Karma, the basis of Philosophy

[Why]

Hi all,
I am posting what I have asked many spiritual and enlightened people and no one has yet been able to answer satisfactorily. Hopefully someone can help me on this.English is not my first language,so please bear with any mistakes.

I have been pursuing the meaning of life and perfect health(topic for another day) since a child. I was introduced into spirituality after reading the 'Autobiography of a Yogi' and since then has been in pursuit of it. I started with hindu philosophy,meditation,yoga,went into Buddhist teachings,Tibetan philosophy each expanding and solving the riddles from one before. There were times when I went back and things became clearer. I traveled a lot trying to meet with great/enlightened masters(Christian,Hindu,Buddhist etc) posing questions. I realized that all religions that I know of spirituality is based on the concept of Karma.

Modern Christianity says Adam did something bad and now you have to work in this world,prove to God you are good during trials and you get to heaven. Islam follows a similar theme, hinting at karma subtly. Hinduism and Buddhism makes it obvious about past karma,finish it off(there's a lot in store and you have some of it for this life) and you are liberated(merge back with ultimate where you came from).Except for book in Raj yoga(a soul close to center can send back subtle energy which can wash off Karma) and a Tibetan book of dead(window of opportunity in Bardos) no one really asks why we are subjugated to Karma? If this can be negated,won't we all be liberated in an instant? Didn't this 'balancing parameter' become part of creation since the creator made it like gravity? And why haven't anyone found a way to hack/over ride it?

[shaberon]

As a law, it wasn't made or created.

It's just momentum, whether physical or of the mind. There is no hacking of responsibility for one's actions and thoughts.

From what you mentioned, Raja Yoga is the best guide. Whoever coined "Original Sin" did us a disservice.

[raff]

I like Teal Swan interpretation on YouTube titled: If we create our own reality how do you explain suffering.
I highly recommend.

[Joe Akulis]

From reading Many Mansions, by Gina Cerminara, I learned a lot about Edgar Cayce's work as it relates to karma. One impression I got was that karma was to some extent self-inflicted, so to speak. Meaning, after a life review when your most recent incarnation is complete, most people feel like there are wrongs that they have committed that they are not satisfied to leave alone. They are compelled to make things right. To "meet" their karma, as Cayce liked to say.

I think one example was of a father who is terribly abusive to a son, and agrees in a later life to reverse the situation and put himself in the hands of an abusive father. Something like that. Or a person who once tortured people to attain fake confessions who decides in a later life to dedicate him/herself to becoming a medical doctor, to repay the karma by helping as many people who are suffering as he/she can.

The more I learned about reincarnation and karma, the more I got the impression that different people are at different stages of maturity. Meaning, some people have only had a couple physical lifetimes before and are so new to that life in between lives that they are guided by benevolent spirits into their next lifetimes. Very much like a school. The older we get, the more we begin to choose what courses we want to take, but we don't start out with that much control at first, especially if we don't even believe we get more than one life.

So we're going through this Earth School. Karma between people can dominate a soul's destiny for many lifetimes. Love triangles have a way of doing this. One person will steal someone else's wife or husband, and leave a person who wants to get even, and thus three more lifetimes are dragged through the mud while the one who had their husband stolen, now becomes the one who is determined to steal the wife of the person who did the stealing the first time. (Yes, genders also shuffle a lot, that makes things even more fun.)

From studying books written by hypnotic regressionists like Michael Newton and Dolores Cannon I get the impression that the part of our mind called the subconscious allows a subtle influce from past lives to whisper to us in this life. Someone who was female for the last seven lives and now finds themselves in a male body for this one can have so much of their past personality influencing this one that they feel like they don't belong in a male body. Someone who spent the time in their past lives to master painting, or music will often reap those rewards in the next. A seven year old who plays perfect Mozart is not just some prodigy. They worked very hard to aquire that ability, just not all in this present lifetime. Understanding this can help give us all a greater degree of patience in our lives, when we know we have all the time in the world, rather than just the years left in this life.

The personality improvements that we make through karmic lessons get passed on through the subconscious. For example, one person who is intent on learning and developing the courage to stand up for themselves will voluntarily place themselves into life situation after life situation where they are married to an abusive husband, until they learn how to deal with things in a way that satisfies them, as they look back on each life after having lived it. Then from that point on, for the remainder of however many lives they want to live, that strength and courage will always be there, shining brightly through the subconscious mind.

What's the point of it all? I think part of the way this works is designed to make us better at coexisting. To experience self, as separate, individual. And at the same time to experience oneness while still maintaining the self.

We are all on an upward path of growth, and it's not really stoppable. We can make decisions that slow that growth or reverse our course, but the progress eventually is inevitable. Consciousness expands after every trip back to school. I think at this "physical" phase of our progress, part of the reason we're doing this is just to prepare for the next phase of our growth.

Karma's biggest lesson is probably forgiveness. And if you think about where we might be headed, into a way of life where we acquire abilities like telepathy, telekinesis, manifestation, you name it... If we don't have control of our emotions, and can't own the things that produce karma, like jealousy, anger, envy, greed, love, hate, you name it... Then why should we be allowed access to a life where one person could stop another person's heart just by thinking about it? Hmm?

The other reason I think we're doing this is to learn more about our Higher Selves. Each persona of each of our past lives is still there, in spirit. We don't disappear from existence just because we decide to forget everything and start a new life again. That's where the concept of the Higher Self comes in. At times, in spirit, you can be any of the people you've been. And at other times you can be all of them together as one. After all, they are all YOU, are they not? But how can you coexist even with yourself, if you're quick to judge someone you once were as an asshole? :-)

Some of us probably won't even learn who we've been in the past until we learn how to love all those around us, more for their differences than for the things about them that we have in common. After all, at some point in your past you may have been a saint, and at some point you may have been a devil.

[11one]

karma is just action/reaction. its not a judge its an accountant

[araucaria]

Hi there
There was a recent forum on the subject of karma ; see here :https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...=1#post1066966

For the theological aspects, interesting background reading would be Financial Vipers of Venice by Joseph P. Farrell, who is a doctor of patristics - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patristics

[Alanantic]

This is how Nisargadatta puts it, from "I Am That":

"All these sufferings are man-made and it is within man's power to put an end to them. God helps by facing man with the results of his actions and demanding that the balance should be restored. Karma is the law that works for righteousness; it is the healing hand of God."

[Rich]

Posted by Why (here)
no one really asks why we are subjugated to Karma? If this can be negated,won't we all be liberated in an instant?

Karma means the energy we give out we must experience, we cannot think a thought without experiencing it’s effect.
But there is no karma in the way guilt depicts it, Love has nothing to punish.