Karma is stupid.
Thanks for the excellent response, nashiitashii. It seems like it’s far more complex than our Western concept, but in the end it still boils down to “What goes around comes around.”
God’ll get you for that.
It’s not so much karma, but people often experience negative consequences for their negative behavior.
Really self-centered people are often miserably unhappy. The people who scramble and elbow their way up the corporate ladder are rewarded with…what? A high-paying corporate job? But these corporate climbers usually aren’t happy with their high status corporate job, their McMansion and their trophy wife. Achieving what they thought was their goal doesn’t satisfy them. They’re still a miserable bastard. So, the punishment for being a miserable bastard is that you’re a miserable bastard.
Whereas people who are kind and friendly and helpful are rewarded by being kind and helpful and friendly.
Nice people get thrown into the gas chambers, sure. But it’s no fun being a concentration camp guard either.
From a Buddhist perspective, karma (and samara, and dependent origination) can be interpreted either in a macro sense (the whole world, or even universe, from lifetime to lifetime) or in a micro sense (happening moment to moment).
In the micro sense, I can easily appreciate that the moral decisions I make in one instant affects the nature of my existence in the next. In my more perceptive moments, I can see the whole thing at work, even if it’s a bit fuzzy. Based on actions taken one moment I take birth in a certain way the next, and on and on. The “on and on” part being, of course, samsara, since just as I take birth each moment, I also die each moment. I can also perceive a part of the effect that my actions have on those I have contact with. This would be the beginning of the macro sense.
Going much farther than that seems to me to be a pointless exercise, partly because of the complexity involved, and partly because karma is so intimately tied to the idea of rebirth. The latter doesn’t get much traction with me: I tend to think I have more impact on the world living moment to moment than I’ll have when I fizzle out.
I believe in karma as in the ‘do good, have good done to you’, but in the general, not the particular. That is, if a society’s members do good to each other - trade fairly, be charitable, keep agreements etc - that society will prosper, and therefore members of that society will on average prosper, even if a particular member does not.
Not if she worries about her own karma! 
I can say I like the idea of a universal balance, in which individuals experience either the direct benefit of having lived a good life or the direct consequences of not having done so. I think of the idea as universal justice. I detest the Christian idea of eternal reward for “good” behavior, or saying the proper words in the proper ritual before you die, no matter how evil your actions in life, vs infinite punishment for not having done so, no matter how good a life you’ve lived or how finite your transgressions. I think of that idea as entirely unjust. Can I say I believe there actually *is * universal justice, whethe called karma or redemption? Of course not.
Hey! I didn’t see any balloons or confetti. gyp! 
I think psychic energy isn’t correct but I’m not sure what else to call it at this point. It isn’t really contained in something you answer as “where is it”
I know you read nashiitashii’s post. We’re all interconnected. Like individually conscious drops of water that comprise the same ocean. It isn’t so much the deed itself as the intent and purpose that became the deed. Punching someone in the mouth because you’re a bully is different than punching someone in the mouth because they are bullying someone else, which is also different from stopping the bully without violence. So our intent that causes our choices and deeds are like pebbles in this vast ocean and the ripples spread out and affect the other drops. Whatever the nature of that intent those ripples return to us in some way. Eventually {we hope} we turn from the negative intent and seek the positive. It is connected to moving toward enlightenment {losing our illusions} and the cycle of rebirth. We see our connection to others more clearly and seek to live in harmony with our true nature. {The ocean}
How efficient is it? Perfectly. In ways we can’t imagine. There is no avoiding the consequences of our actions and choosing, consciously or unconsciously, to act contrary to our true nature.
I have a question for those who seem more familiar with Buddhist teachings.
kelly5078 or nashiitashii In Buddhist teaching does Karma get quicker and more apparent the more we grow and get closer to enlightenment?
I think I read that somewhere. Early on we may not see the connection between our actions and consequences that happen much later. As we grow and are more sensitive to and focused on enlightenment the consequences are closer to the action and we see them more clearly. Does that sound familiar to anyone?
Karma works at the speed it works; I’ve never heard of anything influencing that. Your last paragraph seems to be suggesting some predictive power; I’ve never heard of that either.
Enlightened beings simply don’t generate karma, and those farther along the path don’t generate as much as very attached people like me.
I tend to think that looking on enlightenment as a goal to be reached is not helpful. I can certainly be looked on that way, but seeing as how I don’t think I’m going to become enlightened (and I’m fairly sure I only have one life), I don’t feel like spending time tying myself up in philosophical knots. I just concentrate on the path. I get a bit better as time goes on; that’s enough for me.
Karma isn’t exactly justice. There’s no judge. It’s just actions and consequences.
One of the issues with the interpretation of karma by most Western thinking individuals is that from a Buddhist perspective no particular event can be described as positive or negative.
The tale of the farmer is used to illustrate this.
Farmer’s horse runs away. People say bad luck. Farmer says maybe.
Farmers horse returns with 3 new horse friends. People say good luck. Farmer says maybe.
Farmer’s son breaks arm breaking new horses. People say bad luck. Farmer says maybe.
Farmer’s son escapes the draft because of broken arm. People say good luck. Farmer says maybe.
etc.
The point is, is that no particular event can be categorically determined to be positive or negative from a Buddhist perspective - for that reason to try to look at getting a flat tire as some sort of “bad karma” is sort of silly when you consider that the flat may have saved you from a horrible accident 2 miles up the road in which case it would be “good karma”. It is impossible to determine what sort of karma is attached to any particular even on such a minute level. It’s really a case of missing the forest for the trees.
I believe that karma is entropy.
That is, entropy on a universal (literally) scale. People are “agents”. As are animals, plants, rocks, wind, water, stars, cosmic dust and everything else in the universe.
Whenever an agent acts on some other agent (whether volitionally or not) the balance of energy (not the “woo woo” energy, but real, measurable energy) in the universe changes–even if only in an extremely small way. As the universe moves inexorably toward entropy–or “heat death”–the “balance of power”, or energy, is constantly shifting.
So each and every action you take in life has real, physical consequences. Sometimes these causes that you instigate lead to effects that you may actually notice in your lifetime. Usually, the changes are either unnoticable or they don’t occur in your lifetime or lifespace or some combination of all of these.
So when that jerk cuts you off in traffic, his action will certainly have repercussions, but neither you nor he will probably ever notice or be affected by any but the most immediate and proximate effects.
That’s karma. (To me, anyway)
No, not predictive power. The principle is that as we become more consciously aware we might *notice * a karmic result of something. Yes those farther along the path generate much subtler karma, but being further along they might actually notice it with good humor in passing.
I also agree that the details are interesting conversation occasionally but being in the moment and making the best of it is what really counts. The details will be whatever they are.
Good point. In Christian circles the saying is “All things work for the good of those that love God” Things that seem bad on the surface ultimately can be good if we are open to see it. In Buddhism I think it’s called non attachment to outcome. What happens happens and it’s up to us to make what we can out of it.
Wouldn’t you say that the intent behind the event or action might be seen as positive and negative as I mentioned above? I find it interesting because I’ve seen how the words we use to describe things often shapes or is indicative of how we think about things. We may smile and say nice things while harboring resentment, or envy. We may give to someone but in our heart it is self serving and manipulative. Would you say that is negative or is there a better way of putting it. In harmony or out of harmony perhaps?
Which is also true for most atheists.
Well, again, pretty hard to pin down from a Western thinking perspective. If you accept that the point of everything is to achieve enlightenment, and that enlightenment can only be achieved though following the eightfold nobel path, and that being manipulative in the way you describe is NOT following the eightfold nobel path, and therefore enlightenment cannot be achieved - well - as opposed to bad karma it more a case of shooting yourself in the foot.
If the way to achieve happiness is to be right thinking and acting, acting in a way which is at odds to this only hurts the actor. So, I suppose you could call that bad karma, but that’s really not what it is. More like self destructive behaviour.
I don’t believe in Karma. There is no scientific evidence for it, but I can understand how someone who does many bad things, may have their actions catch up with them, but I don’t believe some sentient force is acting upon their acts, instead the consequences catch up with them. There are too many examples of good people coming to bad ends and the same with bad people having many good things happening to them.
No.
I think it is seductive to believe in the Boomerang Theory, because believing this deludes us into thinking we have control over what happens to us. But funny, we only seem to see in one direction when it comes to ourselves. “If I give this homeless guy money, maybe tomorrow I’ll get a promotion!” “If I clap my hands real hard at church, maybe I’ll be able to shrink that tumor growing in my head!” When shit happens to us, we never consider that our karma’s catching up to us. We never blame our broken-down car on the cruel gossipping we do at the office. We never blame our illnesses on all the times we wished certain people would die. Yet, we always seem to gain “clarity” when it comes to the misfortunes of other people. How convenient.
Bible-believers who buy into karmic justice seem to forget that Job was picked on not because he was a mean person, but because God gets to do whatever the hell He wants to do. I don’t see how people can believe in both karma and God’s will. They don’t seem compatible to me.
Humm - to answer the OP, which it occurs to me I haven’t done - no, I don’t believe in the woo woo style “karma” that many people believe in, in the way that Monstro described. That’s not karma, that’s cognitive disonance.
I don’t believe in a sentient force of any kind “God”, but I do believe that we are more than just chemicals and flesh; that we have an energy that is beyond what we can perceive in everyday life. I don’t like the term “soul” because it implies an exact version of yourself only not solid. I think our energy is more interconnected and wide-reaching than that. I know that our current scientific methods don’t test this very well, but it does seem that quantum physics is starting to touch on it a bit.
It isn’t, for me, just about being a “good person” and acting correctly. I think it is more about the types of energy you put out. If you’re happy, I think that draws happiness to you; if you’re miserable and fretting over all the wrongs in your life you’re likely to get more of the same.
I know there isn’t any concrete proof I can offer those who don’t agree; but I’ve been trying to always look at the positive things in life and to ignore the negative since I was maybe 16 or so, and I’ve had an amazingly lucky and happy life so far (ten years later). So it’s worked for me. YMMV
I don’t think this resembles the views of those of us who believe in some sort of karma in any way. I don’t think anyone who thinks that the universe is fundamentally balanced believes that if there is something wrong in your life all you have to do is be nice for a while and it will resolve itself. Honestly, that sounds like some sort of warped Christian version of karma to me.