It's not really baggage... it's more like how you react to externalities, attachment, and such. I doubt you will run into many people who follow Buddhism that would say karma is really simple. It's actually pretty heavy.
yes - how you react to externalitiers, attachment, and such is a function of the baggage you have in you (or lack of thereof). it's an internal state caused by reactions to external events. the way you deal with things is a function of your past experiences - all those defenses, coping mechanisms, and weird things people have inside of them from past experiences, whether positive or negative. that's karma. simple.
You're kind of jumbling things together. Attachment is not the same thing as karma. Attachment is as much biological as it is learned. Overcoming attachment is one of the requirements to reach nirvana. Seeing things as they are without ego or attachment or pride and such, without projecting. Karma is something separate, it sort of a reward (bad word for it but I can't think of something better) for living a right life as laid out by the Buddha. Your current life is a result of your past karma. Your future life is the result of your present karma. There's really no way for you to know based on events what is karma's effect on you or someone else's karma affecting you and so on. It's not really that simple at all. For example, say you're driving along and don't see a stop sign then you get rammed by another car. Is that your karma for running a stop sign? Or is that your karma for not setting your alarm that day and not waking up on time causing you to rush and not see the stop sign? Or is that your karma for mistreating a friend a few weeks ago? Or is it the result of the other person's karma because he speeds a lot? You have no idea. Multiply that by all of the things you deal with in your life and all the things that everyone else deals with in their lives and that's the tip of the iceberg on karma. Karma is like the Newtonian physics of spirituality.
it's your karma for not being careful and not paying closer attention. buddist karma is not the same as hindu karma, but to me, it's all the same anyway, like I said, all of the past life stuff is really just the mythical aspect of the religion, but in reality, karma is just that if you did some wrong to someone, you'll feel guilt which will manifest itself in a negative way - or anxiety about the future, or something that causes pre-occupation say while you are driving and causes you to miss a stop sign. if you can free yourself of guilt, anxiety, past pain, anger, and all that other stuff, you're free from the influences of these events and karma has no meaning to such an individual.
Because the loving Jesus would throw you in to eternal fire for being wrong ? Yeah, that makes sense.
If you believe in hell, does that make it exist? If you don't believe in hell, does that make it not exist? I would suggest that what any of us believe has little to do with whether hell exists.
Yeah, not so much. Karma is more the result of the totality of your actions and your well meaning intent, not your guilt for doing wrong. I'll just agree to disagree. Cheers.
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i believe in hell but my belief or definition of hell is constantly changing. due to this years presidential campaings, this year hell is "the place where all democrats and republicans go when they die."
no, he'll throw you into an eternal fire for many things, being athiest, I am sure is one of them. good luck!
I wonder why this is so easy for people to say, given that the prophecies of Jesus' birth, life, death and resurrection were told unto many different men, long before he was born. His birth, life, death and resurrection fufilled more than 300 different biblical prophecies...... so why wouldn't any of the prohecies of heavan and hell also be fufilled?
There have been hundreds of gods. Just because one religion won, doesn't mean everyone has to be a sheep. No heaven. No hell.
I can't fathom why people don't believe a cult leader who claimed to walk on water, heal the sick and come back from the dead... Of course, I'm talking about Pythagoras and not Jesus but I like numbers better than stories so I like that one better. Rumor mills and ancient history are often indistinguishable.
Pythagoras life never fufilled any prophecies. I don't believe he or anyone else ever claimed him to be the Messiah. but I also understand that FAITH is the single most important word in christianity.
