🔄Believing in Karma Makes Sense
A simple way to view karma is as a neutral law that energetically returns to us what we have sent out — as simple as that.
I believe that believing in karma yields far more benefits than not.
A Neutral Law
I used to find this concept difficult to comprehend.
Doesn’t believing in karma feel like a fear-based worldview — one where we’re afraid of doing “wrong” things because we might be punished?
At first, I encountered modalities like systemic constellations involving past lives or past life regressions.
I noticed that when we brought those past experiences to resolution, our lives tended to improve. I’ve seen this quite consistently across various case studies.
Initially, I thought — whether it’s real or not, it’s still a powerful practice.
Even if it were a placebo, it’s a powerful placebo.
Over time, as I experienced different modalities and my worldview shifted, I began to see that there might be real truth and merit in them.
If an experience wasn’t resolved in the past, resolving it now allows us to move forward with greater ease.
Across Various Lineages
I’ve come across similar ideas across different traditions — that we often experience what we’ve done unto others.
Various studies on near-death experiences have shown that individuals often find themselves re-experiencing the effects of their own actions — both kindness and harm — as the recipient.
In many new-age traditions, this is also described as a form of role exchange:
If we were a perpetrator in one lifetime, we may return in another as a victim, not as punishment, but to understand the other side and to grow through that experience.
Karma Is Often Used to Blame
In Buddhism, karma is understood in a much more neutral way:
You get back what you give out.
Therefore, there’s clear guidance not to do unto others what we wouldn’t want done to ourselves — hence the teachings on refraining from killing, stealing, lying, sexual misconduct, and so on.
After all, if you know touching an electric socket with wet hands is dangerous, you’d warn your child not to do it. I believe these principles were established with the same intention — to protect and serve.
Yet, without understanding the broader Buddhist worldview, the concept of karma is often distorted into a fear-based notion of punishment.
I recall a friend who had cancer. Other children judged her, saying, “She must have done terrible things in the past!”
For a child, such judgment creates shame, not wisdom or compassion.
The Buddhist View: Karma as Empowerment
In a sense, Buddhism does teach that there are causes for poor health — often related to how we may have harmed others’ health in the past — just that we don’t remember it.
If we are hurt by others in this lifetime, it may be a result of how we’ve hurt others in the past.
Bhante Mangalam from Dhamma Earth illustrated this beautifully:
“It’s like you punched someone, then forgot about it. When that person punches you back, you ask, ‘Why did you do this to me?’”
The forgetting is what happens through reincarnation across lifetimes.
But Buddhism doesn’t teach blame. Instead, the worldview of karma is meant to empower:
If we can plant causes in the past that lead to our present experience, we can also plant causes now that lead to a better future.
In a direct, practical sense — we can exercise and eat healthily to cultivate health.
In an indirect, karmic sense — we can work in healthcare, serve others, or promote wellness. By doing so, we plant seeds for future well-being.
We All Carry Fields of Karmic Seeds
In new-age teachings, we sometimes hear: “We are all one.”
Buddhism provides a rational lens through which to understand this:
- There have been infinite cycles of past lives.
- Across infinity, all possible actions have occurred.
- Therefore, we’ve likely done both horrendous and wonderful things — and may do them again in the future.
- To escape this endless cycle (samsara), filled with recurring pain, Buddhism teaches renunciation and the path to enlightenment, leading to liberation.
Therefore, Cultivate Compassion
Instead of thinking,
“That person has cancer — she must have done something terrible,”
we can now think,
“I, too, have done many things in the past, and I could just as easily experience the same.”
A karmic worldview rooted in proper understanding leads to compassion, not judgment — and ultimately guides us toward enlightenment.
It also makes us more careful in our choices — to think twice before causing harm, even out of anger or revenge — because everything we do has an impact and consequence.
As a result, believing in karma helps us live a better, wiser, and more compassionate life.