Q & A : Karma is Habit, Habits are Changeable

Student’s Question:

Isn’t it taught in the Buddhism that the karma we have cannot be cleared away, even by a buddha or a deity? If that is the case, what use is there for us to practice Dorje Sempa (Vajrasattva)?

Rinpoche’s Answer:

I think there’s a mistaken understanding here.

When we think about ‘karma’ or ‘actions’, we talk of actions of the body, speech, and mind. And while it’s true that I can’t eradicate your karma or take it away, it’s never been said that you can’t clear it away and cancel it out by yourself. You most certainly can. You created it in the first place, so you can cancel it out. That’s the way it works.

If you do something positive, I can’t come along and take that positive karma from you, because I didn’t create it, I didn’t perform that act. And the same applies to negative actions – I can’t take away your negative karma, simply because I didn’t create it in the first place. And for that same reason, neither can any buddha or deity. But the key point to understand is that your karma has been created by you, so you can destroy it, or do the opposite to cancel it out.

If we look very directly at what ‘karma’ really is, then it’s our habits or tendencies, and these we can change. For example, now when I’m talking, i habitually make this gesture with my hand, but when I’m mindful and aware of what I’m doing, I can stop myself. Then when I forget again as I’m talking, the hand just goes by itself, out of habit. A particular condition is needed for the habit to be triggered and here it’s when talking. Luckily it’s not triggered when I’m eating, that would be quite disastrous and very messy. This is how we should understand karma; it is what we get used to, and become habituated towards. So if we get used to negative behaviour, then that becomes our habit and our karma. And when the correct conditions are encountered the habit, or way of acting, arises.

Please keep in mind that we are using the word ‘habits’ here as a synonym for karma; that’s the main point I’m trying to make. So it’s our negative habits that we need to change, and in order to do that we use the practice of Dorje Sempa where we employ the ‘Four Powers’. Taking up the ‘Four Powers’ means doing that which is going to counteract and eradicate our previous bad habits.

First of all, we need to recognise our bad habits as a problem, and give rise to regret for having cultivated and prolonged them. Once we’ve identified them to be no good, then we resolve never to commit them again. These cover the first two of the four, namely ‘the power of regret’, and ‘the power of resolving never to repeat’.

The two other powers are ‘the power of remedy’ and ‘the power of support’. The ‘power of remedy’ in this case is Bodhicitta , the awakening mind, by which our bad habits can be totally destroyed. So by giving rise to Bodhicitta we remedy our bad habits that are based in attachment and aversion; aversion for that which we take to the other, and attachment to that which we take to be of our own side. When Bodhicitta is present in our mind and we have this caring and loving attitude towards others, then naturally we lose attachment to ourselves and aversion to others.

Then we come to ‘the power of support’. We need help to change our bad habits and purify our karma. We give the name ‘Dorje Sempa’ to the support, but it’s not that Dorje Sempa is really some sort of external figure, in a fixed posture. We need to understand that the meditation on Dorje Sempa is a practice of the Secret Mantra or Vajrayana, so we are talking about the practice of very high level and view. We can recognise this by looking at the view of the ‘Mind-Only’ school which is a lesser level of the view and practice than that of the Vajrayana. Their view is: everything that appears is mind. And as this view precedes that of the Vajrayana, it has to be accepted as valid by a Vajrayana practitioner. So the Mind-Only school’s teachings that all appearances are dream-like, illusory, and nothing other than mind must be accepted. (It’s not that once we get to the practice of the higher vehicles we suddenly think everything which comes before that is mistaken. That’s not the way it works.) By the time we come to the understanding of Vajrayana, and gain a genuine practice of it, we see the truth of things being ‘only mind’. Not only do we see things to be dream-like and empty, we now also see them to be pure. So we see the truth of purity, and that purity takes form as Dorje Sempa. And it’s our own understanding and complete confidence in that purity, or in Dorje Sempa, which empowers us to eradicate our bad habits, and purify our karma.

In brief, your karma is your habits; it can be changed and cleared away, by yourself. And if the meditation on Dorje Sempa is done with the correct view and the Four Powers, it can counteract and eradicate our previous bad karma.