Spiritual and Esoteric Directory

Q. Is there any way of telling whether suffering is caused by our karma or otherwise? A. By karmic, I think the questioner probably means stemming from long past action, and this is frequently the case. But most of our suffering comes from our thoughts, actions and reactions of the present and immediate past. Our hatreds, fears, jealousies, envy, frustrations and (thwarted) ambitions cause us to suffer, moment to moment. This, too, is the action of karma. We misuse energy -- soul, mental, astral and etheric -- and so we suffer, through the Law of Cause and Effect, by such misuse. The desire principle has us in its grip, and only by controlling the desire principle -- through the mind -- can we overcome suffering. Most of our suffering is therefore self-inflicted and unnecessary. We share, however, in the karmic suffering of humanity as a whole, but that is something else, the human inheritance.