Thanissaro Bhikkhu on Karma & Rebirth

Question: Is it valid to send mettā to a person no longer in this world, one to whom I felt resentment and who had resentment toward me? Thanissaro Bhikkhu: This is a very good practice to do. It’s one way of bringing your own mind to some peace. You have to remember that when people die, they don’t go out of existence. They get born again. So, they’re always there someplace for you to spread mettā to. Now, whether that person rejoices in your mettā or not, that’s that person’s business. But if you can spread goodwill to someone you used to resent, that takes a huge burden off of your mind. ~ Good Heart, Good Mind: The Practice of the Ten Perfections

"The way the Buddha teaches mindfulness of death, it makes sense only in the context of his explanation of what happens at death. If it were the case that death were the end of everything, mindfulness of death would mean doing everything you can to survive physically and squeezing as much enjoyment as you could out of whatever time is available. The attitude of “eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may die”: That’s how some people think about death. But as the Buddha pointed out, a basic principle of mundane right view is that here is the next world, and it’s built by your karma, built by your actions. And as he explained further in transcendent right view, your state of mind is going to be very, very, important at the moment of death. You want to be able to see your clingings, see your cravings. If you can learn how not to ride with them at all, so much the better. But if you find that you can’t manage that, at least keep yourself, as the texts say, “rightly directed.” Have...

“And what is the stress [dukkha] of not getting what is wanted? In beings subject to birth, the wish arises, ‘O, may we not be subject to birth, and may birth not come to us.' But this is not to be achieved by wishing. This is the stress of not getting what is wanted." ~ the Buddha, The Great Establishing of Mindfulness Discourse: The Four Noble Truths, transl. Thanissaro

Mid-September 2001: "A lot of people have been asking recently about how karma has played out in recent events. The Buddha generally discourages trying to trace back exactly what people did that caused them to die in this or that way. He said that if you tried to trace that back you’d go crazy, for the issues of karma are so complex. The basic principle is simple: Whatever was done with a skillful intention gets a pleasant result, whatever was done with an unskillful intention gives an unpleasant result. And there’s a correspondence between a particular type of unskillful action and a particular type of unskillful result. But the precise details — “What exactly did these people do? Did they do it all together? Did they do it separately?” — no one can trace those back. What the Buddha did teach, though, is to focus on what’s the most skillful thing we can do now, given the situation. That’s where the emphasis should lie." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "For the Good of the World...

"If you meet up with the results of some past bad kamma — suppose somebody does something bad to you — it doesn’t mean that your past kamma compelled them to do something bad. It’s simply that your past kamma left the opening. They saw the opening and they took it. And of course, that becomes their kamma now. The fact that you had that past bad kamma: There are unskillful ways and skillful ways that you can think about it. The unskillful way would be to think, “Well, this person was simply carrying out the dictates of kamma. So the person’s not responsible or is actually doing something good.” That’s unskillful. There’s no excuse for that person’s behavior, because the person did choose to take that opening. The skillful way is to say, “Well, I must have some past bad kamma, so I’ll learn how to take it in stride and not get too worked up about it. And I’ll take it as an incentive to try to be more skillful in the future.” As for times when someone does something really nice to y...

"As the Buddha said, when you see people who have no good habits at all — the things they say, the things they do, the things they think are all corrupt — the attitude you should develop toward those people is the same as when you’re going across the desert and you see somebody lying on the roadside, sick, without any help. At the very least, you would want somebody to come and find that person and help them, even if you can’t do it yourself. That’s the attitude you should have. Because when you’re wishing for other people’s happiness, one, you want it to be true happiness. And two, you realize that happiness, especially true happiness, has to come from understanding. People, to be happy, have to understand the causes of true happiness and be able to act on those causes. You’re not saying, “Well, may this person who’s killing and stealing, etc., be happy killing and stealing.” You’re saying to yourself, “May they see the light, realize that the killing and stealing doesn’t lead t...

"The Thais have an expression for understanding karma, what they call the “rhythm”of things. The teaching on karma doesn’t say that you have a single karma account, that the karma ripening right now is the sum total of all your past karma. Instead, it says that specific actions will bear fruit at specific times. If someone is experiencing bad karma right now that doesn’t mean that all they have is a load of nothing but bad karma. It means that a particular unskillful action is bearing fruit right now. That person may also have other good actions in his or her past that have not yet borne fruit. So you can’t judge the total karmic past of people by their position in life, by their current level of happiness and pain. The teaching on karma is not meant to be used that way. You can’t look at somebody and immediately gauge their karma account. What is does mean is that there’s a rhythm to life. Sometimes you’re experiencing the fruit of bad karma, sometimes the fruit of good past karm...

"What’s really worth doing? On the one hand there’s a lot of change: We’re subject to aging, illness, death, and separation from all that we love. The question is — what are you going to do about change? Some people will tell you that the Buddha teaches you, “You simply have to accept it because that’s all there is: things that keep on changing, changing, and changing. If you resist change, or if you try to find something that doesn’t change, you’re going against the nature of reality.” But the Buddha did teach that there is something that doesn’t change, and it can be attained through our efforts. So, what’s worth willing then? Simple acceptance? Well, no. What’s worthwhile willing is to act in ways that will lead to that changeless dimension. That’s why the contemplation ends with, “I am the owner of my actions.... whatever I do, for good or for evil, to that will I fall heir.” Your actions will make a difference, so you want to make sure that you’re well motivated to act skil...

"When the Buddha was teaching Rahula how to look at his actions, at his words, at his deeds, the point was that he should try to purify the thoughts, the words, and the deeds. He wasn’t focused on making himself a better person; the point was to learn how to respond to situations in a more skillful way. That’s something you can evaluate, something you can learn from. If you make a mistake, you learn from the mistake and learn how not to repeat that mistake. If you do something well, remember that, take joy in that, and keep on training. In other words, when you look at your actions, don’t make them a gauge of how good a person you are. That’s where the fangs begin, and then they start you thinking about, “Well, am I better than that other person over there? Do they do a better job? Are they more generous? Are they more virtuous? Are they better meditators? Am I better than they are?” However you answer those questions, that kind of thinking has fangs because it really obscures wh...

"[The meditation] aims at a happiness that’s totally reliable and totally harmless, one that’s not subject to change. It’s going to found within. And how are you going to find it? Through your actions, your karma. A lot of people have problems with the teachings on karma, but essentially this is what underlies the whole project we’re undertaking here. What we do is going to make a difference. We can’t be sure about the extent that what we do will make a difference in the world outside, but in the world of our experience, what we do shapes everything. And if we can train our minds, it will make a big difference in our lives. After all, when you’re asked to believe in the principle of karma, what are you being asked to believe in? One, you’re responsible for your actions. There’s no outside force like a god or the influence of the stars acting through you. You make your choices; you’re responsible for them. Two, the quality of your choice comes from the quality of the intention unde...

"As you get more and more sensitive to what you’re doing, you begin to see that your actions in the present moment have a lot of power: They can create a sense of full well-being right here, right now. In fact, in the Buddha’s analysis, even though we may have the results of some bad actions coming in from the past that are going to influence the present moment, the question of whether or not we’re actually going to suffer from those results depends on our present actions. Which is good news. Otherwise, we’d just be stuck with whatever comes up from the past and we’d have no way out. But the fact is that our experience of the present moment is a combination of the results of past actions, our present actions, and the results of our present actions. The present actions are the ones that can make us suffer, or not, so those are the ones we want to focus on." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Mature Happiness"

"The workings of kamma are complex — more complex, in fact, than is indicated in [MN 136]. Their complexities would have posed a challenge for the Buddha if he had wanted to construct an explanation of stress and its end based on first principles, for a theory of kamma would have been a logical place to start. Thus he would have been required to give a full explanation of how and why kamma is complex. But because his teaching was teleological, aimed at actually putting an end to stress, he needed to explain only what was necessary toward that end: the ways in which past and present kamma shape experience. Although past kamma can influence the conditions on one’s sensory experience, the actual stress or lack of stress experienced by the mind is the direct result of present kamma — the act of following or abandoning clinging and craving. For the purpose of putting an end to stress, all that needs to be known is how to create skillful kamma and then — once that skill is mastered — ho...

"We don’t often think of the teachings on karma as having much relevance to the meditation. Sometimes we’re even taught that karma was one of those weird pieces of cultural baggage that somehow got smuggled into Buddhism from its cultural background. But that’s not the case at all. The Buddha had some very specific teachings on karma that had nothing to do with what anybody else was teaching at the time, and they’re immediately relevant to why and how we’re meditating. The “why” has to do with the point I just raised. Given that karma is intention, and intention is the huge shaping force in your life, you want some control over it. If you make up your mind to do something that you know is good, you want to be able to stick with that intention. And where does intention happen? Right in the present moment. Where does it get changed? In the present moment. This is why we focus on the present moment, so that we can see the process of intention in action as it happens and can have a sa...

Question: I’ve come to meditation to help me bear the atrocities of the world. What is awakening? Is it a moment of conscience when one embraces all the sorrows of the world, and in that case means hello to all sorrows or is it on the contrary a state of total forgetfulness and egotism, in that case it would be hello to guilt? So, which is it? Thanissaro Bhikkhu: Neither. Remember the image of feeding. Ordinarily, we feed on the world, both physically and mentally, in order to gain happiness and maintain our identity as beings. But when you gain full awakening, the mind no longer needs to feed because it already has enough in terms of its own happiness. When you’ve reached that state, you can engage in the world without having to feed on it. You can help those whom you can help, and you don’t have to suffer in cases where you can’t help. In this way, you’re neither embracing the sorrows of the world nor are you running away from them. Instead you have a different relationship to the ...

"[The Buddha] recommends having a sense of love for yourself, in the sense that you don’t want to act in any way that would cause you harm down the line. And if you really care about yourself, you’re also not going to cause harm to any other people at all, because if you can harm them, then there’s going to be trouble coming back. If your happiness depends on their misery, they’re not going to stand for it. Even if they can’t get you, your kamma will, at least to some extent." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "See Yourself as Active Verbs" (Meditations10)

"As for being kind to others, again it’s good to look at the issue in terms of karma. If you can get them to do skillful things, that’s the kindest thing you can do for them. In some cases, you can’t tell people or recommend to people what to do. Say they’re your parents: You have a debt to your parents, but they’re the hardest people in the world to teach, the least likely to want to listen to your teachings. But you can be a good example, and that’s the way you repay your debt to them. In fact, the practice is one of the ways we repay our debts to all the people who’ve made it possible for us to practice here. Think of all the people who gave so that this building could be built, so that there would be food every morning. We have shelter here. All kinds of good things. Everything down to the pipes underground. For years we had to collect money for the water mains and people kept saying “When are we going to see something built with this money?” We replied, “Well, all the money ...

"Figure out what your actions are and what the results are, how they’re connected, and which actions give rise to better results than others. This is why we meditate — to develop those powers. So it’s not a matter of you versus the system outside, where you are trustworthy and the system outside is not. Rather, it’s learning how to sort out inside you which perceptions and which thought constructs are actually more trustworthy than others." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Trust in Heedfulness"

"Even when people behave unjustly, you have to learn how to set aside thoughts of revenge, because they accomplish nothing good. Remind yourself that what other people do is their kamma; what you do is your kamma. You can’t ultimately be responsible for their kamma; however, you can be responsible for your own actions. So, you spread thoughts of goodwill [mettā]: thoughts that they may be happy, and especially that they may understand the causes for true happiness and then really act on them. That’s a thought you can extend even to people who are really cruel. In fact, you especially want to extend that to cruel people so that instead of focusing on getting revenge or retribution, you open your mind to the question of what you might do or say that would actually get them to change their ways. That way your intentions become more skillful." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Wisdom of Wising Up" (Meditations6)

"Oftentimes, we think of success in the world in terms of getting ahead in our work, doing good work that we like, leaving good results behind in the world. But so many times those results are dependent on factors that are totally outside of our control. So the emphasis should be on areas that are more under our control: the mind. You do good things for the sake of the good that it does for your mind. If for some reason the world changes so that the good you do gets wiped out, still the goodness of the mind doesn’t get wiped out. That’s what stays with you. So spend your time on the aspect of life that does stay with you. Arrange the rest of your life around that. That way, as you sit down to meditate, the outside world doesn’t impinge so much. Because you remember: The outside world is not a set factor. A lot of your experience of the outside world depends on how you interact with sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations. That’s the world you experience. And so much of ...

"Two principles in [the Buddha's] teaching on kamma were especially distinctive. The first is that kamma is intention [AN 6:63]. In other words, action is not simply a matter of the motion of the body. It’s a matter of the mind — and the intention that drives the kamma makes the difference between good actions and bad. The second distinctive principle is that kamma coming from the past has to be shaped by kamma in the present before you can experience it. You actually experience your present kamma before you engage with the results of past kamma. Without present kamma, you wouldn’t experience the results of past kamma at all. The importance of your present kamma is the reason why we meditate. When we meditate, we’re getting more sensitive to what we’re doing in the present moment, we’re creating good kamma in the present moment, and we’re learning how to be more skillful in creating good kamma all the time, from now into the future. Now, in learning to shape our present moment...

"Kamma not only plays a role in shaping experience of the cosmos, it plays the primary role. If this were not so, then even when kamma was ended there would still remain the types of experience that came from other sources. But because no experience of the cosmos remained when all present kamma disbanded, and none would resume after all old kamma ran out, kamma would have to be the necessary factor accounting for all such experience. This fact implies that even the limiting factors that one encounters in terms of sights, sounds, etc., are actually the fruit of past kamma in thought, word, and deed — committed not only in this, but also in many preceding lifetimes." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Wings to Awakening"

"The concept of kamma is usually disliked because people believe it to be deterministic, teaching that your present experience is controlled by your past kamma, which is something you’re powerless to change. But as the Buddha pointed out, your present experience is shaped not only by past kamma but also by present kamma. In fact, your present kamma is more important than your past kamma in determining whether or not you suffer in the present. Present kamma deals with the way you shape your experience in the present moment. We are active beings, not passive. The mind takes an active and proactive role in shaping its experience from moment to moment. It’s like fixing food. Our past kamma is like raw food, and our present kamma is like the act of fixing the food so that we can eat it. In fact, feeding is one of the central images in the Buddha’s teachings: Because we are beings, we need to feed both physically and mentally. To feed properly, we need to know how to fix our food well....

"What the Buddha taught about karma is this: Your experience of the present moment consists of three things: 1) pleasures and pains resulting from past intentions, 2) present intentions, and 3) pleasures and pains resulting from present intentions.With reference to the question of happiness, this teaching has three main implications. • The present is not totally shaped by the past. In fact, the most important element shaping your present pleasure or pain is how you fashion, with your intentions in the present, the raw material provided by the past. • Pleasures and pains don’t just come floating by of their own accord. They come from intentions, which are actions. This means that they have their price, in that every action has an impact both on yourself and on others. The less harmful the impact, the lower the price. If your search for happiness is harmful to others, they will fight to undo your happiness. If it’s harmful to yourself, your search has failed. • Your search for pleas...

"There was once a young monk who was asked by a wanderer from another sect what the results of karma were and the monk said, “Stress.” Then he went back to the Buddha and asked him if he’d given the right answer and the Buddha said, “No. When asked about karma, you talk about how skillful karma leads to pleasure, how unskillful karma leads to pain.” Another one of the other monks piped up and said, “Well, wasn’t he thinking about the fact that all feelings are stressful?” And the Buddha replied, essentially, that was not the time or place for that teaching. So, an important part of strategy is knowing which teachings to use when. And not jumping the gun or trying to skip over things." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "A Noble Warrior's Path" (Meditations8)

"There’s a story about Somdet Toh. A young monk came to see him one evening and said, “This monk came up and hit me. I hadn’t done anything to him at all. He just came up and hit me.” And Somdet Toh said, “No, you hit him first.” They argued over this for a while, and then the young monk, frustrated, went to find another senior monk to complain about Somdet Toh, who he said wasn’t listening to reason. So the senior monk came and asked Somdet Toh, “What’s this all about?” And Somdet Toh said, “Well if this monk hadn’t had any kamma with that other monk in the past, the other monk wouldn’t have come up and hit him.” But then of course that raises the question, why did the first monk hit the second monk, or who hit who first? When you trace it back and back and back, that question becomes meaningless. And the funny thing is, is that making it meaningless takes a lot of sting out of it. The part of the mind that says, “I’ve got to right this wrong,” that holds on to old wounds, g...

"Don’t let the fact that old bad karma is showing itself be an excuse to create more bad karma. It should be your signal that, okay, this is what bad karma is like when it shows its results, and you don’t want it. So do what good karma you can in the meantime. That includes developing qualities like patience, but also looking around to see what other opportunities there are to do something good. Lift your spirits. Learn how to give yourself a pep talk." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Karma Storms"

"The Buddha says that if you think there is a creator god who is responsible for the pleasure and pain you experience, you can’t really practice the Dhamma. You have to realize that the important issues are the things that *you* create. When you solve the issue of your own creations, then you’re done with the problem." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Karma of Mindfulness: The Buddha's Teachings on Sati and Kamma"

"The Buddha says that you don’t go to heaven or to hell because of other people’s actions. Yet all too often we find ourselves in our own mental heaven or hell because of what someone else did. Actually, though, we’re the ones who create that heaven and hell. It’s through our own actions that we take what they did, what they said, or even what we think they thought, and turn it into our own private heaven or our own private hell." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Other People"

"You want to look at the attitudes you’re fostering in your mind and make sure they’re skillful ones — because the whole issue of kamma boils down to this: What you do right now is important. What was done in the past may have some influence on what you can do right now, but what you do right now is what’s really important. And the possibility of doing something skillful right now is always present." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Story-telling Mind" (Meditations1)

"Most of the issues that seem so big when you take the view of just one lifetime become very small when you think about eons and eons of lifetimes. Think about the Buddha as he finally got to the town of Kusinara, where he was going to pass away for his last time and go into total nibbana. Ven. Ananda was upset because it was just a little tiny town — he called it a little daub and wattle town, which means basically that the houses were made of nothing but bamboo and mud. It’d be better for the Buddha to go to a great city for his unbinding. There the people would give him a proper send-off. The Buddha said, “No. This little town here used to be a great city as well.” Then he went into a long description of how great it was. In fact, there’s another sutta that goes into an even longer description of how great it was. He happened to be king that time. And in the story, there comes a point where he’s about to die. His wife, the queen, comes to him with tears on her face. She says, ...

"Ajaan Suwat came from a very large peasant family, and large peasant families usually don’t have much to hand down to their children. He met a forest monk who said, “Hey look, it’s your actions that matter. And the fact that you’re poor now: You may have not been generous in the past, but you’ve got the opportunity now to practice the Dhamma.” So this quality of conviction is what sees us through. When things are going easy, the idea of having conviction doesn’t speak that much to us. But when things get hard: We look at our lives, we look at the people around us, the situation we’re in — and the last thing you need is something that teaches you to just give in. The teaching of karma is precisely what tells you not to give in. It places power in your hands." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Faith"