The following, although long, is thoughtful and will evoke contemplation. It can be read at one’s leisure.
The twelve Laws of Karma are listed near the end.
By Doug “Uncola” Lynn
When I was in second grade, my class took a field trip whereby we walked through a cemetery and the county fairgrounds. We were strongly advised not to throw rocks by our gym instructor who was assisting our teacher on the trip. He was a large muscular man and had a Swedish-sounding name. He said to us kids: “Don’t even THINK about throwing any rocks! If any of you do, you will be in big, big, BIG trouble!”
Well, he should have never given me the idea. Because while walking through the fairgrounds, there were so many metal roofs on the buildings. So I picked up a round heavy stone and lobbed it as high as I could before it landed on what sounded like a giant cymbal.
“Who did that?!” screamed the teachers as over 20 tiny fingers pointed my way. The big gym teacher suddenly loomed over me, blocking out the sun. “Why did you do that?!” he asked me in a loud voice.
Of course, I had no answer for him other than “I don’t know” which I stated simply while squinting up at him. But I remember the feeling very well. Today, it would be summarized as: “Because, F*CK you, that’s why”.
Thus began my life of crime.
I grew up on Lynyrd Skynyrd, jungle gyms over asphalt, incoming lawn dart missiles and stolen cigarettes by the band shelter down in the park. Green grass and high tides forever. Slow gin, peppermint schnapps, rum and keggers at the quarries. For the most part, I never got caught except for the times I was incarcerated for fighting or disturbing the peace and various other general mischief; and, usually, for the same reason: “Because, F*CK you, that’s why”.
Which was pretty much the same reason I started my blog exactly three years ago this month. It was September of 2016 and, at the time, I was sure Hillary Clinton was going to win the U.S. presidency.
As I’ve stated before, blogging is like juggling bowling balls. It’s up and down and gravity is the default. I say this because creating content takes a lot of effort, like throwing bowling balls into the air. The traffic pops for a few days after an article posts and then drops much faster than it shot upwards.
My blog is just an inexpensive wordpress site that I use as a catalog. Over the past 36 months, I’ve averaged an article approximately every 7 to 10 days. Although, I’m not sure how much longer I’ll have anything else to say, so far, I’ve not run out of words; and maybe that’s an understatement – especially given this article is over 5,000 words which, at 240 words per minute, equals around a 20 minute read.
So now you can’t say you weren’t warned. Feel free come to come back later if you want.
In the meantime, please know this: I am nothing special. Not at all. I’m just an average guy living a random life and choosing my words with care. I spent my life making money and raising my family when I should have probably run for office. Perhaps, now, I’m trying to make up for lost time, even if it’s too late. Certainly, hindsight is 20/20. Or, to be completely honest, maybe its pure vanity to think any single individual could have stemmed the tide.
Which touches upon something I’ve been thinking about as well: As Clownworld progresses deeper and deeper into neo-Luciferian madness, I could foresee dishonest “agents” stealing passwords and online identities in order to create confusion and chaos.
Any neutral party reading my online musings over the last three years will see that all of them have remarkable consistency and accuracy. Furthermore, I’m a happy guy with zero suicidal thoughts and zero interest in child porn. Right now I am like Popeye umpiring a baseball game:
I y’am what I y’am and I calls ’em likes I sees ’em.
Therefore, if any future writings don’t pass the “sniff-test” – buyer beware.
In the past, I’ve written a few personal pieces including my musings in a church on Mother’s Day; about my college roommate who died of alcoholism at age 52, and how a dead writer’s suicide showed me anything can happen.
Obviously, this is just another one of those personal, and maybe even self-indulgent, postings.
In the months and years after I went Galt, my college roommate, and my father, died. In the years prior, I was running a business and raising kids while watching my parents wind down like clocks. Hospitals, nursing homes, funeral parlors and cemeteries. Obama became president and I was serving on two separate boards plus several sub-committees. Eventually, I began day drinking to the point I became somewhat paralyzed. Everywhere I looked, I saw dead-ends: Obamacare, John Corzine’s heist at MF Global, Benghazi, Mittens Romney, Syria’s red-line in the sand, and all of those government scandals.
America was doomed.
By then I’d found the free internet where political correctness goes to die. Call it Galt’s Gulch or the Island of Ideological Misfit Toys, in any case, I took comfort there and commenting on blogs became a process for me to test ideas and work things out. There is one website that I frequented the most, and still do: The Burning Platform.com. The airing of concepts there, the debates, the music, the humor, and its overall irony, soon made me want to pick myself up, shake off the lethargy, and get back into the game. It was also there, where that website’s administrator, Jim Quinn, allowed me to begin posting articles and I am very grateful to this day for his encouragement and support.
So, now, my time divides by the blue light separating the three dimensions and the ether. And, accordingly, my fellow bloggers and commenters on the internet serve as my inspiration out here in the interwebs; even as the billionaires at Facebook, Google, Twitter, et al, are sweeping away free speech faster than stray French fries from a McDonald’s floor after hours.
The censorship is occurring even as momentum builds within the U.S. Congress to pass unconstitutional Red Flag Laws; which, of course, will mark the beginning of gun confiscation in the United States.
Is it a coincidence that these are happening at the same time? Sure. Call it a coincidence if you want. But, unquestionably, the timing could not have been better. Or, perhaps, worse.
In response to my most recent article, a reader of my blog e-mailed me the video posted below, entitled: “JFK to 911 Everything Is A Rich Man’s Trick”.
I know. It’s 3.5 hours and that’s an eternity for the average web surfer. As for myself, currently, I’m half-way through and, although I’ve not completely vetted the reporting therein – the video does, admittedly, have the ring of plausibility.
So, in viewing the above documentary, I had a disturbing thought and it was this:
“What if America was never good or great?”
But then, I realized she had her moments even amidst the evil clowns who have ruined her with certain finality. Interestingly enough, the video, seemingly, demonstrates how the billionaires have used American patriotism to manipulate her citizens into serving the collective will of the financial elite.
From Norman Rockwell to foreign wars. And, now, into red flag laws, unconstitutional gun confiscation, and socialism. Everything turns.
In an article posted last June entitled “The Lingering Lies of the Liars are Languishing”, I wrote the following:
The seeds of destruction in the Russian collusion narrative remain rooted in the patriotism of both sides. No matter who wins in the end, it will be a pyrrhic victory because the other team will never surrender, accept any terms, or yield any ideological ground. Any chance of compromise is long past, so it’s all or nothing going forward. In fact, each side’s patriotism precludes any chance of concession.
Or, stated another way, Donald Trump was elected by patriotism because he has professed his desire to make America great again whereas the Russo-phobic loons have expressed their desire to patriotically save the nation from Vladimir Putin’s iron grip. And, obviously, it doesn’t matter that Russiagate was a grand ruse executed by the billionaires.
Dialectal thinking may be the means by which we are controlled but, in truth, nothing, or no one, is ever completely all good or all bad. There is wheat and tares within us all; and all around. To varying degrees, of course.
How many of you have family, friends, or acquaintances that support Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren? I do. Are these family, friends, and neighbors members of the domestic terrorist group ANTIFA? No. Ironically, many of these people in our social circles are very smart and talented in ways far surpassing their political retardation.
But when did such a large percentage of Americans become socialists?
I tell you, it’s a frog-in-boiling-water paradox:
The premise is that if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly.
Indeed. Over the past four decades, political consensus and compromise have consistently trended toward progressivism. It is because, over the same time period, America’s federal education system immunized once fresh and fertile young minds against common sense and self-reliance.
This is why I put down the whiskey and started my blog three years ago. I also became a mentor for my county out here in the land of three dimensions. I may never be a U.S. senator or president, but I was concerned regarding the lost young people in my own locality, who were devoid of direction, integrity, and honor.
I had to do something. Anything, really.
So some of my duties today include assisting individuals in youth facilities, treatment centers, and the jails. Occasionally, I’ll help them find transportation, coordinate with parole officers, and I’ve also assisted others to set up meetings where alcoholics and drug addicts can speak to one another.
There are so many young people in every community who were raised in daycares, on a diet of processed and fast food, juice boxes, and video games; and now in their late teens and early twenties they’re drug-addled and with spindly arms barely thicker than their index fingers.
Then, there are also the tattooed, weightlifting warriors with angry attitudes and dead eyes who I hope to never meet in an alley on a dark night. And, recently, paper work crossed my desk regarding one homeless 33 year old female who has seven kids.
Sometimes I have glimmers of hope and other days I just feel like a middle-aged Holden Caulfield. Because, sadly, the damage, for the most part, is done. Many of these folks relapse and go back to jail or prison, as many others just plain die.
Whether by collectivism, or opiates, or alcohol, the minds of many boil slowly and surely. Every day. Which, for me, raises the question: Why can’t each day be sufficient? What’s wrong with the sunrise and why is sunset never good enough?
In a recent online post about the problems associated with faith, a commenter named “Jaz” posted a link to the below production regarding the “Twelve Laws of Karma”. Initially, I thought it was going to reveal some new age voodoo until very early in the 11 minute video, it defined Karma as not about punishment and reward but more about cause and effect; or rather, the “result and effects” of our “past, intents, and actions”.
Okay. That got me. I was hooked.
For those who would rather read than watch, I’ve listed the 12 laws below; and along with my own personal experiences with each:
1.) The Great Law: As you sow, so shall you reap.
Christians will recognize this law as the Biblical principle of seedtime and harvest and, actually, it’s a spiritual metaphor rooted (pun intended) in natural observation. Jesus Christ, of Bible fame, phrased it thusly in a parable as follows:
….So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.
The point being, of course, is that we get back what we put in; and subject to variables such as timing and “soil”. For example, if a farmer plants his seeds in the fall, the laws of nature dictate he won’t have much of a crop. The same result will occur, even in the spring, if a gardener plants his seeds onto a sandy beach. But when “right” actions are taken at the “right” times, a yield of positive results will most often ensue – even as we “knoweth not how”.
So many times in my own life have I witnessed kindness beget kindness and generosity beget generosity; perhaps for the same reasons when we smile at someone they will usually smile back. It’s like neurological reflex wired into the universe.
In the Bible’s Malachi 3:10, the “Lord Almighty” once challenged his people to “test me in this”:
Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.
Does it work? Do we really reap what we sow? Try it and see. All I know is that it worked for me, an aft disillusioned middle-aged catcher in the rye. And I knoweth not how.
2.) The Law of Creation: You attract what you are, not what you want.
For various reasons several my oldest kid’s friends moved to other towns when they were all between kindergarten and second grade. One day, at dinner, my wife and I asked our oldest who they played with at recess, and the reply was: “I just played by myself”. This, of course, was stated as we the parents were biting our fists in anguish.
This is why I always advised my offspring that the best way to make friend, is to be a friend.
And, as we get older, this law takes other forms such as “dress for success” and why I always told my pre-teens: “Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future”.
Even so, wanting to be popular doesn’t make us popular because people coalesce around value systems. It’s why criminals associate with other criminals, gossips with other gossips, and runners with other runners. It’s because we are what we do and what we do is who we are. And practice makes perfect.
That guy? He’s good golfer because he golfs.
The great news is this: We are in control of our own actions. This means we decide who we become and no one else; even if it’s only how we choose to perceive people, places, or things. So many people blame others for their failures when in fact; excuses, blame, and resentments are all the ways by which we avoid looking inward at our own actions and defects. And if we never look, then we won’t have to do any work to change and that’s called laziness, or sloth.
Not attracting who, or what, you want? Not the person you wish to be? Well, fortunately, we can change our minds. The famous real estate salesman and author of “How to Master the Art of Selling”, Tom Hopkins, wrote therein: “The pain of every change is forgotten, once the benefits of the change are realized”.
For me, this manifested as first taking steps I didn’t believe until, later, I had experiences I couldn’t deny.
3.) The Law of Humility: What you resist, persists.
If you want to see all your problems, get a full length mirror. This means it’s always wise to take stock of ourselves – an assessment of where we’ve been, where we are now, and where we’re going. So many people are afflicted in the here and now by regret or pain from their past. And unless we take an honest look at these things and accept them, there is no way we can ever find ourselves in our shades; so to speak.
All too often, however, people wish to resist looking at these things, but as we ignore them, they don’t go away. On the contrary, the pain of these things end up controlling our life.
But when we face these sorrows, regrets, and past hurts, it allows people to, perhaps, see they weren’t actually at fault, or that things could not have been any different at that time, or even some positive aspects that they are now ignoring. Very often fresh perspectives will allow people to forgive themselves, or at the very least, accept things as they are now so they can move on.
Once during eighth grade my classmates passed around a sheet of paper whereby some of us were identified by a commonality that others have noticed: the bluest eyes, the best laugh, etc. If I recall, I think many of the kids appreciated my sense of humor or smile or something like that. Anyway, one of the guys in my class was identified as having no chin. He was deeply hurt by that, became a hermit, and remains a hermit to this day. On the way to our class reunion a few years ago, I stopped by his house and tried to talk him into coming. He would not. All because of what some silly eighth graders wrote decades ago.
Surely, there is pride involved. No doubt. But if he had just humbled himself enough to stop taking himself so seriously during those decades, he might have discovered entire worlds of laughter, friendship, and forgiveness.
What we resist, persists. And a well-worn path is a rut (more on this later).
4.) The Law of Growth: Wherever you go, there you will be
As mentioned in the second law above, our thoughts become our action and our actions (as stated in the above video) “frame” our “world”.
It means that our belief system determines how we act. Or, stated another way, we act upon what we believe. But sometimes we take actions on faith, while not knowing the potential outcome. It’s like taking the first step in the dark without seeing the top of the staircase. Again, the bestselling book in the history of the world, phrases it this way:
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
– Hebrews 11:1
It means sometimes we take shots in the dark, and no matter what happens, wherever we end up, we’ll still be there.
It also says in the Bible’s James 2:17 that: “Faith without works, is dead”.
For me, this means often acting upon what I believe is right even while knowing it might not work out. But, no matter where those actions take me, I’ll still be there, in the new situation, for better or worse, and I can then make any necessary course-correcting adjustments.
An old man once told me: “I had an opinion, and I did something, or went somewhere, and my opinion changed.”
I took that to mean: Strive to do what’s right even when all looks hopeless and keep an open mind.
5.) The Law of Responsibility: Our lives are of our own doing, nothing else.
My kid gave me a book that was assigned to them for an extra-curricular club at college. It was: “Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win” by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. The authors were two Navy SEALS involved in Iraq’s Battle of Ramadi (2005-2006).
In essence, the two former soldiers have parlayed their military leadership skills into a consulting business that helps corporate professionals and titans of industry succeed. The strategies could be summarized as: take ownership, prioritize, work the problem, keep it simple, and provide best-scenario solutions instead of excuses or complaints.
Whenever leaders don’t take responsibility, or when they make excuses or blame others, failure is almost always assured. But what about us as leaders of our own lives?
Are you in a good place? What could be better? Why would it be better?
As with some of the other laws covered heretofore, all too often we are willing to trade our own autonomy and goals for the pyrrhic pleasure of blaming others for our defeat. How often do we wish to project our pride when we make mistakes, rather than owning those errors and missteps.
Seriously, if we don’t own our mistakes how are we going to honestly fix them?
One of my breakfast buddies asked me one time: “Would you rather be right? Or have peace?”
I told him that’s like choosing popularity over honesty and he smiled because I had just made his point.
In most scenarios, victory is a team effort and this means we must, at times, set aside our own egos to learn the lessons from our own failures. But, first, we must acknowledge our mistakes when we make them. This way we can, then, seek an accord with others rather than projecting on to them in order to protect our own pride. In so doing, people will respect us more as having skin in the game and will, generally, meet us more than half-way in seeking mutual success.
6.) The Law of Connection: Everything you do is somehow connected
For this law in the video posted above, it speaks to the past, present, and future as being connected and how our future is determined by our previous actions.
But for me, this Law of Connection manifests as ripples in the pond. Which is, in essence, cause and effect. I’ve written before how this is like throwing a rock into a smooth body of water, the action (throwing the rock) creates a splash (consequence) that in turn releases ensuing vibrations (reactions) that ripple across the allegorical pond; which, I believe, represents the fabric of space-time.
Is it random? Perhaps. Much of cause and effect may be arbitrary, but not in every scenario – because, quite often, throwing the rock starts with a decision, or choice.
Consider this very post. I started a blog, wrote an article and someone, in return, e-mailed me back a video regarding the treachery of billionaires. Then, someone else posted another article and, in the commentary, I found another video regarding the 12 laws of karma.
Just like I used to ask my kids: “Have ya’ ever noticed how everything always starts with words?”
It’s because language connects. And the lifeblood of any relationship is communication. Words are like rocks because they make ripples. Additionally, the fabric of space-time transcends our earthly matrix.
7.) The Law of Focus: You cannot think of two things at the same time.
This law speaks to prioritizing, choosing what is most important, and then focusing on what truly matters.
Therefore, for me, this often becomes a matter of ideological proximity, so to speak. Or, rather, stepping back and seeing the big picture.
Many people engage in more than enough doublethink to make George Orwell blush in his grave. Obviously, this is in reference to Orwell’s book “1984” where doublethink is defined as contemplating two opposing thoughts at once. For example, I was talking to a guy recently who had asked for my help. He told me he started drinking heavily because of his fear of mortality after his brother died. But, now, he was homeless and told me he was contemplating suicide.
So I asked him: “Well, which is it?”
This is why sometimes we need awareness beyond our own thinking – even if it is another’s opinion or fresh perspectives from multiple people.
In my own life, all too often, I find that I am too close to the situation to understand it fully. I just can’t see it clearly and feel like an eye surgeon trying to perform an optical procedure on myself.
The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 13:1:
…In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.
Personally, I often seek the counsel of neutral parties. Two is better than one and three is better than two. In so doing, at least in my own experience, this acts like the triangulation of a global positioning device (GPS) – keeping me right side up and on point out here in outer space.
Today, when others seek my help, I can truly say that I have removed the plank from my own eye, in order to clearly see the speck in theirs (Matthew 7:5).
Although the above video refers to focusing on “positive emotions, development, and goals”, I prefer to meditate upon actual principles like honesty, hope, and courage.
8.) The Law of Giving and Hospitality: Demonstrating our selflessness shows true intentions.
In the video, it says: “It is impossible to have a belief that wouldn’t reflect in our actions” and that “truthfully, our actions are surer proof that we really believe”.
And this has been my experience as well. Through the years, I’ve come to realize that money and material possessions are not an end to themselves. They are, rather, a means. Honestly, I don’t care for money any longer beyond my daily bread and the support of those whom I love. And, in turn, I’ve found that the following are paradoxes of (what some might label as) spiritual awareness:
1.) We don’t find ourselves until we lose ourselves.
And
2.) When we give, we receive.
These can’t be faked, however, because when we do, our willpower diminishes over time. But when it’s real, we expand. Something flows through. I don’t know where it comes from or where it ends. It’s like the wind.
9.) The Law of Presence: One cannot be present if they are looking backward, or, for that matter, forward.
I’ve heard it said, and as I’ve written before, serenity is when the mind and body are in the same place and in the same time. This is why so many 12-step programs focus on cleaning up one’s past. Because when people feel guilt or shame or regret from their past, it causes anxiety in the present, and fear for the future. No wonder so many people self-medicate. Our thoughts kill us. Such pain. This explains why people shoot themselves in the head. To stop their thoughts. And it’s also why they choke their noggins off with a noose or drown their minds in pills and booze.
But the past is gone and the future is not here yet. There is only now and it is a gift. That’s why it’s called the present. When we get out of our own way, we can have awareness in this moment. This can tell us we’re fine right now: We’re clothed, we have a bed, we’re not hungry, and we’re surrounded by others who care about us. “Hey! Things could be worse.”
Is the proverbial glass half-empty or full? It depends upon where we look. The happiest people in life have gratitude in the moment.
10.) The Law of Change: History repeats itself, unless changed.
The above video on this law addresses the following: Choice, chance, and change; and while indirectly parsing the separation between wishing and doing.
Again, in my own life, I’ve discovered that a well-worn path is a rut. Knowing, or even worse, knowing better, is never enough. We must walk the walk, instead of talking the talk.
We’ve all heard the definition of “insanity” as doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. That is, indeed, crazy.
Therefore, we must honestly assess the defining trends in our life, then decide, and then begin each new journey by the very first step.
11.) The Law of Patience and Reward: Nothing of value is created without a patient mindset.
We’ve also heard the axiom of “genius” as being “1% inspiration and 99% perspiration”. Even when people work out to get in shape, it doesn’t happen overnight. On the contrary, it takes time and perspiration. And we perspire only as we are persistent.
Don’t give up. In fact, never give up. And if we don’t fall prey to false expectations then we won’t be disappointed. This day is sufficient for your troubles. Life by the yard is hard, but by the inch, it’s a cinch. Sure, bad things happen to good people, but this too shall pass. And when going through hell, keep on going.
Pardon all the clichés, but there is truth in each. The main point is this: All too often, people quit right before the harvest; before the magic happens.
Don’t be those people. Stay the course. You got this.
12.) The Law of Significance and Inspiration: The best reward is one that contributes to the whole.
The video acknowledges the similarity of this law with the first law (of sowing and reaping) but differentiates between the two as follows:
Whereas the first law is focused on the individual, this law focuses on the “collective effects of actions” as contributing to society overall and the world in general.
Which, again, reflects back on the previously-described conception of ripples in the pond.
How do we change the world? One mind at a time.
——-Conclusion——-
I have a friend named Daryl who likes to say: “Religion is for people afraid of going to hell. But spirituality is for people who’ve been there.”
Whether rich or poor, or between the two, there are those who seek to fill the inner void by serving others, or by serving themselves. There are selfish people who are impoverished even as the earth is populated by charitable billionaires. But if money is power, and power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely… well… then the dirty tricks of rich men can last only for so long. Because, in the end, the karma of cause and effect dictates that they will reap what they have sown; as death comes for us all.
So what will remain? Certainly not the winners who sowed to the wind with their fiat cash, mansions, boats, bullets, and bombs.
Perhaps spirituality is an appreciation for that which is larger than our own thinking. In this sense, learning is akin to awakening – or going beyond our own thoughts toward something bigger. Larger, even, than the matrix.
A “skeleton key” defined is “a key with nearly the whole substance of the bit filed away so that it may open various locks.”
What if we were like that? Like when our mode of thinking is filed away to the point we become aware of connections, similarities, and patterns, with an ability to see code like Neo in the Matrix movie. What if the “key” were open-mindedness, or curiosity, or love, or, even, the physics of karma? Would we see more?
I certainly don’t have all the answers but I do wonder if it’s like that for so many of us “outside looking in” and quite often while missing the larger view.
Saying “I don’t know” requires a certain humility, and I wonder if that’s where awareness begins for most folks.
I saw the following on a meme several months ago and I really liked it. It said: “The quieter I become, the more I hear“.
Common sense? Maybe.
Or perhaps it’s more than that.
Reality Check 