For Every Action...

	Jamyang Sakya - Praises to the 21... .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

This is a recording of the Praises to the 21 Taras I happened to find- it's a chant used in meditation sometimes, just thought it sounded cool. At any rate, this has been on my mind lately, about trying to be a good Buddhist and also a good soldier. Like any religion, Buddhism has its various sects and various levels of strictness. The difference here is, how strict you are, what you do and do not, is imposed by yourself. Buddhism calls on Buddhas to help you out, so ideally this will help you get where you need to be. There is very little set-in-stone dogma about Buddhism, and the Dalai Lama himself (the current Dalai Lama, the 14th) has said that should science disprove one or all parts of Buddhism, then Buddhism will have to change. So far, no word from science, although science has shown that there is a positive value to meditation, and generally seems to support Buddhist beliefs, although in a less metaphysical sense.
So is it wrong to take life and prepare for war? Although a little more removed from the fighting as a forward support company, would any of us hesitate to defend our own lives or the lives of our fellows? Karma is never as simple as it's made out to be, or for that matter, as simple as we'd like it to be. Intention and end result figure into karma- intention and motivation affect you, while end result affects others. Often people come to think of it not so much in terms of good and evil, as in positive and negative aspects of an action or thought. Good and evil imply absolutes, and so rarely is anything we do either purely good or purely bad. Not that you should run around killing people that good may result- often we can predict the outcome of an action, or given current circumstances, think and find what we should do.
Here's another one- why does meditation 'change' your karma? Actually, it doesn't. But it makes your perspective on it change. Say something bad happens- take it out of perspective, and it's the end of the world. Taken in perspective, it can be an opportunity to learn something, or even to learn from a mistake. Things happen as a result of actions, at least most of the time. When this happens, look for the lesson you can learn from it, and it will be a loss so much less.