Is it KARMA or payback?

"Payback" is your act, not karma's results.

Not every bad thing that happens to a person right after doing a bad thing is the karmic-result of THAT bad thing. Things take time to incubate and produce their results (vipaka and phala). It would be very unusual for an act (deed) to be so weighty as to produce an immediate result such as the Beatles would have called "instant karma." In any case, the result of an action is not called "karma." Results are called vipaka (resultants) and phala (fruti). Doing something unpleasant to someone who did you first is called revenge, and it is your unskillful karma. Their karma has not yet ripened to produce its result. Therefore, there is no need to attack people. This will only be harmful to you. They'll get theirs. Trust the impersonal law of causes and effects, of deeds producing appropriate results. It's universal.

KARMA (Sanskrit, Pāli kamma) "intentional action," correctly speaking denotes the wholesome and unwholesome volitions (kusala- and akusala-cetanā) and their concomitant mental factors, causing rebirth and shaping the destiny of beings.

• Cetanā is the intention, motivation, underly motive, the volition behind an action; this is what determines if it skillful, neutral, or unskillful more than the action itself seen objectively. It is the subjective input, which is visible to those who develop spiritual sight (dibba cakkhu).

These karmical volitions (kamma cetanā) become manifest as wholesome or unwholesome actions by body (kāya-kamma), speech (vacī-kamma), mind (mano-kamma).

Thus, the Buddhist term "karma" by no means signifies the RESULTS of actions and certainly not the FATE or DESTINY of beings or whole nations (so-called wholesale or mass-karma), misconceptions which, through the influence of Theosophy, have become widely spread in the West.

"Volition (cetanā), O meditators, is what I call action (cetanāham bhikkhave kammam vadāmi), for through volition one performs the action by body, speech, or mind.

There is karma ("action"), O meditators, that ripens in hell.... Karma that ripens in the animal world.... Karma that ripens in the world of humans.... Karma that ripens in the heavenly worlds....

Threefold, however, is the fruit of karma:

1. ripening during the lifetime (dittha-dhamma-vedanīya-kamma),
2. ripening in the next birth (upapajja-vedanīya-kamma),
3. ripening in subsequent births (aparāpariya-vedanīya kamma)...." (A.VI.63).

The three conditions or roots (mūla) of unwholesome karma (actions) are greed, hatred, and delusion (lobha, dosa, moha).

Those of wholesome karma are:

1. unselfishness (alobha),
2. hatelessness (adosa = mettā, goodwill),
3. nondelusion (amoha = paññā, knowledge).

"Greed, O meditators, is a condition for the arising of [unskillful] karma; hatred is a condition for the arising of karma; delusion is a condition for the arising of karma...." (A.III.112, A.III.34, A.III.147).

"Unwholesome actions are of three kinds: conditioned by:

1. greed,
2. hate,
3. delusion.

"Killing... stealing... sexual misconduct... lying... slandering... rude speech... foolish babble, if practiced, carried on, and frequently cultivated, leads to rebirth in hells, or among animals, or among ghosts" (A.VIII.40). More

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Richard Gere's Yoga Business Woes

Lee Brown (MonstersAndCritics.com, Jan. 18, 2010)

Movie legend Richard Gere is being accused of failing to pay wages to staff at his restaurant complex. Gere, a devout Buddhist, and wife Carey Lowell took over the historic Bedford Post Inn in Westchester, New York, in 2008. They revamped it into an eight-room inn, restaurant, cafe, and yoga studio. But at least three people working there have told US media that they have not been getting paid their wages.

According to insiders, some yoga instructors at the inn have had payment delayed for up to three months at a time. The yogis, who earn up to $75 per class, say multiple e-mails and phone calls to accountants went unanswered, leading them to stand outside the accounting office in a trailer near the main house to beg for their paychecks.

"We find it humiliating," one employee said. "It's the exact opposite of what yoga is about – integrity, being honest." And it is not just staff grumbling – some vendors also say they are having to fight to get paid what is rightfully owed them." More>>

You're Dead? Debt collector will still call

David Streitfeld (The New York Times, 3/1/09)

The banks need another bailout and countless homeowners cannot handle their mortgage payments, but one group is paying its bills: the dead.

Dozens of specially trained agents work on the third floor of DCM Services here, calling up the dear departed’s next of kin and kindly asking if they want to settle the balance on a credit card or bank loan, or perhaps make that final utility bill or cellphone payment.

The people on the other end of the line often have no legal obligation to assume the debt of a spouse, sibling, or parent.

But [sometimes] they take responsibility for it anyway.

.

“I am out of work now, to be honest with you, and money is very tight for us,” one man declared on a recent phone call after he was apprised of his late mother-in-law’s $280 credit card bill. He promised to pay $15 a month.

Dead people are the newest frontier in debt collecting, and one of the healthiest parts of the industry. Those who dun the living say that people are so scared and so broke it is difficult to get them to cough up even token payments.

Collecting from the dead, however, is expanding. Improved database technology is making it easier to discover when estates are opened in the country’s 3,000 probate courts, giving collectors an opportunity to file timely claims. But if there is no formal estate and thus nothing to file against, the human touch comes into play. More>>