We can only be affected by the wrongdoings of others if there is something in us that responds. We’re like tuning forks that only hum when the note playing next to us resonates with something inside us. This means that the negative thoughts and feelings that come rolling off of others will only stir up the corresponding areas in us where we harbor our own distortions.

Likewise, this explains why whatever we are thinking and feeling can be so contagious for creating similar attitudes in others. And it doesn’t matter if our attitude is conscious or unconscious. We’re still putting down what others are wont to pick up. The spiritual law that governs this is called the Law of Affinity, which relates to the attraction of similar things and the repulsion of dissimilar things.

So in fact, it’s a misnomer to believe that we can come to harm through some arbitrary fate or due to the cruelty, selfishness or ignorance of others. Any fear that this is so is pure illusion. We’re not victims of other people, and no harm can come our way that we’re not self-producing.

This is one of the very best reasons to embark upon a spiritual path: to gain personal freedom from the chains of our inner distortions. For when we won’t take responsibility for our own issues, we lock ourselves in chains. And then we claim someone else holds the key. That’s how we cut off our own freedom.

What we must realize is that there’s a fair and natural price we must pay for liberty. It’s self-responsibility. And the more we avoid it, the higher the toll becomes. Plus, as long as we deny our own culpability, we’ll stay locked in our fears.

So we don’t need to fight to make anyone else perfect. For now we know that their imperfections can’t hurt us. Furthermore, there is no influence from the outside that can cause increased distortion in us. This is one of our biggest, most misguided beliefs ever. Truth is, we were already plenty distorted before some other selfish or ignorant person showed up.

It’s our desire to dodge self-responsibility that results in our lack of understanding, our lopsided discernment and our inability to weigh the good from the bad. So it’s our attempts to escape and deceive ourselves that keep us stuck.

The solution? We must always look within. For if we aren’t willing to grow up and become a mature adult, we’ll be preyed upon by fears of how the harmful behaviors of others can hurt us. Beyond this, if our goal is to reach and affect the core of another person, we must ourselves be acting and reacting from our true selves. Such resonance can then happen whether or not the other person is working on a spiritual path.

So the only true safeguard comes from uncovering the untruth inside ourselves, and giving up our dependency on others doing right. That’s the ticket for freeing ourselves from the effects of other people’s wrong deeds. We must become free of our own illusions and wrong thinking. For if we’re free of our own inner errors, the ills of others won’t affect us.

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