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female
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41-50,
anonymous
writes: Hi guys,this my sound like a silly question but, can anyone explain to me what Karma is, i knew this guy in the past and he use to say this to me, sometimes two people are ment to be together no matter what, its karma, faith....an unexplained feeling...can someone clarify what karma is all about,thanks Reply to this Question
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reader, Sweety Pie  +, writes (5 June 2008):
 Ha they are all pretty good explanations but the way I use it is 'If you do something bad, it will come back and bite you' or if something is going amazingly well, like your wildest dreams, something bad will happen then too. Heres a video to kinda give you the jist of it. Its quite funny.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81oPQ4TZLEQ
The example my male friends were giving me would probaly not be suitable to put on this site... Hope I helped!
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reader, anonymous, writes (5 June 2008): The philosophical explanation of karma can differ slightly between traditions, but the general concept is basically the same. Through the law of karma, the effects of all deeds actively create past, present, and future experiences, thus making one responsible for one's own life, and the pain and joy it brings to him/her and others. The results or 'fruits' of actions are called karma-phala. In religions that incorporate reincarnation, karma extends through one's present life and all past and future lives as well.
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reader, starrynights  +, writes (5 June 2008):
I think in this context he means 'Karma' to mean its fated. Something that cant be avoided and is inevitable. Depends on wether you believe in fate and destiny.
'Karma' can also be seen as a spiritual energy where someone canbe seen to have bad karma or good karma. Also those that are more superstitious can view karma as a universal energy that reflects upon you what you give. Eg you treat someone badly, at some point in the future, that karma will be returned and soemone will treat you badly.
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reader, Queeny  +, writes (5 June 2008):
 "Karma is one of the most important concepts in Buddhism. Karma is an imprint in one's Mind. When one performs a good deed out of good intentions, the good intentions come from the Mind. Having done that good deed, the residues of these intentions stay in one's Mind as "imprints", and that is "good karma". The opposite goes for evil deeds (or what the Buddha would call "unwholesome deeds") done out of greed, hatred etc.
A person's karma affects a person in 2 ways. The first is his disposition. If a person is an angry one, performing many deeds with anger, his mind will be imprinted with experiences and intentions of anger. Because of this imprint, in a similar situation, he would be more likely to feel angry. In a sense, the imprint creates and reinforces a sort of mental habit that causes a person's mind to react in a certain pre-disposed way.
The second and more important way karma affects a person is by affecting his experience. Our experiences, our feelings of joy or sufferings, come mainly from our reaction to perceptual inputs. Taking our angry guy as an example, in many situations, he feels offended, angry and that seriously affects his state of mind. He often feels the pain of anger, very little peace. But if that person practices meditation, develops his mind, etc etc, such that he develops peace and love. He may live the same life all over and he may not experience the anger or the pain of anger etc in those same situations. In a sense, his karma is one of the main determinants of his experiences. In this sense too, we may say that our sufferings comes from our karma and our states of mind.
The underlying factor in the formation of Karma is Intentions. What gets imprinted into one's mind is largly decided by one's intentions. If I accidently stepped on a spider, for example, squashing it to death, and let's say I didn't even notice, there was no intention, how can there be an imprint into my mind? But if say I stepped on it out of "fun", the desire to cause harm now gets imprinted. In later life, I may become less sensitive to the value of life, I may be bothered by this experience, I may find myself more likely to be hateful, etc etc. That, friend, would be my karma. In a similar way, let's say I lost $20 while touring the slumps of India. The money is nothing to me, so I won't even notice. But somebody found the money and fed his family for a month, saving a dying child's life. If I wasn't even aware that I lost the money, how can there be good karma for me?
(This concept of Karma was one of the main differences btwn the teachings of Buddhism and Jainism. Mahavira Jain taught that all actions, intentional or not, creates karma. The Buddha, speaking from his insights into the mind, taught that the Intention plays the deciding role. From my experience as a meditator, I verified Buddha's position for myself.) "
direct quote from:Buddha (Ang. Nik. III.415).
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