20 Ways to Get Good Karma

[sonamdhargey]

Instructions for Life by The Dalai Lama
1. Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
2. When you lose, don’t lose the lesson.
3. Follow the three R’s:
-  Respect for self,
-  Respect for others and
-  Responsibility for all your actions.
4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
6. Don’t let a little dispute injure a great relationship.
7. When you realize you’ve made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
8. Spend some time alone every day.
9. Open your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.
10. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
11. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you’ll be able to enjoy it a second time.
12. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
13. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don’t bring up the past.
14. Share your knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.
15. Be gentle with the earth.
16. Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before.
17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each     other.
18. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
19. If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.
20. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.

Source:http://www.spiritualnow.com/articles/25/1/20-Ways-to-Get-Good-Karma/Page1.html

[Q]

Beautiful advice from HHDL.

One thing I dont understand though is point number 16. How does going to a new place bring about good karma?

For the other points, I totally love it! I can already imagine it in my mind on how applying these attitude in life would bring about a more fulfilled, happier and more compassionate person I would be. Wonderful advice. The best thing is... these advice is not religious per say, and it can be applied to everyone and anyone from different religion and cultural background.

It is advice and teachings such as this that made me so attracted to Buddhism... a religion that brings about universal truth and is applicable to everyone even those that are not Buddhist is a true sign that the teachings is authentic and brings about lasting and guaranteed results. Now that the path to leading a fulfilling life that generates good karma is already taught, it is our turn to make the choice, whether to lead our life according to this excellent advice or to just shun it aside.

I hope more people will come to realize that leading a way of life like this will bring us happiness... and at the same time with the generation of good karma, may it lead them to a spiritual path that will help them accumulate great merits to bring them to the path of enlightenment.

[fruven]

14. Share your knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.

This is interesting an karma to have. By giving knowledge away one will be able to receive the same knowledge in future. Because the knowledge live you are able to live?

[RedLantern]

Have any of us have fully lived each one of these ways? Our goal is to strive foe them.There are ways to reverse our karma and now is the time to start.There is no reason to wait until the last second  to try to reverse years of things.Each day is a new beginning and a chance to change and perfect our lives.
These steps to good karma are truly a wonderful way to live by,thank you for sharing.

[Tenzin K]

I believe all the 20 ways is an excellent guide for us to be a better person, to achieve eternal happiness and eventually enlightenment.

Some sounds simple but not really easy to practice. What which also important for this practices is we believe it can work and have faith with our Guru as if we doubt mean we are not confident and we cannot go full swing. Devotion and integrity play an important role as we keep our promises with our Guru tremendous merits we collected and definitely we can easily follow and practice all the 20 ways as the great blessing given by our Guru due to our strong and clean samaya everything will come in a conducive condition. 

[Aurore]

5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.

If I understand this correctly, learning to break rules properly implies to correcting our motivation before doing something which is against moral ethics. Example, we shouldn't lie. However, lying can be a positive action if it was done properly. In other words, with good motivation lying in certain circumstances can benefit someone. When the motivation is to benefit someone, ok to break it.

[DS Star]

Great advice from HH the Dalai Lama. All 20 are practical instructions for us to lead a good and 'peaceful' life.

I particularly like the following 2 instructions:

3. Follow the three R’s:
-  Respect for self,
-  Respect for others and
-  Responsibility for all your actions.

4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.

What really funny is HH actually teaching us how to break the rules...

5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.;

So it means if we intend to break any rules, we must break it 'properly'    

[bambi]

Love the 20 ways! Most of it, many of us are already practicing everyday. I love most of the rules therefore I can't say which is my favorite. For me personally, I think no 16 means that go somewhere you have not before, enjoy and embrace life. Understand how beautiful life is with all that we have and appreciate it. Learning from it should motivate us in helping others. And I agree with what Aurore said for point no 5. I hunger for good karma...  Thank you for the wonderful share!

[Positive Change]

Such profound yet simplistic advice! My personal favourites are this:

6. Don’t let a little dispute injure a great relationship.
(I see this as not letting the little things affect the larger picture and it is so apt because we do tend to be caught up in the moment and not realise that in wanting to win we actually lose in the end)

17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.
(we forget that love in itself is a very selfish emotion and if we can transcend that love, it becomes void of the "I")

[Dondrup Shugden]

Of all the 20 ways to get good karma, number 5 seems to be tricky.  The explanation from Aurore is clear what it truly means.


"5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.

If I understand this correctly, learning to break rules properly implies to correcting our motivation before doing something which is against moral ethics. Example, we shouldn't lie. However, lying can be a positive action if it was done properly. In other words, with good motivation lying in certain circumstances can benefit someone. When the motivation is to benefit someone, ok to break it."

[MoMo]

As I scroll through the list there is one particular one which stand out
#16. Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before.
The rest have been well mentioned numerous times that none of it can be disputed based on spiritual and secular view.
I guess, HHDL really do advice us to take a break to recharge our body and mind for us  to progress further but on the other hand since the Vajrayana path was also the Bodhisattva path since when a Bodhisattva  take a break to tell sentient beings “Service close from XX date to XX date”!! 

[Tenzin Malgyur]

I love these ways that His Holiness the Dalai Lama have stated in order to get good karma. The one that drew my attention the most was rule number 3.

3. Follow the three R’s:
-  Respect for self,
-  Respect for others and
-  Responsibility for all your actions.

I fully agree that we must have respect for ourselves first of all before we can attempt to have respect for others. Having respect for others includes not criticizing the actions and beliefs of others that are different from that of my own. It is not easy to abide by, but I am trying my best for I fear most of getting on bad karma.

[RedLantern]

Great list Sonamdhargey! It’s amazing what little things we can do to turn our life around or be more productive. We’re always looking for something profound, but real change and impact is found in the little habits and stolen moments.