Day 6 "Karma - Misperceptions" Oct 26-Nov2 Retreat at St Francis

Today we'll talk about karma and what karma is. There's a lot of misconceptions about karma in terms of the karmic cycle and the idea that we have what's called karmic relationships and all these different ideas that have been spinning around. But we want to simplify what karma is for the sake of understanding it in our own lives.

First and foremost, the Buddha has said that karma is intention. Very simply put, karma is intention. And this is a very important thing that he said because he's distinguishing what other dharmas were presenting, namely what is now modern-day Jainism, presenting what karma is. At the time of the Buddha you had six other schools of philosophy there. There were the materialists, the ones who said that there is nothing but just this body and there's nothing like an afterlife and that's all there is, so eat, drink and be merry was their philosophy, quite literally.

There was the philosophy of amoralism, that there's no meaning in giving and what is sacrifice and what is offered. There is no action and consequence and so on. There was the school of the skeptics who never really landed on any specific conclusion about one thing or the other. Very much agnostics. There were the eternalists. So the eternalists said that there is some kind of... there are these seven eternal principles, the four great elements, and there's a self that is completely eternal, and it doesn't matter whether you destroy something, because ultimately it will exist forever. Then there were the fatalists, the law of niyati, as it's called in Pali. The fatalists said that life is basically just a ball of yarn that you unravel.

And once it's unraveled, that's the end. That's it. And everything is deterministic. There's nothing you do that will have any shift in your life. Everything from all the life events that you experience, even your awakening is supposedly fixed according to this particular philosophy. And then there's the Jains who say that there is a soul, there is a self, which over a period of lifetimes collects karmic dust.

And it's all kinds of actions, intended or unintended, that is where we collect this karmic dust. And we have to do ascetic practices, we have to fast, sacrifice different things in order to start to whittle away at that karmic dust. The Buddha said, but how do you know what is left? How do you know how much dust is actually left?

And the Buddha distinguished from all of these different philosophies in many different ways, but namely in the idea of karma. The idea that karma is intention is a very powerful one, very simple, but very powerful. In other words, the karma that we produce is dependent upon our intentions. So how we choose to behave in the world, how we choose to interact in and with the world through our thoughts, deeds and words will determine what happens next.

And what happens next is what's known as vipaka, the fruit of those efforts. Now the fruition of these efforts can be immediate, or they may happen after some time, or they may never happen at all. And there is a notion that in order for us to be fully awakened, we must do away with all of our karma. This is a mistaken notion, and unfortunately there are a lot of people who have this notion, because then they feel that somebody who has still karma to burn is not yet fully awakened, and either they're just misguided in the way that they understand karma or they just truly don't get the whole idea altogether.

But if that was the case and you would see that individuals like the Buddha would not be existing, because karma is what keeps you existing in this samsara. Karma is the fuel for the aggregates. And the Buddha had to go through his own karma even after full awakening. He had a cousin who in his life spouted all kinds of things against him. He had people accusing him of all kinds of wrongdoing.

He had back pain, of all things. Imagine, you're known for being the world's greatest meditator. You have back pain. And so he had a physician that tried to help him with that in many different ways. But it was still something he had to deal with, especially after he became quite old. They escape their karma. When karma comes to ask for its dues, we must pay.

But it doesn't mean that at the end of one's life, you exhaust all your karma either. Very important to understand. Karma arises due to causes and conditions. When the causes and conditions are present, when they are ripe. This is one way of understanding karma. And this was something I took from a participant at Dhammasukha a couple of years ago.

One of our teachers was Upandita. And Upandita explained it like this, and I thought it's a really interesting explanation about karma. Suppose you have an apple seed, an orange seed, and a watermelon seed. And for the apple seed, you provide enough soil, enough fertilizer, enough water, enough sunlight, and so on. For the orange seed, you provide just enough. You don't provide the best nutrition, you don't provide enough sunlight, you don't provide enough water, and the watermelon seed you leave to its own survival, so nature will take care of it, we'll see what happens. But because you have given, and then let's say the watermelon seed, in this case, you have one more kind of seed, let's say a mango seed, and with the mango seed you decide that you are going to give it the worst conditions.

Not enough sunlight, not enough fertilizer, not enough nutrition, not enough anything. So now the apple seed, the orange seed, the watermelon seed, and the mango seed, they by their very nature germinate in their own time. By the programming of the seed itself, it will grow in its own way. But because there is enough nutrition, more than enough nutrition, enough water, enough sunlight, everything for the apple seed, it will grow healthy.

In the case of the orange seed, it will be okay because you've just given just enough, the bare minimum. And then with the watermelon seed, you've done the same. But because by the nature of the watermelon seed, being different from the orange seed, it will grow at its own rate. None of those seeds will grow at the same rate. And finally, with the mango seed, you haven't given enough water, you haven't given enough sunlight, you haven't given enough nutrition.

And so it withers away. So the same applies for karma. Karma, in this case, the fruition of karma, comes about when the right causes and conditions are present and by the nature of the intensity of that karma. So the nature of the karma is the same as the nature of the seed. It will grow at the rate that it will grow based on its pre-programming within the seed.

When the right causes and conditions are there, that is to say the right person, the right situation, the right words, all of those things come together, then the karma will come to fruition in whatever way it comes to fruition. So an example of this, as per Buddhist doctrine, there are five immediately effective karma, and none of them are good.

The five immediately effective karma are the killing of one's mother, the killing of one's father, the killing of an arahant, the drawing the blood of a Buddha with the intention to harm him, and the split of the Sangha, or trying to split the Sangha, creating a schism, as they would call it. All of these, as per Buddhist doctrine, take you to hell immediately. As soon as you do that, then all the other karma that you have, and the immediate karma that you have produced there, will take you to a lower destination. So it's also the nature of the karma that you have that you produce that is said to create a specific kind of outcome.

So if you see karma in this way, then you realize that if causes and conditions were never present for the fruition of a certain karma, then they won't come. And that's okay. Good, bad or indifferent, that's okay. What you are in control of is how you choose to react to that karma. And how you react to that karma will determine whether that karma is further proliferated.

So if I take that karma personally, whatever fruition of that karma happens in the moment, which manifests as feelings, which manifests as experience, and I take it personally and I react to it from the sense of I, that this is affecting me, I have craving, I have clinging, I have becoming, and so on, then it will further proliferate into more karma.

We see this in the meditation with regards to hindrances. Hindrances are old karma. Karma that we experience in the form of thoughts. Not the active thoughts where we think about things, consciously think about things, but the passive thoughts that come and go in the form of ideas and concepts and so on. And how we choose to deal with that determines whether that hindrance continues or it starts to fade away. And bit by bit, this is how karma fades away. Through non-reactivity and just observing the experience, the sense of self towards the experience, that karma dissipates, loses potency, loses its energy.

And once it dissipates, it may arise again, but much weaker. And then it starts to arise again, but much, much weaker. And eventually there is the remainderless fading away of that karma. So we've talked about old karma and new karma. The fruition of karma, which is the old karma, that is, everything we're experiencing through the body.

But could it be said that when I got sick, that that was my karma? It would be pretty non-compassionate for you guys to tell me that that's my karma. Does it really matter if the illness was my karma or not? Does it really matter if when a baby is born and they have some kind of birth defect that it's their karma?

It's pretty uncompassionate to judge someone being born for their birth defects. So that's not how we use karma. That's not how we see karma. And the Buddha was very, very explicit about this. He said, though there is the doctrine of karma in the Buddha Dharma, the end-all, be-all understanding of life and existence. And so there is a sutta, Samyutta Nikaya 36.21, the Mulya Sivaka Sutta, in which the Buddha says, there are those Brahmins who have this doctrine that everything that arises, arises due to karma.

But I say that is just part of the truth, part of the reality. That there are other factors present that are not related to karma. Like what? The imbalance of the humors. In the case of ancient India, we had Ayurveda. So that was vata, pitta, kapha. Vata is the air or the wind humor. Pitta is the heat or the bile. And then you have the kapha, which is the water. Things in the system cause disease. It's not because in lifetime 472 I did so and so and therefore now I'm experiencing this particular illness. It's because for whatever reason, while I was traveling, somebody was coughing and in the air there was this virus, and my body picked it up, and it seemed to be that because my immune system was such that it reacted in that way. So therefore, it's not my karma.

It's just the causes and conditions that were there present in terms of the imbalance in the body and whatever is happening in external factors. Then secondly, he said, accidents. Accidents are not karma. You're not looking and you drive in an intersection and you don't realize it's a stop sign. And then boom, you get into an accident. Was it your intention to get into an accident? In that case, it's not an accident. You make it look like an accident, but your intention was otherwise.

But if you weren't looking, it's an accident. You didn't intend it. And so the Buddha says we must give accounting for these as well. Then there's assault. Somebody comes running at you unprovoked. Somebody says something to you unprovoked. I wish the best for all of you. I hope none of you become Dharma teachers. You go through so much unwarranted criticism, through so much unwarranted words from people that you don't even know. Unprovoked.

Not your intention. This happens all the time in our lives. When we were bullied in school, did we ask the bully? Did we provoke the bully? Did we piss off the bully? The bully had his or her own issues. And unprovoked, they started to bully us. So these are also part of that process. Nothing to do with karma. Nothing to do with direct action and consequence. Environment, the environmental factors, the weather, the climate. We don't have any control over the climate as such. And so where we are born, or where we might be going, to Florida or some tropical place in the wintertime, and then suddenly there's a hurricane.

We're not in control of that. It just supposedly happened due to the weather. Buddha says that karma is only useful in understanding what to do in the present moment. If I try, and this is what the Buddha says, if I try to figure out all of the different karmic mechanisms that are out there that led to this moment, and I try to find this action and then this consequence, makes connection to this particular thing and that particular thing, and then with person A, with person C, led to this particular experience with person D. All of that, as the Buddha says, will make your head explode.

There's no need for it. So the idea is you don't need to fathom the intricacies of karma from how many lifetimes ago this particular thing happened and therefore now you're suffering here. It's not helpful. So the Buddha says that the best way of understanding karma is what do I do with what I have right now? What I'm experiencing right now? Sure, there are causes and conditions that led to the arising of this particular experience.

Now, how I choose what my intention is with what I am facing will determine what happens next. So do I choose to make a big deal out of it? Do I choose to take it personally? Do I choose to try to control it? And if I do, what happens? That karma becomes heavier and more entrenched? Or do I learn how to let go?

Do I learn how to disengage my identification process with the experience? Do I learn how to disengage from the experience as this is me, this is mine, this is myself? And do I just have complete acceptance of the situation? Because that's what it is at the end of the day. The understanding that we are not in control here. The fantasy of 'I am in control of my life. I manifest my life. I do all of these things in my life.' And it's a wonderful notion. It's a beautiful fodder for the ego. That I am in control of my life.

But it's also scary for the ego to think I'm not in control of my life. I'm not in control of what happens in the next moment. And so we need some kind of security. And it always boils down to the desire for some kind of stability in an otherwise truly unstable world. But the more we come to terms with that instability, the more we surrender to that, the more we let go, the easier it flows, the easier it becomes. This karma that we experience happens in the relative world.

What do I mean by that? In the absolute sense, of the world outside of the sixth sense basis, that is the space of Nibbana, there is no karma. If we were to look at karma as this, vibrations, that's what they are. Ultimately, vibration. Everything. Our eyes are vibration, our ears are vibration, our nose, our tongue, our body, our mind is vibration.

The sense objects that they pick up is also vibration. Everything is vibration. Feeling, experience, perception, conceptualizing, all of it is vibration. And so Nibbana is to learn how, is that space of no vibration, beyond vibration. The space in which the vibrations cease, cessation. And it is available here and now. It truly is. What we do in meditation and how we meditate is just a simple exercise to deal with the vibratory thinking mind and letting it feel like it's doing something.

Keeping it occupied and say, here, run with this and play. That's what meditation is. It's to keep that part of the mind fully occupied so that the real work happens after that. You know, the jhanas and the enlightenment factors and entering states of bliss and awareness and wonderful things that we see, the oneness with the world and all of that, it's still in the realm of the thinking mind.

It's still in the realm of, hey, look at me. Give me my certificate of enlightenment now. It's still in that realm. But Nibbana is beyond all of that. Nibbana weaves through that and therefore it is part of it, but it is also beyond. Which is why it's so easy to drop into it once you understand that. Excuse me. Once you understand that space between one moment and the next, and you realize there is the unconditioned, the unfabricated, the uncreated, the Nibbana element, that is the substrate of all that we see here and all that we experience here, that is paraconscious, beyond the realms of awareness and non-awareness, non-existence, because these are all just concepts for the small I, the small me, mine, or myself.

When we drop all of that, in that silence, beyond that silence, there is Nibbana, and no karma exists in that. That is the total destruction and cessation of karma. And the question arises, is how do I get there? You don't. If you have to ask the question, how do I get there, you're still working within the realm of self. If you drop all mental effort. This is what we mean by surrender.

This is what we mean truly by taking refuge in the Dhamma. Letting go of our small, tiny, fragmented sense of self that believes that it is the doer, that believes that it is the experiencer, and truly just relaxing into the flow of all experience. In the seeing, there's only the seeing. In the hearing, there's only the heard. In the sensing, there's only the sensed. In the cognizing, there's only the cognized.

Just resting in that stream and going into that flow. Over a period of time, the mind starts to go silent. And with it, the ego disappears. The small self merges, melts into that flow. And so that substrate of Nibbana and that flow is one and the same thing. And so it doesn't matter if the body is subject to these kinds of karma, if the sense bases are subject to this kind of karma. It doesn't matter. Not because of some nihilistic understanding. You realize, you understand that. That-ness. Suchness.

The underlying basis of all reality. And when the mind sinks into that, then there's nothing to do. Nowhere to go. No one to become. Truly. Because there never was. That's the realization. And the mind doesn't care about karma. Because that's in the relative world. The body is subject to illness. Okay, great, whatever. The mind is subject to different kinds of tension and hindrances and all of this. No problem. That's fine. Bring it on.

But when the mind relaxes into Nibbana, when it truly touches that, then there's nothing else to do. Awareness is not Nibbana. Awareness is the reflection of Nibbana. Pure awareness. Every time you go into the signless, it is a direct reflection of Nibbana. It is a direct reflection of Nibbana. Nibbana itself is not consciousness. Nibbana itself is not going to give you clarity. Nibbana doesn't care. Nibbana just is.

What really cares is the mind. The mind wants to process it. The mind wants to make sense of it. to it. When Nibbana is beyond meaning, Nibbana is beyond action and consequence. Nibbana is the only thing that is independent, permanent, unconditioned, and truly the self. But it is not one self that we own. It is not the self that we see as Atman, as some kind of consciousness. of everything everywhere all at once and the only thing we have to do is relax, just relax, relax the tightness, relax attention, relax the hindrances, relax, relax the lack of attention to the object, relax the object itself, relax all doing, relax all effort, relax all trying.

Don't meditate. Don't try to do anything. Don't be a meditator. Just let meditation happen. That's it. Everything else, you know, the seven factors of awakening, the 37 requisites, the Eightfold Path, the Four Noble Truths, dependent origination, transcendental dependent origination, all of that is to appease the relative mind so that it gets in line. And the trouble is when that mind becomes prideful. It says, hey, I've done something here, I am here, this is the experience. But that's missing the point. You're keeping the mind busy enough so that you can bypass all of that and come to the true nature of everything. Suchness, thatness. And it is to be understood that when you touch that and when you fully embody it, what does it mean to fully embody it?

It means the ability to go and access it whenever needed. And this is what we're talking about when we say nirvanizing life. Bringing nirvana into samsara is the process of the realization that nirvana is your true nature. Beyond your identity of male and female and gender and politics and race and name and form and sense basis and all of the things that qualify you as this is me, this is mine, this is myself.

Beyond all of that. And when you do that, so long as there is still a playing of the game, because Nibbana is beyond the game. Buddhism is just another game. The Dhamma is just another game. Just another VR headset that we pick up and enter into the matrix. When you get to Nibbana, you don't care about the game anymore.

When you fully embody Nibbana, you don't care anymore. Not because you're apathetic, not because you're nihilistic, but you see through the emptiness. You see through all the different little things that can get you caught up in the game of karma, action, and consequences. So you take off that VR headset. But what happens is, once we have seen it, we take on another VR headset, Dhamma 2.0.

And now I am a Dhamma practitioner. I am a meditator. I am a Dhamma teacher. I have awakened, and so on and so forth. And that is the subtle, nuanced conceit that we must see and let go of. Don't put on any more VR headsets. Take them all off. And you will have Nibbana. Drop all effort. Drop all trying. Let go of the raft.

You're already at the other shore. Already at the far shore. You just don't know it yet. You just haven't realized it yet. And the thing is, so long as you have a mind, and so long as you have a body, so long as you are in the relative world, you're still subject to karma. In the ancient Indian understanding, there are three categories of karma.

Something called Sanchita Karma, Agami Karma, and Prarabdha Karma. Sanchita Karma is the karma that's the storehouse of things that have led to this life and that you're bringing in as different kinds of seeds to unpack and to germinate. It's the universal storehouse that all of our lives have. Agami Karma is the karma that we add to the storehouse.

And so there's always a replenishing of the granary of karma. And Prarabdha Karma is the karma that is, in some sense, allotted for this life. Your lifespan, the five aggregates, the number of years you live on this planet, in this existence, all of that is Prarabdha Karma. The things that you cannot escape, that you must go through if causes and conditions come to be.

When somebody becomes fully awakened, when somebody fully embodies Nirvana, they're no longer subject to any kind of Sanchita Karma and Agami Karma. In other words, all of the storehouses of future lives is burned away. And so what they are subject to is just the allotment of what we would call destiny. been rolling because the arrow has already been released. The momentum may slow down. The intensity of that karma may decrease over a period of time.

So the Buddha's Prarabdha was his back pain. It was all the rumors that people spread about him. It was his cousin trying to kill him and all of these things. That was the Prarabdha that he had to go through. That was the destiny that he had to go through. And nobody can escape that. But the beauty of embodying Nirvana is that you no longer identify with it.

You just see it as another thing that happens. But this isn't spiritual bypassing. It doesn't mean that we are going to just ignore our emotions. It doesn't mean that we're just going to ignore and say, I can't do anything about it. I might as well just sit and do nothing. No. We still have much to integrate. But the difference is, we still have our little quirks, our little idiosyncrasies, our different preferences about this or that. We still have all of those things. Because that's the embedding of the body and the mind complex.

But, because we are fully embodied Nirvana, we see through the emptiness of all choice, and we just rely completely on intuition. And intuition comes from that territory, that para-conscious territory, beyond existence and non-existence, beyond any kind of dualities. you to be in full alignment with Prarabdha so that whatever needs to be done is done right and so once that experience is done that's it it's burnt out right there and then my reactions to it or whatever my reactions are to it but I won't act out of my emotional reactions I may say this is this is terrible and I might be annoyed and I might be irritated and all these things and they're all valid emotions but I don't function from that I allow whatever comes up to come up the only reason why it intensifies is my resistance to it my resistance to the experience my resistance to the emotions my resistance to whatever is coming up that's what intensifies it but when I am completely in full acceptance of every moment, then it just glides like butter.

And there's nothing to do then. Now, does that mean I just sit around all day under a tree and I don't do anything? No. We still have Aparamda. We still have responsibilities. Why? Because that chain reaction, the momentum of the arrow being released has already been released. We're still beholden to our responsibilities. So we continue doing what we need to do.

So we do it much happier, much freer. And there is a different kind of joy there, such that it is independent of any kind of causes and conditions. So whether I fail or I succeed in a task, it doesn't matter anymore. I get blamed or praised for some kind of experience or something that I do, it doesn't matter anymore because I have a different kind of happiness that is unconditioned, that is my true nature. So all of that is just the remnants of the game, the remnants of the VR headset. And I realize it's just a VR headset. I realize it's just a game. Playing it for fun until the batteries run out. And that's it. That's the end. So I'll stop there.