Conference hydra::dejavu

    Hi Mindy,

    As I understand the concept of karma, it pervades all events in our
    lives.  All the things you experience are a result of the force of
    karma in your life.

    I have met many people that I felt I already knew.  They were like
    meeting old, treasured friends.  I deeply appreciate these people in my
    life.

    I think there are "lessons to learn" from everyone we meet.  But, I
    also think that the purpose of those lessons is to teach us that all
    error can be undone.

    I would suggest that you consider approaching this from the perspective
    of truly wanting Love to be the outcome.  If this is your intent, it is
    like a seed planted in the garden.  Seeds of Love cause plants of love
    to grow.  

    I believe that when we deal with situations out of any intent that is
    less than Love, that it actually creates more karma.

    Peace,

    Ruth

    As said the laws of Karma have a great influence on our lives,
    the environment we are born into in this incarnation, the type
    of person we are, the type of situations which we have to face
    (or again choose to ignore) in our life, and the people we meet.

    It is said that the good things which happen to us in this life
    are the results of past good deeds accumulated in past lives,
    the opposite is also true.

    I have also heard that our parents, children, close friends and
    relatives share these associations on into their next incarnation.
    We are familiar with them and like them so we all chose to hang
    around with each other so to speak.

    In the same vein someone whom we feel we have met or known before is
    probably precisely such a person. Again the relationship can go
    both ways, it maybe someone whom we loved and events have worked out
    so the relationship can continue this life. Or it maybe someone close
    to us whom we had problems with and we are meeting again to try to
    resolve, come to terms, overcome past difficulties.

    There are no hard and fast and rules, just be open to the idea and
    take the opportunities which present themselves, maybe we can 
    overcome something which has been holding us back.

    				Chris 

                                 

    Thank you for providing me with some insight. 
    
    I trying to get some understanding of why one person has been put in my 
    life so accidentally.  I believe that there is some lesson I need to
    learn but I am having a hard time seeing what it is.
    
    Maybe I'm not to know what this lesson is right now or maybe never.
    I'm just a little frustrated.
    
    Mindy
    

    Mindy,
    
    From what I've read so far you're a Scorpio and he's a Sag.
    
    Each sign has "lessons to learn" from the sign directly higher.
    A Sag is more developed then a Scorpio. No offense meant. 
    On the order of the signs an Aries is a baby and it progresses from
    there. I've already had some lessons from the Capricorns. (I'm a sag)
    
    It makes sense that you would spend some time with a sag.
    
    A Scorpio is a natural detective so I assume that's what you're doing
    with all these questions. Just be careful not to get to obbsessed.

Re -1

Curious - most of my lessons have been learnt from Capricorns. (I am a Scorpio)
I have had no contact with Sags at all (the exception being my brother but I 
still haven't had much contact with him)

Linda

    re: basenote
    
    There are always many lessons to be learned at any one time from
    innumerable sources.  Maybe you just providing the avenue for the other
    person to learn a lesson (and resolve karma between the two of you in
    the process).
    
    tc
    
    ps. for what it's worth, my birthdate is December 21st; around 8:30am.
    	That makes me either a Sagicorn or a Capritarius.

    Hmm, this looks like a fairly nice karma topic, even if it
    digressed towards the end...
    
    My understanding of karma is:  if you do a Bad Thing, your karma
    goes down.  If you do a Good Thing, your karma goes up.  If your
    karma is too low, Bad Things happen to you.  Karma is passed across
    lifespans.  If you die with low karma, you may be punished in your
    next life by being some lower life form.
    
    If this understanding is incorrect, please correct it.
    
    I now offer the following scenario:
    Person A says something.
    Person B disseminates the sayings of person A.
    Person C makes critical remarks of person A's saying.
    Some people feel bad because there is disagreement.
    
    Questions:
    Does person A's karma go down for making a possibly controversial
    remark?
    Does person B's karma go down for reproducing that remark?
    Does person C's karma go down for making critical comment on the
    remark?
    
    Somewhat mystified,
    Mark

Karma is seen as the sum of your thoughts and actions in this life, and
how that decides your fate in the next.  So bad deed today does not result
in a brick wall landing on you tomorrow.

There is neither good nor bad in a statement, regardless of it's content.  
Your Karmic "score"(?) is affected by the reasons behind that statement.

>    Questions:
>    Does person A's karma go down for making a possibly controversial
>    remark?

No, unless person A was deliberately attempting to cause conflict between
B and C.  But then again, the reasons for "A" wanting to bring about this 
discord, could be quite honourable.

>    Does person B's karma go down for reproducing that remark?
>    Does person C's karma go down for making critical comment on the
>    remark?
 
Same applies.  These actions in themselves are neither right nor wrong. 
But if person "C" were to delight in ridiculing "A"'s beliefs, at the expense
of "B"'s feelings, then "C" is a real bad dude, who'd better hope that he 
has sufficient time in *this* life, to rectify his Karma.   

regards,
joyce_who's_definitely_paying_off_a_Karmic_Debt :)

    I don't think of karma as some sort of bank:  Put in good, pull out
    good.  I don't think there is some cosmic accountant in green
    eyeshades, a sort of adult version of Santa Claus.  ("He knows when
    you've been bad or good so be good for goodness sake.")
    
    I think it is much subtler, and in many instances, more direct than
    that.  I think we daily reap karma's consequences in this life, as well
    as any parallel or "subsequent" lives.  
    
    It is most instructive to think about the complexity of life.  I tarry
    at the office a moment before driving on the highway, and never even
    know that I avoided a car accident.  But the moment I enter the Post
    Office to get my mail, I run into someone I wanted to see.  I spend the
    evening thinking about this person.  I make decisions about handling a
    situation in my life, based on this person's example.  Five minutes too
    soon or too late and I would not have seen her.  This influences a
    later phone call to a friend.  My words affect him based on the
    particular circumstances of his day.  These small interactions steer
    the course of our friendship over time.
    
    It helps to think of life as a large pool of water.  Our thoughts and
    actions are like pebbles dropped into it.  All the radiating circles
    intersect.  It looks like a choppy surface, but if we were able, we
    could trace all the disturbance to each pebble.  Thus, karma is a
    highly dynamic process.
    
    Is it just?  Is it fair?  Do the bad get punished and the good
    rewarded?  Karma is nowhere that simple.  It takes great philosophical
    or religious courage to face the world in its complexity and apparent
    lack of fairness.  Innocent children suffer.  Gangsters die wealthy
    under their grape arbors.  
    
    It is safe to say that karma is pretty clear in our inner lives.   The
    violent live cut off from their higher selves.  They can never achieve
    spiritual growth without repentance and return to a better way of life. 
    Those whose inner lives are dedicated to peace and enlightenment will
    surely achieve their quests.  Of this much we can be sure.
    
    This is a very adult way of looking at things.  It is not easy to hold
    in my head.  But it is a reasonable model of reality in my experience. 
    Life is in fact a little easier when one gives up the naive belief that
    the circumstances of life are just in a way we humans can understand. 
    At least I feel open to chance, I'm less disappointed when things don't
    go my way, and I don't waste energy railing at the unfairness of it
    all.
    
    Laura

    Please see note 992 in the VAXWRK::INDIA notes file for some excellent
    quotations about karma from great sages of India.
    
    Laura

    Re .8:
    I see.  If someone accumulates bad karma (or good), it won't affect
    them in *this* life.  Kind of like rolling over an investment.
    
    By the by, the persons A,B, and C in my scenario are all
    operating under what they individually perceive as good, but different,
    intentions.  Does the fact that the activities of these individuals
    may be perceived as negative by others have any effect?  (Many
    people dislike criticism, so person C's actions are likely to be
    perceived as negative.)
    
    Re .9:
    It seems to me there must something like an accountant.  How else
    is it determined how much good and bad happens to an individual in
    their next life?  That is, somewhere, somehow, when that individual
    does something that affects her karma, the "karma difference" must
    be applied to the "karma balance" that will be used for the next
    life.  Otherwise, how is the feedback achieved?
    
    Or are you saying that a karma event causes certain kinds of ripples
    in the pool of life, and they eventually come back, even if it's in
    a different life?
    
    Mark

    It doesn't make any sense to tally good and bad in life, as if we have
    a balance sheet.  Most actions are in the gray area.  How many things
    that you do are purely good or bad?  And by whose moral system will
    they be judged?  And when will the judgement be made, daily, yearly, or
    at the end of your life?  It starts to sound like a brokerage
    calculating gains and losses, or a bank calculating interest.
    
    A rigid mechanistic view is nonsense imho.  
    
    The Tibetan Book of the Dead says that one may reincarnate as an
    animal.  The interpretive notes say this need not be literal.  The more
    profound meaning is figurative.  I live like a pig, I gain a pig
    nature.  I live like a Boddhisattva, I gain a Boddhisattva nature.  I
    think the dynamic is happening right now and doesn't wait for death.
    It's similar to cognitive therapy, wherein our thinking affects the way
    we feel.
    
    Another key point is that we have free will and we have god-nature, and
    we need not be governed by karma.  If we were, life would be a machine. 
    At any time, we can free ourselves of our karma and ascend spiritually.
    
    In this last point, I am particularly reminded of those who believe
    their childhood traumas dictate the rest of their lives.  It is
    necessary to bring buried traumas to light, to experience repressed
    feelings, and to mourn.  What's so often missing is the final step,
    saying "I am more than the sum of my experiences.  I will fly free,
    determine my own destiny, seek my fortune on the high road."  Those who
    are perpetual victims never get free of karma.  They are unable to
    develop spiritually, which is our greatest capacity as humans.
    
    I sincerely believe that the Holy One gave us free will specifically
    for us to free ourselves from shackles, both real and metaphoric.  This
    is the great opportunity of being in human form.  Don't delay!
    
    An appropriate image on which to meditate when you are stuck in
    determinism  is the Fool in the Tarot deck.
    
    Laura

    Re .12:
    >that you do are purely good or bad?  And by whose moral system will
    >they be judged?  And when will the judgement be made, daily, yearly, or
    >at the end of your life?  It starts to sound like a brokerage
    >calculating gains and losses, or a bank calculating interest.
    (The above is a pretty good summary of why I don't believe in karma.
    Basically, there's no plausible mechanism.  Of course, there are
    also some definitional problems...)
    
    What does "gain a <x> nature" mean?  (You use this for x=pig and
    x=Boddhisattva.)  If I "live like a slightly nerdy software engineer"
    do I "gain a slightly nerdy software engineer nature"?
    
    >A rigid mechanistic view is nonsense imho.  
    Well, I am a little stuck here.  I like to believe that natural and
    spiritual processes have mechanisms that have a certain amount of
    logic to them.
    
    Let's try some more scenarios:
    
    1. I'm walking down the road.  I kick a rock (as I am sometimes wont
       to do while walking) down a hill to another road, causing
       (unbeknownst to me) a car to swerve, killing a child.
    2. Same as 1, but this time I see the child killed.
    3. Same as 1 or 2, but this time I kicked the rock on purpose to make
       the car swerve, but did not know the child was there.
    4. Same as 3, but I know the child is there.
    In each of these, it is *my will* that starts the chain of events.
    
    What are the karmic influences on these events?  How is the karma
    of the participants changed?
    
    Another scenario:
    I'm walking down the road after a rain.  A car drives by, splashing
    me.  As a result of this, I get pneumonia and die.
    
    Did this happen because I have bad karma?
    Did it lower my karma further?  What if I survive?
    What happens to the driver's karma? (He didn't mean to splash me.)
    
    Mark

                                    
    Re.13
    
    Mark,
    
    It is my belief that 'intent' is the key.  If you intend to harm
    someone by your actions, then it will come back to you.  But if you
    genuinely do not mean to, then what happens is what happens.  Very
    oversimplified, but I see intent as being central to how karma works.
    
    Cindy

    Is it true that if a person eats Pork they don't have Karma?

    >Is it true that if a person eats Prok they don't have Karma?
    
    hehe.. I liked that.
    
    Ahem.. sorry.  Where was I?
    
    Look, I would never deem to tell anyone that thier perception/belief
    is right or wrong.  Life / Karma / whatever, is as simple as you chose
    it to be.  If you prefer the complicated/intricate nature of a web,
    so be it.
    
    If you need to imagine some sort of an Accountant, keeping the books,
    then taht's fine too.  But in each of us is the living God; perhaps
    that Accountant is within you.  No one knows better than you, your
    true intentions.
    
    Don't confuse your will with your actions though Mark,  your action
    may start a chain of events that results in catastrophe.  But that
    catastrophe, could be the result of someone else's Karma.  It was
    not your will that caused it.  If you have ever seen Buddhist monks
    before they set out on a journey, often they pray towards the soles
    of their feet.  This is to ask forgiveness of the insects they may
    inadvertently kill, as they step on them.  It doesn't bring bad Karma
    though.  That's just an umm.. unfortunate step. :)
    
    As for death, I don't suppose anyone waits for it, although there 
    have been some horrific stories of child suicides in Japan where
    the child believed his/her Karma to be so bad that they decided to
    for-go a life and "try again".  Sad.  Death is not an end to anything,
    except the body.  Some see it as a transition, a passing through.
    Others have an even more simplistic view; just an event; and one
    that does NOT necesarily change the spirit.  Death changes nothing;
    we do.  We choose to change, from one life to the next.  Some do,
    some don't, some progress, some regress.  It's not a hard and fast
    rule.
    
    The Chinese are firm believers in animal natures.  But of course,
    our perception of an animal is quite different from that of Western
    culture.  ie,  A pig is a very good nature to possess.  "pig" people
    are believed to have tremendous fortitude, are honest, polite and loyal.
    They are quick-tempered, but hate quarelling.  Buddha did not allot
    an entire year to a creature perceived as greedy, slovenly or dirty.
    Or perhaps, I misinterpreted the comparison made before, between the 
    life of a pig and that of a Bhoddisatva.
    
    And yes, I do agree that we have free will.  No one is governed by 
    their Karma, we determine our own Karma.  
    
    But that's just IMHO.
    joyce

    On "pig nature", I no longer have my copy of the Tibetan Book of the
    Dead, so I was supplying an example of a principle from my imagination.  
    The example may or may not exist in this book.
    
    No doubt it doesn't fit Chinese cultural ideas.  At any rate the
    example well illustrates my point for people from a Western background. 
    It is a metaphor anyway, and not literal.  That was my key point.  No
    one image serves all cultures equally well.  Even within a culture, an
    image may vary.  For instance, if I say "dog-nature," what do you think
    of?  Loyal, hardworking, affectionate?  Dirty, craven, always hungry? 
    Depends on your view of the dog.
    
    Laura