Karma vs. The attempt to be successful?

What is it really worth to make your life on the backs of others?

I, like many, get by thinking that I'm kinda helping, but knowing deep down that it's not enough. There is a sort of emptiness provided by the powers that be. It could be your boss, your dad, your sibling, your town, your friends. When it becomes apparent that you are working for someone else's success, do you move on? Or what?

Strength can be obtained through stability. So you stay. And never achieve what you could.

Or, you say your piece and be cast out as a threat for being outspoken, or whatever the easiest hit can made upon you?

Politics.

Should your perceived talent be limited when your actual abilities exceed others? If you make one enemy, are they the one to choose how your future should go? Can they ally more against you?

I say this, because, I was one to be nonconformist. I was pretty blunt. It worked with alot of folks and they tended to be older. Any younger folks tend to get offended by being slighted in the least. And there are people who just don't like you.

When people rise to any position, it begs a question of how they got there. If they actually deserve the role, or are they just a faceman willing. If you are that person willing to take a position worthy of the hate and scorn, and be a victim of sudden unpopularity, who should you cry to? Or throw under the bus?

This is my thought upon life. Right vs. Wrong.

I had an experience... My brother started a fight and was overwhemingly defeated. He came back and stabbed me proper. 38 stitches later, and a real numbness in my left hand, I still fought him off with a little help. I helped him out and he was able to go on with his life. Life against death or confinement? Karma comes into play.

FastForward 13 years... My brother has wormed his way back into my life. He still needed my help, and still proclaimed to all else that he was protecting his lil' bro. When his attempt to rise above approached...
He took over my life, and stole it. Property and everything. Oh, and made me a felon accused of domestically strangling him. When he started it all and had a witness. I heard him and his gf talk about it before, but I didn't believe it, at all.

Now, back to the Right versus Wrong. Of course, you are allowed to make judgement calls. Should you go so far as to cripple another with your decisions?

This is a simplistic version of the world, with an example, Yet, is there catharsis?

Does physical possession of property equate a need to be 'so-called' better than another?

Competition is one thing, we teach the kids that.

We teach the world different.

My question is: Can you succeed by being a good person by way of doing things that will benefit other people, or do you need to ______?

This world is not here for you to succeed as an individual. You are beginning to see that you are here, and possess the mental abilities that give you hindsight/foresight/intuition because you have a job to do. Do you really need the materialistic things that make you "successful" or is it inner peace that quells that feeling more than actively reaching for it?

To me success is peace of mind. Peace of mind is not found by actively searching, it is pulled to you through physics similar to magnetism. Focus on your inner peace, and allow that inner peace to pull the positive things to you like gravity.

This for some reason reminds me of the song Dogs by pink floyd.

I am sorry to hear of your struggles do to those circumstances. For many reasons peoples idea of success is having a # ton of material security. Don't they know in 100 years it will be dust?

Well apparently not as we can see the rat eat rat mentality. i don't necessarily agree with the survival of the fittest dogma. It's pretty animal like and those aware enough of the cyclical destructive nature of it don't really get sucked into it. Society has a great way of manipulating you unawares through what the majority of people believe to be normalcy. It's so funny. wealth is egomania and the earth that buries you alive is the hammer deflating the idea of superiority. We're all dead already, so lets live constructively and not destructively, as our future inhabitants will reap what we're sowing.

and in the end you'll pack up,
fly down south,
hide your head in the sand.
just another sad old man,
all alone,
dying of cancer.

and that is usually the end of a "successful" life.

reply to post by chadderson


I agree, and you are right.

Peace can only begin inside. Still, how to recompense for others? When that is accomplished, is that success? Or, just karma?

Tough question, I know.

reply to post by jvm222

Survival of the fittest... Cockroaches will survive our next "nukular' war, gas, and torpedoes. Biologicals have an even better rate of survival.

Maybe we should vote a cockroach or even a bacteriological infection into the white house.

Politics, right?

I think what I really want to ask is: Do you wanna live for this life, or hope for the next?

reply to post by dfens


Im not sure what you mean by recompense to others. You are only responsible for you. Be a beacon and radiate for other people but realize only 50% will respond in a positive manner while the others will be negative.

The kicker is, karma and how it influences this. If you are radiating you are going to be shown those that are positively responding rather than negatively, more often than not. You will still encounter negativity but this is only to solidify your foothold on your new mental/spiritual 'plateau'.

If your intentions are positive, you will be shown more positive things. Negativity always tries to get you to turn around and look back, or to change your direction... but stay true to yourself. This is so hard in today's society.

reply to post by chadderson


I see what what you are trying to convey. Yet, this life wants you to get over on the next one.

I play for the next team. If that makes any sense.

It is hard to try your best for people who will sell you out in a minute. Chalk most up in that category.

Time seems to be immaterial.

reply to post by dfens
We can live for who we are. Some may live for who they were and to varying degrees I suppose we all do. I like living for who I am becoming and who I am becoming is who I will be with or without a " next life"

reply to post by dfens


I personally achieve a level of balance in my life. Obviously, it is every persons duty to look after the needs of his family and friends, because without these crucial close societal bonds, societies would be dangerously close to total loss of cohesion. However, at the same time as working to enable the continuation of our small family business, contribute to the ability of myself, my mother, and our business partners ability to eat and so on, I also make it my business to look out for people.

I am a locksmith, so my customers (who are pretty much all from the neighborhood in which I grew up) trust me with thier home security. It is my job to assess thier premises, ensure that thier security arrangements are up to the current industry standards, and make recomendations which would improve the over all security of thier dwellings, business premises, off site storage facilities, vehicles, and even thier suitcases. Now, although we are a small family business, and cannot afford to purchase materials and equipment in bulk, we have a policy on prices for work we do and sales we make, which basically places us amongst the cheapest operators in our area, despite our maintaining a retail premises (which is very expensive). We decided very early on, that our practice should be about maintaining high standards of customer service and satisfaction, while doing everything we can to keep our prices for the sort of vital work we do, as low as possible.

You see, me and my mother have both lived in squalor before. Heck, we are no where near properly solvent as it is financially, even now, after running a business for about a decade now. We are working class folk, who know precisely what it is like to need vital infrastructural work undertaken, but have no means of paying the extortionate rates being asked. Thats why we have the cheapest labour by the hour rate of any of our local competitors, and cut keys at the cheapest rate of any honest to goodness locksmith (rather than say a cobbler with delusions of mechanical engineering knowledge, who also cut keys, just really badly), within a twenty mile radius of our shop. We wouldnt be able to stand in front of the mirror in the morning, and look ourselves square in the eye, if we just rinsed every job for all its worth, because we are honest folk, and thats not the way we want to operate.

We could have had all the money we would need for the rest of our days if we had been more mercenary with our prices, and were the sort to go round putting superglue in locks for instance, but thats just not our way.

Along with the responsibility we take on, for the security of our customers, the trust placed in us by our customers, we also feel a sense of moral and ethical obligation toward our fellow traders on our road. When the local jewlery store got robbed, my collegue and I chased off the robbers (nearly caught the bastards too! Just eight feet away when they jumped in thier car!), sprinting two hundred yards in the process, and relaying information to the police the whole way. We were able to get on thier tails because when I stand out front of our shop having a cup of tea and a cigarette, I am not just passing the time between customers in plesant solitude and contemplation. I have my eyes on gimbals, always looking to ensure the continued saftey and security of my friends, neighbors and fellow traders, and because of that, I spotted the thieves going in. I was the only person outside that jewlery store who knew what the hell was happening, because I have my eye on things. If things kick off down my road, I am first on the scene, and last off it, because I am damned if I am letting people I care about suffer if theres something I can do to prevent it.

And you know, its nothing to do with Karma for me. I have been dumped on by life, and normally the thing that allows that, is everyone elses indifference. I am making a stand for myself, by saying no matter what happens to me, I will never abandon someone I could have saved some grief, to a fate they have no control over. If that means I care too much to make a "success" out of myself, then that is a price I will gladly pay, for being able to sleep at night, a price I am happy to pay to know that I am doing all I can to ensure the well being of folk around me. I love my job, but I also love the duty which having a pulse and a heart beat places about my shoulders. Offering protection and care to the people of my town, and wherever I go may not be in my job description, but I believe it is my duty as a human being, one that I refuse to shirk for the sake of convienience.