One thing that I got sort of hooked on for a long time, or didn't quite "get," was the idea of karma. Certainly I got the gist of the popular definition: "What goes around, comes around" or a version of poetic justice. But the meanings I was reading in books about yoga, buddhism, and spirituality in general... each kind of made sense but for some reason felt restrictive or like just another story I was holding onto for some reason. So, let's dive into it together and explore how it actually can apply to your awakening and fulfilment path (and not to have to rely on anything about reincarnation, good or bad, past lives, choosing to come to earth, whatever theory that we can't really confirm in our day to day life).
So what really is karma and how does it relate to awakening? Karma in the plainest terms is simply any story that is continuing to play out in your life based on a belief about reality that is not true. We talk a lot about thoughts, stories, and beliefs in spiritual and awakening circles, and unfortunately use our beliefs about those to police ourselves or other people. But they are all just pointers to aspects of what we could call karmic knots (as they sort of solidify in our bodies and act as wounds) or karmic patterns (when we see how they didn't originate with us but are stories that have been passed on in some capacity through generations, cultures, art, religion, anything). Essentially, karma is an untrue belief (redundant, really) about reality. Holding onto this untrue belief creates physical, emotional, and mental suffering. And in most cases, this untrue belief has been taught (intentionally or unconsciously) over many years or even centuries or longer. It's an energetic pattern that can cause great suffering exactly because it doesn't usefully model reality, and in fact creates a deep sense of friction, resistance, fear, and painful separation. And it didn't start with you.
In awakening and fulfilment paths, an intention of willingness to see and welcome a karmic knot into awareness (or painbody, or samskara, for you tantrikas) is all that is required the entire way through. A willingness to see that all of your deeply held beliefs are likely not in alignment with reality any longer, and that they have been causing either subtle or obvious moments of suffering in your life, usually on repeat.
Let's say someone has a lot of apparent karma around body image. This is not some big mystical statement about souls and good behavior and lifetimes (honestly, who knows/it doesn't matter). It's a simple statement that untrue beliefs about bodies and their value have come into your awareness and are literally playing out in your life. This could look like extreme exercise, overeating, cosmetic surgery, constant commenting on your own bodies or others, anxiety and fear around eating, recurrent health issues, etc. And on a more emotional level, it can feel like you are in some kind of perverse hellscape (even when it may look amazing on the outside) doomed to repeat the same painful situations over and over (if you're lucky to even notice that you are indeed suffering, which can be a big first step in itself).
The body size beliefs clearly didn't start with you - how could you even come up with the notion of size, beauty, value, worthiness etc without someone defining these for you (either directly or through unconscious behavioral and verbal patterns they have themselves about it)? And they likely didn't stem from anyone who passed it on to you either (including an entire body aesthetic or health culture). The untrue beliefs are just there, being played out through many lives and in different forms. And sometimes you're just born into a life with those particular beliefs being more prominent.
But there is also a deeper pointer here, which is that there is no "you" and separate "karmic pattern" - these untrue beliefs are the very fabric of the sense of a separate "I." To believe you have ____ karmic conditioning that you need to work through is a near-miss on the actuality, which is that the very act of "working" on something implies incorrectly that there is someone and a separate karma. Like the trees blowing in the wind or a comet hitting earth, there's not someone in whom these karmic patterns are getting stuck. All that's happening is that you as awareness are now seeing the untruth of these beliefs and allowing them to finally rest. The sense that you were making good or bad choices in your life, the sense that you were a victim or a champion, the sense that you are the most beautiful or most grotesque... they simply cannot hold together in the spaciousness and gentle knowing of awareness. The karma - the belief system - is simply welcomed into awareness and allowed to dissipate in its own time. When these dissipate, all that's left is space for ease, flow, fulfilment, and seeing reality as it is.
In the upcoming course, Untangling the Knots, we will be exploring a number of different techniques and pointers for identifying 'karmic knots' and loosening their resistance to the present moment. These knots, with practice, can be felt in the physical body, but there are times when we may need assistance navigating things like intrusive thoughts, strong emotions, energetic changes, etc, and so having some foundational practices from different angles can be very helpful. And my goal in the course is to help demonstrate how to do this gently and relatively consistently. I know very personally how intense these beliefs and knots in the body can be - and how subtle - and have learned through much trial and "error," that a gentle and curious approach with a deep sense of allowance is the most effective. The only real fire in the awakening path is awareness itself (the actual you!), and it is a safe and very powerful flame for truth. And it only gets stronger the more you allow it in.