Past-Life Karma and its impact on Present Life

Normally during consultations or live sessions, people have said this quite often that it is unfair that we are suffering because of our actions in past-lives because we don’t even remember what we have done in our past-lives. In that case, why we should suffer the consequences now? As this thing was said more often, I thought that this issue can be addressed in one of the off-beat articles which I love to write.

Prima-facie it looks like a highly intellectual thought but if we look at it closely then it is another excuse created by our cunning mind to keep us trapped in our comfort zone, so that we should not think about any sort of evolution in this life.

Let’s try to understand what I am trying to convey –

Current Life – At least I, as an Astrologer, don’t remember saying to anyone of my client or student that they are suffering in this life because of their past-lives actions. Whenever someone asked about past-life related things, I simply said that this current life is more important for me. Accept it or not but if I am suffering in this life then it is because my own actions or inactions. Whatever we go through in our life is the result of our own actions/inactions or awareness/ignorance. I can definitely say that whenever we were about to commit any mistake in our life, at least one person had come to guide us properly but we didn’t listen to his/her advice. Hence, it is always better to take the responsibility of our life on ourselves because then only we can hope to improve. If we continue to shift the blame on others or on past-lives then the hope of improvement or evolution is gone because responsibility is shifted. So, for me at least, this current life is all important as if you can make any change/improvement/growth then it is in this life.

Past Life, Present Life and Future Life – But I can understand from where the question is coming? We are told from our childhood that we are suffering because of our past-life karma. Now, if you just observe your present life closely then you will realize the uselessness of this statement.

a. In our current life whenever we perform some good actions, then and there we feel happy. Likewise, whenever we commit any evil actions, then and there our consciousness feels guilty. No matter how evil someone is, at consciousness level everyone is aware what is right and what is wrong. That consciousness is nothing but the presence of God within us.

b. All I am trying to convey that Karma and its results are instant. We get results as per karma instantly, then and there. We need not to wait till next life to get the results. It is as instant as if I put my hand in fire then it will be burnt. Hence, we don’t get results of our past-life karma in this life. Fortunately, Karmic Results Delivery System of God is not so delayed.

c. Then if we get results of this life karma in this life only then why we take next life? So, first of all the categorization of time as Past, Present and Future is again a human creation. For existence, there is only Present Time. There is only one life which moves through different times. Understand through this example, if you pay attention then last thought of night when you are just about to sleep is also the first thought of next morning when we wake-up and we carry forward the same life in morning from the same point where we left in night. Likewise, we carry forward the same life at the time of birth in current life which we left at the time of death of body in past-life. And then we continue the same life in this incarnation.

d. We take new birth not because of our past-life karma and their results but because soul still has some desire to accomplish. Soul still wants to experience few more things and accordingly, it takes new life to accomplish those desires. Also, remember that we are coming from source energy or God and we will continue to take re-births until we evolve again to the level where we can again merge into the same source energy.

e. Through this journey, with every birth and death, we create a pattern for our life and with every next life, we evolve on this pattern. For example, suppose someone has just completed a life in which he was a Serial Killer then in the very next life, we cannot expect that all of a sudden this soul will be evolved and it will live life of a Spiritual Guru. His soul would enter in new life on the foundation and pattern of Serial Killer only but then he needs to evolve through his free will from this pattern to the next pattern of life. Like this, we need to continuously evolve to the next levels, so that we can merge-back with the source energy.

f. But the difficulty comes that with every new birth, we forget the past life and we involve ourselves again in the activities and stuffs we have done many a times before in our past-lives due to social conditionings.

g. Someone can say that why this nonseense was even created where we come out from source and live different lives at different evolution level and then again merge-back into the same source. Well because we wanted to experience this world. We had a desire to experience all the things we are experiencing in this life, that’s why we created this world for ourselves. There is no creator outside this world who created it. We ourselves are creator and we created this world to enjoy and experience. And the moment we get fed-up of this whole game, our spiritual journey back home will begin but the main thing is that as yet, we are not fed-up. We are enjoying this world. Either we are enjoying our good times or we are enjoying our bad times because even then there is a hope that good time will come back and by giving this hope, mind again keeps us in trap of hope of enjoying the good time again. We can only get fed-up from this world only when we don’t want to experience anything any further but right now that stage hasn’t come as we are waiting for next promotion, next relation or even next movie. As long as these desires are there, we will be caught-up in this world and it is our own decision whenever we want to move back to source.

Remembering Past-Lives - Someone can also say that then it should be the situation that we should remember all our past lives, so that we should not get ourselves involved with same actions again and again. That would help us in evolution. Certainly but if nature has made this arrangement that we should forget our past-life the moment we get our new body then it must be for a reason, right? Now, understand the reasons.

a. Forgetting is very necessary to live a sane life. It is necessary to have separate sections of conscious, sub-conscious and unconscious state of mind. Now, understand this from reverse point of view. What will happen if you remember everything or I should say that you are unable to forget anything? Leave aside past-lives and this life, even if we remember each and every event or activity or things said or heard during a single month then within no time we will go insane. Nature knows how much memory space is needed for conscious mind to work on daily basis and it keeps that space. Rest of our memories go into sub-conscious and unconscious state of mind, so that we can function properly.

b. Then remembering is still easy but if you remember something from your past-lives then it will be almost impossible to forget it in this life. We find it difficult to let-go and forget the regret or guilt of this life only and now imagine keeping the regrets or guilt of your many different lives.

c. And it is not as simple as it looks. Suppose someone is born with a very weak or fearful mind in this life and he comes to know through past-life regression that he was actually a big criminal in past life and killed many people. Or if someone comes to know that he had committed inhuman acts or crimes in past-lives then how much he would be able to live this life with peace and positivity?

d. So, it is possible to know about past-lives but only people with strongest and most positive mind should go in that dark area. May be that’s why, they say when someone realizes enlightenment, at that time nature brings all his lives in front of his eyes. It is because he has proved his strength of body, mind and soul to go through that experience.

e. So, not remembering our past-life karma is in our own favour, so that we can take more evolved actions in this life for our own evolution. But human mind is cunning which creates one or the other excuse.

Lives lived in illusion – But is there really any difference between our past-life and present life? Take this example, if I don’t take any evolved action with total awareness in this life then can I expect that my next life will be any better or different? As I see, certainly not. I will be living a very similar life again which would be full of similar illusions which I am facing in this life.

So, if I am living a life of illusion currently then it only means that my past-lives were of equal or even more illusion and if some change can happen then it can happen in this life only, not in past or future life. This is why I feel that this current life is most important and we have our best chance of evolution in this life only. If we take more aware and conscious actions in this life then only we can expect current life to improve and then future life can be more evolved one. At least blaming our past-lives are not going to help in this evolution.

Cunning Mind – And this is where I feel that it is very important to see mind as 3^rd person. Whenever someone is trying to guide you in right direction and you start asking questions which make you feel that you are very intelligent or intellectual, understand that cunning mind is playing its role of keeping you trapped. For example, whenever someone tells us about Meditating, we start making hell lot of excuses, such as – “what will happen?”, “what is the benefit?” or “where is the time?” etc etc. We feel that we are very intelligent by asking this questions but in actuality, we are just fools and cunning human mind is giving us all these excuses because at least our mind doesn’t want us to meditate. Mind knows that if this person starts meditating then sooner or later he will be able to take control of mind whereas Mind itself wants to be in control. This logic of past-life karma and its results in this life is another excuse created by same mind of those people who didn’t try to go deep into the subject and then this illogical logic was accepted by people. So, start seeing human mind as 3^rd person to be in control of mind and you will realize its cunning-ness and ability to make excuses. As Osho said, human mind is a beautiful servant but dangerous master. It is unfortunate that human mind has taken the place of dangerous master for majority of us.

Conclusion – This is what I feel about this topic of past-life karma and its results in current life. As I see and as I said, we can choose to be more evolved at any point of time there is no reason to find excuses in past-life karma. And if at all, someone really wants to know about their past life karma then please research about a term “Jati Smaran” in Buddhism and Jainism. There is a way of achieving everything through Meditation.

Hope this helps. Thanks, 

Swami Premanand Bharti