More Buddhist Stuff: The Good News is...
Nov. 18th, 2004 03:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusGood Karma Made Easy
Most people don't have the time or inclination to work for world peace or feed the starving multitudes, no matter how terrific that would be. Sure, we'd like the wealth and health and results of such generousity, but it's hard to do while holding down a full-time job, raising kids, going to school and what-have-you.
There's a short-cut.
Believe it or not, because karma is generated in the mind, simply rejoicing in and being happy at the good others do makes you a participant. Yes, standing on the sidelines and cheering creates the same karma, as if you were doing it yourself.
So if you hear about someone giving out mittens to homeless people, take a minute to be happy that they're doing it. If someone wins the Lotto, spend a second or two and be glad of their good fortune - at some point they did something to earn it. This eliminates jealousy (and sometimes that's some work, let me tell you), creates a gentle, kind attitude, and - hooray - creates a great deal of good karma.
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wildernessguru isn't Buddhist, but he practices this. He's so happy that someone created those carpeted cat trees, because it's given millions of kitties so much pleasure.
There's a flip-side.
The same happens when we rejoice in the awful things that happen to people.
If we watch an execution and are glad the bastard is dead... uh-oh. Yeah. You might as well have thrown the switch yourself. When people danced after 9/11 that so many died in the World Trade Center? Ugh. The karma they created for themselves at being happy at the death of so many people. (Thank goodness it's not as bad if you don't know any better.) Because it's all in the mind.
This is a subtle thing. We're talking about motivation.
Let's say we're glad a war is over, like VJ-Day at the end of WWII, dancing in the streets. Well, if you're happy that your husband's coming home and there will be no more fighting, no more deaths -- that's a good thing.
Let's say however, you're glad the bomb was dropped at Hiroshima, because "those Japs had it coming to them after that Bataan death march." That's very different. Even though it might be the same event and look the same on the outside.
That's fairly obvious, but I caught myself this summer being glad the body count in Iraq was going up, because I hoped it would get Bush out of office. 'Oh shit' is right. Bad intentions sneak in there. There's a picayune monastic vow in the Vinaya to not watch troop movements - now I know why: it's hard not to root for one side over the other. I did better when Dick Cheney was sick this weekend; being glad anyone was sick just didn't seem like a good thing to be happy about.
Okay. So... what if you have a pragmatic attitude, i.e., "I'm sorry we had to drop the bomb, but Japan would have never surrendered otherwise"? That sounds neutral, but really that one's a mix of motivations, accumulating negative and positive karma at once. Which is what we normally do.
We spend a lot of energy on the end results we want, but don't watch our minds to see what we really create.
I thought about this because of the recent spate of abortion posts, encouraging people to give a thumbs up. I was pretty upset about it, and had to think why. Now I do detest (abhore, deplore, despise...) social engineering and utilizing peer pressure in general. It's a despicable method, regardless of who uses it. I know of Buddhist monasteries that do, and it doesn't really work: people have to act on inner principle rather than being s-q-u-e-e-z-e-d by peer pressure. *bleah*
I have to get the bad taste out of my mouth just thinking about it.
*ptooie* Yeah, really hate manipulation.
But from the Buddhist point of view, there's also the aspect of inviting people to rejoice in and thus create the same negative karma. (I've described the rather subtle view Buddhism has on abortion in the past, but the three-second version is: abortion falls under that "non-violence" thing - don't do it - but if you have, well, that's samsara for you. Life is like that. Do damage control - according to the Abhidharmakosha* how negative it is depends on the level of development of the fetus; purify it and move on.)
Now, only the individuals who responded know their motivations: was it to give support and kindness, and ameliorate the shame women feel? Well, then that would be good. But was it to encourage women to have abortions, or to be glad that this is done? *sigh* At least if you don't know it's not good, the karma isn't as strong.
*ETA: The cool thing about the Abhidharmakosha is that it describes the physical stages of fetal development with remarkable accuracy. Dated around 500 B.C., in a time where the fetus was thought to be a fully formed baby that just started small and got bigger, the Abhidharmakosha accurately depicted the fetus as going through stages "like a tadpole" "like a frog" "like a turtle", week by week, pegging the correct stage with the correct week.
In addition, it describes the mental development of the baby as dependent upon the physical stage of growth.
So while non-complex, pre-conceptual awareness of self-existence begins at conception, the capacity for experience enough to be aware of other, does not begin until around the 7th week. At that point, the baby has the faculties to experience the mother's heartbeat and be aware of 'other.' At that point, the first emotional experience occurs, which is this tremendous love for that other. Always thought that was a positive sign, that the first human tendency is love.
Most people don't have the time or inclination to work for world peace or feed the starving multitudes, no matter how terrific that would be. Sure, we'd like the wealth and health and results of such generousity, but it's hard to do while holding down a full-time job, raising kids, going to school and what-have-you.
There's a short-cut.
Believe it or not, because karma is generated in the mind, simply rejoicing in and being happy at the good others do makes you a participant. Yes, standing on the sidelines and cheering creates the same karma, as if you were doing it yourself.
So if you hear about someone giving out mittens to homeless people, take a minute to be happy that they're doing it. If someone wins the Lotto, spend a second or two and be glad of their good fortune - at some point they did something to earn it. This eliminates jealousy (and sometimes that's some work, let me tell you), creates a gentle, kind attitude, and - hooray - creates a great deal of good karma.
wildernessguru isn't Buddhist, but he practices this. He's so happy that someone created those carpeted cat trees, because it's given millions of kitties so much pleasure. There's a flip-side.
The same happens when we rejoice in the awful things that happen to people.
If we watch an execution and are glad the bastard is dead... uh-oh. Yeah. You might as well have thrown the switch yourself. When people danced after 9/11 that so many died in the World Trade Center? Ugh. The karma they created for themselves at being happy at the death of so many people. (Thank goodness it's not as bad if you don't know any better.) Because it's all in the mind.
This is a subtle thing. We're talking about motivation.
Let's say we're glad a war is over, like VJ-Day at the end of WWII, dancing in the streets. Well, if you're happy that your husband's coming home and there will be no more fighting, no more deaths -- that's a good thing.
Let's say however, you're glad the bomb was dropped at Hiroshima, because "those Japs had it coming to them after that Bataan death march." That's very different. Even though it might be the same event and look the same on the outside.
That's fairly obvious, but I caught myself this summer being glad the body count in Iraq was going up, because I hoped it would get Bush out of office. 'Oh shit' is right. Bad intentions sneak in there. There's a picayune monastic vow in the Vinaya to not watch troop movements - now I know why: it's hard not to root for one side over the other. I did better when Dick Cheney was sick this weekend; being glad anyone was sick just didn't seem like a good thing to be happy about.
Okay. So... what if you have a pragmatic attitude, i.e., "I'm sorry we had to drop the bomb, but Japan would have never surrendered otherwise"? That sounds neutral, but really that one's a mix of motivations, accumulating negative and positive karma at once. Which is what we normally do.
We spend a lot of energy on the end results we want, but don't watch our minds to see what we really create.
I thought about this because of the recent spate of abortion posts, encouraging people to give a thumbs up. I was pretty upset about it, and had to think why. Now I do detest (abhore, deplore, despise...) social engineering and utilizing peer pressure in general. It's a despicable method, regardless of who uses it. I know of Buddhist monasteries that do, and it doesn't really work: people have to act on inner principle rather than being s-q-u-e-e-z-e-d by peer pressure. *bleah*
I have to get the bad taste out of my mouth just thinking about it.
*ptooie* Yeah, really hate manipulation.
But from the Buddhist point of view, there's also the aspect of inviting people to rejoice in and thus create the same negative karma. (I've described the rather subtle view Buddhism has on abortion in the past, but the three-second version is: abortion falls under that "non-violence" thing - don't do it - but if you have, well, that's samsara for you. Life is like that. Do damage control - according to the Abhidharmakosha* how negative it is depends on the level of development of the fetus; purify it and move on.)
Now, only the individuals who responded know their motivations: was it to give support and kindness, and ameliorate the shame women feel? Well, then that would be good. But was it to encourage women to have abortions, or to be glad that this is done? *sigh* At least if you don't know it's not good, the karma isn't as strong.
*ETA: The cool thing about the Abhidharmakosha is that it describes the physical stages of fetal development with remarkable accuracy. Dated around 500 B.C., in a time where the fetus was thought to be a fully formed baby that just started small and got bigger, the Abhidharmakosha accurately depicted the fetus as going through stages "like a tadpole" "like a frog" "like a turtle", week by week, pegging the correct stage with the correct week.
In addition, it describes the mental development of the baby as dependent upon the physical stage of growth.
So while non-complex, pre-conceptual awareness of self-existence begins at conception, the capacity for experience enough to be aware of other, does not begin until around the 7th week. At that point, the baby has the faculties to experience the mother's heartbeat and be aware of 'other.' At that point, the first emotional experience occurs, which is this tremendous love for that other. Always thought that was a positive sign, that the first human tendency is love.