Karma is a Bitch?
“Karma is not fate, for humans act with free will creating their own destiny. According to the Vedas, if one sows goodness, they will reap goodness; if one sows evil they will reap evil. Karma refers to the totality of our actions and their concomitant reactions in this and previous lives, all of which determines our future” – Taken from Wikipedia.
So, Karma is about cause and effect, plus and minus, yin and yang, good and bad, right and wrong and all other such antonyms you can think of, but with a common thread of – balancing out.
Its pretty difficult to believe isn’t it? Karma, in modern day analogy is like a Bank Account – If you do something good, your karmic bank account will increase by a certain value. If you do something bad, it will reduce by a certain value! You cannot check your bank balance – but it is all accounted for, at the end of your life. Or perhaps multiple lives.
Religion has tried to justify the concept of Karma by introducing rebirths – if you are born as a politician in this birth, you will most probably be born as a common man in your next birth! So, the concept of eternal justice is somehow upheld!
But why consider multiple births? Can’t we see the existence of Karma in one birth itself? If a person keeps cheating others, after a point of time no one trusts them. If you disrespect your parents, you will be disrespected by your kids. There can be many such examples.
BTW, the title has been inspired from this nice song – Karma is a Bitch. Nice music, not nice lyrics. Since they choose to apply a gender to Karma (in that song), may be we can say Karma is a BITCH indeed – (I stole this one from one of IHM’s blog commenters) Babe In Total Control of Herself (And other’s too?).
So, is there something like Good Karma/ Bad Karma? Does it actually add up to our Karmic Bank Balance? Is there a Karmic law controlling all our actions? What do you think about it?
Destination Infinity
interesting read
on Karma, yes what we do we get it
What we do, we get back indeed!
Destination Infinity
‘murpagal seyyin pirpagal vilaiyum’ – this is the Karma theory and I believe in it, D.I. You reap what you sow…so many examples are there!
Yes, why wait until next birth, we will get the result in this birth itself!
There are many people who don’t believe in it. For example, they think that if a person is righteous and straight forward in life, still he suffers. In some situations, we would have ourselves seen that in-spite of our good intentions, there are people who are bent on causing damage to us! Sometimes, those are the only type of people we get to meet! What do you think of that?
Destination Infinity
I agree with you, D.I. This has made me a hard natured person now, though I don’t like it.
This is sooo true. I continue to trust people even though I know I shouldn’t. I get screwed every damn time.
These people are rotten to the core and yet I wonder how this is going to come back to them. I agree, it seems like a good deal of the people I come into contact are hell-bent in making people’s lives miserable. Instead of living by the Golden Rule, they live by,
“Screw over as many people as you can before you die – life is too short.”
And what Sandhay said about being a hard-natured person, I am the same way and I don’t like it one bit. But the wall has to be there to protect my sanity.
When we come across enough people who are hell bent in making other people’s life miserable, we learn to identify them quickly and perhaps filter them out. Becoming hard is one way of doing it. But it is more important to identify good people and keep their acquaintance. So, we cannot become too hard as well. I guess it takes some time, learning and experience to balance the art of judging people and opening our wall selectively. Eventually it happens.
Destination Infinity
‘if a person is righteous and straight forward in life, still he suffers’
Could this be an enabling one to develop a strength to take forward? My sister suffered with Multiple Sclerosis which may have seemed unfair but then it may have been preparing her for what was to come after she left this life…
Maybe – But we don’t know if there is another life.
I do understand its a huge disadvantage, but let us also think about it this way – If people with disadvantages do not get the benefits that normal people get, they don’t get exposed to the problems that normal people face in their daily life, as well. So, do the Karmic laws also work for disadvantaged people, within their own lifetime as well? Its actually a tough question to answer.
Destination Infinity
This is an aspect to which I have given a lot of thought. I do not believe in re-birth and I do not believe in Karma. That is because some people get away with evil and some people who do good deeds do not get anything good. Sure, we hear of evil people being punished all the time, but that is happening more in countries with a good criminal justice system. In other words, we human beings are doing the punishing, not fate.
However I do think that we lose the respect of people if we disrespect them. Therefore I do not believe we disrespect our parents our kids will disrespect us. I believe that if we disrespect our kids they will treat us badly when we are old, they will disrespect us. Whenever I hear of any old couple being ill-treated by their kids, I always wonder: What did they do to their children when they were young? Love begets love. Hate begets hate. I have never seen loving parents being rewarded with hate, like they show in movies. You love your child, and respect him, and he will love and respect you when you are old. Actually there are many aspects of good parenting which I don’t want to get into here!
Sending someone to Jail by a criminal justice system is not the only way someone gets punished.
I am not experienced in parenting, so I will take your judgment on that topic. You have a point – People who treat their kids badly get treated badly by their kids later on. I agree.
Destination Infinity
Well. I respectfully disagree with you on one point. If you are an Indian politician, in all likelihood, you will be born as a maggot. If you are Digvijay Singh, you will be trapped between death and life, as a preta . Everything else is bang on !
Even Indian politicians have enough problems and struggles to handle. When you are in a job where you can get easy money without having to use any specialized skills, there are a lot of people around you who would either want a share in it (or) want your job so that they can enjoy. The competition for becoming a politician is very tough, precisely for this reason!
Destination Infinity
DI, I think you mean the guilt that a person feels, and the guilt that can torment him if he does anything bad. Is that what you mean when you talk of punishment? My take on this is that really evil or greedy people feel no remorse. They would do it again if they thought they would never be caught. They only feel bad that they are caught. However, there are some people who are not totally bad, do something bad on impulse and regret it. They are likely to suffer internally with guilt and other feelings and as a result their lives could be ruined. But this is because they have something good in them in the first place, and they suffer more than the evil ones.
The act of committing a sin / or doing something do cause destruction to others was committed in the first place when someone is not able to tolerate the other person’s success (or) some other positive attribute in the other person. So, they are already jealous and want to bring down the other person for which they are willing to take epic struggles.
Suppose, let us assume that they win. They have brought the other person down. Now what? Will they be satisfied, will they be happy? No way! They will be tormented with the success of two more people or many more people. They can go after all of them, if they are powerful but what what is the motive?
Their in-toleration. Now they have pulled so many people to reach a certain height. Now what? Will they be happy? Far from it! They will now scan all their subordinates to see who might play similar games with them to bring them down. Because, deep under, they know that their position is not secure. It was not won by merit, but by pulling others down.
Actually, if you are able to go inside a tormentor’s mind, you will find that it is the most restless and unhappy mind to ever have! That’s why great people have advocated compassion even (and especially) towards evil.
If a person feels guilty about an action, they will worry about it and try not to do it again – It ends right there. But if a person doesn’t feel guilty about an action (which is wrong), they continue to suffer / be tormented inside their own minds for a long time. Of course, they bring suffering to others also, but that’s something else.
Destination Infinity
I totally believe in Karma. It always stops me from doing anything bad and evil. We might not be able to prove it scientifically but I have total faith in it 🙂
The song is quite catchy although I wouldn’t want to listen to it again and again 🙂
I too thought I would not listen to the song repeatedly when I listened to it for the first time. But, very soon I got hooked to it! So, don’t listen to it again…
Destination Infinity
That is interesting DI. You have a point. However I do believe that bad people are basically unhappy and dissatisfied. That is why they do the bad. If they didn’t to a bad thing, they would still be unhappy.
i once read in “have a little faith” by Mitch Albom, the story about a guy, who does wrong all the time so he gets what he deserves and 1 fine day, his heart stops him from wrong doing, although he doesn’t do anything wrong but he gets trapped in the scene initially but later is rescued thanks to his positive actions in that very scene…
so just to strengthen the fact, what you sow is what you reap.
regards
rahul
Actually a lot of people think that they might be able to get away with doing wrong things (as they are extremely clever or rich or powerful or whatever) – This audacity is one of the foundations of human civilizations though (both in the good and the bad sense). Its like, Until proven guilty someone is innocent. So, until Karmic law is proven, one doesn’t believe in it! Fair enough? 🙂
Destination Infinity
We can also say that if no one comes up with a theory which disproves the Karmic Laws one has the freedom to believe in it. Can’t we 😉
Yes, you can either prove a theorem or prove that its converse is untrue 🙂
Destination Infinity
Intersting read…We should see the after effect in this birth itself
Kaliyugathil Kaimeila balan types…
I too think so, but who knows what is the actual design of the ‘designer’? Perhaps its better that we don’t know – Life might be more interesting that way!
Destination Infinity
Karma doesn’t come to Get you. The Negative influences in your life cause Bad things to happen. If you Cause chaos it brings Negativity or Bad Karma
By choosing to treat Others and Yourself with Respect, Doing what you can to Help in Situations, Surrounding yourself with people of Positive energy and Spreading good energy and calm in situations Your life will improve.
You will be Happier about your situation. Thus improving Health and Energy and the Quality of People around you
I found your thread quite interesting after reading it thoroughly.
I personally believe in reincarnation. But what happens after death is all speculation
lol.. I don’t think anyone here Has that answer.
I know what you mean about some people receiving rewards for doing evil. It happens Everywhere! I live in America and I get it All the time.
I just try to not let the actions of others Upset my inner peace. I just think, “I bet that guy goes home to a Wife with Warts”. Laugh and think about how good I have it. And Smile the rest of the Day 🙂
Let’s go one step ahead. Why not sympathize with the oppressor?
No one in this world is inherently bad. They become bad in retaliation – In defense. A group of people decide that being bad is the best way to survive – perhaps due to their personal experiences. The worst crimes are mostly committed due to fear and insecurity, if you closely gauge it.
Thinking that the (bad) guy goes home to a wife with warts is the first step of realizing that even (bad) people have their own (bad) problems. They do. Even the (seemingly) most powerful people have their tough times. The best they can do is to hide it.
When we realize that, it becomes easy to sympathize with the so called bad guy. No one behaves rudely for fun, right? So, What is making him behave rudely? Why have they come to believe in everything that is bad? Does he need attention?
Analyzing the situation from their point of view – from their shoes, will, open up our mind and perhaps bring in more clarity to the situation.
Destination Infinity
I do believe in karma but seeing our politicians and many bad people enjoy life more than the good ones, I think retribution does take another birth. But then again I have seen some people pay in this life only.