Triggers

Is karma really so hard to see in operation? Don’t we only have to look back at our own lives to see clearly the consequences of some of our actions? When we upset or hurt someone, didn’t it rebound on us? Were we not left with a dark and bitter memory, and the shadows of self-disgust? That memory and those shadows are karma, the results of our past actions, words, and thoughts. If we examine our actions, and become really mindful of them, we will see that there is a pattern that repeats itself. Whenever we act negatively, it leads to pain and suffering, whenever we act positively, it eventually results in happiness.

Glimpse After Glimpse,

Sogyal Rinpoche

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Does karma mean that the harm done to me in the past is unchangeable? If my old tapes rule my life, am I stuck with the karma I’ve acquired over a lifetime? I am careful of how I look at a lifetime of negative words, actions, and thoughts. Can flipping them to the positive be enough to turn my karma around into a better direction? These things are hard to discern, depending on how I perceive the past from where I sit in the present. I can see two distinct ways to look at the problem of karma: one is to look at it loaded with nostalgia. Nostalgia is a tricky thing. It can fool me into longing for the joys and regretting the sorrows of the past. The other way of looking at karma is a rigorously honest self-examination. Sometimes this takes help because I can be blinded and side-tracked by nostalgia and get stuck in remorse. I have witnessed far too many of the people I have worked with“triggered” when they approach the Fourth Step of AA. The Fourth Step is the one where a thorough inventory is taken and, on the Fifth Step, we share what is found there with another human being. Sometimes these two steps ought to be done together. with the help of someone who can be trusted and who is knowledgeable about how to direct the karma so that it can be disposed of. One of my favorite people, Big Al, used to say, “Take the bullet out of the gun and the trigger has no power.” At any rate, it is damned near impossible to do this effectively on my own and that is why most AA’s insist that we work the Steps with a trusted sponsor.

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