Karma, the unseen balance

As a child, I was inconsolable when my new footwear, left outside a temple, went missing. Those around me tried to comfort me with the phrase “bala talli", suggesting that any misfortune coming my way had instead passed on to the person who took my slippers. Even then, the idea felt unconvincing. I remember wondering—if misfortune could be so easily redirected, why not simply leave things behind for others to take and cleanse our destiny? I was told that would only count as generosity, perhaps earning karmic merit.

Years later, I see that moment differently. Karma is not a ledger where outcomes can be reassigned at will. Good and bad are not detachable; they are bound together, two sides of the same coin.

A small incident captures this truth. One festival morning, a man passing a sweet shop noticed trays of freshly made laddoos. The shop worker was momentarily distracted, and the street was empty. Temptation won. He took a tray home, and his family enjoyed the unexpected treat. By the next day, however, all of them were struck with a severe stomach infection. What began as a moment of indulgence turned into days of suffering and mounting medical expenses. 

He later learned that other customers who had legitimately purchased sweets from the same shop had also fallen ill—but they were compensated by the shopkeeper, who sought to preserve his reputation. The man who had stolen the laddoos bore the full cost alone. What he had gained without right also denied him the possibility of redress.

The episode reflects a broader truth: the benefits we receive are inseparable from the conditions that produce them. Even inherited wealth carries not only material advantage but also the unseen imprint of how it was acquired.

This principle finds resonance in the story of Krishna’s death. Though he upheld dharma in the Mahabharata, he could not escape the grief caused to Gandhari. Her curse eventually led to his death at the hands of a hunter. In that moment, Krishna is said to have accepted it as destiny—even the divine are not spared of the inevitable unfolding of cause and effect.

Karma, then, is not something we can pass on or avoid. It is something we inherit, create, and ultimately live through – whole and indivisible.