Karma summary

Let’s say you’re chopping vegetables when your partner says something that enrages you. Furious, you whip around and stab him with your knife. Does this act earn you some bad karma – as well as some legal problems? Definitely.

Here’s an alternate scenario. Let’s say you’ve been angry with your partner for a few months and have decided to take violent action. He comes over, he upsets you, and you lunge with your knife. This would earn you even more negative karma than the first scenario, since you’ve compounded the violence with months of resentful and vengeful thoughts. No surprise there.

In 2013, Emory University researchers released the fragrance of cherry blossoms into a cage of mice. Right as the smell was released, the researchers administered a mild electric shock to the mice. Over time, the terrified mice learned to associate the smell with the pain of the shock. They soon began to run as soon as they smelled cherry blossoms, even after the scientists stopped administering the shock.

But here’s the interesting thing. Those mice had babies, and even though the second generation was never electrocuted, they were just as afraid of the smell of cherry blossoms. This fear persisted into the third generation.

Each culture has its own origin myth. The origin myth of yogis is that everything started from pure intelligence. To merge back into that intelligence – or God, vibrations, energy, whatever you want to call it – is the ultimate destination for every human.

What stops us from attaining this goal? According to the author, Sadhguru, it’s merely the notion that we’re individuals and our very strenuous efforts to maintain that myth, all of which adds to our karmic load.

Sadhguru tells the story of an aspiring yogi who spends hours meditating under a tree until hunger pangs compel him to go home. He returns the next day, vowing to be stronger, but notices a crippled fox sitting by the tree. How did this fox survive in the jungle? The mystery is solved a few hours later when a lion enters the clearing. The yogi is terrified, but the lion walks over to the fox and drops meat at its feet.

Aha, the yogi thinks. It’s a message from God: trust and I will be provided for.

Sadhguru believes that about 40–48 days after a child is conceived, its karmic fibers begin to tighten. Imagine karma as a coil that gets thicker and denser. At death, this karma slips out of the body in the form of energy.

In between – between that first tightening and that final release – is that individual’s entire life. How that person chooses to expend their karma in that lifetime will determine how much is left to work on in the next. We can act upon our karma on three planes: physical, mental, and energetic.

Sadhguru once visited a monastery carved into rock that was used by Jain monks 1,900 years ago. He worked hard all day cleaning the place. At one point, he sat down on a rock bench upon which a Jain monk had lain nearly 2,000 years prior to that day.

Immediately, Sadhguru began to feel powerful vibrations. The monk had left behind a significant amount of his energy, so much that Sadhguru could make out a physical outline based on the energetic vibrations. He could tell that the monk’s left leg had been amputated at the knee.

You’ve learned what karma is and isn’t, and how to manage your karmic load in the best possible way. But there are still questions. Do you need to understand rebirth in order to buy into the concept of karma? Should you explore regression into previous lives to work out issues?

The key message here is: Karma is your attachment to the limiting illusion of your individuality. Cleansing yourself of this notion will allow you to live joyfully.