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Sometimes it is very useful to accept
that whatever we are, whatever we go through now, is the result of our
previous actions. But for the future, everything
is in our own hands. We plant the seeds of our future in
this life, in this present moment. We can really change our future,
definitely! Sometimes, because they misunderstand the nature of karma,
people think that Buddhists are determinists or fatalists. They think karma
is very solid, very real. However karma, whether positive or negative, is
not really fixed. I always give the example of the body and its shadow. As
long as the body is solid, it has a shadow. When we realize the empty nature of everything, karma
dissolves; it no longer exists. Knowing
this is a source of happiness, because whatever bad karma we may have
accumulated, it can be changed. Therefore we shouldn't get depressed,
feeling that we are sinners without any way out. It doesn't have to be that
way. Of course we have made many mistakes, but as long as we can learn from
our mistakes, we really have a great potential.
Karma is no excuse for feeling hopeless
and for making the same mistakes over and over again. If we improve, it
will definitely have a snowball effect on our environment. Buddhism is very
practical. If we become wiser, calmer, more stable, our relatives and
friends will come to us to take advice. They will listen to us because our
judgement is impartial, not based on our own ego and interest. In Tibet, we
say that if a man wants to win the respect and esteem of his family, he
cannot achieve this by selfish means. His first job will be to make his
wife and children happy.
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In Buddhism, we talk
about karma. Some people do not want to hear that word and say they do not
believe in karma. But instead of calling it karma, we can just call it cause
and effect and the meaning becomes very simple. If I punch somebody, he
will punch me back. If I say bad things about other people, they will say
bad things about me. Everything we think, everything we say, everything we
do, has consequences. It means we know that whatever we do will produce
effects that we will experience. It is like cultivating a field. If we
plant pure seeds, we will have a pure crop, but if we sow weeds, we will
produce weeds, not a pure crop. We can only clean a field by going into it
and picking up the weeds one by one. We can only weed out
our mind by meditating and facing our negative emotions, no matter how
painful the process may be.
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Are the doctrines of karma and
reincarnation an essential part of Buddhism?
The understanding of karma is part of
Buddhism. Karma, in very simple terms, is cause and result. It is not
reward and punishment. Reincarnation belongs to the law of karma. With this
understanding, you know that if you have done good then somewhere there
will be a good result and if you have done bad things then the result will
be bad. Karma, or action and result, means that if you want to improve
anything, yourself or something else, then you have to work on the
improvement yourself - this is Buddhism. I think an understanding of karma
is still useful even for those who do not totally accept it.
Does the Buddhist view of karma mean that
the whole of your life is pre-determined, leaving you no choice?
Some people look at it like that but that
is not quite correct. Up to now - when and where you were born, who your parents are, your
brothers and sisters - things like that are all caused by actions in your
past life or lives and you are now experiencing the result.
But it is also said that you do have some choice to plan for
your future - both for next year and the next life. Your future depends on what you do right now. Right
now you are planting the seed - that is the cause - and you will experience
the result later. And if you plant a potato seed now it will not grow into
an apple tree The result, the future, is in our hands; our actions now will
create a result. The law of karma does not mean that you just sink into a
sleep, thinking, "There Is no point. All I can do is wait for the
result". Our present human life carries the experience of the result
of our past actions, but at the same time we are creating our own future.
If you see it in this way, everything is not pre-determined by karma,
because we are also creating our own, new karma. One thing I keep on
saying is, "Doesn't matter what you did, what matters is what you
do now so that you can make your future better".
Some people are disturbed by the idea of
karma. If a disaster happens, like a sickness, or death of a child, it is
seen as 'punishment' for something they have done wrong, Can you comment on
that?
I think that people who use the idea of
karma like this, either do not understand karma properly or are misusing
the meaning of karma to make excuses. What is happening does not depend on
whether you believe in karma or not; things will still happen in your life,
good and bad, pleasant and unpleasant, but I think a better understanding
of karma will enable you to deal with everything more easily. Without
understanding, dealing properly with painful things is much more difficult,
and you just say, "This must be something to with really bad past life
actions and therefore there is nothing I can do about it. This suffering is
my punishment", I think with a better understanding, you will not use
the idea of karma like this, as a kind of careless excuse. A better
understanding will help you to experience everything - good and bad - In
a more positive way. It will help you to make your personal garbage
into good compost!
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Action is usually founded on projection,
assumption, misunderstanding; and therefore karma is generated. Now, mostly
people have a very superficial understanding of karma. Karma, of course, we
know means cause and effect and we usually think of karma in terms of "You
kicked the dog yesterday, the dog bites you today". So, it's external
things. Actually karma is much more subtle than that. There is what we
could call the external level of karma, which is things producing tangible
external results. This is the area where most people think of it. By the
way, karma is nothing to do with punishment. It is cause and effect right
across the spectrum. From the most harmful act producing he most
devastating result, to the most altruistic act producing the most
beneficial result. So karma relates to all our activities. But a much more
important level of karma is; every time you do,
think or say something an imprint is left in the deeper levels of your
mind. So it is called karmic imprint and that imprint is what moulds the way
you are. We are moulded by imprints we have created in the
past! Those imprints are the basis of our tendencies, of our
predispositions, of the way we are without thinking about it. So we are
moulded or we are moulding ourselves by the way we use our mind. For
example, if you habitually give way to anger, the imprints you leave in
your mind are deepening imprints to strengthen anger. Therefore, anger will
strengthen as a result of that. If however, you consistently practice
generosity, forbearance, kindness, the imprints you create are according to
that and you will become kinder, more gentle, more generous, more peaceful.
This is why understanding karma is so valuable, because then we understand
why training the mind is so effective. We understand that whatever negative
patterns are playing out in our minds are simply the product of past karmic
imprints.
The
training is not to suppress them, because we can't do that, but just not to
reinforce them. The training is to reinforce the mind
that is not making karmic imprints. Now, this is asking a lot because we
don't know how to do that. Mindfulness is like the universal cleaning agent
that wipes out the imprints. The purification meditations do the same. So
within our training, we are trained in specific methods for purifying
karma. When they talk of purifying karma what they are talking about is
neutralising; bringing these underlying imprints to the surface and
neutralising them, wiping the slate clean. The training we embark upon with
our meditation and our mind-training is based on a very sound understanding
of the way the whole karmic process works, particularly understanding these
karmic imprints which we are either weakening or reinforcing.
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Karma and The Wheel of Life
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Why are some people rich yet some poor,
some happy yet others in misery, some lucky and some unlucky? Moreover, why
are some pure, innocent beings afflicted with terrible misfortunes whereas
evil tyrants remain healthy and rich?
These
are difficult questions for most faiths, believing in a just and
compassionate God, to answer. The Buddhist explanation is to see this life
as but one in a series of many. In this existence, one is reaping the
harvest of seeds sown by actions (karma) of past lives, while at the same
time planting new seeds to ripen in the life to come. There is no natural
evolution in this process, hence a higher state of existence can be
followed by an even better one or a worse one, depending entirely upon how
it is utilised. Going up or down from one life to the next and returning
again and again to the same patterns of action, through habit, and thereby
reaping again and again the same results, this endless round of existence
is represented by the 'wheel of life' .
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The mind is what matters most
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If the mind does not change, all the
positive and negative experiences that we have had are carried with us
wherever we go. If we move to a different place, the mere changing of
locations does not solve our problems. While learning different skills like
Tai Chi, yoga, massage and so on may have some short-term benefit, the
overall picture will never change unless we deal with the mind. We will
just go back to the same old habits and ideas repeating themselves again
and again. This is why we need to remember that the important way to change
ourselves is through training the mind.
When we
try to understand ourselves it is important to bear in mind that what we
are experiencing now: this thing called me', 'my life' did not pop out of
nowhere. Each one of us is a product of a variety of causes and conditions
that have shaped the way we are. These have not been imposed on us by an
external force but are the result of our own behaviour in a previous
time that we have forgotten about. In the same way, we learn to understand
that everything we are doing now, absolutely everything, is shaping our
future. We are masters of our own destiny. When we understand this it is easier to understand why
training to do good and avoiding harm is so important. We never escape the
effects of our actions, good or bad, and they are the choices that caused
what we are now and what we will be in the future.
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Compiled by T.S. Prem Kumar, Madurai, India.
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