Earl is just a regular guy whose life doesn't really go anywhere, and can't be counted as successful by anyone's standards: Even as a criminal, he never really makes a name for himself. The title of the show alone, My Name Is Earl, suggests an existentitial kind of frustration or a devotee of my own fake religion.

 

Then, Earl discovers karma, or at least his own cockeyed version of karma. From what I can tell, Earl's idea of karma (like most everyone else's) can take three different forms:

 

At times, Earl almost seems to view karma as something like an individual, a mind or consciousness that he seems to pray to. Karma recognizes you, blesses you or withholds blessings, it requires things of you, it can be reasoned and communicated with.

 

I guess if you think of karma this way, as God, then blessings and good fortune are things you earn and things you deserve, and I can see why some folks would be attracted to a notion like this. My problem with this way of thinking is that it would leave you either thinking that you'll never get rained on, or blaming yourself if you do.

 

Some folks seem to think of karma as a kind of cosmic open-air market, where good deeds and compassion are currency, and you can buy and sell your own luck. Like, if I help someone I can expect something good to happen to me, even years later or miles away or completely unrelated. If I buy girl scout cookies from an orphan, then I can expect someone to help me change my flat tire three years later because my karma is good. It alters the laws of probability and while I don't necessarilly buy it, I have to concede that (like most spiritual things) you can't prove or disprove it.

 

And let me qualify that, too, because I'm not saying that I don't think it can actually work this way. I think compassion and selflessness are like energy in that they move around, from person to person, and that even a little bit is good. But I don't believe that getting things back for our compassion should be our motivator. That's self-serving, it's trying to buy your way into Heaven, or buying your own prosperity.

 

You can smile at someone and they're more likely to smile back, and you can be kind to someone who doesn't deserve it, and odds are that they'll do the same to someone else even if it's someone you don't see. And even if they don't, someone else may notice what you do and they'll follow your example. The Buddha's First Noble Truth is that suffering exists, and that when we acknowledge it and act with loving kindness, we reduce the amount of suffering that there is in the universe. Like dominoes or the Genesis Device in that Star Trek movie or some giant, cosmic Rube Goldberg Device, compassion spreads out in unexpected directions. And it's not self-serving, except maybe in the sense that the more kindly you act, the more you peceive kindness in others. You act, expecting nothing in return.

 

You might call it energy, except that energy, like matter, is limited. Energy burns itself out. Compassion and kindness can conceivably continue on in ever-widening circles, forever.

 

On My Name Is Earl, karma can mean any of these things or all of them at once and it can be confusing. In reality, I like to think of karma as more like the third than the other two. Karma is the sum total of your existence, all that you are. It's how "The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son" (Ezekiel 18:20), and reaping what you sow.

 

At its heart, though, I think it's a show about a guy just trying to be a better person.

 

 

Earl's List