Causes of poverty.

[PadmaVonSamba]

"Tilo", what do you understand to be the difference between inner and outer obstacles?

[Tilopa]

So you are saying that karma, not plate tectonics creates tsunamis.

Both are necessary for beings to be adversely affected by one. You have to distinguish between root causes and co-operative conditions. It's the karma of living beings to live in a place where tsunamis occur but a co-operative condition for that karma to be experienced is for the tectonic plates to shift. It's often very difficult to separate the (karmic) causes from the co-operative conditions and it's common for people to confuse the two. As I mentioned before it's only a fully omniscient being who understands the very subtle workings of cause and effect. In a comment about earthquakes HHDL once said 'it's very difficult to understand how such an event is related to karma, but nevertheless it is'

What about gravity?

What about it? It's our karma to live on a planet where the law of gravity operates.

What do you understand to be the difference between inner and outer obstacles?

Inner obstacles = ignorance, self grasping, anger, hatred, attachment. ie: delusions.
Outer obstacles = sickness, spirit interference, harm from humans and non humans, environmental problems

There cannot be outer obstacles without there first being inner obstacles. No delusions = no contaminated karma and no contaminated karma = no problems.

[PadmaVonSamba]

It's our karma to live on a planet where the law of gravity operates.

Now you are changing your position.
You are asserting that a planet can have gravity, a condition, prior to any karma putting somebody there.
Before, your position was that conditions only exist because of karma.

if gravity can be a condition that exists, which is not caused by the person who is held down by gravity,
then poverty can also be a condition which exists which is not caused by the person who is held down by poverty.
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[Tilopa]

It's our karma to live on a planet where the law of gravity operates.

Now you are changing your position. You are asserting that a planet can have gravity, a condition, prior to any karma putting somebody there.

OK whatever....

[PadmaVonSamba]

It's our karma to live on a planet where the law of gravity operates.

Now you are changing your position. You are asserting that a planet can have gravity, a condition, prior to any karma putting somebody there.

OK whatever....

You have great karma.

[wisdom]

Poverty and Wealth are based on our perceptions of it. I make about 18k a year living in the west. Thankfully I have no family, but I still do not have much in terms of western wealth. I am about to apply for foodstamps actually and probably declare bankruptcy. However compared to most of the world I am wealthy. I have water, food, and shelter. I squander money on stupid things like video games or taco bell whenever I want. I buy books on Dharma on an almost weekly basis. I give money to everyone who asks when I am able. So by another standard I am very wealthy even compared to people in the west who have no home, no income, and so forth.

Many wealthy people think they don't have enough, therefore they live in poverty. Many impoverished people think they have plenty, therefore they are wealthy. So its true that our karma creates our poverty or wealth, but it has nothing to do with our accumulation of material things, and everything to do with our perceptions of it.

[PadmaVonSamba]

So its true that our karma creates our poverty or wealth, but it has nothing to do with our accumulation of material things, and everything to do with our perceptions of it.

It is my understanding that karma is what creates our experience of being rich or poor.
Our experiences are based on our perceptions
and our perceptions arise when three things occur simultaneously:
a perceiving mind, an object (or objects) of perception, and the event of perception itself.

It is a mistake to think that the objects of our perception only arise when the results of our previous actions put us in a place to perceive them. If that were true, then it would be pointless to talk of lineage (as in vajrayana), since no lineage would exist prior to one hearing about it.

It may be true that for each individual, his her personal 'reality' only arises at the moment they perceive phenomena, such as conditions of poverty, and that may depend wholly on karma. This is really no different than chemical activity in the brain being 'experienced" as fear or anger. But material things do, at least in a relative sense, occur prior to being perceived by any particular individual.

If cells in the body need nourishment, and there is no nourishment, then starvation occurs. Whether the mind chooses to label that "hunger" and categorize it with the label 'poverty"or not doesn't alter the physical facts of the event, that there is no food.

I cannot imagine a greater example of ego clinging than to suggest that
nothing occurs until, due to my karma, I experience it.
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