When we don’t understand cause and effect, this can have serious consequences for our chance to become happy. One of the more important consequences is that we may end up believing that our actions don’t matter. This is a very serious mistake because it can cause us to become complacent and even lazy and, if that happens, we can’t make much progress towards our goal of being happy.
The view that actions don’t matter can be perpetuated by wrong view about where happiness and satisfaction comes from. If we have the view that happiness comes from getting people to behave the way that we want then that will be a cause for us to suffer because we can never hope to have any real control over the behaviour of others.
By contrast, if we understand that our own actions by themselves have the power to cause us to suffer or to be happy, that can be a very powerful revelation. This understanding will lead us to spend more time doing things that bring good results and less time doing things that are useless or which cause us and others to suffer.
If we are accustomed to being lazy or to spending time on fruitless pursuits or we are overly attached to worldly endeavours, we need not spend time lamenting that reality. Instead we just need to train ourselves in the process of bringing the mind away from our sorrows and instead to what is happening in the present moment. If we practice doing that over and over again, then eventually our unfortunate habits will be replaced by ones that are truly productive and happiness will become just a normal feature of our existence.