The Karma of Happiness: A Buddhist Monk Looks at Positive Psychology (extract)

"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 pleasure or gratification in the present has an impact not only on the present but also well into the future. If you want a long-term happiness, you have to take into account the way your present actions shape future events. And you have to pay careful attention now, for you can’t come back from tomorrow to undo any careless mistakes you had made today.

Taken together, these observations about the connection between action and happiness show the need to be skillful in your pursuit of happiness. If you want your happiness to last, you have to look for pleasure, gratification, and meaning in ways that are harmless. You have to carefully choose which skills to develop that you’re sure to need in the future — strengths of character that will enable you to be happy in the midst of aging, illness, separation, and death.

Fortunately, the nature of this connection between actions and their results means that it’s possible to develop skill in areas where you’re not yet skilled. There’s enough of a pattern between actions and results that you can discern the pattern and put it to use. At the same time, because the pattern is not deterministic, you have the freedom to learn and change your ways.

In this way, the Buddha’s teachings see a clear connection across past, present, and future as to the best way to pursue happiness. You develop the right attitude toward past mistakes so that you can learn from them. You approach the present as an opportunity to respond skillfully to whatever arises. And you face the future with the confidence that you’re developing the full range of skills you need to handle whatever lies in store. Of course, the Buddha’s teachings on happiness go beyond this, to a happiness — nirvana — that doesn’t depend on actions or intentions, but just this much should be enough to suggest many new avenues of inquiry for positive psychology."

~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "The Karma of Happiness: A Buddhist Monk Looks at Positive Psychology"