But life inevitably throws us curve balls, unexpected circumstances to remind us to expect the unexpected. I've come to understand these curve balls are the beautiful unfolding of both karma and current.
Carre Otis
I would like to explore the unfolding of circumstance in front of each seemingly ( but not so) separate body and mind. Is it random? Is it just a chaotic, order-less dropping and plopping of events here and there? Is that why some people find themselves living in the streets of Calcutta, fighting off stray dogs for a morsel of food, while others are floating in big pools, eating strawberries and cream, in front of their inherited mansions in California?
So I take this question back to my little life...and I know it is "little" as is this idea of "me, my and mine" when I slot it into the big picture. That is something we don't do enough, though, is it...slot our little slice of life experience back into the bigger picture?
What is the Bigger Picture?
Michael A. Singer pointedly describes it by explaining that, we as this "separate self," are one of 8.5 billion humans. Human beings are one species of trillions that live on this planet. We take up about 6.3 square feet of this plane twhich has a circumference of about 25,000 miles. It takes 1.3 million of these planet earths to fill the sun and the sun is only one of billions of stars in our galaxy. This galaxy is one of trillions. Wow! Now that is the bigger picture.
Now looking at that, how much do our little and not so little woes matter in the big scheme of things?
I slot my itsy bitsy self into a space between the Calcutta street person and the pool floater. This experience that this "me" is having seems loaded a little unevenly and my mind often leans me towards the less fortunate allotment...There seems to be a lot of challenging circumstances to deal with ...boom...boom...boom...but obviously there is not as much as that starving person in India's allotment of hardship and circumstance. I look towards the pool floater and think sometimes...if only, if only I had a bit of what you had ...man I would appreciate my life more.
Now...I am evolved enough to know that the person floating in the pool is not necessarily happy and peaceful...They may be lying there on top pf their whale shaped floatable device contemplating how they are going to end their life because of something that showed up on social media or over the fact that they just lost a percentage of the family fortune on some gambling venture they went on when they were drunk. Or maybe they are lonely and never felt loved. The Calcutta person, however, once he gets his belly full, may befriend the dog, sharing with it what was fought over, and may be grateful and happy over his good fortune and for the fact he made a new friend. Circumstances do not make us and they do not break us. It is all about the energy inside.
Anyway...why? Why was that person born into the life of poverty and why was that person born into a life of material abundance? Why was I born where I was? Why is "my" life unfolding the way it is? Is it random? Why do so called "good" things happen to some...and so-called "bad" things happen to others?
Of course, being somewhat of a yogi, I am going to answer with one word: Karma. Karma isn't punishment or reward....It isn't "personal" and it isn't random. It is pieces of curriculum offered to each personally created "me" to help with the "learning" of cause and effect needed to balance the energy along the entire "bigger picture". Well, that is what I tell myself as I sit here...not fighting off stray dogs or eating strawberries and cream as I float along...but as I ...as this "little me" ...recovers and reflects on the effects of another seemingly "gruesome" 24 hours. Once again, I lost my focus, momentarily drifting from the bigger picture, and narrowing it down to this tiny, insignificant one of 8.5 billion humans, I call "me". When I do that, it seems that "i" have been randomly slapped with complicated lesson after lesson in an advanced calculus class while "my" very limited personal mind is still trying to figure out long division. I...whoever this "me" is...reacted to it with resistance and confusion and overwhelm asking "What the Fork am I supposed to do with this? This is unfair! Are you ever going to give me a break?" And instead of ringing the dismissal bell..Life just plopped another lesson, and another lesson on "my" lap.
All I can do now...is ask, "Okay....what am I to learn from this? Please show me."
There really is no sense in resisting or complaining about any of it. The lessons are going to keep coming until we learn them. The big thing is, they are not personal!! We don't just learn them so we can get out of school...we learn them for the sake of the bigger picture....for the sake of the person in Calcutta and the person in California also spinning around on this planet we share in one galaxy of many.
What is the lesson we are to learn, crazy lady? We are to learn to simply experience it all, whatever we are given, relax and allow it all to just pass through us. In the bigger picture there are no difficulties or problems. It just is what it is and it all belongs.
Hmmm! I don't know. I am rambling again, aren't I?
All is well.
Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( March 9, 2023) Moving Past Your Personal Limits. https://tou.org/talks/
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