AD: Alright – I decided to change tactics and to see if I could make better headway coming from the karma as cookie direction instead of the karma as whammy direction. I am starting to understand how tit-for-tat would makes sense, how the debt cycle doesn’t need to be paid directly to the one who you incurred the debt with, how debts are settled in kind or degree and how the circumstance of such can arise. I have considered wider world stuff, but also some personal examples.

Here is the clearest personal example in that it shows how I ‘remembered’ a debt owed, I tried to begin paying it with like kind, I paid it forward to someone else (not directly in return), and upon payment I got extra credits (like interest?) and positive reinforcement to continue this kind of cycle.

A few months ago, I had a big dhamma realization — that idea that my putting so much effort into working out so hard didn’t prove that working out = extreme willpower, but rather proves that I BELIEVE working out shows extreme willpower, and I am someone who values that trait. I know it sound kinda obvious now, but I was really stuck. I couldn’t see past my view. Anyway, it was a big help in practice, so I did spend some time considering exactly how I arrived at such a big shift and I recognized that the nudge I needed actually came straight from the story of a dhamma friend that I internalized —  For the purposes here, it came about as a ‘bonus’ in my process of trying to right a debt.

The friend had Lined me out of the blue and asked if I would review her dhamma HW and wanted to exchange some thoughts. It was on rupa and 4 elements, I felt confident that I could share from my own experiences and contemplations, so I helped. I mean I really gave it my focus and attention and time, not just a quickie. Obviously I helped for a lot of reasons, she is a friend, I love the dhamma and want to have it thrive, but most of all, I helped because I feel like I owe you (Mae Neecha) a debt. I am keenly aware, and grateful, that over the years, you have always been my call/line/email a friend lifeline in practice. I also know I can’t pay that back to you directly because of our positions. So, when someone asked for similar help, I was especially eager, and conscious, of a chance to do so as a ‘pay it forward/back’ opportunity.

The cookie I got from you is guidance in practice, what I gave, was in kind. When the opportunity came, I immediately saw it as a way to give in kind. The further cookie I got as a result of my efforts to pay back my karmic debt by helping a dhamma friend, was clarity on a stuck point, a boon in kind. It also makes sense: The context is all practitioners doing practice. That it is continuous and further opportunities for karma to be traded in this sphere also makes sense. This story also shows how karma might be able to play out without being a continual exchange with the same person.

Honestly, I don’t think my block is about understanding how the contours of karma work, it is about thinking it is an indictment of me. I only see one side. Especially when I start from whammy side, I imagine all the whammies I deserve, will be subject to. I think it proves I am a ‘bad’ Alana. A worldly law, that simply describes the nature of cause and effect/ reasons and results, — in my fun-house-mirror-mind — warps into personal indictment.

Then I go extra bat-shit crazy and want to quit practice. Because I don’t ‘deserve’ enlightenment, I am bad. Enlightenment must be a cookie dolled-out according to Alana’s laws and standards of goodness (j/k but also sorta how my mind must work). If I can’t succeed, I might as well quit before I try –better that than failure.

Eric asked me, “Alana, do you think your dear dhamma friends, like Oat and Amy, are failures because they aren’t enlightened?”. I answered, “of course not, no one would call an unripe grape a failure just because it hasn’t ripened yet” That I suppose is my answer to myself here. That and the fact that whether I think I can succeed or not, my feelings aren’t really the arbiter of reality, they don’t dictate what happens — I should have already learned this lesson when I delt so thoroughly with fear/hypochondria.

This pervasive view, that Alana is/can be/should be/ GOOD, it the bigger problem here I suspect. I am working on it, but it is like whack-a-mole. One of these days though….

Anyway, stay tuned . Some other thoughts that overlap karma and self building currently brewing…