I was thinking the other day how nice it would be if Karma worked like the points you earn on your credit card or like the miles you earn with the airlines. This would be nice because it would give you control over your luck. Now I don’t really need this in day to day life, but when it comes to flying it would certainly be a nice change; giving you the option to change you luck and get along a little smoother when ever you wanted to.

Why was I thinking this – because I have no clue how the seating gods make their decisions. Who are the seating gods? These are the super natural forces that dictate who gets a row to themselves who sits between the fat couple from Tennessee. Who gets upgraded to first class, who gets the exit row, and who has to check their bag at the door because all the over heads are full. Who gets the special seat with extra leg room and who sits next to the guy that doesn’t bath. I believe the seating gods must be similar to the three fates that the ancient Greeks believed in. They sit there watching everyone’s life and make decisions about their luck and what will happen to them.

I started thinking about this on my flight to Las Vegas (details on that to follow in another blog). For some lucky reason I was put into a seat that had no one the seat next to it and had extra leg room. I don’t know why this happens from time to time. Another woman on the flight asked me to switch with her so her husband could sit in the unoccupied seat and they would be together. Well I said yes. Why? Yeah surprised me too. I said yes first because I thought it was the nice thing to do and second because I didn’t know only my row had the extra leg room. I found out to my surprise that the seat I switched to had much less leg room. Arghh.

This lead to my thinking of Karma: I must have done something nice to have deserved the extra special seat on that flight – don’t know what but something. I also wondered if that Karma could be banked. How would this work? Well because I gave up the seat for purely altruistic purposes I should have gotten the Karma Points back for the seat plus some for being extra nice. These points should then sit in an account and build up every time I did something good, nice, or thoughtful. Of course their would be similar deductions for the opposite negative actions.

Once you had a certain amount of Points you could trade them in to the seating gods for better treatment. Maybe an upgrade, maybe more foot room, maybe a better snack. It would all depend on the number of points you where spending. It would be like using miles but it would affect more things. For instance you could keep smelly people away, get more leg room, or maybe get the whole row to yourself. This is kind of how karma works (see My Name is Earl on NBC) except that it would be more codified. Maybe there could even be a website to track your karma on. That would be nice. Yes that would be nice.