Were We Destined To Interact With Those Who Come Into Our Lives?

[rockyysdt]

It seems any negative actions we perpetrate against others must occur in order for the other party to either suffer as a result of accumulated khamma and/or learn from before moving on, due to lack of self awareness.

Our life appears set up, fashioned by our environment so our future actions can dovetail into anothers suffering.

As our environment has custom designed us to act in specific ways to given experiences, our actions are able to create specific suffering for others.

Were we destined to interact with those who come into our lives?

A person I know suffers greatly from rejection.

She feels she'll always live a lonely life & will never marry.

She drinks heavily to drown her sorrows & lives a self destructive lifestyle.

This inhibits self awareness further exacerbating her situation.

Due to her small baby like size & cute good looks as a child she was favored by her parents over her siblings and was spoilt, resulting in her selfish & self centered personality.

A number of friends, flat mates, & boyfriends have deserted her over time, due to her negative behavior & lack of concern or regard for their feelings.

After suffering personal attacks, hostility, rejection, disinterest, lack of intimacy & silent treatment at her hands, the common response for these people has been to leave her without notice nor confrontation & then to refuse any contact with her. She lacks self awareness & is too self centered to recognize she has pushed them away.

It seems the mechanism of khamma introduces her to specific people who prefer to withdraw from her life rather than confront her.

Her suffering is reinforced as she gets no explanation and without self awareness she can't break the cycle.

She has shown inflexibility to those who have tried.

The accumulated khamma on those in her life appears to result in them being made to feel poorly about themselves at her hands & to experience ongoing feelings of guilt due to their actions to abandon her.

The result of accumulated khamma on her is for her to suffer an ongoing cycle of rejection without apparent end as those around her are too weak to confront her behavior.

Both parties are interdependent.

The trap also appears to be that although each party's actions lack merit, they appear to be accumulating merit by offering an opportunity for the development of self awareness as well as assisting to expend accumulated negative khamma in each other through suffering.

Am I wrong?

Edited June 20, 2009 by sabaijai
large font size reduced per forum rules

[purushanti]

It seems any negative actions we perpetrate against others must occur in order for the other party to either suffer as a result of accumulated khamma and/or learn from before moving on, due to lack of self awareness.

Our life appears set up, fashioned by our environment so our future actions can dovetail into anothers suffering.

As our environment has custom designed us to act in specific ways to given experiences, our actions are able to create specific suffering for others.

Were we destined to interact with those who come into our lives?

A person I know suffers greatly from rejection.

She feels she'll always live a lonely life & will never marry.

She drinks heavily to drown her sorrows & lives a self destructive lifestyle.

This inhibits self awareness further exacerbating her situation.

Due to her small baby like size & cute good looks as a child she was favored by her parents over her siblings and was spoilt, resulting in her selfish & self centered personality.

A number of friends, flat mates, & boyfriends have deserted her over time, due to her negative behavior & lack of concern or regard for their feelings.

After suffering personal attacks, hostility, rejection, disinterest, lack of intimacy & silent treatment at her hands, the common response for these people has been to leave her without notice nor confrontation & then to refuse any contact with her. She lacks self awareness & is too self centered to recognize she has pushed them away.

It seems the mechanism of khamma introduces her to specific people who prefer to withdraw from her life rather than confront her.

Her suffering is reinforced as she gets no explanation and without self awareness she can't break the cycle.

She has shown inflexibility to those who have tried.

The accumulated khamma on those in her life appears to result in them being made to feel poorly about themselves at her hands & to experience ongoing feelings of guilt due to their actions to abandon her.

The result of accumulated khamma on her is for her to suffer an ongoing cycle of rejection without apparent end as those around her are too weak to confront her behavior.

Both parties are interdependent.

The trap also appears to be that although each party's actions lack merit, they appear to be accumulating merit by offering an opportunity for the development of self awareness as well as assisting to expend accumulated negative khamma in each other through suffering.

Am I wrong?

Lot of psychology in your writing, but I wonder if we are just guessing about what is going on with the other person, part of whose o so subjective life is secret to all but her, and another part secret to her.,,,,,,, ah!---the complexity of it all.

Some points, or, my 2 cents---she will repeat her lesson until she gets it. Eventually she will graduate from this universe-city.

---the people she meets, if not attached to the results of their actions, will receive no suffering, nor karma.

---the mental intention is important, so these other people need to have pure intentions. The physical world is an illusion.

------ Thought is the basis of action. If one chooses not to help, or not to be helped, another counterpart of the personality, on another probable world, will act this out. Free will is of the utmost importance. On another probable world of reality, with counterparts of the same people,this situation has all been resolved; the soul collects this experience too.

---Yet nothing is important, but everything matters.

---An action may appear negative, but we know not the intention, nor whether this is karma resolved or karma initiated.

Those who come into are lives are catalysts for change in our lives, and we in theirs.

---Positive/negative is a judgement. The soul wants experience unjudged by the soul. We are here to satisfy the sou'ls desire. The personality may suffer, but the soul rejoices.

One cannot save another (post 16 years) from karma. If another has receptivity to positive suggestions, from outside, or within, from the Higher Self, s/he can save the small self.

--Self-awareness, individuation, use of free wiil---these separate us from plants and animals, to journey thru this valley of Emotions, on the way to living from the Heart in Service to Others.

[phetaroi]

Hi Rocky,

In general, I think people come into and leave our lives by mere coincidence. However, I think that there are a very few people that come into our lives (or we into theirs) that may imply destiny...although that is not the correct word...the perfect word here escapes me.

I am reminded of that old joke about the man who is caught in a flood. First, before the water starts rising someone comes in a jeep to rescue him, and he replies "God will save me." Then, as the water rises to the first floor someone comes in a boat to rescue him, and he replies "God will save me." Then he is stranded on his roof and a helicopter comes to rescue him, and he replies "God will save me." Then, of course, he drowns and when he gets to heaven he says, "God, I counted on you to save me." And God replies, "Well, I sent a jeep, a boat, and a helicopter."

We may not always realize who those key people are, and I think they are few and far between. A very few people have influenced my life in that way. Certainly less than five...maybe even only two or three. And I met those people under circumstances that were rather illogical, and they changed the direction of my life. Or, perhaps they put my life back on its intended track.

Now, exactly how this relates to Buddhist beliefs, I don't know. I do know that one of the people who came into my life in a very illogical way sent me to Thailand on my first journey overseas. And, as a result of a chain of events brought on by his relatives in Chiang Mai, a very personal experience in Buddhism led me to the beginning of a path I otherwise could not have imagined my life taking.

[rockyysdt]

Lot of psychology in your writing, but I wonder if we are just guessing about what is going on with the other person, part of whose o so subjective life is secret to all but her, and another part secret to her.,,,,,,, ah!---the complexity of it all.

Some points, or, my 2 cents---she will repeat her lesson until she gets it. Eventually she will graduate from this universe-city.

---the people she meets, if not attached to the results of their actions, will receive no suffering, nor karma.

---the mental intention is important, so these other people need to have pure intentions. The physical world is an illusion.

------ Thought is the basis of action. If one chooses not to help, or not to be helped, another counterpart of the personality, on another probable world, will act this out. Free will is of the utmost importance. On another probable world of reality, with counterparts of the same people,this situation has all been resolved; the soul collects this experience too.

---Yet nothing is important, but everything matters.

---An action may appear negative, but we know not the intention, nor whether this is karma resolved or karma initiated.

Those who come into are lives are catalysts for change in our lives, and we in theirs.

---Positive/negative is a judgement. The soul wants experience unjudged by the soul. We are here to satisfy the sou'ls desire. The personality may suffer, but the soul rejoices.

One cannot save another (post 16 years) from karma. If another has receptivity to positive suggestions, from outside, or within, from the Higher Self, s/he can save the small self.

--Self-awareness, individuation, use of free wiil---these separate us from plants and animals, to journey thru this valley of Emotions, on the way to living from the Heart in Service to Others.

Interesting points which help progress my thoughts.

Quote: "We are here to satisfy the sou'ls desire. The personality may suffer, but the soul rejoices."

If her soul rejoices I am pleased, but as I'm still very much grounded in the personality, my small self grieves for the suffering of her small self.

Edited June 20, 2009 by rockyysdt

[sabaijai]

Theravada experts on the topic of kamma (I'm not one, just reporting what they've told me) would respond that the workings of kamma are so complex that it's impossible for any of us to know the answer to such a question.

In the first place, one must distinguish kamma (action) from vipaka (result). They are not the same thing. Each vipaka we meet could be linked to a very proximate or a very remote kamma, eg, from kamma that arose five minutes ago or five eons ago. There is no way to know which, directly, and furthermore it probably would profit one little, if at all, to know such things, in terms of attaining liberation.

One thing you can say for sure is that every single moment that arises was caused in part by the previous moment, and thus in every present moment we have the ability to alter the arising of the next moment. Nothing is pre-destined in that sense. Liberation is always at hand, even if vipaka has still to be experienced.

The book Karma for the Traveller gives a very good overview of the way in which kamma works, in Theravada Buddhism, complete with charts that show how kamma-vipaka is not time-dependent and thus there is no 'order' to the epoch-leaping linkage of events in ways that can be directly perceived by the mind.

The Tipitaka says there is no 'soul' that migrates from life to life, rather an unbroken chain of citta or mind-moments. When sati (awareness) arises, vipaka continues but kamma ceases.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Karma-Today-...ler-t84704.html

[rockyysdt]

The book Karma for the Traveller gives a very good overview of the way in which kamma works, in Theravada Buddhism, complete with charts that show how kamma-vipaka is not time-dependent and thus there is no 'order' to the epoch-leaping linkage of events in ways that can be directly perceived by the mind.

Living in Australia at the moment, I've tried to source a copy from the Theosophical Society.

Unfortunately they've suggested that it might now be out of print?

[sabaijai]

rocky there are thousands of copies available for free around Chiang Mai, particularly at Wat Suan Dok and Wat Lai Hin but also several other monasteries. Do you know anyone in Chiang Mai who could mail you one?

[rockyysdt]

rocky there are thousands of copies available for free around Chiang Mai, particularly at Wat Suan Dok and Wat Lai Hin but also several other monasteries. Do you know anyone in Chiang Mai who could mail you one?

Sadly not.

Chiang Mai is a place I've often wanted to visit but haven't been able to.

I'll have to visit there some time in the future.

If I do, I'll definitely attempt to get myself a copy.

[sabaijai]

Perhaps someone on the forum who lives in CM could send you a copy.

[cognos]

I used to "love" Karma..now I think sometimes poor people in Thailand , although they are quite happy.. which is good (poor people in the west are not happy)..but the problem could be that since they accept their fate from the last life..it makes them accept their fate of being poor. On one hand, this gives them some comfort..but it makes them 'Unable" to change and become prosperous..but I love all my Buddhist Thai family..

[rockyysdt]

And some out there are just manipulators for their own gain,,,taking advantage of other people,

No doubt they will get theirs in the end, or maybe before if we are clever enough to catch them out!

I view manipulators in a different light.

Why are they manipulators?

Perhaps trapped in a mindset formed by their environment and childhood conditioning.

Locked into subconsciously driven behavior requiring great effort to overcome.

They do hurt others, but hurt themselves even more.

The person I experienced said she lost her heart.

Having lost her mother who's love she never received, she now feels permanently irredeemable.

Faced with so much pain she shuts out her feelings with alcohol & escapism allowing her to further continue with her behavior.

The only escape I can think of is through Samatha & Vipassana.

Unfortunately only a tiny minority of humans are driven to practice.

Edited October 2, 2009 by rockyysdt

[fabianfred]

I used to "love" Karma..now I think sometimes poor people in Thailand , although they are quite happy.. which is good (poor people in the west are not happy)..but the problem could be that since they accept their fate from the last life..it makes them accept their fate of being poor. On one hand, this gives them some comfort..but it makes them 'Unable" to change and become prosperous..but I love all my Buddhist Thai family..

Understanding the law of karma helps them to accept their being poor and to know the reasons for it......far better than the poor Westerners who can only ask "...why me lord...?"

I would say that being rich spiritually is preferable to material riches....

[mauGR1]

During my first journey to India at a still young age,the law of Karma was for me like rain through the dry sand,nonetheless i accept i cannot understand it completely through my less than perfect mind.

I had the feeling that some of the people i met in this life i knew in previous ones.

I've read some theory that if i dream about somebody which i met few days before,most probably i knew him/her from a previous life.