Karmic Psychology

Karmic Psychology is all about producing a desirable inner environment. This means both creating feelings that we want and getting rid of feelings that we don't.

I am going to briefly discuss how thoughts feelings and actions produce the karmic result of emotion.

Thoughts are closely linked to emotion. This is shown in the ABC model of resiliency and CBT.

• habit: When we think a thought, through neuroplasticity, we are more likely to think it again. Therefore we create the habit of the associated emotion. "Life is wonderful." is associated with positive emotions. "Life sucks" is associated with negative emotions.
• Similar Experience: Through the false consensus effect, a person who cheats on tests (and therefore thinks about cheating on tests) is more likely to see other people as people who think about and are willing to cheat. Being willing to cheat (presumably to get ahead) and seeing other people as willing to cheat (presumably to get ahead) would have an emotional consequence (probably a type of dysphoria and a sense that effort is meaningless).
• Future Experience: I think future experience has more to do with action and perception, so we'll cover it later.
• Environment: Environment mostly has to deal with perception so we will cover it later.

Feelings:

• habit: When we train in particular emotions, we get in the habit of feeling them. This is similar to thoughts. If we practice gratitude, we get in the habit of feeling gratitude. If we practice frustration, we get in the habit of being frustrated.
• Similar Experience: When we experience certain emotions on a regular basis, it is common to think that other people experience those emotions regularly as well. If we are in the habit of being frustrated, it's common to think that other people would be frustrated by a particular situation as well (if we get frustrated while being stuck in traffic for instance, we think that other people also get frustrated in traffic)
• Future Experience: future experience has more to do with action and perception, so we will discuss this later
• Environment: Environment has more to do with perception so we will discuss this later.

Actions:

• habit: Actions are motivated by thoughts or emotions. Allowing particular thoughts and emotions to influence our actions and not other ones is a habit. For instance, a person may be in the habit of allowing their anger to influence them to yell because they think this is how to get results. That same person may not be in the habit of allowing their compassion to influence them to speak kindly because compassion does not achieve results.
• Similar Experience: When we perform an action (think practicing a musical instrument), we train our nervous system to pay attention to that action. Therefore, if we act in an angry way, we are more likely to perceive that in others. Anger is an inherently unenjoyable affective state. Because of empathy and mirror neurons, when we pay attention to other people being angry, we also experience that feeling. That's why acting angry leads to being angry more often. And acting loving would lead us to pay attention to other people being loving and being able to empathize with that.
• Future Experience: If I act in an angry way, based on anger it causes a feedback loop where I perceive more and more anger in my environment, leading to increased response. This way my future anger is assured. If I act in a loving way, based on love it also causes a feedback loop where I perceive more and more love in my environment, leading to increased love. This way my future love is assured.
• Environment: If I act in an angry way because I think that is the only way to get results, I am going to feel that my environment is hostile.