Must be their karma? Many a time when we are faced with an unusually challenging situation or get a windfall, we tell ourselves, “Oh, this must be our karma”. In India, where the word karma and its related concepts originated around 5th century BC, often times the contentment on the faces of the financially poor people is explained as their reconciliation with their karma. It appears the word karma is often used to describe the correlation between one’s past deeds and one’s current or future circumstances. While that’s a fairly accurate expression of the concept of karma, here are some additional insights into the subtleties of what it is and how we can better apply it to our lives.

The ancient Indian literature on karma brings it forth as the notion of a cyclic process of our every action or intention leading to lasting impressions on our psyche, that in turn impact our future behavior (action or intention), leading to new lasting impressions being formed. As Chip Hartranft explains in his book on the teachings of Patanjali (an Indian sage who lived in the 6th century BC), any kind of volitional body or mind movement, physical or mental, constitutes a kind of karma. Each action, or even intent, leaves an impression in the deepest part of our psyche and comes up in the future at the time of a related thought or action. This is how our childhood impressions of relationships, role of parents, money, success, social conformity etc. create an inner perceptual map that shows up to determine our response in relation to similar issues in the future. The outcome of that behavior, in turn, creates new inner impressions, thus continuing the cycle of latent impressions and activation. As Eckhart Tolle illustrates in his recent book “A new Earth”, this cycle can also be explained through a scientific principle. As Newton’s third law of motion states, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Since this law applies to all types of energy forces, it must apply to our thoughts and emotions too. What that means is that every desire, thought, volition, action, and reaction has an equal response – the experience in this case leaving a lasting imprint on our psyche. Every time we spread love, we feel loved inside. Similarly, we cannot harm anyone consciously, without harming ourselves. As Joseph Goldstein said, “Our only real possessions are our accumulated wholesome and unwholesome intentions.”

Notwithstanding those definitions, here’s an important consideration. While the concept of karma is truly relevant for our psycho-emotive destiny, which is directly impacted by our intentions and actions, it may not necessarily be for our physical and material future. What we experience at the level of our psyche and inner state is a direct reflection of our volitions, thoughts, and emotions. However, what manifests in our lives at the physical level has another dimension to it as well – and that is the dimension of other external forces; the environment; the circumstances; the laws of nature. Thus, what we experience is a result of both our past actions (karma) and the environment (people, economy, nature’s laws of birth and aging and so on). That’s what begins to explain why nice guys don’t always get the top job, or the best marriage. While being genuinely nice directly and positively impacts what we experience in our own inner emotional state, it does not dictate what we achieve in a material sense. In that context, the saying, “what you sow, so shall you reap” well encapsulates the notions of karma, though relevant only at our psychological and emotional level.

Further, it’s not what happens to us at the physical and material level, but how we respond to it, that has a deep impact on our inner state – and, the cycle of karma. That’s why our level of contentment and inner peace is not a function of the material success; but entirely of the value we internally attach to it. It transpires then that we can indeed be masters of our inner destiny through the thoughts and emotions we choose to have in relation to any experience (see related article on the journey of personal mastery). It is also apparent that for our true happiness and inner peace, we should have more positive thoughts – be more compassionate, be calmer, be more trusting and accepting – as that sustains the virtuous inner cycle for us. As Buddha said, “Those who are free of resentful thoughts surely find peace”. Also, as this is a cyclic process, it’s possible to break old patterns and change its course with what we do in the present moment. By living with greater awareness in the present, we can surely begin to flush out the historical baggage of the past latent impressions inside us.

Finally, it maybe worth mentioning that in the context of the karmic cycle, the sages also talk about a much more profound objective to work towards – one of pursuing true inner liberation. At a more spiritual level, it is believed that it is not possible to have only positive thoughts – the moment we have a label of positive and negative, good and bad, to thoughts, emotions, and situations – we cannot avoid having some negative thoughts and emotions as they are part of our bipolar perceptions. Also, even positive thoughts may carry underlying impressions of one of the potential sufferings – of egoism, attachment, aversion, or clinging to life. The sages then espouse that the only real way to break the cycle of karma is to not have any thoughts altogether – a state of Nirvana, where no new impressions are being formed in the psyche and the person experiencing it is one with the divine*!!

* Several Eastern meditation practices are built around this notion, but more about that another time!