Most of us are inclined to avoid growth and change, even if our resistance comes at a high price. Only when the pain becomes intolerable are we willing to do our homework and learn our lessons. The prevalence of learning through painful experiences, of course, is not due to some cruel divine law; it is simply the consequence of our habits and our “forgetfulness.” Our Higher Self is primarily interested in our progress as student in the school of life, and not so much in our comfort. Like a wise and benevolent parent, the Higher Self orchestrates experiences for the student that provide the greatest growth opportunities for the highest good of all -- even if the student fights it tooth and nail.
Obviously, no student enters the school of life as a blank page; we all bring some characteristics, dispositions, and attributes with us as we enter this plane. (Parents who have more than one child may not need to be convinced of this assumption.) Not only do we bring innate characteristics to a new embodiment, we also subscribe to a comprehensive curriculum for that particular lifetime. Both are intricately intertwined and in no way accidental. [Obviously, we do not believe in the idea of a genetic lottery. Our phenotype and personality traits are not the expression of a random recombination of DNA but of a finely crafted blueprint designed on the higher planes. The concepts of “coincidence” and “randomness” are convenient and widely-accepted excuses for a lack of true understanding.]
What we are is determined by what we were and what we shall become. Using the school metaphor again, whether we go on to learn 11th grade math is determined by our performance in 10th grade math and our aspirations for our educational future. Eventually, all students have to master all subjects, but each one completes the curriculum in a unique order and at a unique pace.
It requires numerous incarnations through eons of time until we have learned enough to graduate from the school of life on earth. To be precise, we don’t really learn anything new, we only learn to remember what we already know. Our graduation from a life in a human body, however, is not the end of the “grand experiment in consciousness.” In fact, there is no end to the expansion of consciousness -- just as there is no end to the expansion of the physical universe.
Karma
While each student has been given free will, the school of life only seems to be anarchic. We learn our lessons within the parameters of the Law of Karma, also known as the Law of Cause and Effect or the Law of Balance. Most religious traditions have based their ethical reasoning on some version of this law (for instance, “whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Gal 6:7) or the Golden Rule). According to such teachings, it is how we use our free will -- i.e., the intent behind our thoughts and actions -- that is the deciding factor in producing “good” or “bad” effects at some later day in one’s life, at the time of judgment, or in another lifetime, depending on the specific religious tradition.
While such reasoning may be legitimate in the context of an effort to give ethical guidance, it may also be somewhat misguided. A slightly more neutral, less value-laden interpretation of the Law of Karma sees it only as the Law of Balance, providing us opportunities to “experience the other side,” accepting all experiences and rejecting none. This viewpoint would deny that there are “good” or “bad” experiences, and affirm that there are only opportunities to learn.
Which interpretation is right? While all experiences are part of the grand experiment in consciousness, and thus all are principally neutral and valid, from a human point of view some causes and effects are clearly more pleasant than others. We should not forget, however, that the goal is learning, not comfort. And as students of life, we know that our most painful experiences often prove to be our best teachers.
One could also think of karma as referring to debits and credits on our cosmic bank account. This perspective includes “good” karma as well as “bad,” the latter being the kind of karma that most would be concerned with in this context. We design each incarnation based on a balance sheet that lists imbalances with certain other individuals that we intend to address during a specific lifetime. This purpose is one of the factors entering into the design of a lifetime’s curriculum. Another factor would be the spiritual and karmic agreements with other souls that our Higher Self negotiated on the higher planes prior to our incarnation. These may be agreements to help a fellow soul advance on his or her spiritual path or to provide opportunities for learning and balancing of karma for others.
Just as a businessman does not expect debits and credits to balance at the end of each day, but rather is striving for a balance over a longer period of time, so human beings do not reach a karmic balance within one lifetime. Instead, the karmic balance is being achieved over many incarnations. If we observe seeming injustices -- some “get away with murder” while others experience inexplicable suffering -- we should remind ourselves that ultimately, all is in perfect order. Lest this more “objective” view sounds callous, we should keep in mind, of course, that wisdom and compassion in the face of suffering -- seeing yourself as one with all others -- are of utmost importance.
Furthermore, we should try to look beyond the human preference for comfort that underlies our judgment of events as “good” or “bad.” Just as eating ice cream and pastries every day is more pleasant than healthy, having a lifetime of ease and comfort may not truly be for our highest good. It is wiser to relinquish all judgment of what is “good” or “bad” for us or others, as we can never truly know a person’s karmic agenda or what is for that person’s highest good.
We would misunderstand the Law of Karma if we equated it with some version of the Old Testament’s rule: “. . . as he has done it shall be done to him, fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth” (Lev 24:20). Correctly understood, there is no element of vengeance or punishment in the Law of Karma. Karmic law does not “condemn us” to live down the consequences of our actions. Indeed, the karma we decide to live out in a certain lifetime is based on choices we make on the level of our Higher Self, which decides what lessons we need to learn for our own soul growth and greater understanding.
Our human mind cannot fully comprehend the karmic choices that we make on the higher planes. We simply need to trust that all is designed to advance us on our paths. We can, however, work toward transcending our karma by actively pursuing the lesson we have set out to learn. Once we learn the lesson, once we heal the issue we have had, within ourselves and/or with another person, there is no need to perpetuate a particular karmic drama. When a student has learned the material, he or she can move on.
Balancing of karma with another person may occur solely on the higher planes. Restitution or balancing on the material plane is not necessary. As the veils between the higher and lower planes are lifting, access to the higher planes can be achieved ever more easily. This now allows us to heal and release much of our karma in other ways than the path of suffering that seemed so inevitable in the past. We are, indeed, at the threshold of a new time that allows us to close the books of the past. More easily than ever before, we now have the opportunity to choose to leave our karma behind and begin a new book altogether, rather than add yet another chapter to the old story.
Chapter 4
Co-creation and Manifestation
Many have heard the formula that “you create your own reality.” While this has become a mantra-like staple of New Age thought, it is an idea not well understood. When we find ourselves in a painful situation, we may doubt that we really chose to experience such pain. No matter what we proclaim, when we become really miserable and uncomfortable, we tend to see ourselves as victims of adverse circumstances or actions, feeling that others have wronged us, by life, or by God. After all, who would have chosen to go through such an experience?
And yet, there are no victims, we do have free will, and we are the creators or our own reality. The choices, however, aren’t necessarily conscious choices of our human mind. These choices may have been made in other lifetimes or before we entered this incarnation. Or they may have been made by our Higher Self in the interest of balancing karma or progressing in the school of life. Remember, comfort is not an important concept for our Higher Self -- but soul growth and expansion is.
It is the Higher Self that chooses a set of