As coolbluewater had explained The law of karma
is a very sophisticated subject to discuss in detail
There are different kammas. Some give results in the next life;
some in lives after that. The ones that gives results in
future lives are a store of kamma, which everyone has. We have gone
through this samsara (rounds of rebirth) for many aeons, and
we have done good things
and bad things. Some of the kammas may have given results,
but some may have not yet given results. Both good and bad kammas are, in a way, waiting for a
chance to give results. Bad kammas give results when
they favourable opportunities, favourable circumstances to give
results.
If you do bad kamma here, then bad kamma from the past is more
likely to give results by your doing new bad kamma. But if you do
good kamma here and now, you can block, but not eradicate totally the bad
kamma from the past. That is why people are asked to
do meritorious deeds.
Buddha once put this in the form of a simile. If you put a spoonful of salt in a cup of
water that water becomes very salty. But if you put the same amount
of salt in a lake, that water will not be very salty In this way,
when you have a large amount of good kamma, you can counter-act or
dilute the effects of bad kamma.
By doing good deeds, we make circumstances unfavourable for the bad
kamma from the past to give results.
