Are people who are close to me contributing to my karma? If yes, how do I deal with this?
Don’t think it is your family that needs to be cleaned up! Who knows who is suffering whose karma. Maybe they would say something else! If you feel your family is bad – they may have become like that, but they may not stay that way. They have phases like the moon. They have pleasant faces and unpleasant ones. This happens because there is a lot of proximity in a family.
Whatever happens in your life is your responsibility. That means it is your karma, your doing. When you are on the spiritual path and you utter the word “karma,” it should always refer to yourself. It is a completely wrong approach to judge someone who is going through something nasty and think it is his or her karma. You will lose your fundamental humanity. Someone else’s karma is never ever your business. It is your karma that you have to witness something unpleasant happening to another human being.
The moment you refer to someone else’s karma, you will become an evil force. Evil does not always mean by intent. Evil means you are such that no matter what you do, it will turn out negatively for people around you. The moment you start thinking about someone else’s karma, you are moving in that direction.
This is what we are trying to fix in spirituality, that you realize that no matter what happens, it is you. It happens in your life, so it is your karma. Whether you are suffering or enjoying people around you, it is your karma.
So do not worry about karma that comes from your family – there is no such thing. “Family” is only in your mind. The idea of who is your family and who is not, who is dear to you and who is not, is entirely manufactured in your mind. If you did not have a mind, the concept of family would not exist for you. That means they are your doing, your karma. You need to realize that whatever happens in your life, it is you. Once you are aware of that, you become an individual. Otherwise, you remain scattered. Because people are so scattered, so identified with so many things around them, it takes them a long time to gather themselves into one organic whole. Once that happens, what you are seeking can be yours in an instant.
What is the root cause of current menace of terrorism in the world? What are the ways to restore peace and brotherhood in the world?
Religious terrorism is a major part of the mechanism of terror today. Of all the kinds of violence, terrorism motivated by religion is the most dangerous. You can speak reason to a man who is fighting for anything else, but when a man believes he is fighting for his God, there is no reasoning with him. Those who think they are fighting for God or doing God’s work are only too eager to die and take all of us with them.
Public discourse needs to move from the politically correct stance to striving for solutions. In the very sacred texts that are purported to be the words of God, there is very strong stimulus for violence against all who do not share the belief that some have chosen or been taught to believe.
Whatever the reason these words of instigation got into sacred books, it is time that what is not suitable is expunged – God willing. We can ask, if God says nothing it wouldn’t be a crime to take it as an affirmative. Ensuring that no one needs to be a God’s soldier is the absolute need of the day. If God is almighty as one believes, he wouldn’t need puny creatures like humans to fight for him, for sure he can take care of himself.
(Sadhguru is a Yogi, mystic, visionary and a New York Times bestselling author. He is also the founder of Conscious Planet – Save Soil)
