The idea of karma is an ancient idea. Even when I was a kid, I was familiar with the saying, “What goes around comes around.” The saying served two purposes back then: first, to get me to think about what I was doing that might come back around to haunt me (which was hardly ever my first consideration), and second, to think about what others were doing to me that might come back to haunt them.
That was my preferred interpretation and consideration. It enabled me to construct revenge fantasies. Ann told me my nose was pointy—she would get hurt as much as that snippy comment hurt me. Tony called me a nerd in front of the whole bus—one day soon he would be humiliated, too. William snickered when I got emotional during the reading of Great Expectations? He’d give the world plenty to snicker about someday.
I spent a good part of my life wishing and hoping that the people in my life who’d hurt me in visible and invisible ways would get their comeuppance in the end. What goes around comes back around, I assured myself when my best friend in college spread untrue rumors about me in our circle of friends. What goes around comes back around, I told myself when a man I worked for denied me a raise because I was a mom of three kids and he said, “A woman loses her ability to work well when she has kids.” (Yes. This really happened.) What goes around comes back around, I whispered into the hurt places when a good friend from college said he hadn’t considered my husband and me friends for several years because he doesn’t associate with “aggressive feminists.”
What goes around comes back around.
It’s an uncharitable thought and hope and desperate wish. And the worst part is—I still find myself thinking and hoping and wishing it at times, even today.
This kind of thinking and wishing and hoping hinders progress. It keeps us stuck in a very small place. It keeps our hearts strangled and our minds—or at least part of them—in a kind of prison.
Relationships are tricky waters. And hurt can turn us into uncharitable people who imagine elaborate revenge fantasies of how what they did to us will eventually return to them—for better or worse (usually worse).
I don’t want to be an uncharitable person, even when I’m hurt. Or angry. Or disappointed. Or scared. I want to be a forgiving person. A person with boundaries, of course, but a person who doesn’t wish the worst on those who have done the worst to me. I want to flip the script.
Florence Scovel Shinn, an American artist, once said, “The game of life is a game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds, and words return to us sooner or later, with astounding accuracy.” I love the way she puts this, because it makes me think there’s another way to consider “what goes around comes back around.”
Reframed, it becomes: What are you putting out into the world?
This question is a much healthier (and enjoyable) one to consider, because it focuses on ourselves, not on other people. One of the frequent refrains I repeat in my house (so many times!) is, “Mind yourself.” I use it when my kids are comparing what one got to do versus what another got to do. I use it when one kid got in trouble for something and immediately said, “Well, he did it, too.” I use it when I’ve instructed them to tidy up and one wanders around the living room telling his youngest brother to clean—when he’s not cleaning, either.
“Mind yourself,” I say. If we spent half as much time minding ourselves as we spend minding other people, I tell my children, we’d probably be so much better at everything. Tidying. Loving. Living.
It’s true for us too, isn’t it? If we just minded ourselves, we’d be so much happier and wiser and more fulfilled. Comparison—gone. Fair and unfair—gone. Revenge fantasies—(mostly) gone.
What are you putting out into the world?
I know what I want to put out into the world. Love. And peace. And hope. And truth. And beauty. And wonder. Did I mention love?
It’s not easy to put these things out into the world. It’s especially not easy when our eyes are so focused on how others have it so much better than we do. Or how much they hurt us or how unfair it is that they have this amazing thing and we only have this unimpressive thing. Or how they’re such a difficult person and they’re so successful anyway.
We need to change our focus.
What are you putting out into the world?
Every day we have the opportunity to make the world better in whatever small way we can—whether it’s through our work or in our families or with a stranger in a chance encounter. If we keep this question top of mind and think about how every encounter and activity and task is an opportunity to put peace and hope and love and truth and beauty and wonder into the world, and we do our best to put peace and hope and love and truth and beauty and wonder out into the world, it will come back to us. It’s a game of boomerangs.
What are you putting out into the world?
I hope it’s beautiful.
3 ways to put love and peace and hope and love and truth and beauty and wonder out into the world.
1. Thank yous
It’s such a simple thing, and yet a thank you goes a long way. We live in such a rush-rush world; oftentimes we live under the belief that people just know we’re thankful. And while that’s sometimes the case, it’s not always. A few words go a long way. Think of someone who deserves your appreciation today. Send them a note—email or text is fine, if you’re not the snail-mail type—but a real physical note is even better.
2. A “random” act of kindness.
It doesn’t have to be random, of course. But think of some ways you can be kind to someone in your life today. Can you compliment someone on a shirt that makes their eyes shine? Share some homemade cookies with a group of teenage boys who show up at your house unannounced? Invite a neighbor over for dinner and conversation? It doesn’t have to be anything big or expensive or inconvenient, even. Just like with thank you, a little goes a long way. Let the kids have a day off chores. Pick up dinner so your partner doesn’t have to cook. Fill up a water bottle for the kid who needs hydration.
3. Use less.
This one may seem a little out of nowhere, but hear me out. We live in abundance. But there are many, many people who don’t. And when we take more than our fair share—of food, water, electricity, resources, etc, we are taking those things from the people who don’t have enough. So a way we can put love into the world is to use less. Eat less food. Use less water and electricity. Drive less and walk more. Look for ways to take care of the earth and others. (For more on this concept, I highly recommend Hope Jahren’s The Story of More.)
