(Prologue: I’ve got first-hand experience that a real understanding of the laws of karma can substantially change our lives for the better. I created this weblog to share information and personal experience with others. May it be of benefit!)

source:  Elephant Journal March 16, 2009 edition

In previous posts, we came across terms like the

• 12 links
• 12 nidanas,
• wheel of life, and
  
• laws of dependent origination.

Here’s a Plain English way to understand these terms: if you have a project to do, you first break it down into small tasks. Let’s say there are 12 of these tasks. They are all linked, interlinked, with task one leading to task two leading to task three and so on until finally we have completed the entire project.

It’s the same with the 12 links etc. And the project described by these terms is nothing less than the creation of a “self” and its karma.

I like to use the word “factors.” But no matter what term you use, all these terms explain the dependent relationship — the INTERlinking —between the factors that create our karma :

…[In short] how we are born, how we create karma, how we die, and how that all revolves. <Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche>

and why we experience the world the way we do:

…the ego-self is ungrounded, and as a result we experience an uncomfortable emptiness or hole at the very core of our being. We feel this problem as a sense of lack, of inadequacy, or unreality, and in compensation we usually spend our lives trying to accomplish things that we think will make us more real. <author: David Loy>

If we want to understand why we suffer, then we have to understandthe process of causes and conditions that underlies the suffering. Only then can we begin to undo these causes and conditions.

Up until now, I haven’t listed the 12 links. Over the past 30 years, whenever I tried to study them in depth, I got dizzy. I felt badly about that.

When I finally realized how important it is to understand the links because of the central part they played and continue to play in the creation and maintenance of my karma, I came across this sentence: “The point is that we got a bit dizzy and can’t quite think straight.” (Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, 1999 Sutrayana Seminary).

Notwithstanding the fact that the Sakyong was explaining link (factor) number one (Ignorance), I felt that my previous reaction of dizziness was a reasonable one! After all, the links describe our ferris-wheel-like existence — a wheel that goes round and round and round and round……. People pay the price of a ride. They get on. Then they get off. Some people, regardless of whether they had a pleasant, unpleasant or neutral experience, want to go back on. So, once again, they pay the price of a ride. And get on. Then at some point they get off. And so on. We can get off too. More on that in later posts.

Arethauses another metaphor:

Chain, chain, chain, chain, chain, chain
Chain, chain, chain, chain of fools
……
But I found out I’m just a link in your chain
……

It’s helpful to think of the links as dots in a child’s colouring book. When you join the dots, you see the picture! The twelve links,which can apply to any particular situation, or to many lifetimes, create a picture of why we experience life as we do:

1. Ignorance — do not understand the true nature of the world – we can’t cope with open space with no solid reference points so we create a “self;” we believe that this self is “frozen” (solid) in space, and all things are permanent
   
2. Formations — ignorance gives rise to confusion; not understanding, we perform an action believing, in ignorance, that what we want is important and worth getting; or that certain things are important to reject; or that still other things are important to ignore
   
3. Consciousness — a volitional action plants a seed or imprint on our mind
   
4. Name/form — the seeds determine what future [rebirth] will be like
   
5. Six Senses —we’re familiar with the five senses; buddhadharma includes the ego-mind as the sixth sense; with our senses, we survey our world
   
6. Contact — having surveyed our world, we now begin to experience it
7. Feeling — experience of outside world gives rise to feelings [e.g. compassion leads to good karma; hate leads to negative karma]
   
8. Craving — because of feeings, we get involved with wanting, avoiding or ignoring something
   
9. Grasping — becoming involved, we make a decision to get desired object or avoid something (intention)
   
10. Becoming — decision now put into action which creates karma that will ripen later
    
11. (Re)birth — actions taken will have effects in the future
    
12. Aging & Death — stands for all the suffering of existence based on karma and start again at #1, Ignorance etc. etc. etc.

I have come across an excellent document entitled “Going to a Party” by, which is a Plain English description of the 12 links using the example of a party. One person tells me that Douglas Penick wrote the document; others, that it was written by John Rockwell.

1. Ignorance – enter the door, don’t know anyone, no reference point, freeze, go numb, heightened self-consciousness
2. Formations – can’t stay at the door all night, must do something, impulse to find a landing spot, vision narrows to find a reference point, head for the bar
3. Consciousness – have now made it into the party, but need to nourish yourself, oral compulsion, have a drink
4. Name/Form – feel warmth pervading body, feel fortified, empowered, embodied, feel more expansive
5. Six Senses – survey the situation, look for someone to talk to
6. Contact – see someone interesting who catches your eye
7. Feeling – person looks good, attractive, worthy of our attention, we feel good
8. Craving – desire to talk to them, engage them, irresistable impulse, so lonely
9. Grasping – mind is fixated on how to approach them, can’t ignore them, already caught
10. Becoming – go over to talk to the person, yak, yak, yak
11. Birth – get to know the prson, give birth to a relationship
12. Aging & Death – conversation, focus starts to flag, diffuse, interuppted, reference point dies, gap, no one to talk to

and back to #1 again

1. ignorance – panic, go numb again, heightened self-consciousness, aloneness
2. Formations – head back to the bar for another drink ETC!

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