How to navigate karma.

It is fairly common to hear people complain about their lot in life. One consoles such outbursts by saying, ”It’s our karma, we cannot escape it.” Karma is a universally acknowledged word worldwide. People everywhere immediately associate it with Sanathana Dharma and proclaim none can escape it, but there are ways to navigate it, said P. Swaminathan in a discourse.

What is karma? It is nothing but the ledger balance of one’s deeds in past life. It is human nature to do both good and bad things in this world. While the good deeds earn us a bonus of prosperity in the next birth, the wrong things we did to others will attach themselves to our life in the next birth. As Lord Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, one will get only what one is ordained to get, in this birth.

How does one mitigate the effects of karma? Kanchi Mahaperiyava was known to say that there are three ways one can do this. First is to have bhakti, think of God every day, recite prayers, make offerings and visit places of worship. Next, pay homage to the ancestors, and lastly, pay heed to the elders in the family. By doing so, one can somewhat reduce the impact of the bad deeds of our past birth, just as how we protect ourselves from driving rain by donning a rain coat.

One must remember that even gods cannot completely wipe out your karma deficit. Goddess Parvathy once pleaded with Siva to improve the lot of a poor cotton candy seller, as he was an upright person in his current birth. Siva sportingly showed Her how wrong She was. Siva arranged for an expensive piece of jewellery to lie in the path of the candy seller. However, the poor man, burdened by his debt, suddenly wondered how he would earn a livelihood even if he fell sick or lost his eyesight. Determined to fight for his livelihood, he walked on the usual path, his eyes firmly shut, without seeing the jewellery lying in plain sight. A few metres on, he opened his eyes and was jubilant at his ability to earn a living even if he were to go blind. Do your duty and lead a virtuous life for a better life and after life.