What is “boredom,” really?  Its one of the excuses the do-nothing sluggards who shot in the back and killed an innocent Australian college student out for a run this week.

The victim, Christopher Lane, clearly wasn’t bored.  He was experiencing a new country and culture.  He was studying numerous interesting subjects in college.  He was an accomplished baseball player.  He had established close, meaningful relationships.  He was working to keep his body in shape by jogging.  He had created for himself a life of meaning, value, and direction.  Now he’s gone and society is left with 3 murderous monsters to support in prison for the rest of their useless lives.

Nothing can justify this.  Certainly not the murderers’ race, or socio-economic status, or lack of opportunity, or “poor role models.”  But I’m sure we’ll hear every one of these excuses and more before their trials are over.

The main reason I wrote Karma: How To View It, Use It and Lose It was because I had become sick of hearing so  many make excuses for their own behaviors and choices in life and shift the blame onto others when things “don’t go well” or they are held accountable for their actions.

If Westerners understood the facts of reincarnation and karma–the law of cause and effect–they would realize:

1) We choose our life circumstances before each incarnation.

2) These choices are made either to balance karma created in previous lives, to learn, or to teach.

3) There is no such thing as good fortune or bad luck.  We all enter into earthly life  with a soul purpose.  Therefore, every single life carries within itself direction, meaning, a goal, specific lessons to learn and goals to accomplish.

If we understood how the law of cause and effect works and  how to uncover our unique, specific purpose for being here, how could anyone “lack direction,” be “bored,” or lie to themselves about personal accountability?

Preparing to speak about Karma at the Optimist Club, today, led me to consider Pessimism, as well.

It seems to me that pessimism must be born out of a belief that the world is unjust and unfair; a sense of individual powerlessness; fear of random occurrences which are viewed as “bad luck” or “bad things happening to good people;” and a sense of victimization.

Such a world view would never be held by one who understands and accepts the law of Cause and Effect–Karma–to be a perfect, impersonal, undeviating fact of life.

Optimism, on the other hand, springs from a solid belief that our world is governed by fair and just natural and spiritual laws. In such a world, no one is a “victim” because the Law of Reciprocity insures that we reap what we sow–always.  Every thought, word, and deed; every cause we set into motion results in an effect we will have to experience–either in this life, the world beyond, or another life on earth.  This is not punishment but, rather a just and natural method by which to return us to a state of equilibrium/homeostasis.  Nothing in life “just happens.”  There are no “victims.” And human beings are powerful in that it is we ourselves who create the life experiences we live–both the good and the bad.

Such a world view would only be held by one who understands and accepts the Law of Cause and Effect–Karma–to be a perfect, impersonal, undeviating fact of life.

Below is the Creed of Optimist International.  If you find it appealing, I’m sure you will be able to find a local branch near you:

Promise Yourself:

To be strong so that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel there is something in them.

To look on the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.

To think only of the best, to work only for the best, and expect only the best.

To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to greater achievements in the future.

To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.

To give so much time to self improvement that you have no time to criticize others.

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

I can’t recall a time when the world, our country, or my family and friends have been–of necessity–more focused on money than during these past few years.

THINGS:  Exerting the time and effort to earn money to acquire them; going shopping to buy them; then, spending more time, effort, and money to keep them clean and shiny, in good operating condition, and well repaired is, to me, a gigantic waste of time, effort, and money.

There are so many more meaningful, life-enriching activities to focus on than consumerism and surrounding one’s self with lots of inanimate “stuff:” education, travel, cultural activities, nature, animals/pets, volunteer work, reading, gardening, spending quality time with loved ones–to name but a few.

But, it takes financial security and unfettered time to enjoy even these non-materialistic pleasures.

A long time ago I read a tiny book titled, Leisure: The Basis of Culture.  It’s thesis is that no great art, literature, philosophy, religion, government, scientific discoveries or society ever emerged from cultures in which individual members needed to spend every waking moment working to acquire the necessities of life.

Without the leisure to think, learn, create; become broadened, deepened, skilled, enlightened, and awakened; humans are nothing more than dull functionaries focused entirely on fulfilling their “animal needs,” day in and day out.

History and anthropology validate these assertions.  It is only when we first have what we require to survive and thrive that we can carve-out the time necessary to engage in the higher level activities that lead to important cultural contributions and an enlightened populace that has the potential to make their society “Great.”

But what is the best way to insure that every person is given such an opportunity?  The news is replete with stories of riots and demonstrations in Europe where government entitlements and subsidies are being decreased; thousands of homes are in foreclosure; parents must work 2 or 3 jobs just to keep some kind of roof over their kids’ heads and food in their bellies; people have worked and saved their entire lives only to see their 401K’s disappear, pensions cut, and worry that social security and medicare might not be there when needed; and prices are sky-high, on everything from food and gasoline to medicine and college tuition.

Is the answer more and bigger government? A society in which the rich are mandated to support the poor? A subsistence standard of living for everyone? A turn away from entitlements and back to the self-reliance once prized by our ancestors? Endowments given only to the brightest, most innovative and industrious among us so that private enterprise will flourish and lead to more and better jobs for all? ………………….? Many questions.

At this point, only one thing seems certain to me.  As a species, we are being forced to face and resolve the effects of the economic causes we have set into motion decades ago. There is no sane way to ignore these any longer. The coffers are bare.  There is no place to go and no one to turn to for loans. The benefactors and bail-outs available to rescue the millions drowning in debt are, themselves, running dry.

How we determine to respond to the “economic karma” we are now facing will affect many generations to come.  Let’s determine to finally take responsibility for our individual circumstances and stand on our own two feet again–one-by-one and nation-by-nation.  Only then will we be in a position to assist those who are truly unable to fend for themselves. Only by doing so will we free ourselves from a karma of scarcity and reclaim the natural state of abundance intended for all Creation.

I was surprised to receive an invitation to speak about Karma by the Optimist Club of Virginia Beach this week.  I was surprised not because I don’t think an understanding of the Law of Cause and Effect leads to a healthy, optimistic life and world-view, but because my experience has been that many still view karma in punishing, negative terms.

The law of reciprocal action is anything but negative.  It is a totally just, logical, impersonal and infallible law demonstrated throughout nature.  And, whether we like it or not, as physical creatures we are part and parcel of the natural world and subject to the same laws that govern every other part of material life.

The fact that we are spirits ensouling a physical body does not absolve us from taking full responsibility for our thoughts, words, and deeds and experiencing the effects of every cause we have set into motion.

I think the reason some view the law of karma as harsh and unjust is that they fail to take into account the fact that our spirit enters into a physical body and life experience bringing with it a long history for which we are totally responsible and accountable.

Life is a continuum, not a flash-in-the-pan, one time “event.” At the end of each life cycle, we step out of our physical body and our soul simply goes home to its natural world of non-matter and continues to learn, grow, act, create, and set into motion both positive and negative causes in the ethereal realm– causes we bring with us into future incarnations.

While nearly everyone understands the “What goes around, comes around” fact of life to be true–we often wish it wasn’t. It is awesome and scary to realize how much power, authority, accountability, and responsibility we possess over our individual life direction and circumstances.  And, it is much easier and more comfortable to blame other people, Powers, and possibilities for our predicaments than to take responsibility for them ourselves.

However, if we were not in control of our life experiences we would be nothing more than puppets, pawns, and victims.  Now that would be truly scary!

Fortunately for us, the perfect Law of Reciprocal Action does exist as a method by which to learn and regain the original state of purity and enlightenment we started out with as creatures made in God’s image. The God-quality of free will is an inherent aspect of every human spirit.  But, we obviously need to learn how to use it in the service of goodness, light, and the upliftment of all creation rather than for personal gain, ego-gratification, and self-aggrandizement.  I mean, just look around!  And, the only way to truly learn anything is through direct experience.

Without free will and the redemptive gift of karma, we would be pathetic, impotent creatures indeed. But we aren’t; and we have every reason to be grateful and OPTIMISTIC about life and our future.

“The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary figure is repeated without end.”  This is the first sentence of one of my favorite essays, “Circles,” by Ralph Waldo Emerson.

St. Augustine describes the nature of God as a circle whose center is everywhere and its circumference nowhere.

In myth, legend, and archeology there is evidence to support the fact that the most highly developed ancient civilizations understood the “Law of the Circle,” or, “The Law of the One” and expressed this concept in philosophy, religion, the design of their buildings and even the design of their towns.

All things in the universe move in circles and, ultimately, return to their Source.  This same law holds true in human action and experience.  Everything that you think, feel, desire, and send “out there” to another or others ultimately returns to its source–YOU.

In my book I concentrate on the Law of Cause and Effect to illustrate the workings of Karma.  The Law of the One provides another way of looking at this important phenomenon.

In Reality, you are the creator–the source–of your life experience.  Learn to be as conscious and careful with your thoughts as you are with your actions.  This isn’t an easy discipline, but I think you will find it well worth the effort.

Many wonder how Karma–the Law of Cause and Effect–and the Law of Attraction are related.

If you’ve read The Secret, by Rhonda Byrne, you know that visualization (the topic of last week’s blog) plays a big role in the latter.  To activate the Law of Attraction, you visualize/imagine the future you want and call-up the appropriate emotions to accompany this picture.

By doing this, you create an Energy Field that will Attract everything and everyone necessary to transform this projection into a reality.  In other words, you become the Cause of the Effects that begin to manifest in your life.

Where Karma is concerned, you did not consciously and recently create the causes that result in the effects you are now experiencing.  This was done by you, for your, and orchestrated along with you by the “Karmic Board” in the realm of Spirit–before you were born.

However, these two laws are synergistically entwined.  For instance, if you were born into a life of use and abuse and do not understand that an underlying cause–set into motion by your previous, free-willed thoughts, words, or deeds–has caused these effects to manifest, you will view yourself as a hapless victim.

The resultant emotions you will then create to accompany this view will be anger, resentment, fear, and a sense of not being lovable or “good enough.”  The Energy Field generated by these emotions will then Attract events and people who will validate and perpetuate the beliefs you hold about your personal identity.

This is why it is so imperative that you take the time, and exert the effort, necessary to learn as much as you can about the Law of Karma. Once you comprehend the impersonal, immutable workings of this law you will come to see that your life is as it is because you caused it; AND, it can transform at moment because you Will it.

You will learn that every situation you find yourself in can be used to (re)create a state of balance and resolution and to free yourself from any remaining Karmic Ties. As a result, you will be able to transform the negative, self-limiting emotions that accompany “victim” status into the positive thoughts, feelings, and expectations necessary to attract the love, support, and opportunities necessary to achieve the goals and outcomes you desire.

Karma isn’t punishment.  It is opportunity; it is Grace.

The law of reciprocity–karma–is always at play in our lives, whether we are aware of it or not.  This Christmas season could be a perfect time to observe the wonder of its workings.  2011 has been a tough financial year for many.  Yet, precisely because of this, we have a unique opportunity to experience the immediate “effects” of extending ourselves to others:  Be it through tucking personal notes into greeting cards, serving hot meals at a soup kitchen, walking or playing with abandoned pets at a local animal shelter, visiting shut-ins, or taking one lonely child carolling or to see her first Christmas lights display, we find the immediate sense of warmth and joy derived from giving the gift of Self to be so much more fulfilling than the short-lived tummy tickle the giving of any object could possibly bring.  Though money might be scarce, this year has the potential to be one of the most lavishly rich seasons of your life.  Happy Holidays!