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One potential concerning karma that every individual should take care to prevent, is the acquiring of another's karma. Basically speaking, we all have plenty of our own to work through making it a pointless roadblock to needlessly take on the debt of another. However, it is a thing that happens often, and being unaware of the conditions that cause this will never allow one to escape this burden if they have made the choice to become involved in another's karmic state. When one unknowingly takes on a part of another's karma, it will have to be worked off in the usual sense. The bright side of this is that it insures that the lesson will receive the necessary attention from the individual to learn and thus be able to avoid doing it further into the future. In Eckankar, among the Vairagi Masters, this action is frowned upon and is often warned against. However, it is always at the discretion of the individual to actively choose not to do it.

There are a number of ways, or personal choices made, that can cause this to happen. In a majority of cases this is brought about by the pride of an individual. This is the ego, that refuses to allow the self to remain detached from the situations facing another, perhaps because they want to see that person pay the price for previous actions. However this motivation serves only the false ego, the lower mental and emotional states, that are seeking a personal satisfaction from seeing another receive that which they have earned for themselves. This is often done not out of an objective desire to see the other make their way forward, and this obviously is seeing the situation from a lower, less beneficial state of being.

While having such a desire is bad enough on its own, if that individual says or does things based on that motivation, they will have actually chosen to learn that same lesson, and usually in a rougher way than might have been necessary beforehand. Making unnecessary comments, whether in spoken or written form, is one way that this can be done. An individual may feel slighted by the words or actions of another, and while they have every right to feel this way, they are literally choosing to allow that feeling to be a set of virtual chains that will bind them to that situation. While one may have a "righteous" anger toward the other person, that anger is not at all righteous, and is therefore more beneficial if it can be overcome rather than submitting to it.

At times there can be a situation where two opposing individuals carry out a lengthy attack process against one another. While one may have been attacked first, that does not mean that reciprocating in kind is the best process to resolve it, and doing so only serves to feed the situation and literally keep it going longer than it would have if left alone. Sometimes two such individuals will make verbal protests on websites, portraying themselves as being saintly, while portraying the other as being wicked or evil. In these cases that person is pretending to be the victim when in fact they are not at all. Choosing such a position is a choice, so there cannot be any degree of actual victim hood about it. In certain situations where the first offender has done a thing against the other, that of course creates a karmic imbalance that will have to be rebalanced. At that point it is best to surrender the situation to the Divine Will rather than to proceed making decisions as to how to act against that person. The surrender to detachment is a freeing from these potential chains.

Anytime one does not use a right discernment and detach from the situation, they tend to make poor choices that not only cause them to take on a portion of the other's already existing karmic debt, but is an example of one way where an individual can effectively choose to "stand in their own way." This, from Soul's point of view, is an action that is virtually without benefit, or at the least the benefit can only be gained after having gone through the rough rebalancing, that could have been much easier to work through before that karmic portion was acquired.This is an action that by choice, slows Soul's progress in development, making that process take longer than should have been necessary. I have witnessed a situation that occurs primarily online, where one person offended another, stealing that site's mailing list which was then spammed relentlessly by this person. Instead of remaining detached and allowing that individual's karma to proceed, the victim of this action decided to go out and try to make the offender pay.

This went on for several months, and in the end did nothing but hinder the first individual's payment of their karma. The person the original action was taken against, chose to promote themselves as a sort of hero against the other person. This intrusion of the second person's ego accomplished nothing other than drawing part of the first person's karmic state to the second person, which will now unavoidably have to be paid. The second person is unaware of it, but they are in fact the only reason the first person's karma has not yet manifested. They chose to interfere, as if to say "God? You have not done good enough for me, therefore I shall handle this matter myself because I can do better." That, in my opinion, is not a wise course of action to take, but that person made their choice and now things shall proceed exactly as the Eternal dictates, that lack of patience not having been ITS fault or limitation. This is the primary reason that the Living ECK Master, being a direct and unobstructed channel for the Divine Will, will seek to guide chelas from taking part in an action that would cause them to take on another's karma. This is a necessity of walking a direct path towards God Realization.

Some of the other general circumstance or actions that can cause such a thing would be making needless observations about, or judgmental  comments to another, such as calling an overweight person fat, or some other term such as ugly, retarded, mentally or emotionally deficient in some manner as an insult. Also any comments based on sexual orientation, skin color, race, religion or creed or any other grouping would fall into this category, having not one thing to do with how true a comment or observation might be regarding a person from any group. One who remarks about a weight problem that another might have, can find themselves gaining disproportionate amounts of weight soon thereafter, as one example. In such cases these judgments or comments are ones that need not have been made, or that are particularly rude or offensive. When such an action takes place, the offender will undoubtedly acquire a portion of that other individual's state, whether it be occurring due to karma, or if it is because of a lapse of judgment or standards concerning themselves.

One who is unable to allow another the freedom of choice to be the way they want to be, will cause themselves the need of learning a necessary lesson in a more harsh fashion. It is always a choice, and thus the individual cannot avoid bearing the responsibility for the action they have taken. Some of the things that when observed, can avoid the needless acquiring of another's karma, include but are not limited exclusively to: Humility, which causes one to not comment needlessly on the state of another, which is an expression of the ego. Detachment, which allows one to remain free of an attached and judgmental state concerning another. Patience, which helps to avoid unnecessary angering towards another that could cause lashing out, as well as Right Discernment, which allows an individual to see accurately that certain words and actions can only cause one to stand in their own way from progressing. Forgiveness is another quality that enables one to remain free of grudges and other negative emotional and mental states that can come to be after one has done or said something unsavory towards you. All of these qualities are simply other names for the grandest of them all, Love, which when coupled with the quality of Grace, which is bestowed upon us by the Sugmad upon ITS own decision, are literally unlimited mechanisms that make it possible to propel  Soul forward in Its spiritual development.

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