Life Lessons and/or Karma?

[Nityānanda dāsa]

Radhe Radhe!

Just thinking today about the idea of 'life lessons' in contrast or comparison to the idea of 'karma'. Here's how I would define them and their difference...

Life lessons seem to imply a concept that one is born into a certain situation in order to learn certain lessons. Or as one lives their life and goes in and out of situations they are meant to learn certain things. And if one doesn't learn them, then 'history repeats itself' or in other words 'one doesn't progress until one learns one's lessons' for history repeats itself only for those who don't learn from it, right? Does that make sense in terms of how I'm framing the concept of 'life lessons'?

In contrast, karma seems to say that we're born into a certain situation because of our past deeds and that as we experience our karma, it burns off and is gone. Of course we make more karma, but that's not my point here. So what would seem a 'life lesson' from a karmic point of view isn't necessarily a lesson. It's just a passing phase. Sure we might learn something from it, but such learning stored in our intelligence (which is matter) is temporary. Karma means we burn through the experiences of life and also create new ones to experience in future lives (for those not engaged in a transcendent path). 

And lastly, how would each concept be different for and/or applicable to those on transcendent paths? 

Thoughts? 

[JD33]

They can both go together in the sense that this is a planet in which we have an opportunity to take responsibility for our karma and work through it (this is the humanistic part) and hopefully become better people. Transcendent part is the clearer we become of negative karma, the freer we are to pay better, clearer attention to Bhavagan.

On CV and other Rasik paths the karma burns up as we do intensive Bhajan sadhana and knowing this do not let the residue negative past thoughts, memories, emotions get in the way of our progression.

The part is not clear though do we somehow use the vasanas, etc in CV path in someway ?? Nitai Das ji - can you answer this?

[Īśvaradāsa]

Sept 24, 2019 15:52:04 GMT -6 JD33 said:

They can both go together in the sense that this is a planet in which we have an opportunity to take responsibility for our karma and work through it (this is the humanistic part) and hopefully become better people. Transcendent part is the clearer we become of negative karma, the freer we are to pay better, clearer attention to Bhavagan.

On CV and other Rasik paths the karma burns up as we do intensive Bhajan sadhana and knowing this do not let the residue negative past thoughts, memories, emotions get in the way of our progression.

The part is not clear though do we somehow use the vasanas, etc in CV path in someway ?? Nitai Das ji - can you answer this?

I ran into this verse today, I don't know if it relates to what you were thinking, but it might be a hint, it's from Rupa's Brs. 1.2.264:

सा भक्तिर् एक-मुख्याण्गाश्रितानैकाङ्गि काथ वा ।
स्ववासनानुसारेण निष्ठातः सिद्धि-कृद् भवेत् ॥१.२.२६४ ॥

sā bhaktir eka-mukhyāṇgāśritānaikāṅgi kātha vā |
svavāsanānusāreṇa niṣṭhātaḥ siddhi-kṛd bhavet ||1.2.264 ||

"That bhakti, either in one main form or in many forms, in accordance with one's own inner inclination (vAsanA), executed with unwavering steadiness brings accomplishment"

I'm not really sure what in accordance with one's own inner inclination might mean exactly, to be honest. 

[JD33]

Thank you Ed, I think in this context it might point to what angas of Bhakti Sadhana one might do more of or the way in which one might do them, i.e. Thakur seva, Kirtan, Path, Japa: one lakh minimum or do 3.5 or more lakhs of Japa. Siddha Manohar Pandit Baba was know to do 7 lakhs of Harinam Mahamantra Japa. Siddha Vamsi Dass Baba did alot of Thakur seva. In what bhav even - as Mother, Friend, Lover or helper of the Lover Radha, etc.

It is related also to one's nitya seva.

However I was thinking of worldly vasanas, etc. when negative eotions come up how does one in CV actually deal with them? Anyone who actually knows.

[Īśvaradāsa]

Yes, I'm sorry, I misinterpreted what you said. And thank you, you are right about the use of vAsanAs in Rupa's verse, today I was reading Jiva saying:

"By practising the various forms of bhakti with faith or respect, offense is destroyed and the subtle inclination (vAsanA) to serve the Lord with the purpose of making him happy appears. The name of that subtle inclination is love of the Lord".  

So I guess that "following one's own inclination" means this Krsna-rati when it is expressed as one of the main 5 different types, as you said. Rupa says that the reason for this difference in inclination is the variety of people in which it appears, and I thought this variety was referring to the different svabhavas as they are manifested in this world, but considering that Krsna rati is out-of-worldly perhaps the variety he speaks of is in fact the seat of or original expression of the temporary variety we find in our experience, meaning, the different eternal loving expressions of Krsna's companions. I'm not familiar with the Brs. so most of the time I struggle with context in this way. Hopefully others will give us their input. 

[meeno8]

Keep in mind that cultivating punyas over papas (good over bad actions) in and of itself will just strenghthen the 'astral' body and only serve to keep one bound in Mahamaya's web. That is why we do not adhere to karma-yoga. As jd33 points out, the bhajan we have will get rid of all the karma to avoid that plight. We want to be under Yogamaya's spell!

[Nityānanda dāsa]

Good morning everyone. Radhe Radhe!

Maybe I wasn't so articulate when I started this thread. Let me see if I can better express myself. From what I've learned (and certainly I have SO MUCH more to learn), our present life circumstances are due to our karma at least in part, i.e., the family we're born into, our tendencies, the people we find ourselves surrounded by (who aren't bhaktas), our careers, etc.
What I meant by citing the phrase, "Those who don't learn from history are bound to repeat it," is that are we meant to learn a lesson from our karma or is our karma just what it is and we don't necessarily have to learn from it?
Take eating for example. If we have the habit of sensuous, passionate eating, if we frequently desire good food and eat more than necessary when we can get the food we desire---one could say that's a karmic habit. Or perhaps it's just a bad habit learned to deal with some psychological karma? And of course the result of such eating is that one likely becomes fat and unhealthy. And then again, I'm certain there are food connoisseurs who don't overeat, but are 'food snobs' so to speak in terms of their exquisite, refined tastes. But back to the point, so if somehow one is experiencing a negative impact on their life because of eating, wouldn't one try to change that?
Or in a relationship for another example, if one finds that one is struggling and one isn't happy, it seems that one of two things (or more things) may be happening. (1) Maybe the relationship isn't good and should be given up. (2) Maybe one isn't learning what one should learn from being in a relationship, such as the normal give and take balance. Or maybe one isn't learning to give up their selfishness?
I've often told people that relationships are like crucibles in that you're voluntarily putting yourself into this container (commitment) with another person and it's normal that you're going to knock around with the other person and hopefully wear down one another's bad edges and make each other better people. Of course that frequently doesn't happen because of our attachments to what we want out of or expect out of a relationship.
Here's a nice short clip from Jordan Peterson, that I send to my psychotherapy clients regularly. I think he makes some fantastic points: youtu.be/Rc_NNjV0s1o This talk is titled 'The Real Reason for Marriage'. Oh and lastly that reminds me, and this is a classic (what I've come to view as pretty horrible advice), there's the standard IGM advice, "If you want to have sex, get married." As if that's the only thing that marriage is for. Talk about setting an entire population up for failure!!
I've often heard the argument that Krishna doesn't put us into circumstances that we can't handle. Yet it seems to me that this isn't true. Or again, maybe it is true and people are dodging the lessons they're meant to learn and thus they end up taking their baggage from one situation to the next in somewhat of an oedipal fashion. I think IGM is a good example of this in the sense that many of Bhaktivedanta's students gave up/rejected their perhaps strict Christian/Jewish upbringings only to join IGM and re-establish the same dysfunctional patterns that they rejected, but with themselves as the authority (parental role) rather than the abused minority (child role).
So back to the main question or point...
It seems to me that there are many elements of one's life that one could learn from. But is there a necessity to learn from karma? Because again, if it's just karma, shouldn't we just tolerate it and practice bhakti, kind of waiting for it to burn off---even if that means waiting until death? Or should we endeavor to change our circumstances, learn from situations, make improvements and changes to improve our lives and our practice of bhakti?
I did have the opportunity to ask a question along these lines to Prabhupada Kishor Rai Goswami. I asked if we're meant to try to not do the bad things in our lives or if we should focus on practicing bhakti instead and that the bad things will fall away or correct themselves. (I'll have to look up exactly what was said if you like) He replied that we should do the latter, just focus on practicing bhakti.

[meeno8]

Hey, Nila, and subho mangolbar! That is one big post of yours and covers a lot of territory. When considering psychology, I can't really see how we can separate that from neurology and fMRI brain scans in neurological research. When it comes to 'free will', it would seem that is somewhat paradoxical. How much are we 'programmed' in our behavior from birth and throughout our lives? How much leeway do we have to act outside those propensities, to color outside the lines, if you will? The arm moves, but the subject's brain sent the signal to the arm before the subject was conscious of the intent to move the arm. The lords of karma are the nava-graha, and one is born with one's jyotish-chakra in the palm of their hand, but those lines can change over time, so that would indicate our fates are not fixed. When I discussed palmistry with my mother years ago, she said that one aspect of it is clearly a scientific fact, due to the fact that children born with Down's syndrome have a missing or very truncated head line in their hands (I forget which exactly, but I think you get the point). I had my palm read by an expert at Nabadwip in 1980 and he told me all sorts of things about my life that he could not have possibly known about me. Voila! Food for thought (please do not overindulge all you gourmets and gourmands).