You can always choose—and choose again. No matter what happens, you can choose to start over. My positive psychology teacher often said, "choose to choose."

This philosophy aligns with how Deepak Chopra teaches us to change our karma. Karma can be thought of as the momentum of your daily choices. It's not something that happens to you; it's something that happens through you. You can change the momentum of your karma by consciously making new choices—again and again.

When yogis say that your life is your karma, they mean that your life experience is entirely up to you. How you experience anything is 100% your choice. But for this to make sense, it’s necessary to believe that life begins within you, not out there. As the yogis teach, the outer world is a reflection of your inner world.

Another way to think about karma is as a memorized pattern—positive or negative.

Personal Story: My Dad's Legacy
My dad recently passed away and was a registered organ donor. His eyes were donated to help two other people see better. As he lived, his eyes memorized people, places, and things, layering them with meaning—positive or negative. His eyes had developed karma (or memory) that influenced his experience of life. But once those eyes no longer belonged to my dad, all the experiences were “erased,” and the eyes, as organs, were neutral again. His memories did not transfer to the recipients.

Like my dad’s eyes, life is beautiful—but neutral. We memorize the meaning. You have yours, and I have mine.

Karma as an Agent of Freedom

You can change your experiences and your karma by changing your choices. Karma is action, often understood as cause and effect. But too often, we focus only on the effect, which is the past. It shows you where you’ve been focused and what you believed so far. Your power to shape your present and future lies within the cause.

Yet many people feel stuck and continue to look outward for the freedom that can only reside in their choices.

Choices include your focus, attention, beliefs, thoughts, actions, relationships, and more. You have so much freedom—maybe too much sometimes.

Dolly Parton said, "you can't control the wind but you can adjust the sails." Choices are your sails. You can adjust them anytime and change your karma.

I know it's not always easy. I wish it were. I get stuck sometimes too. I am dealing with some big stuff right now in my marriage and with my extended family. And I lost my dad three months ago and just spent my first Father's Day without him. So I get it. It's not always easy to choose something new when life seems to be showing us something else.

But when I remember that my choices are my most powerful tool in shaping my life experience positively or negatively, I get up and try again.

This may mean taking an action that is scary or thinking in a new way, but it's all possible, and that gives me hope.

Pay Attention

Notice where you feel stuck or stressed. Write down anything and everything you have control over. Remember Dolly’s quote? You have 100 percent control over the sails, not the wind. If you keep trying to control the wind, you’ll create more karma of frustration, blame, anxiety, fear, and so on. When you learn to control the sails, you’ll have a much smoother and more enjoyable journey.

Choose to Choose

From your list, choose one thing you have 100 percent control over. Take more responsibility for what you can change by committing to one new step, thought, belief, behavior, action, or attitude that you can repeat until you create momentum and begin to experience a new outcome. When you work at the cause or source of something, you are learning to use karma as a creative agent for more freedom and joy. I am still learning this—it’s a practice.

Simultaneously accept life as it is right now. Choose to be content and see the good, even as you seek to create a new outcome and practice making a new choice. Appreciation goes a long way in creating a better life experience!

Karma is something that is already happening, so learning to work with it is worth the practice.

With love,

Joy