Understanding Karma

Karma means action, work or deed; it also refers to the spiritual principle of cause and effect where intent and actions of an individual (cause) influence the future of that individual (effect).

As per Hindu Religion, the Soul remains and gets manifested in different bodies across births, till it reaches its final destiny of Moksha. So the ultimate goal of soul is to attain Moksha, ie to reach the abode of God, the parabhahman. But this is not easy.

The Karma's performed by soul determines how long it takes to attain Moksha and what are the happiness and sufferings the body containing the soul has to go through across different births. The Soul without body cannot experience either happiness or suffering. That is why God blesses it with a body to experience the happiness and sufferings as per the Karma's it performs across births. Till the Karma's dont get exhausted and there is something to be experienced by the Soul, the cycle of birth and death continues.

So the whole concept of human taking birth empty handed is wrong. They come in with accumulated Karma of past life and also leave the world with accumulated Karma based on actions they performed between birth and death.

The whole Karma can be classified into 3 major types.

1) Sanchitha Karma - These are the Karma's( Good and Bad) of the past life, that were not fructified in that life and are carried over to the next birth of the soul. 

The reason for the carry forward may be because those Karma's require time to fructify. We can understand this by example of drinking ice cold water and immediately we catch cold. But if we keep consuming alcohol for a certain period and then leave its consumption,certainly there will be an effect on the liver, which will be reflected after many years.

2) Prarabdha Karma - These are the Karma's that are carried forward from past life into present life and that which are going to be fructified or experienced by the body of the soul in the current birth.These are part of Sanchitha Karma, that will be experienced in current birth.

3) Kriyamana Karma or Agami Karma - These are Karma's carried out in current birth, that will be accumulated for the future.These will be added to the Sanchitha karma for future births.

In the three categories we have total control over the Kriyamana Karma. We should properly think twice before performing actions and make sure our action do not affect any human, any life or nature etc. We will be accumulating good karma for future if we perform good Kriyamana Karma now.

So now we can clearly understand why some people in this life though keep doing good things and are very good suffer a lot, while some people who are really bad and do all kind of bad activities live a happy life. Reason is Karmic Cycle. 

The Soul through this birth and body experiences the pain and suffering that were fructified due the bad karmas of the past life while accumulating good Sanchita Karma through the various good Kriyamana Karma that it is performing in the current birth. This is the former case of a good person suffering in this current birth.

The Soul through this birth and body experiences happiness and pleasure that were fructified due to good karmas of the past life while accumulating bad Sanchitha Karma through the various bad Kriyamana Karma that it is performing in the current birth. This is the latter case of bad person enjoying in this current birth.

The Karmic Cycle can be broken by the three spiritual ways - Gyana Yoga - Perform good actions after analyzing and understanding the principles of Karma. Do only good actions., Bhakthi Yoga - Devotion to God and Karma Yoga - Perform good actions.

The Karmic cycles are repetitive and almost occur in cycle at same frequency and time. We should be conscious enough to understand it and break it by devotion to God.