Karma means that every action is an opportunity to advance in our practice

Cause and Effect 1.

The word karma penetrated the Western consciousness, from the Buddhist point of view at least, in somewhat distorted guise. It is often called the Law of Cause and Effect, so it is about the consequences and actions of the body, speech and mind. And consequences are very important in Buddhism.

Any action that is willed, however subtly, by the person who performs it will always produce a future ripening and ultimately a fruit of similar moral quality, because in the human sphere karma operates in an ethical manner. So an unethical action will produce a come-back of like kind in this life or some future rebirth; and the same goes for morally good or indifferent actions that are willed and freely undertaken.

In the Bible it says something similar: that we reap what we sow. If we want to progress spiritually--or even just live with minimum aggravation--it therefore behooves us to be very careful how we speak and act, for there is no way we can escape the consequences.

John Snelling, Elements of Buddhism

Cause and Effect 2.

Right livelihood is not just a philosophical ideal. It is a practical, achievable reality. Finding and maintaining right livelihood does require regular, consistent action, but the steps are clear and the results immediate. Finding your own right livelihood depends primarily on getting in touch with your "beginner's mind."

Mindfulness challenges us to stay with things as they are and to change our lives through action that harms no one. Working together, mindfully and compassionately, we can create a community in which all our livelihoods are "right."

Claude Whitmyer in Mindfulness and Meaningful Work

Cause and Effect 3.

Karma is often wrongly confused with the notion of a fixed destiny. It is more like an accumulation of tendencies that can lock us into particular behavior patterns, which themselves result in further accumulations of tendencies of a similar nature.... But it is not necessary to be a prisoner of old karma.... Here's how mindfulness changes karma.

When you sit, you are not allowing your impulses to translate into action. For the time being, at least, you are just watching them. Looking at them, you quickly see that all impulses in the mind arise and pass away, that they have a life of their own, that they are not you but just thinking, and that you do not have to be ruled by them. Not feeding or reacting to impulses, you come to understand their nature as thoughts directly.

This process actually burns up destructive impulses in the fires of concentration and equanimity and non-doing. At the same time, creative insights and creative impulses are no longer squeezed out so much by the more turbulent, destructive ones. They are nourished as they are perceived and held in awareness.

Jon Kabat-Zinn, Wherever You Go, There You Are

Cause and Effect 4.

All results come from causes that have the ability to create them. If we plant apple seeds, an apple tree will grow, not chili. If chili seeds are planted, chili will grow, not apples. In the same way, if we act constructively, happiness will ensue; if we act destructively, problems will result.

Whatever happiness and fortune we experience in our lives comes from our own positive actions, while our problems result from our own destructive actions. According to Buddhism, there is no one in charge of the universe who distributes rewards and punishments. We create the causes by our actions and their effects, in the same way that Newton didn't invent gravity. Newton simply described what exists.

Likewise, the Buddha described what he saw with his omniscient mind to be the natural process of cause and effect occurring within the mindstream of each being. By doing this, he showed us how best to work within the functioning of cause and effect in order to experience happiness and avoid pain.

Thubten Chodron, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, Vol. VI, #3

Cause and Effect 5.

What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow: our life is the creation of our mind. If a man speaks or acts with an impure mind, suffering follows him as the wheel of the cart follows the beast that draws the cart. What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow: our life is the creation of our mind. If a man speaks or acts with a pure mind, joy follows him as his own shadow.

The Dhammapada, trans. by Juan Mascaro

Cause and Effect 6.

In a well-known phrase, the Buddha said, Hatred can never cease by hatred. Hatred can only cease by love. This is an eternal law. We can begin to transcend the cycle of aversion when we can stop seeing ourselves personally as agents of revenge. Ultimately, all beings are the owners of their own karma. If someone has caused harm, they will suffer.

If we have caused harm, we will suffer. As the Buddha said in the Dhammapada: We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world. Speak or act with an impure mind and trouble follows you as the wheel follows the ox that draws the cart. Speak or act with a pure mind and happiness will follow you as your shadow, unshakable. Happiness and unhappiness depend on our actions.

Sharon Salzburg, Lovingkindness

Cause and Effect 7.

Those of us who start on the path to right livelihood find that our lives are more balanced, simple, clear, and focused. We are no longer strung out in a meaningless cycle of material consumption. The contemporary economy focuses on this cycle of consumption. It doesn't really support our efforts to find meaningful work.

Today, work is a means to consume or to pay debt for consumption already indulged in. How many people do you know who really love the work they are doing? How many feel bored and alienated? How many are simply earning the money to spend it on material pleasures? Right livelihood demands that you take responsibility for making your work more meaningful. Good work is dignified. It develops your faculties and serves your community. It is a central human activity.

Roger Pritchard, in Claude Whitmyer's Mindfulness and Meaningful Work

Cause and Effect 8.

Right livelihood has ceased to be a purely personal matter. It is our collective karma. Suppose I am a schoolteacher and I believe that nurturing love and understanding in children is a beautiful occupation. I would object if someone were to ask me to stop teaching and become, for example, a butcher. But when I meditate on the interrelatedness of all things, I can see that the butcher is not the only person responsible for killing animals.

He does his work for all of us who eat meat. We are co-responsible for his act of killing. We may think the butcher's livelihood is wrong and ours is right, but if we didn't eat meat, he wouldn't have to kill, or he would kill less. Right livelihood is a collective matter. The livelihood of each person affects us all, and vice versa. The butcher's children may benefit from my teaching, while my children, because they eat meat, share some responsibility for the butcher's livelihood.

Thich Nhat Hanh, in Claude Whitmyer's Mindfulness and Meaningful Work

Cause and Effect 9.

In simple terms, what does karma mean? It means that whatever we do, with our body, speech, or mind, will have a corresponding result. Each action, even the smallest, is pregnant with its consequences. It is said by the masters that even a little poison can cause death, and even a tiny seed can become a huge tree. And as Buddha said: "Do not overlook negative actions merely because they are small; however small a spark may be, it can burn down a haystack as big as a mountain."

Similarly he said: "Do not overlook tiny good actions, thinking they are of no benefit; even tiny drops of water in the end will fill a huge vessel." Karma does not decay like external things, or ever become inoperative. It cannot be destroyed by time, fire, or water. Its power will never disappear, until it is ripened.

Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

Cause and Effect 10.

The Buddha identified karma as volitional activity. That is, each volition in the mind is like a seed with tremendous potential of the same way that the smallest acorn contains the potential of a great oak tree, so too each of our willed actions contains the seed of karmic results. T

he particular result depends on the qualities of mind associated with each volition. Greed, hatred, and delusion are unwholesome qualities that produce fruits of suffering; generosity, love, and wisdom are wholesome factors that bear fruits of happiness. The Buddha called the understanding of this law of karma, the law of action and result, the "light of the world," because it illuminates how life unfolds and why things are the way they are. The wisdom of this understanding allows us the freedom to make wise choices in our life.

Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation