Hands Across The Bandsaw

I happened to catch a pretty good show on TV last night, called Bar Karma. A lot of it you just kind of take for granted- okay, this is the way it works. The show centers around a bar, in which people discuss their decisions and subsequent consequences of decisions- karma, in other words, as well as how to change that karma. Well, that's kind of a misleading idea- once karma has been established, you don''t actually get to change it. Actions always have consequences, so once something is set in motion, it's possible to deflect it or even perhaps counteract it, but never stop it. There was a story about a madman-turned-monk who still had some negative karma to burn off from killing a ton of people. But, however, the perception of karma can also be changed, as the madman realized what was happening was only karma, and that it could be a positive experience, or at least one to learn from.

At any rate, the point being, the decisions we make in the present do have consequences- at this point we are able to affect the course of events- not in the past, which has already occurred, or in the future, where the decisions we make in the present will play out. It's an interesting idea, though. At one point in the show the bartender tries to explain the choices we make with a deck of cards. He points out, spreading the cards out Vegas-style in a row, that this is how most people view their lives- a linear series of events. But this, he goes on to say, is how it really works, as the cards all stand up on their edge, looking like dominoes. Each event has possibilities, stemming off of it. Each potential is there, as is each actual decision, which then becomes the reality we experience, along with its consequences. Had we chosen differently, any of a number of these other branches would then have become our reality. Interesting, but confusing. Nonetheless, it's interesting to consider how free will factors in here. Do we have free will? Well, yes and no. We are free to choose within confines- the consequences of past actions lead to a new set of choices at each juncture. You could no more get out of this than you could fight against the Devil- well, I should clarify and say the Christian Devil. On a tangent, I never understood that, but always kind of liked this Lucifer. Here's a guy, God's right hand man, or whatever he is, who doesn't like the way God's running shop. (Free will?) Who knows, he might have gone ahead, dropped a couple cards in the suggestion box, but no dice. Screw this, he says, I can run a better multiverse than this joker. So off he goes- he would rather be free and cast out of heaven than be safe therein serving a purpose his heart was not in. True, he could have just been the rampant egomaniacal dink that the Church would have us believe, but I can still see the principle here. Almost shades of Henry David Thoreau here- I will not submit to nor recognize any authority I do not explicitly consent to serving.

Now that I've gotten off on a tangent, I'll try and tie it all together- we ourselves are not immune from cause and effect- it seems no one is. This, I think, is perhaps the universal law- if there is an omnipotent God, it would seem he decided to mechanize (so to speak) some of the universe, creating an immutable machine-like system of cause and effect. Is this where magic (magick?) comes from? The fact that every action creates ripples in the world, resulting in change that might not otherwise have been there if that action had not been taken? Perhaps so. Perhaps the universe simply hangs together because that's the way it is. Whatever the case may be, don't give up hope- if every action has consequences, the greatest and only sin we can commit is to waste the time we've been given.