Dealing with good karma

 We normally think of karma as something bad; as a debt to be repaid, as a store room of reactions to be exhausted. This is true, as karma is the mud that is covering the ‘Jewel’. However, the same applies to good karma.

 If we feel that, when good things happens to us, we somehow deserve it, pride turns good karma into bad karma very quickly! Often, this is picked up by others, causing a reaction which also creates bad karma – in them. So our pride creates a chain reaction.

 This doesn’t mean we do not recognise good karma: we acknowledge it as a feedback of positivity and let it go. This is done by dedicating all our accumulated merit for the benefit of others.

 “May whatever merit I have accumulated be for the benefit of others that they may attain Buddha hood” is the dedication at the end of any practice: compassion is the hallmark of all practices.

 As we proceed, this negative pride becomes increasingly subtle, so we have to be very careful, as this is how demons are created.

 However…and here is an important however!…there is divine pride. This is to do with tears of joy and relief that you are “facing the right direction”. That you are joining the path “following the enlightened ones”, and that there are genuine tendencies of bodhisattva activity.

 This is where one accepts good and bad karma as one taste. Bad karma is seen as joy now, as this experience may be one’s last obstacle!