What does it mean when people say that they have bad karma? Actually, karma refers to the patterns that you’ve created over your many lifetimes. So the karmic patterns aren’t punishment at all. The universe isn’t trying to make you feel bad. No, these patterns are simply the result of your accumulated thoughts and actions.
This should give you hope, because this means that karma is just an ancient way of saying the popular expression, What goes around, comes around. That’s good news, because this means that you created patterns, both good and bad, in the past. You are experiencing the results of those thoughts and actions now. And the good news is that you aren’t condemned to repeat these past patterns.
Here’s where it gets interesting: Though you have good and bad karmic patterns, they are not permanently frozen — they are always in a process of changing. That is because the good thoughts and actions have their own transformational energy to them. So as you generate positive thoughts and actions, the positive energy gradually heals, or transmutes the deeper negative karmic patterns.
So this means that one of the secrets to improving your karma is to generate good thoughts and actions. However, it’s not enough to just know about goodness as a concept. Nor is it enough to automatically follow so-called good behavior patterns in a robotic way.
Genuine good karmic patterns come from how you approach your life, and each person has their own customized lesson plan. With that in mind, now you can explore three ways to improve your karma.
1. Observe other people, and notice when they are expressing good patterns, and notice when people are behaving badly — don’t judge it; just notice it.
Why does observing other people help your karma? When you recognize bad behavior, that is because you have already learned that particular karmic lesson. You were stuck in that inappropriate behavior many lifetimes ago, and your soul gradually came to recognize the wrongness of that behavior. It could also be that you recognize the behavior from your own younger experiences in this current lifetime. Now, you easily recognize the wrongness of the behavior when you observe it in others.
Every time you see recognize the pattern in others, it reinforces the lesson that you learned when you were doing that very same thing. This explains why you don’t want to judge or condemn others, even when you observe the inappropriateness of their behavior. Judging them, when they are in the middle of their karmic lessons, is no different from judging yourself.
If you are not judging others, and if you do perceive that another person is behaving inappropriately, what attitude can you reasonably have about that person? Bless them, and imagine that they are learning their lessons as quickly and easily as possible. It just takes a moment to bless another person — and blessing creates good karma, too.
2. Look at the lessons you’ve learned in this present lifetime, and discover ways each day to follow the wisdom path that those lessons lead you to.
Maybe you used to eat junk food, and now you don’t. At least, you generally don’t, but here’s the wonderful karmic opportunity. You gradually recognized that your body felt better when you ate healthier food. When you were younger, you didn’t notice how food affected you. Now you do — you learned the lesson. This provides you with an opportunity for generating good karmic patterns, because you are potentially strengthening the divine temple of your body with your intelligent daily choices.
You potentially create good karma each day, and even in each moment, in the small choices you make. You have this opportunity each day, at each meal, with each bite, because you are either choosing food that helps you feel more conscious, or you are choosing food that lowers your consciousness.
It’s a simple choice, and many karmic choices are. That is the elegant simplicity of karma — each time you make a healthy choice, you create good karma. But not because the universe is rewarding you — it is because you are building a healthy positive pattern. So if you’ve learned the lesson that healthy food feels better, then you use that opportunity each day to make healthier choices.
Or, maybe you used to enjoy making fun of others, or gossiping about them. You came to realize that this activity lowered your vibration. It didn’t feel good any more. But the tendency may still be there, and so your karmic opportunity each day is to find healthier ways to communicate. Each time you make the healthier choice, your good karma grows, and your negative karma lightens and releases.
You might be wondering how people can learn at all, since they seem to be so affected by ignorance, confusion, and illusions. Actually, you learn through experience, and when those experiences don’t feel good, you do some deep soul-searching. That is the secret of karmic improvement, because soul-searching leads you to your deeper soul wisdom. Alignment with your soul is the key to improving your karmic situation.
When you gradually realized that your negative actions were hurting you, you gradually learned to explore different choices in thought and action. Your soul helped you to consider these possibilities. That is why some people are referred to as older souls. It is not that they are automatically wise, but that they have more experiences that they have learned from. The older souls have cultivated a deeper soul alignment that they can draw upon, but the younger souls still tend to get stuck in their automatic reactive thoughts and behaviors.
But before you start judging those reactive younger souls, remember that your judgmental response to them is curiously automatic and reactive. You are learning how to notice things, without getting stuck in a dramatic response. And that leads you to the third way to improve your karma:
3. Release your condemnation and judgment about yourself and others, so that you can calmly explore the best options, and take your karmic lessons to the next higher level.
For example, suppose you experienced that when you rudely condemned and gossiped about people, it created bad energy for you, and only spread bad vibrations around. You noticed this, it didn’t feel pleasant, and so you vowed to minimize that kind of behavior. But what about your own self-talk — the voice in your own head that condemns and gossips about you?
This is an example of taking your karmic lessons to the next level. You learned what happened when you judged others harshly. Now you’re learning what happens when you judge yourself in that same rude way. So you always take the old lessons, and discover each day how you can refine them, and take them to that next level. In this example, you notice the judgmental inner voice, you thank it for sharing, and you re-write its judgmental words so that they are more empowering and useful.
Each day, you have the chance to look at your behavior, and to look at people around you, and there are amazing karmic opportunities in how you respond to what you see. You can notice when you find yourself going into an automatic reaction pattern — you can even shift it in mid-conversation.
Who do you think is most apt to judge others who are gossiping? That’s right — the person who is still working on that karmic lesson. How do you know if you’re still working on the lesson? Well, if you’re quick to condemn others who do it, then it’s still your lesson. Otherwise, you’d be more accepting of other people learning their own lessons. You would recognize that everyone is your mirror — showing you your past and present issues and patterns.
But how can you recognize that another person is acting inappropriately, while not condemning them? Don’t you have to dislike or condemn what is wrong? There is a higher way that takes daily practice, and it is the key to moving forward spiritually:
Learn to calmly observe, while clearly recognizing the lesson, and yet without emotionally judging.
This is a powerful way to discover your higher truth, and to generate good karma. It bypasses denial, it bypasses condemnation, and it leads to your being able to recognize positive choices. When you center yourself, you are able to act on wisdom, because you align with your deeper soul wisdom.
The behavior that you see in other people is a mirror for you, because you see your own patterns, past and present, in their behavior. When you have an abrupt emotional reaction, that suggests that you are still judging your own patterns. Your reactive attitude suggests that you have not forgiven yourself for your own patterns.
If you are unforgiving to yourself, then you create a division within yourself, because the condemned part of the self can become angry, shameful, and resentful. This can lead to bad behavior. However, when you acknowledge your patterns, with love and non-judgment, then you can calmly shift your behaviors in a healthy direction.
Whether you see bad patterns in yourself, or in another, that is a karmic opportunity. Noticing the problem, and recognizing healthier alternative behaviors, is an important step. Stepping out of the judgmental attitude is another important step in creating good karma. The non-judgmental path lets you calmly consider the options for yourself, and lets other people live their lessons at their own pace.
Notice that whether you see another person gossiping, for example, or whether you find yourself starting to gossip, the lesson is there. In fact, the instant you find yourself moving down the negative pathway that looks familiar, and you sense that it is wrong, that is the perfect time to create some good karma. It is the crossroads of your karmic path.
This is the decisive moment when your soul is sharing its wisdom with you. You are able to sense how something in your behavior doesn’t feel right. Anything that you do to switch to a healthier path, in that moment, is a powerful inner victory.
Each positive choice means that you are reinforcing your soul connection, learning from your past mistakes, and doing something to improve your karma. Patterns take time to change, and so your goal is to make as many small healthy karmic choices each day as you can. Every shift in your consciousness builds healthy karma, and melts old karmic negativity away.
In the world of karma, there is no total success, and no total failure. Karma is a dynamic system, and your karma is shifting in subtle ways every day. There is no such thing as being totally good, or totally bad. That is the beauty of karmic patterns, because the patterns are always dynamically shifting in accord with your moment to moment thoughts and actions.
This means that whatever your situation may be, it can change. You are not permanently condemned. It also means that even when you create good patterns, the effect is good, of course, but it is not permanently good. It’s sobering to realize that even if you have generated tremendously good karma, that can change each day if you start generating negative karma. You have a choice in each moment.
Your thoughts and actions, in each moment, are building your karma, for better or worse. Your soul wants to help you. Tune into your inner wisdom. Slow your mental chatter, feel your breathing, and get a sense of your deeper truth. If you aren’t certain of the healthy alternatives for a situation, ask your soul to guide you to those positive choices. Let the wiser choices come to your attention.
Life brings you the opportunity to learn, through the circumstances that emerge for you each day. You have the three ways to improve your karma, and you can use them each day to build your positive energy in alignment with the highest good. To sum up, the three ways are:
1. Learn by observing other people — and also bless them.
2. Learn from your own lessons — do have high standards — and bless yourself, too.
3. Release judgment, so that you can take your lessons to the next level of excellence.
Where do you start? Begin with bringing your attention to each moment. Gently shift any moment, in a subtle way, into a more positive direction. Create small victories, and you will find that you can generate a positive karmic path for yourself.
For now, notice your breathing, and discover how you can be more gently present in this moment. Be calmly aware of your chattering inner self-talk, without judging it. When you discover the quiet voice of inner truth — deeper and more subtle than the chattering voice, you’re beginning to hear the deep teaching presence of your soul. May each day bring you into ever deeper alignment with the stable love and wisdom that your cosmic soul eternally shares with you.
Many Blessings,
Joel Bruce Wallach
Founder, Cosmic Living – spiritual instruction via tele-classes and home-study mp3’s
I blog quite often and I seriously thank you for your
content. This great article has really peaked my interest.
I’m going to bookmark your website and keep checking for
new information about once a week. I opted in for your
RSS feed as well.
Dear Joel,
You are right, thank you. In both the ultimate and relative sense, I appreciate your perspective. Thank you again for taking the time.
Lapril,
Self-empowerment is available for each of us, when we claim it and practice it. May all beings be graced with the ability to recognize their potential, and to embody it.
Dear Joel thank you for your interest in helping us. I have become entangled with someone energetically and Feel locked and unable to fully command my energy. I feel this person’s techniques exceed me exceed my knowledge and I wonder do you think that when this person dies I will remain locked up? Or do you think when they die I will be released?
Lapril,
You’re defining this situation in a way that does not empower you. Let’s redefine the situation:
– Instead of trying to entirely release their energy all at once, release 10% per day. It could be more or less – this is simply a way to think of it that will seem less difficult.
– Learn techniques for releasing energy. Be responsible for learning how to help yourself:
– https://cosmic-living.com/articles/how-to-clear-your-energy-blocks/
– https://cosmic-living.com/articles/how-to-give-yourself-a-centered-radiant-aura/
– https://cosmic-living.com/articles/cleanse-your-home-and-office-with-sky-aura-clearing/
You don’t have to wait until this person dies; that’s a passive attitude that weakens your personal power. Educate yourself, treat yourself with respect, and take back your personal space. The cosmic divine energy that you are made of is ultimately more powerful than any negative person.
I believe I am being punished for something I did I long ago. Is this karma?
Louie,
You are not being punished. The divine universe would do no such thing to you.
Karma is the result of old past-life behaviors. These events have created negative patterns. Your job is to shift the pattern.
Release the old pattern, ask for forgiveness, and create new positive patterns, so that you can live in a more balanced and positive flow of energy.
Thank you Joel, to sharing this wonderful Karma thought. However, I have only two question to ask you 1. Why every human has retains their good and bad karma from past life whatever it is, Why they not die while we released our old soul and born in to new soul. 2. In “truth decade” whenever human thought about supreme god with his heart within few second god will give reply or he may present at same spot, now days telepathy power does not exist?
Once again i am really thank you for sharing this karma words.
Fascinating questions, Vatsal —
1. The whole purpose of retaining karma is so that you have a chance to utilize the karmic experiences to learn more deeply. If it all dissolved after the lifetime ended, then you would have to start from zero in each lifetime, and you would never learn anything deeper. It would be like starting in first grade at school, every day; a pointless existence where you never learned advanced studies.
2. It is your task to develop your subtle sensing. Quiet the mind, stay centered in the body, and notice the subtle insights that emerge. There are many techniques described on this website, and there are mp3 studies that help you develop your deeper awareness.
https://cosmic-living.com/bundled-audio-training-mp3-sets/
I enjoy looking through a post that can make men and women think.
Also, many thanks for permitting me to comment!
That’s really helpful for everyone to change their mind and live peacefully
Thanks for sharing
Thank you, Reet.
Many blessings!
Hi Joel,
I loved this article which quite explains to my inner self why I’m in this position right now. Thank you!
May you be blessed thousand folds.
Ellen,
Thank you for exploring this topic. May each day bring you closer to your goals, with ease and grace.
I loved this article, took me a bit to get through it…I needed time to process. Wow, have I had it wrong. Then I read rasce’s comments on Feb 8, and then the retraction made by the real respondent. I had to laugh, it illustrated the points in the article in a humorous way!!! It really felt like the ego and the soul conversing. CLASSIC!!!
J,
Yes, exactly… ego vs soul — so true to life, and so funny!
What advice would you give someone who gets judged over and over for many years for an action that is not even taking place but may have 30 years ago? People still gossiping over that old behavior and how not to let it affect you by becoming angry and acting out in other damaging ways as a result of their constant negative vibrations–what can be done?
This was a great article, thank you!
TS,
Glad you liked the article. I believe you can utilize it for this situation you’re describing.
Though it’s a bothersome situation, here’s how you might address it:
Forgive the people judging you for the past event.
Individually forgive each of these components:
their words; their facial expressions; their actions; and their thoughts.
Each time you forgive something, imagine releasing its energy from your personal space.
And of course, forgive each element of your actions, whatever they may have been, regarding the past event, too.
Dear Joel,
Thank you for sharing your insights.
Words cannot express my gratitude for you having shared this knowledge with so many other people, including myself. It has struck a cord with me, indeed, as it has with many other people here. I also must say that it has made me think of difficult situations I’v been in, very differently, in a more clear, positive, and wise manner. Its like when someone says the truth and you unflinchingly know he/she is right, but you just can’t quite explain it.
God Bless you,
Cheers,
HP
HP,
Many thanks. May all difficult paths become smoother through our elegant conscious response to life experiences!
Hi Joel,
This is by far one of the most life changing things I’ve ever read. Thank you for sharing the wisdom and putting things into perspective. Before I stumbled on your article, I was looking up on why no one has ever noticed me romantically. Not to sound cocky, but I believe I’m decent looking. After reading your first recommendation on observation, a thought flashed into my mind … yes, like some kind truth, and I immediately know why I am in the life that I am and seeking out some answers to why I am not romantically involved; the voice immediately pointed out that I subconsciously look down on myself. This lack of appreciation for myself and everything else I have, be it family, friends or career makes me undesirable … even my mind wad wired to that negative feelings towards myself. With this new awareness, I have made it a point to 1. accept it as a current reality 2. acknowledge that I have the choice to think differently and 3. make every conscious effort to develop a more positive thought pattern. Thank you so much again for being the answer to my question.
BB,
Thanks for exploring. You’re having some useful insights.
Now it’s time to be your own best friend. A true friend is someone who knows that you’re capable of much more, but is also completely accepting of you, even when you have problems and apparent limitations.
So love yourself where you’re at each day, and you’ll move forward more gracefully. And as you befriend yourself, the right person will be able to find you more easily, too.
Thank you. I’ll work on it as best as I can. And when the right person come along, I’ll remember this. I’ll pay it forward by spreading your wisdom too. May the Universe bless you Joel 🙂
Hey Joel. This was really interesting. It spoke to me in ways I have never contemplated before. I do understand a little bit about Karma but it’s clear now that it’s not enough. Each day teaches us so much. After this short explanation of yours, it’ll make it easier to understand the lessons in each moment and act on them. Is there any advice you can give regarding furthering my investigation on this subject to attain inner peace? An email would be nice. Thank you
Vijay,
Regarding inner peace, please explore this:
You review each day,
you release judgment about self and others,
and you look at what how you might have done better.
Then, you visualize yourself doing those improved behaviors.
This was absolutely stunning and spoke straight to my soul, thankyou so much for this piece of writing, great work!
Thank you, Ellie
May you experience divine ease and grace each day.
do you guys honestly believe this garbage? and do you truly talk like this? “let it ease your sole”… this trash is stupid.
and bro, your mustache and eyebrows are terrible
sorry, that was my friend. I and doing an inquiry paper in how luck and karma exist and how they affect us everyday, and i had your website open as a resource, and he left the comments. I am very sorry.
No worries, Rasce. Your friend is exploring consciousness at his own rate of discovery, and he will no doubt become more aware as the years go by.
Hi Joel, From my study of Buddhism you’re partly incorrect. You can’t change bad karma with good deeds. Karma is the result of your past speech, thoughts and actions. As a result of your past, it’s unchangeable. To ad to the complexity, karma can come instantly or delayed. However if you begin to practice good speech, thought and actions you will have good karma in the future. As an anecdote; some Tibetan Buddhists welcome horrific life circumstances(eg. cancer) as a chance to burn off bad karma.
Jakedog,
Thank you for sharing your understanding of Buddhism. The insights I share come from my reading of energy. According to my sensing of how energy works, energy patterns can be changed.
Energy patterns — past, present, or future, are malleable, and it is worthwhile for us to tune into these energies and heal them. If this understanding is not known to some Buddhists, that is because they may be unaware of other traditions, such as Taoism, in which the knowledge of how energy can shift is understood.
There is much we can learn from the mindfulness practices of Buddhism, and when we combine that practice with a deeper understanding of energy, we will all benefit.
Regarding those who “welcome cancer” as a way to burn off karma, this is a limited understanding of energy, and it reflects a narrow view of what is actually possible in terms of transmutation, transformation, transcendence, and deeper spiritual healing.