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It’s not positivity, gratitude or mindfulness.
By Neeramitra Reddy — Written on May 12, 2023
As I clutched the phone, my legs turned to jelly.
My ex-girlfriend had been rushed to the nearby ER after slitting her wrist.
Giddy with hormones, I had messed up majorly with her: Zero dates. Only booty calls. On and off as I pleased. Lame excuses to break up. Bald-faced lies to get her back.
Once I broke up with her, she took to cutting herself.
Discovering the truth, her counselor aunt threatened me with serious consequences.
Mopping the sweat with my sleeve, I pleaded and entreated.
I swore I’d get back with her and treat her right — bloody lies again.
Karma never ever loses an address
2 years later, the karmic punch landed.
My super-senior, who I was drowning in love with, dumped me to fly off for her Master’s Degree.
Just as the pain started vaporizing, a smiling snap with her new boyfriend re-solidified it.
Karma had sliced open my heart — to avenge my ex slicing open her wrist.
For every lie, deception, or scam you "got away with," Karma’s silently counting.
When the day of reckoning arrives, you’ll be forced to pay back — with interest.
"When you truly understand karma, then you realize you are responsible for everything in your life." — Keanu Reeves
I’d soon recover from the breakup — but the regret of my teenage f***up would haunt me for years.
Such is the way of karma.
You can never escape yourself
How can you escape your own self?
The self that witnesses everything. The conscience that keeps you tossing in bed. The guilt that chokes your throat in the shower. The fear that makes you hear 1 AM screams. The memory that replays like a broken tape.
In the book Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky illustrates this masterfully. To quote him, "The man who has a conscience suffers whilst acknowledging his sin. That is his punishment."
This is Karma’s built-in mechanism — even if it doesn’t hit you back externally, it’ll torture you from the inside.
From "harmless" white lies to ruthless homicides, your self is always watching.
And always judging.
Don’t fall prey to societal B.S.
Society encourages dishonest niceness and frowns at real people as "rude rustics."
With slick suits and slimy smiles, the majority strut around muttering fake pleasantries.
But they are unhappy, anxious, broke, and borderline depressed.
The masses are miserable.
Honesty equals unrivaled, forever peace of mind
When you’re honest, there’s nothing to worry about — because the truth stands on its own.
Nothing to hide. No fake stories to cook and remember. No risk of embarrassment or confrontation.
Every lie forces you to utter more lies — and safeguard those lies in your mind so you can pile up even more lies when cross-questioned in the future.
"A lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the other person, condemning oneself from then on to faking the sort of reality that person’s view requires to be faked…The man who lies to the world is the world’s slave from then on." — Ayn Rand
The more you lie, the more you degrade yourself in your mind — and the more fretful you grow.
Be it a wandering Himalayan sage or a blunt Texas pear farmer, the most truthful people have the calmest minds.
Every time you’re (forced to be) dishonest, see it as a failure — and strive to be more honest and courageous next time.
This is the path to true happiness.
This is the path of forever peace of mind.
If you or somebody that you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, there is a way to get help. Call SAMHSA’s National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357) or text "HELLO" to 741741 to be connected with the Crisis Text Line.
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Neeramitra Reddy is a writer and editor of In Fitness And In Health, Wholistique, and MANXIMIZE.
This article was originally published at Medium. Reprinted with permission from the author.