Thursday, January 26, 2012

善因必有善果, 恶因必有恶果

Each seed of goodness that one plants becomes a tree that shall give him shade in the future. It may not be now but it will come.

What we reap today is what we have sown and what we sow today shall be what we reap in future.

The main difficulty that many face is in reconciling with the observation that there are people who seem to be ruthless, vicious and do bad things who still seem to be doing well and are happy. Why are they doing bad things and still getting good fruits?

The answer to this is that the good fruits that they are getting are from the good deeds that they have done before, whether it is in this life or from earlier lives. However, it is also equally true that when the good karma that they have generated from those good deeds have been fully expended, they will no longer enjoy good fruits. If they do not continue to plant good seeds, they will no longer enjoy good fruits in future. Likewise, the bad seeds that they have planted will bear bad fruits for them once the karma ripens and bad fruits will come until the bad karma has been fully expended.

Such is the suffering of beings in samsara.

How does the practitioner generate good karma in spite of the negative environment? By expressing gratitude (sincerely) to all other beings that have given him the opportunity to grow in spiritual awareness and wisdom. When we are slapped by someone, that is a result of a debt that we have to that individual. However, at that point in time, if we are mindful, that situation can help us generate good karma.

The practitioner is given the opportunity to observe his own emotions and mind-state at the point of being slapped and after being slapped. If he is sincere and has been diligent in his practice, he will grow wiser from the incident because he has learned more about his own emotions (frustration, anger, hatred) and understood more about the roots of those emotions. Therefore he is grateful to the one who has slapped him. This may seem counter-intuitive to those who are not practicing but to those who do, they understand that he has benefited from the situation.

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