Good Karma Music Stories

I like to forget my good actions immediately after I’ve performed some. One summer night, 6:00 p.m. or so, I was returning from the gym. At that time, I lived together with my parents and had no job at all. Professional future was nothing but a wander. It´s very usual up here for many people to taste some smelling hot coffee with a sandwich at night, instead of dining.So, I was coming back home from an exercises routine and, halfway, under a roof with a huge hole in, inside an abandoned house´s dirty and stinky garage, there stood that old couple, forgotten by mankind, dressed in rags. I’ve seen animals best treated than that old couple. But, despite all the poverty on this huge world, there seemed to be love between that poor old man and that humble lady, there in that absence of any material comfort, two people left astray from the so called “civilized society” which was supposed to aid them in their old age. Promptly, I decided to go home, prepare some hot tasty coffee and a juicy sandwich, and rushed to that poor stinky spot in order to still try to find them laying around. For my happiness, both of them were still there and the light in her eyes, when I gave her that fresh tasty meal in a cold night is worth more than a million thank you´s.

I used to live in Rotterdam. Frequently I took a stroll in the busy shopping streets in the Rotterdam Centrum. There often I pass by a homeless person. Frequently I (try to) to talk to him, in the hope of understanding his situation. Unfortunately his story was often incoherent, despite my best efforts.This one time, it was very late and dark. And definitely pass dinner time. I saw this homeless person again and I thought by myself “How should I help him?”. I don’t want to give him money. You never know how he will spend the money (drugs?).So I asked him if he was hungry, which he replied yes. Then I asked him what he wanted to eat. I offered him to go to a Chinese restaurant (and there were very good ones in Rotterdam.) He said he was satisfied with having a McDonald meal. After I gave him the take away, I went home. I gave him food to fill his stomach. He gave me the chance to Paramita Dana.

Just after moving to a new home my wife and I notice that the neighbors had a very noisy labrador retriever that used to bark and mourn constantly. After sone days we visited them realized that the dog was recovering from broken his leg months ago and his owners were afraid of walking him since then (he used to scape from the dog-collar, eventually he was hit by a bus), that is why he was so noisy and anxious. So we volunteer to walk him. We have been doing that for the last weeks and got very happy with our new friend.

I wanted to get the CD so I decided to do some acts of kindness until I had a story to share. First I gave money to three homeless people with eye contact and a heartfelt blessing. That seemed pretty easy. Someone saw the response of one of the recipients and told me that I made her happy. Maybe I helped to inspire that passerby to be generous, too. Then I gave leftover food I was planning for the next day’s lunch to another homeless person. He seemed very hungry.The Rev. Heng Sure told a group that there are three types of giving: material (money, food, etc); courage and dharma.My courage story is that I met with a student from Hong Kong who is studying at an American University. He is interested in the field of sustainability (in which I work). I gave him advice for how to grow his contacts and his vision of what he wants to do and told him to keep me updated every few months. That felt like a true gift of attention, my time and my knowledge and some inspiration for him to fulfill his life’s dreams.My dharma story is that I am working to transform my anger against those who are blocking policy on energy and climate change that could accelerate the transition to a low-carbon economy and could help humanity to learn to live with a lighter footprint. I absorbed the advice to separate the policy from the person and to be able to love all beings as divinely connected. I also get that coming from anger (and hatred and rage) leads to half-baked messages. My dharma act will be to tell the truth as I see it, not holding back for fear that people can’t handle the truth about what we are doing to our planetary life support systems and the consequences that humanity (and our brethren living beings) will have to endure over millenia to come. I will speak this truth from a place of love, as well as urgency and passion. And with the intention of building bridges between where people are now and where we can go together, building a future based on love, as well as science and commerce.Thank you for your beautiful music and your message of wisdom and walking each step with mindfulness and intention.

Once, there was a huge black spider with long feet on the wall of my room, but, instead of feeling disgusted and smashing it with a broom, I quickly played a buddhist song in my laptop, hoping that the mantra would make the spider more compassion and it would eventually stop frightening me. When I paid no more attention to the spider for a few minutes, I looked back at the wall and the spider was nowhere to be found. I am so glad that I did not take its life.

This is an odd time to be thinking about the Paramita songs because I’m currently taking part in the 8 precepts which inhibits listening to music, but I suddenly remembered I don’t have the songs anymore and wanted them 😛 About a year ago, I lived a five minute drive from school and the “Be Green” fad was at a major peak. All of a sudden, it was the cool thing to be green (not that it’s a bad thing), so I was surrounded by people consistently preaching environmental awareness. Well, it worked; I wanted to be more environmentally friendly, so I decided I’d start taking the bus. I figured since there was a bus station across the street on the street that my school was on, it’d go there.. right? Nope. I looked up directions on Google maps and it said I needed to walk a mile to the closest bus station. I almost did it until I thought, “Wait, how far away is the school?” So, I looked up the walking directions and found the school was only 1.6 miles away. I thought it was ridiculous to walk a mile to save .6 miles, so I just ended up walking to school on non-rainy days. I suppose that broke the habit of relying on my car and now I’m a public transport frequenter. And on the bus, train, or lightrail, I constantly get the chance to observe random acts of kindness that help inspire me to be a good person.

Thursday after noon, at East Pacific Mall in El Cerrito, CA while loading grocery into our car, I heard my wife’s voice behind me. “Let me help you.” I turned around. An old woman was struggling with a 50lbs rice bag into the trunk of her car, parking next to ours. My wife helped her lift the heavy bag into place. The woman walked toward the passenger side of her car. I opened and hold the door for her. As she got into the car she said something I could not understand. However, I could not help seing a young man in the driver seat, reading a newspaper.