Karma Simplified (Part 3)
Posted: Tuesday, April 17, 2007
by e
Dhammabucha Rocksprings Meditation
Karma can be imagined as a psychic record of all our desires that impels us toward the activities and actions that we are inclined to perform. Karma colors each consciousness that is created moment-by-moment by mind, and we act accordingly. We establish habit patterns of greed or giving, hatred or compassion, ignorance or wisdom based on these activities. These habit patterns are what strengthens the karma, which continues and transfers lifetime after lifetime similar to the Hindu Atman or the Christian soul. Karma is unique compared to an Atman and a soul, however, because karma is not personal. Karma is only tendencies - causes and effects - developed over countless existences, similar to habits that we form in daily life. We are reborn to the same habits but not the same body or identity.
The Buddha's Four Noble Truths gave us the reason to change our habits - our habits cause anxiety. Our wanting things, and then our subsequent difficulties in acquiring, and then holding on to them, creates angst, not only in our present existence, but beyond as well. The Truths then go on to claim that a way exists to change these habits and escape the anxiety, which is an approach to life that does not involve religious beliefs, but rather self-inquiry.
According to the Buddha, within existence and experience, we are simply products of cause and effect without an underlying soul or "self" that stands behind our activities. Only a thought thinks, only an eye sees, and only an organ functions. One thing leads to another, desire to greed, insight to wisdom, and compassion to love, and conversely, lack of desire leads to non-greed, lack of insight to ignorance, and lack of compassion to hatred.
The broader picture of this cause and effect involves lifetimes. The Buddha laid out twelve interconnected causes and effects, which perpetuate endless rebirths: When we desire something, the effect of that emotion causes craving for the desired object. This craving creates a "self" or "I" thought to arise, which is the one who will act toward acquiring the desired object. The effect of the arising of this "I" thought is the action that is taken, or karma, and the ultimate effect of karma is rebirth.
Our karma, during rebirth-linking consciousness, produces volitional formations that take on physical form - the body and mind. The body and mind then develop the six senses of the eye, ear, nose, tongue, tactile sensations, and the brain. These senses, in turn, experience contact with the world. Contact with the world creates feelings toward the contacts pleasurable, unpleasurable or neutral, which compel the body and mind to either desire, reject or take no action toward the contact. If the contact is pleasurable, a desire to repeat the experience results and a craving the object is the consequence. This craving then leads to the idea of an "I" thought chasing after the desired object, and we are full circle.
Breaking this twelve-step cycle at any point will end it. This is the goal, and in one way or another is the goal of all religious practices, but it is most difficult to accomplish. It requires action at a spiritual level that is enormously mysterious to most people. Attempting to break the cycle at the intellectual level; for example, reasoning and thinking about it, is fruitless. Logically attempting to work it out will only guarantee that it will continue at a subtle level, just under the radar of the brain. The "I" thought is a clever chameleon that can disguise itself in many spiritual-appearing ways, while the twelve-step cycle merrily rolls along.
Only meditation or deep self-inquiry can penetrate into this cycle. Meditation can touch our life-continuum consciousness while the body is still alive, and if one can remain in the life-continuum consciousness (a part of mind), by not allowing thoughts, emotions, or sense contacts to disturb it, then the rebirth- linking consciousness can be modified. This either changes the circumstances of rebirth when born into a physical body, or eliminates the requirement of rebirth entirely.
Meditation therefore, either concentration or insight practice, is the key to altering not only one's present lifetime, but subsequent lifetimes as well. One can also cut the twelve-step chain by stopping at an initial contact with the senses before a feeling arises regarding the contact. This is accomplished with insight meditation, where the mind is not allowed to go beyond contacting an object. It negates the subsequent feeling about the object that would normally develop and the craving or aversion that would then result. Therefore, karma never arises because an action is not required.
Until we cut this twelve-linked chain at some point, we will continue to cycle around cause and effect. All things are temporary that moves through this cycle of existence and experiencing, including our "I" thought. There is only the actions themselves, which are all interconnected with one thought following another. New thought arises out of the store of karma in our life-continuum consciousness, and unless we can either ignore the desires that these thoughts create, or eliminate the thoughts completely while in meditation to break the cycle, we will continue with our same habits. Despite the rare insight that occurs spontaneously from our deeper consciousness, we become trapped in a world of cause and effect no different from a child that cannot find its way out of a house of horrors at the carnival.
When we, however, finally transcend this "I" thought, or our false idea of "self"' the mind becomes empty pure and uncolored. Once this void is experienced, there can no longer be a clinging to the "I" thought, and this effectively breaks the chain. Then, when the chain is broken, the Buddha proclaims that Nibbana, which is the ultimate, eternal joy, and replaces the false idea of "self."
And we are liberated.
E. Raymond Rock of Fort Myers, Florida is cofounder and principal teacher at the Southwest Florida Insight Center, http://www.SouthwestFloridaInsightCenter.com His twenty-eight years of meditation experience has taken him across four continents, including two stopovers in Thailand where he practiced in the remote northeast forests as an ordained Theravada Buddhist monk. His book, A Year to Enlightenment (Career Press/New Page Books) is now available at major bookstores and online retailers. Visit http://www.AYearToEnlightenment.com
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