Ajahn Sucitto

Excerpts from: “Kamma and the end of Kamma”, Chapter 1: “Action that Leads to Liberation” (continued from last week) “These impressions and interpretations begin with the external mind, but get settled in the heart through the agreeable or disagreeable feeling (vedanā) or the prior association it evokes. In other words, citta doesn’t receive sights, sounds, smells and tastes; it receives the perceptions that mind-consciousness brings in.”

Consequently, the pairing of the objective mind and subjective heart builds meaning. The spiritual quest is based on the understanding that there is ageing, sickness and death; and with that the experience of separation from the loved, and being disagreeably affected by these facts of life – while at the same time being powerless to do much about it. Even on the level of daily life, what we think about, and how we conceive of people and things, washes over the heart with pleasant or unpleasant feeling, arouses gladness or disappointment, and may lead us into action. This is how the world of sights and sounds and people and events gets into us and gets us going (even when the event happened long ago). The inheritance, the vipāka or ‘old kamma’ of being born, is that whether the mind interprets things accurately or not, the heart stores its interpretations. And it bases intentions, responses and reactions – kamma – on those stored-up meanings. It’s a questionable basis.

The basis is as much psychological as sensorial. We need to, and do, seek to understand and otherwise manage our circumstances. Therefore, one of our most continual mental actions is that of interpreting and filing away experience to derive meaning and purpose. And, as with other creatures, part of that meaning and purpose has to do with getting support from, or participating within, a group. In our case, this ‘belonging’ also entails participation in a complex weave of social programs, customs and attitudes. “that tell us how to operate in order to be accepted. This also affects our kamma, because although some advice is wise, we may also act upon socially-derived prejudices that cause us to contribute to hurting others – so we become arrogant or insensitive. Some social customs are about bypassing uncomfortable truths (such as mortality), or not giving deep attention to the heart: a life of golf and parties fails to come to terms with the facts of life. Another big effect comes from the views and opinions of others: being praised or blamed, valued or neglected, lingers as perceptions by which we sense ourselves. This self-reference then becomes an identity. As a general principle then, how we have been (and are being) affected by others solidifies into who we are.

This psychological program of being affected and responding is called the ‘mental (or heart) formation’ (citta-saṇkhāra). Installed at birth, at any given moment this ‘master program’ responds to present experience in terms of what it has learnt that experience is like. It is informed through a library of perceptions, or ‘felt meanings’, that the manas aspect has encoded, even though these perceptions are all only representations of an object, an event, or of course a person. And also, saññā adds subjective tints to any object-definition, such as: ‘Will she like me?’, ‘He looks threatening’ – and so on. These tinted perceptions become the basis of many spur-of-the-moment responses in our lives.

Meanwhile, the mind has responded on many fronts: we may be involved with business, but are challenged by the result of hearing of a relative’s death an hour ago. Even as we struggle with this, other long-term aims or social obligations apply their pressure. Bodily health and energy also have their effects. In addition to this, our attention span fluctuates, particularly if we’re tired – so we can be running on automatic, attending in a habitual or blurred way, and acting on outdated or biased programs. Rather like the tides of an ocean that can lift us up, engulf us, or sweep us in any direction, this kammic process is then a dynamic field of the interplay between established aims, former or current input, and responses to any of these. The mind-sets, attitudes and interpretations that have become established in our hearts carry the potential to shape our present actions; and the future will arise according to whichever mixture of these effects we act upon.

Steering Through the Causal Field

From the above, you’ll see that kamma is potent and multi-dimensional. Steering through its causal field is possible, but it does require a reliable and trained mind; training is then an imperative. Dark kamma weakens the mind and destroys people; bright kamma is a source of strength and nourishment. On account of bright kamma, such as ethical integrity and goodwill, we can establish the calm and clarity that supports training manas and citta. Together, these two aspects of mind can then handle, understand and release the causal tangle.

Look after yourself!

‘And for the sake of what benefit should a woman or a man, a householder or one gone forth, often reflect thus: “I am the owner of my kamma, the heir of my kamma; I have kamma as my origin, kamma as my relative, kamma as my resort; I will be the heir of whatever kamma, good or bad, that I do”? People engage in misconduct by body, speech, and mind. But when one often reflects upon this theme, such misconduct is either completely abandoned or diminished.’

(A.5:57; B. Bodhi, Trans.)

So kamma is not an imprisonment, but a matter to be mastered. Firstly, if we must generate kamma, we can at least determine whether it will be bright or dark. Remember, there’s a choice: kamma depends on impulse or intention – but ‘intention’ is not just a deliberate plan; in fact, we’re not always that clear about what we’re doing and why. Many of our troubles come from just being preoccupied, or getting stuck in habits, or from inattention or misunderstanding; then intention is not guided by clarity. “Complacency or, on the other hand, pessimistic fatalism may also weaken the clarity and firmness of intention.

We might wonder why we are who we are and what made us like this, but such speculation just activates the mind to no good end. The details of kamma are too complex to understand – it would be like trying to figure out which river or rain-cloud gave rise to which drop of water in the ocean.[4]

 The most direct and helpful way to steer kamma begins with ‘right view’ (sammā-diṭṭhi). Right view is the view that there is the bad and it can be steered away from, and there is the good and it can be cultivated. And cultivation entails training one’s attention. An attention that’s firm, clear and not flustered by moods and sensations can enter the underlying currents of the mind and turn a tide of heedlessness and self-obsession that would otherwise steer intention. In this way, right view leads into ‘right attitude’ (sammā-saṇkappā), which is the aim to set one’s attention on a skilful footing. With these two steps, the Eightfold Path out of suffering and stress gets established.[5]

The first responsible and accessible action on this Path is to pause on an emotional response and ask yourself whether this response is reliable and aims in a wholesome direction. Even this brief breaking of the reactive link that engages fresh intention with an old habit, if done repeatedly, can dissolve that link and cause that mental habit to cease. You find that you don’t have to retort, that you don’t have to rush to the deadline, and you don’t have to binge. Then different responses can arise – such as patience, forgiveness and tolerance. In ways like this, you can get out of the gridlock of ‘I’m stuck in this habit; I am this’, and make meaningful choices in your life. The “basis of any such choices is gaining the capacity to choose. And this heedfulness (appamāda) is what pausing and considering offers: I can pause, come out of a mind-state, give it due consideration, and decide to act on it – or let its accompanying impulse pass. I don’t have to be compulsive or reactive. Just taking this step, that of disengagement (viveka), opens the possibility for the fourth type of kamma, the kamma that leads to the end of kamma.

 This is what ‘liberation’ and ‘awakening’ refer to.

[Please find the last part of this chapter in the original, (see the link below), under the subhead: ‘Liberation Begins with Mindfulness,’ which can be found in the Contents listing. I decided not to continue with it here because it is of interest to a limited readership, in my opinion, and it’s best to move on to another aspect of this subject.]

https://www.abhayagiri.org/books/458-kamma-and-the-end-of-kamma