Karma, dharma, dogma—three pillars that appear across scriptures, commentaries, and modern self-help shelves. Their roots run deep, yet in everyday speech the meanings often tangle. What follows is a gentle untangling: tracing each word to its classical soil and offering ways the trio can still nourish a contemporary life.
- Karma is the sum of our intentions and the momentum of our habits—helpful or harmful—the subtle force we plant with every choice.
- Dharma is the guidance we invite onto the journey: teachings, mentors, and principles that steer us toward clarity, compassion, and peace.
- Dogma is the outward form—prayers, rituals, rules—originally meant as friendly signposts, but prone to becoming mindless habit when we forget what they point to.
As an anolgy, imagine personal development as a hike to the top of a tall hill: karma is both the aim that pulls you uphill (fresh air, a summit view) and the distractions or discomforts that tug you off course (a rock in your boot, a buzzing phone). Dharma is the trail wisdom—steady breathing, map-reading, knowing which plants to avoid—that keeps the journey skillful. Dogma is the stopwatch that insists you reach the top in twenty minutes or the name-brand boots someone swears are "the only proper gear": outer forms that help only when they serve the experience, not replace it.
What Karma Is—and Isn't
Popular culture often treats karma like a cosmic vending machine: insert behavior, receive instant payback. Classical teachings, by contrast, present it as a force of nature—steady, impersonal, and inescapable—more like gravity than a heavenly scorecard.
Before we explore its conceptual roots, lets first clear away a few misconceptions:
- Cosmic scorekeeping. Karma is not a divine reward-and-punishment ledger.
- Fixed destiny. Karma doesn't mean that whatever happens was meant to be.
- Instant payback. Intentions yield actions, actions yield cause and effect. The timeframe may be fast or slow, or even imperceptible to us.
In other words, karma is less about cosmic justice and more a reference to causal resonance: what we set in motion keeps moving until something—often our own insight—redirects it.
That does not mean every setback, illness, or unkind word is a rebuke from the universe. Storms roll in, economies dip, bodies bruise and heal—most often for reasons unrelated to our personal conduct. Karma concerns patterns, not punishments. Over time the tenor of our relationships tends to echo the tone we repeatedly strike: when we speak or act with harshness, we often encounter more harshness in return; when we move through the world with patience and care, kindness more readily circles back. Yet neither tendency shields us from unexpected misfortune. The real karmic moment arrives after the surprise: when rudeness or loss shows up, can we keep choosing kindness? Those choice-points—more than the weather of fate—are where karma is forged.
Below are touchstones—brief definitions drawn from different traditions—pointing to the essence of karma as intentional action and its results:
A man reaps what he sows.
—Galatians 6:7, New International Version (NIV)
कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन।
You have the right to action alone, and not to the fruits of action.
—Bhagavad Gītā 2.47, (trans. Winthrop Sargeant, 1984)
"Every action generates a force of energy that returns to us in like kind."
—Deepak Chopra, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success (1994)
Across these voices runs a single thread: what we choose sets causes in motion; what returns is the echo of those choices.
Karma Is Intention
Cetanāhaṃ, bhikkhave, kammaṃ vadāmi. Cetayitvā kammaṃ karoti—kāyena vācāya manasā.
It is intention, bhikkhus, that I call kamma. Having intended, one acts by body, speech, or mind.
—The Buddha, Aṅguttara Nikāya 6.63 (trans. Bhikkhu Bodhi, 2012)
When the Buddha said this, he placed the spotlight on motive rather than motion. An action, in this view, is only the ripple; the original intention is the stone dropped into the pond. The same gesture—a knife in a hand—can heal in surgery or harm in violence. Karma measures the heart-impulse behind the blade, not the blade itself.
Once intention is seen as the seed, a natural corollary follows: actions sprout matching harvests. Even if the timeline stretches beyond our sight, the flavor of the fruit carries the flavor of the seed. Ethics, then, is agricultural: weed unwholesome motives early; cultivate wholesome ones often.
Key takeaways in brief:
- Karma is intention. Deliberate mental, verbal, or physical acts carry karmic weight.
- Actions express intention. The outward gesture takes its moral tone from the motive that drives it.
- Consequences echo intention. Results unfold in line with the original motive, regardless of timeline or form.
- Purifying intention is primary ethics. Intention is the root of karma.
Unintentional or accidental behavior may still have practical consequences, but those events do not plant new karmic seeds in the Buddhist sense. Intention is the seed; the act is merely the sprout.
manopubbaṅgamā dhammā manoseṭṭhā manomayā
manasā ce paduṭṭhena bhāsati vā karoti vā
tato naṃ dukkhamanveti cakkaṃ’va vahato padaṃ
Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts, suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox."
—The Buddha, Dhammapada 1:1 (trans. Acharya Buddharakkhita, 1985)
Think of intention as the seed and the action as the plant:
| Seed | Plant | Likely Harvest |
|---|---|---|
| Care | Cutting vegetables and cooking a meal for a friend | Comfort, goodwill |
| Harm | Using the same knife to cause harm | Suffering, fear |
Across faith lines, the focus on motive persists. Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, warns: “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment… everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:22, 28, ESV)—a shift of ethics from the hand to the heart.
The Bhagavad Gītā likewise cautions: “He who restrains his organs of action, but continues to dwell on sense-objects in his mind, is a deluded hypocrite” (Bhagavad Gītā 3.6, trans. Sargeant).
Jain teachers sharpen the point: bhāva-karma—the mental state—“stains the soul” (see Tattvārtha Sūtra 6.1, trans. Vijay K. Jain) long before a deed is done.
In every case, what we continually intend is what we gradually become.
Recognizing Karma in Daily Life
Karma can feel theoretical until a familiar storyline loops back into view—like hearing an old melody inside a new song.
When I was eight, the story line was simple: win the video game. One lost level, one cracked controller, and a dent in the bedroom wall told me how fiercely I wanted control. Anger was my blunt instrument.
Fast-forward to adult life. The game cartridge is gone, but the pattern re-emerges wearing subtler costumes: a stalled work project, a political headline, a missed promise from someone I love. The surge in the chest is the same, yet the potential fallout—hurt feelings, damaged credibility, ruptured relationships—is far costlier than a shattered game controller.
Why the shift? As our experience grows more nuanced, so do our karmic lessons. Life greets a maturing mind with progressively intricate scenarios, as if to ask, Have you learned the lesson yet? Every recurrence is less a punishment than an invitation to respond with deeper skill.
The pattern itself is neutral—just feedback. If I keep rehearsing irritation, the echo gains momentum; if I practice patience, the echo softens. A familiar maxim sums it up: Lessons repeat until their roots are understood. The moment rage flares is not the universe condemning me, but the curriculum knocking: "Ready to try a different answer?"
These days I listen for the early cues—the tightening jaw, the impulse to refresh an email thread—and decide: lash out, or plant something kinder. Some days I still miss the mark; the harm now extends far beyond a bedroom wall. Other days I pause, breathe, and place a gentler seed. The storyline keeps teaching; I keep practicing.
"過而不改，是謂過矣。" "To make a mistake and not correct it is to make a second mistake." —Confucius, Analects 15:31 (trans. D.C. Lau, 1979)
Recognizing a pattern, then, is not a guilty verdict. It is the tap of a friendly guide inviting another circuit of growth—like a new ring forming inside a tree trunk, preparing the wood for storms yet to come.
Karma as Pattern—Personal to Ancestral
Karma is more than the micro-moment of intention; it is also the momentum that intention sets in motion. Over time that momentum hardens into habit, and habit into patterns that can span a lifetime—or a lineage. Hindu, Buddhist, and even Western frameworks all point to this wider field where our private choices braid into family stories, cultural scripts, and what modern science now calls epigenetic inheritance.
Classical Echoes
In the Bhagavad Gītā, actions (karma) bind the soul (ātman) to the wheel of birth and rebirth (saṃsāra) "until the doer acts in wisdom and freedom from desire" (4:19). The same text prescribes rituals (śrāddha) to help resolve ancestral karma, acknowledging that the past is a living presence in the present.
The Buddha spoke less of lineage rites and more of "habit energies" (saṃskāras): deeply grooved tendencies that renew suffering (dukkha) until met with mindful awareness. Whether the echo arrives from a past life or last Tuesday matters less than our willingness to hear it now.
Generational Threads
Therapists and modern spiritual writers extend the concept to family karma—the emotional residue of addiction, abuse, or silence that travels down bloodlines. Children absorb unspoken grief the way trees absorb minerals from soil; the imprint becomes so familiar we mistake it for personality.
Recent studies in epigenetic inheritance offer a biological hint of how this works: prolonged stress or trauma can tweak gene expression, priming descendants to relive the very fears their ancestors endured.
Looking Ahead to the Twelve Laws
In the other articles in this series I'll talk about the Twelve Laws of Karma as they appear across popular sources. The three that dovetail most with the pattern view sketched here, however, are:
- Law of Change – history repeats until consciousness intervenes.
- Law of Connection – every act, ancient or immediate, threads into the same tapestry.
- Law of Here & Now – presence loosens the past's grip, clearing space for a new response.
Western Parallels
The book of Exodus says the "iniquity of the fathers" will be visited upon their children "to the third and the fourth generation" (Exodus 20:5, ESV).
In secular psychology, Murray Bowen's family-systems theory describes multigenerational transmission of roles and reactivity until one member differentiates and changes the script.
Seeing the Full Mosaic
However we name it—karma, curse, conditioning—the invitation is the same: notice the pattern, then plant a different seed. Acts of mindful choice can become the turning point where ancestral inertia bows to fresh intention.
| Framework | Karma as Intention | Karma as Inherited Pattern | Key to Breaking the Cycle |
|---|---|---|---|
| Upanishads & Gītā | Yes | Yes — includes rites for ancestors | Self-knowledge, detached action |
| Early Buddhism | Yes | Yes — saṃskāras / habit energies | Mindful awareness, ethical living |
| Twelve Folk Laws | Yes | Yes — esp. Laws of Change & Connection | Conscious change, present-moment practice |
| Western Religion | Sometimes | Yes — generational sin/curses | Repentance, forgiveness, new covenant |
| Family-Systems Theory | N/A | Yes — multigenerational transmission | Differentiation, therapy, choice |
Dharma: A Compass to Navigate Karma
Dharma literally means "what holds things together," but in lived experience it's the thread that keeps a life from unraveling. It can arrive bound in scripture or scribbled on a sticky-note, chanted under temple eaves or murmured across a café table. The common denominator is not pedigree but potency: a dharma is whatever moves you one step beyond knee-jerk reactivity toward a deeper current of peace, joy, and compassionate connection—the soft dissolution of suffering that some name nirvāṇa, others communion with God, and many of us simply call waking up.
Formal lineages certainly matter: vast libraries of Buddhist sūtras and the threefold training—ethics (sīla), collectedness (samādhi), and insight (prajñā)—compose what Professor Verhoeven sums up as "grounding, centering, expanding" Grounding, Centering, Expanding—DRBU, 2023. Yet the canon is only the deep end of a much larger pool. The steady encouragement of a coach, your therapist's reframing question, the passage in a novel that knocks something loose—each can play the same role if it tilts the heart toward clarity and compassion.
The Buddha himself gave permission to sift and sort. To the Kālāmas he said:
Yadā tumhe, kālāmā, jāneyyātha: 'Ime dhammā kusalā, ime dhammā akusalā; ime dhammā sāvajjā, ime dhammā anavajjā; ime dhammā hīnā, ime dhammā paṇītā; ime dhammā kaṇhasukkasappaṭibhāgā samādinnāya saṃvattanti dukkhaṃ, samādinnāya saṃvattanti sukhaṃ.'
When you know for yourselves, ‘These things are wholesome, these things are unwholesome; these things are blameworthy, these things are blameless; these things are inferior, these things are superior; these things, when adopted and carried out, lead to harm and suffering—these things you should abandon. These things, when adopted and carried out, lead to welfare and happiness—these things you should practice.’
—The Buddha, Aṅguttara Nikāya 3.65 (trans. Bhikkhu Bodhi, 2012)
Two millennia later the Apostle Paul offered the same litmus test:
Test everything; hold fast to what is good.
—1 Thessalonians 5:21 (NIV)
L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the Church of Scientology, put it bluntly:
What is true for you is what you have observed yourself. And when you lose that, you have lost everything.
—L. Ron Hubbard, "Personal Integrity" (1961)
Across the ages, a single refrain resounds: lived experience outweighs pedigree. Scripture can glow, mentors can guide, yet the final measure is the heart's quiet shift.
When a teaching presents itself, I rest it on three touchstones:
- Does it soften suffering—within me and in those nearby?
- Does it cultivate the virtues sages praise—honesty, patience, courage, love?
- Does it remain sound after practice, revision, and honest doubt?
Should the answers incline toward yes, I carry the lesson forward; if not, I set it down with gratitude. In this way the toolkit stays light, intimate, and alive—dharma as fellow traveller, not museum relic.
Your pack will naturally look different from mine. Two companions may hear the same verse and draw different medicine, yet compare notes without turning difference into discord. The aim is not uniform belief but a shared unfolding—each of us tuning the dial until the signal rings true.
Seen this way, a library of teachings resembles a greenhouse more than a shelf: whatever helps wisdom photosynthesize earns another hour in the sun, while the rest returns to compost that will nourish tomorrow's growth.
Dogma and the Parable of the Finger and the Moon
法喻如指月。見指不見月。指不是月。指所以顯月。
The Dharma is like a finger pointing at the moon. If you look at the finger, you will not see the moon. The finger is not the moon; the finger is a means to reveal the moon.
—Platform Sūtra of Huineng, ch. 10 (Red Pine tr., p. 172)
Dogma is the fossil of once valuable practices that have lost their meaning, focusing on form rather than function. A chant that once opened a monk's heart like sunrise may, centuries later, be repeated without thought as memorized words, devoid of any emotion at all.
Christian and Hebrew holy texts refer to the same thing:
These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
— Isaiah 29:13 (NIV)
The Qurʾān echoes a similar concern:
So woe to those who pray but who are heedless of their prayer.
—Qurʾān 107:4–5 (Sahih International)
The peril is universal: habit can hollow any tradition.
Dogma often reveals itself through quiet habits. It is there when a prayer slips from the tongue yet the mind has wandered elsewhere; when beads slide through unfeeling fingers while errands crowd the mind; when we dismiss a practice on the strength of a label rather than the substance of its fruits. In each case form has outlived the spirit it once carried.
None of this signals moral failure; it is simply a lamp asking us to look again. Rituals, doctrines, and symbols arise to steady the heart, knit community, and widen compassion. When they cease to serve those ends, the gentle invitation is to revise rather than to repent.
The needed shift is often small: linger on each syllable of a mantra until meaning seeps through; trade "Lord" for "Love" if that eases old bruises; exchange om for a measured breath if Sanskrit feels remote. Even principled skeptics nurture their ethics by similar means—a dawn run, a gratitude journal, a science-tested mindfulness app cleared of incense yet rich in calm.
In short, I stand not against ritual, creed, or doubt, but for whatever keeps awareness bright and goodwill supple. If a cathedral hymn lifts you, sing it; if a cedar path speaks more clearly, walk it. And when a form no longer serves, polish it, trade it, or lay it down with a bow.
Working with Resistance
The Law of Change basically says that history itself repeats until consciousness intervenes.
Each time we tighten against an unwelcome feeling, the pattern gathers force and circles back, not as punishment but as reminder. When familiar challenges return, we can greet them with quiet inquiry—What lesson is asking to be heard?—and step through the moment rather than wrestle against it.
The Buddha taught:
"To avoid all evil, to cultivate good, and to purify one's mind—this is the teaching of the Buddhas."
—The Buddha, Dhammapada 183 (trans. Acharya Buddharakkhita)
A popular teaching story expands on this ancient verse:
A student asked a sage, "What is the heart of the path?" "Do good things; don't do bad things," the sage replied. "But, that's so simple that even a child already knows it," the student protested. "Yes," the elder smiled, "but even the elderly have trouble doing it."
It's a practice, not a perfect. The goal is progress, not perfection.
When anger flares or apathy drags, pause, breathe, begin again—ideally with a touch of lightness. Each restart is a fresh karmic turning.
Setting Out
No single map fits every traveler. Keep what moves you toward kindness; set down what does not. The moon cares little which finger points the way.
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