If, as Lama Marut says, old bad karma is stored in the always shifting, impossible to capture, present mind, then being a fiction writer is the only way to change things. Wow. So, if what we think of as fact - "I had a bum deal in this life." is what is making us suffer, then why not change the story to "I have had a fantastic life."?
I am trying this on many levels. The old "fake it 'til you make it" thing is the name of the game. Do you notice that when someone asks you "How are you?" and you answer "great!" the whole scene brightens? It just does. The other thing you might notice is that the person asking really doesn't want to hear all the miserable details of your suffering and will work very hard to top you with their own suffering. Do you really want to go there?
Then you are in what I used to call 'The Pain Sweepstakes'. There used to be a show on TV called 'Queen for a Day'. On this show women would come on and tell their misery, like a bad country-western song; "I lost the house, my husband is sick, the cat has worms, I had my wallet stolen, my mother lives with us and won't eat" and so on. Then when all the contestants had told their stories, they would line up and the audience would cheer and the applausometer would register who got the most applause. Then, the host would put a red cape and a crown on that woman and give her red roses and she would beam and be given her prize. The grand prize was often a new washing machine or mix-master!
We are a little like that. Why do we think it is better to win the 'The Pain Sweepstakes' than to talk about the endless miracles that we experience everyday? I am thinking about this and experimenting with it. Does this square with your experience?
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