To wonder if you believe in Karma and to give me an example

[leprechauncream]

In general I feel very lucky and blessed in my life but, over the last couple of years, I have been betrayed/let down in a major way by two people I was close to - one personal and one work related. I feel very upset by this but am trying to move on as life is too short to let these things - which probably happen to everyone at some point - sour my life or other relationships.

I wouldn't want anything very bad to happen to anyone but, in relation to the person at work (who plotted and lied about me to improve her own prospects), I have to confess that I was not sorry to hear recently from a former colleague that this person is now encountering her own difficulties at work.

AIBU to feel like this? Has anyone had any similar experiences?

Former F**k wit of a 'boss' who was such a nightmare that me and several others resigned due to the stress. He applied for a managers role and told everyone at work but he didn't get it. He then had a meltdown at the person who was successful, who complained to HR and took out a grieveance against him. He then nutted out at HR in the discliplinary meeting, so HR took out a grievance against him. He then hired a lawyer and tried to sue the company, but then 'resigned.'
I and the others he was an a$$ too moved on to great jobs - he worked as a PA (with a massive pay cut) but only lasted about 6 weeks (cos he was so moody and useless with computers).
Last I heard he was still unemployed.
I totally believe in karma - have a few other examples but think this is the best one. It make take a while, but karma does come around.

My cousins husband lied and told her mother she had cancer in a poor attempt to extort money out of the old girl. Their son died of lukaemia 5 years later.

Big believer in what goes round comes round. lied

No I don't think I do believe in it.

By my reckoning, for all things that have been done to me by my ex, he sould long have ago have been squashed by some mighty unstoppable force but, no, he's still leading what looks, admittedly to the outside world, a charmed existence.

Karma schmarma!

Not that I'm too keen on ever having to see him in this life or any other, but would I? If he gets his comeuppance, not in this life, would I ever know?

He is actually a Buddhist and you would think, should know better?!

Hi all - I am a devoted lay buddhist practitioner. Karma/kamma is a complex issue and there is much misunderstanding of what it is in the west. It is sometimes described in this way: if you have harmful thought patterns / behaviours, it creates stress and suffering for yourself maybe others too, now or later (or in another life, if you believe in rebirth). If you do something negative or unskillful, it is like planting a nasty seed. The seed needs the right conditions to grow, which may be now, or later. Karma means 'action'. Sometimes actions are skillful, sometimes not and sometimes they are neutral. The key thing is the intention behind them. Deliberately harming others means that you harm yourself, as you increase the negativity in your own mind. Many (most?) people harm others by acting mindlessly, they don't even appreciate the harm they cause and they are generating suffering for themselves. Having anger for these people or their actions is harmful to yourself. Wishing ill on others, no matter how awful they appear, is not helpful as it just creates more suffering - it strengthens your sense of elf or ego and makes you more likely to engage in negative behaviour/thought patterns yourself. All beings suffer to some extent, mostly because of our sense of self or ego and trying to protect it. Reducing your ego-centric thought behaviour can result in a much more peaceful existence (but it is not easy !). Just my two pen'orth !

YANBU to have no sympathy for a colleague who treated you badly.

In the west karma is widely perceived as "what goes around comes around" and I don't believe this is true: in fact I find it extraordinarily offensive. Bad stuff happens to good people whilst bad people can sail through life effortlessly.

Live your life as positively you can and when bad stuff does happen, as it almost inevitably will, you will find it far easier to cope with and move on.

Interesting ... Sydney - have you ever heard of a book called "Many lives, many masters"? It's about a psychiatrist who has a patient with many phobias, ends up putting her under hypnosis to try and find the source in a suppressed childhood trauma or something, and then instead she starts talking about traumas from previous lives. Goes into what you have described a bit, about consequences playing out over lifetimes etc.

I do believe in what goes around comes around kind of thing. Also had a work situation where the two managers in the team lied, bullied, pretended our work was their own etc. etc. to get ahead. For the main instigator, her career has now completely stalled. The other had to resign (though that may also have had something to do with complaints to HR) but also in her "perfect" personal life, things started to go pear-shaped.

"I believe in what goes around comes around" but not in terms of karma which I can see from the above posts I don't understand anywhere near enough about.

I think that in general you reap the rewards of your behaviour i.e.people will treat you how you treat them and if you behave badly towards people eventually that behavioiur will catch up with you.

This doesn't mean that good people don't sometimes have bad things happen or that everything bad that happens is a result of past actions.

I wish "what goes around comes around" were true, but I think generally it isn't. We just wish it was to make ourselves feel better about people who behave badly. We like to think that they'll get their just rewards in time. Sadly, it isn't usually true. Some people are lovely and have a lot of undeserved shit in their lives. Some people are professional dick-wads and get away with it.

Anyway, here's how "WGACA" bit me on the ass this week. Got on long haul flight in London on Tues night. Was secretly happy that the bad weather meant loads of people missed their connection so there were some spare seats on what was an overbooked flight, and DS (16mo) got own seat rather than being on my lap for 12 hrs (so basically I was happy that I benefitted from other's misfortune). Then DS got vomiting bug on plane and threw up all of yesterday. Game, set and match to karma me thinks.

DH was totally unreasonable and started a big argument with me at my parent's house at NY. In the middle of his hugely embarrassing rant, he lost his iPhone. HA

I would love to believe it, but my family had such a run of awful things happening (we're good people, honest) that I struggle.

Here is a most satisfying example of someone receiving their just desserts - we have had the misfortune to have come in contact with the individual involved and, believe me, he was an unpleasant, knob-end-shaped charlatan of epic proportions.

This story was linked to on MN before (it made the national press at the time) - I remain convinced that the vehicle in question had a little 'assistance' from its original parking spot slightly higher up the slipway. Never upset an old fisherman.

I don't believe in Karma, I have had much councelling and in mental health terms it would fall under the umbrella of 'magical thinking' and consisdered quite dangerous to healthy thinking.

It's all very well while you are doing lovely things for others and lovely things happen to you, but exceptionally hard to process when as the above poster said you have done nothing but good and all is going wrong around you.

In therapy we were encoraged to wish loved ones (and if that was too hard our therapists ) dead in terrible ways to see there is no connection to the way we think and actions around us, did find it very hard though.

They did also talk us through doing things that we would consider wrong to invoke 'bad karma' but is not really possible to put into practice except in very small ways

What sydney said. I am muchness learned but I hate it when people refer to karma in this way - it isn't "just deserts" or " every dog has it's day" or "what comes around goes around". It's a religious and complicated concept.

Much less, not muchness.

Sorry to those scholars of Buddhism if I have misunderstood the technical meaning of Karma and I found your comments very interesting. Perhaps I should have put the question in the vernacular - 'Do you believe that people always or sometimes get their "come-uppance" for waht they do or don't do?'

Karma from a buddhist perspective really isn't someone getting their 'just deserts' and it isn't something like the old testament 'an eye for an eye', or anything like that. Karma means action, or volition (and has been likened to 'cause and effect'. If you intentionally hurt someone and cause them to suffer, it will make probably lead you to suffer in some way, at some time. If you undertake a skillful action with compassion (and do not necessarily expect something great back in return), you develop a more peaceful mind thereby reducing the chance that you will suffer in some way. If you are mindful of what you do (i.e. have developed awareness) you can avoid a lot of unskillful behaviour and realize that the default setting for any human is to crave things that you think will make you feel 'better' - be it money, power, sex, food, drugs, material things, holidays, etc. Some things are essential to life (shelter, food, clothes, good company, medicine) - a lot of stuff isn't really.

Being annoyed that someone seems to be having a great life despite their shortcomings and then getting angry because someone you like is having difficulties is not helpful to them or you. It just generates anger within yourself, or sometimes grief or fear, or guilt. All of which lead to stress / discomfort/suffering.

At least, that's how I understand it...

If we are talking about a western sense of 'karma', I think if you are a negative, hateful person, then that will have a negative impact on your life, if only because other people won't want to be around you. You will suffer, so in that sense it's a bit 'reap as you sow' - be nicer and people will want to help and support you and be a part of your life.

There are exceptions, because some people do seem to get away with awful behaviour (but are they lonely/miserable inside?), but on the whole I think that being consistently awful will come back on you eventually and when you find yourself in a mess, others wont rush to help you get out of it.

Bad things do happen to good people (like illness etc), but those aren't things that people can avoid, so not connected to behaviour.

After reading the 'experts' on this thread (very interesting read btw) I do believe in Karma.

I like the concept - the planting of a seed, good explanation!

I was messed about by a friend, caused me untold stress. She let me down, then turned on me - in all honesty I didn't deserve the vitriol and nastiness she sent my way, but looking back I think she lashed out as deep down she knew she was in the wrong and had made herself look horrid. I was uber bitch and public enemy #1 because I stood up for myself and she played the victim, when in reality she was truly awful to me, I took so much and then stood up for myself.

Anyway, that was 3 years ago. We see each other in the street, all very pleasant 'hello, how's things' as I'm not one to hold a grudge and there was a lot going on in both our lives at the time. I recently found out that the thing she had done to me, had been done to her - she'd been let down and left in an utter mess, completely ballsed up!

I didn't think 'good you deserve it' but I did think 'well, maybe you'll understand what you put me through now'

That's my take on Karma. I don't believe that if somebody does something bad to you, then Karma comes along and whoops their ass. I just think it is more of a learning experience, a time to reflect on the good and bad you have experienced, and to move on from that as a better person.

Hi Leprechauncream - no need to be sorry ! Karma is a complex issue and a lot of nonsense has been written in the popular media about it. It took me years to suss it out (and even then, I am still a beginner!)

If you intentionally do something that is unskillful, i.e. you know that is was harmful to others, then you will, in all likelihood cause suffering for yourself in some way at some time. If you do something daft, without thinking or being mindful - e.g. someone cuts you up on the road and you shout and scream at them, it leads to stress / suffering in that you are angry, however this has a different quality to it.

Buddhism includes training in developing 'mindfulness' or 'awareness' so that you can 'see' what is going on in a situation and react more appropriately (i.e. not continue the chain of negativity). For example, if someone cuts you up on the road, the natural tendency is to shout at them and get stressed and angry and resentful. If you can think of that person as someone who is being rather self-centred and aggressive (and therefore in a state of stress themselves) and that humans tend to be like that, it takes some of the sting out of it. If you think more like: 'why are they doing that, they are awful, I hope they crash', or why is everyone out to get me?' - their stupidity (and suffering) therefore rubs off on you, and you already probably have enough to be getting on with :)

No disrespect meant but who cares what the technical Buddhist meaning of it is? I mean it is interesting and all if we were having an indepth discussion of that point to but the "West" has adopted the word as a short hand way of saying what goes around comes around and usually in this lifetime. Sucking on lemons because people are having a reasonably light conversation about their observances of "karma" in the western sense does not show how learned and clever you are above other people.

Leprechaun I think for the most part it is necessary in this life to interact with other people and if you generally treat other people badly or with contempt, people will realise this and start to treat you the same way or at least avoid you. So I think if you are generally an unpleasant person at some point it will probably come back to bite you. I think that a one off action of doing something bad, if you are generally a good person, is less likely to lead to bad karma or you getting what you deserve unless someone specifically looks for revenge.