what role does karma play in deciding a person's life?

Answer 1

Good Question
Yes seems we have to plan our life out and include our karmic paybacks I would say it plays a big part in our lives.

Or are you talking about Karma in our own lives my life path is 8 which is Karma I can tell you so much about Karma it is not funny I think I am the Queen of Karma lol
In my personal life and having the life path of Karma it plays about 100% in my life

If I do something wrong the littlest thing like be 1 minute over in a parking space the parking office would be writing out the ticket

I never speed and the first time I went 6 kl over the limit and got caught lol you are allowed up to 5 kl

However I give out so much good karma and it takes longer to come back and I appreciate it when it does come back.

Love & Blessings
Milly

Answer 2

This is very easy and simple to understand but like we can't see nose though it is nearest to our eyes.
It is our daily experience that we get a good reward when we plan a nice perfect project for a good purpose in day to day job.
Then if we plan for our whole life, taking in account certain proved best karmas by great spiritual seeker in the past, it will definitely play a big role in deciding our life. So believe it without any doubt and go ahead.

Answer 3

I sort of agree with everybody.
Karma is not the same as fate or destiny. Nobody has there future decided by Karma but your Karma is a mixture of the result of your previous actions and the actions of others.
If you accidentally kill an ant but had no intention to do harm it has no effect on your Karma. If you had intention to kill the ant, knowing that it was doing no harm, you would develop negative Karma. Helping the ant to find food would give positive Karma.
Maybe Karma should be thought of as a combination of conscience, moral principle, public opinion and self esteem.By doing what you believe to be right you and the majority of others think better of you and want to do better for you.
It is the nett result of your actions in terms of how they predispose you and others to act in the future.

Answer 4

Look at it the other way: the decisions we make in life are what creates our karma.

It is only us who make the causes in our own lives and therefore receive the effects in our own lives also. Our environment acts as an agent for the manifestation of our karma; in other words, our environment acts as a mirror showing us exactly the effects of all the causes we have made in our lives since the eternal past.

Answer 5

Karma plays crucial role in one's life of prosperity or adversity. What we are now is dependent upon the karma of our past actions. Karma is the lifeline of one's life whether he propers or mars his life. At every step of life, karma rules. Without karma there is no good or bad life. Karma decides one's fate in life.

Answer 6

Lord Krishna descends specifically to reestablish the real purpose of life when man forgets that purpose. Even then, out of many, many human beings who awaken, there may be one who actually enters the spirit of understanding his position, and for him this Bhagavad-gita is spoken. Actually we are all swallowed by the tigress of nescience, but the Lord is very merciful upon living entities, especially human beings. To this end He spoke the Bhagavad-gita, making His friend Arjuna His student.

Being an associate of Lord Krishna, Arjuna was above all ignorance, but Arjuna was put into ignorance on the Battlefield of Kuruksetra just to question Lord Krishna about the problems of life so that the Lord could explain them for the benefit of future generations of human beings and chalk out the plan of life. Then man could act accordingly and perfect the mission of human life.

The subject of the Bhagavad-gita entails the comprehension of five basic truths
1. Isvara-the supreme controller,
2. Jivas -the controlled living entities.
3. Prakrti-the material nature
4. Kala- time (the duration of existence of the whole universe or the manifestation of material nature)
5. karma (activity) are also discussed.

The cosmic manifestation is full of different activities. All living entities are engaged in different activities. From Bhagavad-gita we must learn what God is, what the living entities are, what prakrti is, what the cosmic manifestation is, how it is controlled by time, and what the activities of the living entities are.

The distinction between the jiva and the isvara will be explained in the Thirteenth Chapter of Bhagavad-gita. The Lord is ksetra-jna, conscious, as is the living being, but the living being is conscious of his particular body, whereas the Lord is conscious of all bodies. Because He lives in the heart of every living being, He is conscious of the psychic movements of the particular jivas. We should not forget this.

It is also explained that the Paramatma, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is living in everyone's heart as Isvara, as the controller, and that He is giving directions for the living entity to act as he desires. The living entity forgets what to do. First of all he makes a determination to act in a certain way, and then he is entangled in the actions and reactions of his own karma. After giving up one type of body, he enters another type of body, as we take off and put on clothes. As the soul thus migrates, he suffers the actions and reactions of his past activities.

These activities can be changed when the living being is in the mode of goodness, in sanity, and understands what sort of activities he should adopt. If he does so, then all the actions and reactions of his past activities can be changed.

Consequently, karma is not eternal. Therefore we stated that of the five items (Isvara, jiva, prakrti, time and karma) four are eternal, whereas karma is not eternal.

All the above from the Introduction to Bhagavad-gita-as-it-is, by
A.C.Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada,Founder-Acharya of
ISKCON(International Society for Krishna Consciousness)

So Karma decides where we go, high, low or middle positions or transcend and go to spiritual world.

Answer 7

Tremendous.
Karma is the outcome of one's reaction (anger, passion, happiness, sadness, greed, lust, pain, pleasure and so on) within the framework of ones body and mind. And the greater the reaction the greater the forces of karma. Lets take the example of killing. The act of killing is just the physical part but image the hatred, anger, fear, pain one would be going through mentally before one decides to kill someone else. The seed of Karma has been sown by this time by ones reaction. Nature/Dhamma/Law/Karmic wheel whatever you call it has begun its work even before the action or the actual deed has happened.
As long as this reaction continues to go on, this cyclic wheel of karma will continue to occur and grow stronger. If one can get past this, even for a second, he/she has sown his/her seed for liberation. You could do this by dispassionate observation within the framework of the body and mind by observing senstations and not reacting to them and letting them pass away.

Answer 8

karma is more about reeping what our last generation has done... for example if one's parents worked hard in their life...their karma is passed on to d next generation -as in his kids n siblings r gonna enjoy d benefit..therefore if u want d good karmas to pass on then u better do some hard-work....so karma does nothing but motivates one to work harder.therefore karma and hard-work,perseverance n patience and good deeds are all related directly to one another.

Answer 9

Karma is supposed place you in circumstances which provides opportunities to you to atone for the past mistakes committed by you. What you do now, becomes Karma for your future. That is why it is said that 'your future is in your hands'

Answer 10

its role is same as the third law of Newton "laws of action and reaction" . i would call the laws of karmas as " law of cause and effect and it states
"whatever karma you will do , it will have impact in future ,good karmas will have good life and bad karmas will have bad life "