Karma...and some other shit

I went to Catholic school through 4th grade. I also went to Church regularly until my mother began to move away from organized religion and more towards open spirituality. To me organized religion was all bullshit. I couldn't accept (and still can't) many of the inherent contradictions in that world, but over time I've grown to be more accepting of people and whatever they want to believe. The religious aspect remains pretty unappealing for me personally, but the spiritual side of life has become something I embrace very strongly. A lot of what attracted me to Buddhism was the idea of investigating my own spirituality without having any rules or beliefs forced upon me. The basic premise is you sit on a cushion and find out for yourself what works and what doesn't. So really, anybody could benefit from the practice. There are Christian Buddhists, Atheist Buddhists, celibate Buddhists, Buddhists who put things in their butts and everything in between. Personally I'd say I identify as an Agnostic Buddhist (who sometimes puts things in his butt) because honestly I don't know what is really out there, nor am I sure it's very important to how we live our lives in the present moment.

One thing I have come to believe is that we all share a basic goodness that unites all human beings. Over time most of us lose touch with our basic goodness for periods of our lives, some people lose touch with it forever and end up doing some really horrible things.. BUT we all start the same.  Again, I don't expect anyone to believe in basic goodness just because I say so, or the Buddha said so or God or whatever the fuck else. I think it's our duty to investigate this stuff and find out for ourselves. That said, I have looked for myself, and I do very much believe in basic goodness. This is the part of us that lets us feel happy, sad, connect to other people and know the difference between right and wrong. I also believe it to be the source of balance when it comes to karma and karmic debt.

Now a lot of people understand karma to be you do something good, good things will happen, you do bad things and bad things will happen to you. This is kind of the idea, but not entirely. The word Karma actually translates to action, and so karma isn't so much the action/reaction we tend to think of, but our actions themselves. Many believe karma works because a mystical force of some sort is keeping everything in checks and balances, so it knows when you deserve to be punished and when you deserve rewards...but that's not it either. Again, you can believe or not believe anything you want and still benefit from Buddhism, or at the very least meditation. Personally, I don't think there's any fucking guy in a cloud or mystic fucking fog that keeps track of us and the things we do. I do however believe in karma and karmic debt.

My understanding of it is that our basic goodness allows us to know the difference between right and wrong. We can lie to ourselves and try to justify shitty behavior, but deep down we know when we've done wrong. This will cause us suffering because it goes against our basic goodness. The biggest joy we can experience as people is doing the right thing. Of course the right thing to do will vary from one situation to the next, there are no firm answers, but the important thing is for us to do our best in each moment. If we've honestly done our best then we have created good karma and worked to level our karmic debt. In the end I don't believe there's anything or anyone who will punish or reward us for our actions. I do however believe that we can all be happier if we work to do the right thing. So if you can't help others and do the right thing for the sake of..well..helping others and doing the right thing...then do it because it can balance your karmic debt and make you a happier person. Whatever reasons you find to try and do good in this life, be it some old dude in robes on a cloud threatening to burn your dick off in hell unless you do... or maybe a simple part of your being that wants to be good, get out there and fucking do it.

xo Dildos