, the knowledgeable one, he has consciously eliminated all tilt -- the drops stay at the centre till he decides which way he wants them to flow out.

For the karma-yogi, his focus is on work and not on the result of work. The leaf is like a funnel and all drops flow through the centre, gathering neither good nor bad karma, irrespective of his mental tilt.

For the bhakta -- well, he has thrown away the leaf and his mind. The drops fall right through and go wherever they want - he cares not.

How are you holding your leaf?

Dharma vs Karma

Kriya as per dharma gathers no karma. Activity as per norms of rightful conduct leaves no residue in the mind. 

There is no residue when the mind knows that it has acted as it should have, checked out against some reference list. Before choosing an activity, before making a response, let us stop and think. Will it leave a residue in the mind? If it seems so, let us not do that action. Delve deep and see what is being violated from that reference list. Is it a basic value? Will it cause harm to somebody? Or is it just some mental position being opposed? If it is just a position, we can try to free ourselves from that position. If we cannot then let us not do that activity. No activity is worth the residue. 

There will be times when we are able to do neither -- not stop the activity, nor let go of the position. Let us just be aware of the clash and concentrate on sadhana. As the mind clarifies, one of the two will slowly dissolve.