Law of Karma, in simple words, means – ‘as you sow, so you reap’. Even Newton defined Karma in his own way when he said “for every action there is an equal & opposite reaction.”
Majority of the people believe that the word Karma refers to actions. However, that is not the complete meaning; Karma is also the result of our actions. Whatever a person is going through in present is the result of his previous actions; and these previous actions may not just be from this life, but from many previous lives that one may have lived. There is nothing in this universe that happens by accident. Everything that we see happening, happens in regular order as the past, present & future are inter-dependent and interconnected. Cause is Effect concealed, & Effect is Cause revealed!
We all would agree that our lives are very often touched by unfathomable events. Especially when people have to undergo mental or physical suffering, they are often seen complaining and tend to view it as some kind of unjustified and unfair happening. Likewise, a lot of times some completely unexpected good situations occur spontaneously in our lives, and there is no apparent cause for these happenings to occur. These all incidents are related to the science of karma or the universal law of cause and effect.
Though the science of karma is so scientific, still it is seen that a lot of people don’t accept it. The hidden cause for not accepting the theory of karma is usually that they don’t want to change their habits, but yet want to run away from the fact that they will be held responsible for their actions, and would have to suffer for it sooner or later. If you slap someone, you surely invite a slap back on your cheeks from that person and not a flower.
The ancient Vedic scriptures tell us that it is our mind alone that is the performer of actions, and our gross body is just a means. Whatever is physically done is actually inspired by a thought springing from mind. Thus, in one sense we can say there are two types of actions:
- Mental actions alone
- Mental actions combined with physical actions
However, in both cases it is the mind alone which is the governor, and physical body is just a loyal servant following its master’s commands. The scriptures tell us that when we die, we leave only the gross body behind; we carry our mind, intelligence and ego to our next bodies. And this is precisely the reason why we suffer or enjoy because of our past actions from previous lives too, as the doer, in the shape of mind, is always there; only the gross body has changed, and gross body is not the doer.
The only way out of this cycle of action and reaction is by purifying our karma. How we can purify our karma would be our next topic of discussion.
From the time I can recall, I was always interested to know more; not only what we can see with our eyes, but also that what our eyes cannot catch.
