I have talked to people who have clinically died and later revived. They share certain experiences up to a point. Depending on if they have been raised with Buddha, Christ, or other enlightened beings, they tend to see that being at the very end of the process. This is because the mind is still with us and it needs to place a label on the transcendent feelings that are flooding the consciousness.

If you ask a buddhist monk, such as Geshi Tashi Tsering, he would explain what happens in the afterlife in terms of karma and the emotions we go through when we are actually in the stages of death:

“If one is going to take a lower rebirth, very strong, fearful appearances will appear to your mind during the dissolution of the four physical elements. Conversely, in a fortunate migration, more gentle appearances occur and there is a happiness in the mind. During the radiant white sky, red sky, etc, visions there are no particular fears because the coarse conceptions do not arise.

“The way of dying affects your emotional state at the time of death and this determines which karmas are activated. For example, if someone was killing you, you might become angry, and this would activate a negative potency, a condition for a bad rebirth. It would require a very strong practice of tolerance not to get angry. In general, we should make efforts to help the sick, elderly and dying to generate a very healthy, positive state of mind before and during death. This, in turn, will benefit us, helping us to continue our work towards helping others.”

But as far as people’s personal beliefs about heaven and hell—they are just that. Nothing more than beliefs (have not been proven) and personal (based on their fears of the dissolution of the person they believe they are). No one whom I’ve talked to, who has ever had a death or near-death experience, has ever mentioned hell. Particularly the version of hell with the devil poking them with a flaming pitchfork.
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Conversely, no one mentions the bland version of heaven, with angels playing harps all day in the clouds, that certain cultures indoctrinate into their people. So, despite people’s beliefs that they have “earned” this sort of heaven, anyone who has returned from the grave has not vouched for this depiction of the after life. It is a much more dynamic process that goes beyond the petty conjectures of the human mind.

The concept of Karma is tied into reincarnation. We may be reaping the consequences of our behavior and actions in other lifetimes, not only this one. This lifetime is an opportunity to clean it all up. Most Europeans have not included reincarnation as a central concept to the meaning of life and the immortal soul. It is a concept that has come out of Eastern religious thought.

Jewish and Christian holy literature, upon which European ethics are based, places more emphasis on getting it right this time around. It is presumed to be our only lifetime and we are punished or rewarded according to how we follow the holy word. We can also be rewarded by grace or by our demonstration of faith.

Yet in spite of this denial of reincarnation, in Matthew 17: 10–14, it appears that Jesus is telling people that John the Baptist is the reincarnation of the prophet Elijah. He says:

• 10 “For this is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.
• 11 Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist. . . .
• 14 And if ye will receive it, this is Elijah, which was for to come.

Other than that, both the Old and New Testament are full of a version of Karma, which is, “What goes around, comes around,” or “You reap what you sow.”

Here are just a few examples:

Isaiah:

“Woe to the wicked! It shall be ill with him, for what his hands have dealt out shall be done to him.”

Galatians:
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“. . . for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.”

Proverbs:

“Whoever digs a pit will fall into it, and a stone will come back on him who starts it rolling.”

“Whoever sows injustice will reap calamity, and the rod of his fury will fail.”

“Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and one who waters will himself be watered.”

“Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself.”

“A man who is kind benefits himself, but a cruel man hurts himself.”

Matthew:

“. . .whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”

“Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”

“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.”

Romans:

“. . .never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”

“If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.”

Hosea:

“For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.”

Colossians:

“For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.”

Ecclesiastes:

“Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.”

Psalms:

“His mischief returns upon his own head, and on his own skull his violence descends.”

Job:
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As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same.

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Both our actions and our inactions are based on a decision. We alone make the decision to act and we alone make the decision not to act. We are the only thinkers in our heads and therefore, we are responsible for everything we do or don’t do based on our choices.

If someone comes up to you and spits in your face, you make the decision whether to physically confront him or her, verbally protest, or just stand there and do nothing. Sometimes doing nothing is the most logical thing to do in the long run.

Running away from the spitter is also an action you may choose. You are the one who gets to decide in this and in every other situation.
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In life, if you decide to lie around all day and do nothing, that is up to you as well, and therefore your responsibility. If you decide to live an active life, full of adventure and contributions to the planet, that is your prerogative too. This takes the blame off everyone around you and places the responsibility on you alone.

The Kali Yuga is the last of four stages of time in a huge cycle referred to in ancient Hindu scriptures. According to one astronomical estimate, there are four Yugas with the following behaviors and durations:

• Satya Yuga (virtue and goodness rule) = 1,728,000 human years
• Treta Yuga (3/4 goodness and 1/4 evil) = 1,296,000 human years
• Dvapara Yuga (1/2 goodness and 1/2 evil) = 864,000 human years
• Kali Yuga (1/4 goodness and 3/4 evil)= 432,000 human years

The Kali Yuga is where we are now in this cycle. According to scripture, the Kali Yuga is a period of darkness and disintegration. Its purpose is to prepare the world for a rebirth at the start of the next cycle. It is a phase of violence, greed, dishonesty, addiction, religious conflict, and social chaos. Social, family, and economic structures break down and turmoil takes over.

Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo, a Tibetan Buddhist, wrote an essay on karma in the Kali Yuga entitled Vajrayana and the Kali Yuga. She says:

“This time of Kali Yuga is extremely contracted. Karma is thick. It isn’t spread out and dispersed over a great, long field. Rather, it is drawn in. It is a time of contraction, and karma ripens much more quickly than it used to ripen.”

When she says our karma ripens faster, she means that the fruits of any action, thought, or emotion are more likely to surface in a very intense way. Time, like the growth of technology, seems to be speeding up and therefore karmic consequences are going to be more apparent to you in this lifetime. What you will need to do to clean up your karma will be difficult but excellent for your spiritual practice.
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Because time speeds up in general in the Kali Yuga, your spiritual practice is also intensified. It gives you the opportunity to face your darker side and well as your inner light as they are magnified to you. As you face your karmic consequences, clean them up, and release the energy, you now have an even deeper connection with Cosmic Consciousness and peace.

In Theravada Buddhism and also Jainism, killing any life form carries with it dire karmic consequences. In Jainism, this even extends to killing certain plants, with those growing below ground carrying more heavy karmic load that those growing above ground.

However, my view of Karma is not punitive. It is not a set of strict rules or commandments, which we are bound to fail at if we try to follow them. The idea behind the karmic precepts is to do as little harm as possible in your intention. The intention behind your action counts more in this vibrational universe than the fact that you killed something for the sake of your own physical survival.

For example: When you kill an mosquito that is sucking the blood from your baby, you are doing a karmically good thing for yourself and the baby yet you are consciously doing harm to the insect. Maybe you didn’t intend to kill the mosquito but it happened anyway. Sometimes killing insects happens inadvertently, such as when you brush the insect away but its delicate structure succumbs to the force of your hand.

Your body's immune system kills all lifeforms that it doesn't recognize. You step on and crush countless microorganisms and tiny insects every day. Yet karmic precepts direct us to minimize the amount of harm we do in the world.

The reason for this unattainable ideal is to cause us to focus on how killing less evolved creatures impacts our own peace of mind. If you kill a Lyme tick, knowing that the act is harmless, and even helpful, your mind remains calm and even the act of squashing the tick supports meditation practice.
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If you kill the tick with aversion and resistance, feeling horror and guilt, fear and loathing, the karmic consequences are not pleasant—for these emotions are not pleasant. But if you honor the life of the tick as you dispatch it to eternity, you are in a much lighter, happier place karmically.

Atheists might think that nothing happened to Hitler after death except that he became food for the worms. They think that there is no God to punish such a monster and he will just go “the way of all flesh” and dissolves into nothingness.

But the things Hitler did live on and not just in history. The karmic consequences, which have nothing to do with God but everything to do with underlying spiritual laws of the universe, remain. His soul will have to go through much to cleanse and balance the atrocities he perpetrated.
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My view of the karmic universe is that no one gets away with anything. And Hitler is no exception. Karma is a more accurate justice system than the criminal justice system ever was. That is because it operates out of universal principles and is not created or enforced by fallible humans.

Karma is the Sanskrit word for “action.” All energy created by an action has to be returned. It is a law of physics: For every action there is an equal an opposite reaction. Action does not exist in a vacuum. There will always be repercussions. Thus the expression: “What goes around, comes around.”

To really understand the depth of karmic principles, it is important to accept that you have lived for many previous lives and the situations and circumstances of your current life are the result of the actions performed during all those lives. This is one explanation for bad things happening to good people or or even good things happening to seemingly bad people. Except in cases of what is called, “Undeserved Suffering,” everything in your life is the result of the energy created by actions in previous births.

Every situation that happens to you, and even everyone you meet, has a Karmic meaning. In other words, as the old saying goes, “Everything happens for a reason.”
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Karma places the responsibility on you. You have created and will continue to create your life. This means you can also clean up karmic patterns as you evolve spiritually. You can use your free will to cut the karmic chains and choose the life you want to lead, attracting the energy you desire through the energy radiate.

I have written an answer on how some beings choose to die when they feel it is their time. You can read it here:
 How do we die?

As to blaming yourself for the death of your cat: Be kind and gentle to yourself and forgive yourself. Technically, it was the vet who directly caused the death. You were only an indirect cause. You innocently brought your cat to the vet with the intention to help it.

Many people believe that our days are numbered and that the moment we die is predetermined. But this is not taking into account the free will that makes humans uniquely spiritual beings. It is free will that makes our karma possible. For karma is choice, action, for which we take responsibility. Cats do not share in this karmic aspect of humans but they, like other intelligent animals can figure out when it is time for them to “cross over.”

Karmically, you do share responsibility because your choices brought the cat to that particular vet. This does not mean the same thing as your being guilty.

I want to take this a step further and let you know that death is assumed to be a bad thing, when it is an inevitable part of the rhythm of Life. Death is moving from the physical to the non-physical and does not need to be something to fear or even be seen as the ultimate enemy. I have known many pet owners whose companions have contacted them from the Other Side, to let them know that their Spirit is still very much alive.

Karma is all about action. It’s not about words. Apologizing is making a gesture through words but it is through your actions that Karma is reversed or burned off. We can say all we want, but what do we do? That is the point.

Abusive people will apologize again and again then return to their abusive behaviors. This is not enough, from a Karmic point of view. It is so easy to apologize. Many insincere people do it on a regular basis because they think they will be off the hook.

We must go a step beyond merely apologizing to effectively clean up our Karmic debt. That means being good to the person we harmed as well as to others in general. It also means never to do the “wrong things" again.

​You don’t “get’ bad karma.
 
Karma is not a law of rewards and punishment by some judging entity in the Universe. It is simply the spiritual law of cause and effect as the result of your actions. It is, by definition, bad karma if you are harming yourself physically because harming means something bad is happening. It hurts you. It is not something good, peaceful, harmonious, or enlightening.
 
Therefore it is bad Karma to harm yourself physically but you are not “getting” bad Karma.