Thoughts On Compensation....

Compensation. It is a word with multiple meanings. Compensation can be pay, or a just reward for an action. Compensation can be a making up for a lack or weakness. Compensation can be a neutralization, such as an equal and opposite reaction to every action.

I think that the principle of Compensation is alive in the universe, in the world around us, and in our own individual lives. And I think that all three senses of the word mentioned above apply.

"Mythbusters" is a favorite television show in our house. In a recently screened episode the scientists worked to determine if two bodies (automobiles, in this case) colliding with eachother head-on, each traveling 50 mph resulted in a force equal to one car hitting a solid object (wall) at 100 mph. The initial thought was, yes, the forces would be cumulative. My intuition said the same thing.

However a small body of viewers asserted that the "equal and opposite" clause would result in a compensating force that would make the collision similar to a single car hitting a solid object at 50 mph.

They were correct. Nature compensated for the additional speed of impact and yielded a force that was equivalent to the second car, speeding at 50 mph into a head-on collision, simply standing still.

Our bodies compensate for weaknesses by developing dominant eyes, hands, feet, and brain hemispheres. We can compensate for an injury by using different muscles or body parts to perform routine tasks while we heal. Over the long term our bodies can alter their skeletal and muscular structure to compensate for and overcome permanent damage. I know a pilot who was shot down over North Viet Nam. While ejecting from his aircraft his back was broken in several places. Over years in a prison camp, without medical attention, the muscles along his spine grew stronger, providing support for the broken bones, until his bones fused back together.

In free market economies we see the price of labor, goods, and services rise or fall to their natural levels, with the producers of such resources compensated justly, or fairly for their added value. This happens without intervention by governments or other outside forces.

I think that there is also a metaphysical or spiritual law of compensation at work in the universe. The Preacher in Ecclesiastes said, "Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days." In other words, we will reap what we sow in this world. The compensation may not be immediate; note the Preacher's use of the words "after many days." But it is sure.

And I don't think that needs to be a scary thing. In fact, it ought to be a hopeful and a happy thing for us. To know that Nature and the Universe are aware of the things we do, the thoughts we have, the hopes we carry in our hearts; and that They will compensate us for them, help us see them to fruition, give us the end product of them should give us great encouragement.

As Saint James taught, as surely as a fig tree bears figs, or an olive tree bears olives, we can be assured that our thoughts and hopes and wishes for good in the world will lead to good in the world and to our compensation with good in our lives.

And just as a tree cannot bear fruit without first producing a blossom, so we must produce that first blossom of goodness if we wish to see goodness return to us. Yet the fruit tree does not bloom of its own accord. The tree blossoms because Nature made it possible and Nature endowed it with the power to bloom. So with us; we cannot do good of our own power, but Nature has given us Its power to do good, and when we use the power for good that Nature bestowed on us we can hope for the eventual return of goodness' fruit to us in our lives.

Even the thought, or the desire is sufficient for us to begin to reap the benefit of goodness. And as we reap that benefit and feel its influence in our lives we come to know that the law of compensation is working for us. And we often come to desire more good, hence we do more good, hence we reap more good.

The cycle of virtue and goodness in the universe is an encouraging one. It is a hopeful one. It is one that shows a pattern to follow that has the ultimate potential of curing all the world's ills. As we think and act in goodness toward others, it tempers them and leads them to think and act in goodness toward yet others. And so on, and so on, until neighborhoods are changed, then communities are changed, then cities, then states, then entire nations are affected by goodness to act in goodness and virtue one with another.

You may say I'm a dreamer; but I'm not the only one. I hope one day you will join us, and the world will live as one.