The Karma Chronicles.. the Super Bowl & Chase Blackburn

February 9, 2012

Karma is a central subject of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad Geeta. In Geeta 4-17, Śrī Kṛṣṇa says:
गहना कर्मणो गतिः (gahanaa karmaNo gatiH) "imponderable is the nature (path) of action."

The word karma (कर्म), in Samskritam means more than just action. It also means the result of the action, whether the result is immediate, comes in the future in this lifetime or encountered in a future lifetime.

With this post, I am launching a new series, the Karma Chronicles, which will use contemporary stories to highlight the inexplicable nature of Karma. If you are a follower of the Eastern religions, this is easy to grasp. Those who're in the theistic Eastern religions (Hindu / Sikh) as well as those of the semitic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) would also attribute this to the inexplicable ways in which the Lord acts.

I came across the story of Chase Blackburn, a linebacker for the New York Giants. He was pivotal in the Giants' victory in Super Bowl XLVI. Except that Chase Blackburn almost didn't play.

After spending six seasons with the Giants, most in a reserve role, Blackburn and his wife sold their house after he was released before the 2011 season. They moved to Ohio, where he's from, to raise their two young kids. Blackburn was working out whenever he could, sometimes after dark because there are days when that's the only time a father of two babies finds to himself, but he was about to become a substitute math teacher. Why? Because his family needed the money. And because his NFL career was over.

And then, it wasn't. Two linebackers for the Giants, Michael Boley and Mark Herzlich, were injured Nov. 28 against New Orleans. The next day the Giants called Chase Blackburn in Ohio and asked, "Are you in shape?"

The rest as they say is history or as I like to say it, an episode in the Karma Chronicles.

Hari Om and Namaskaar until the next post

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