Churning in the fire of insults/criticism? Burn!
Question:
JGD Ekta Didi,
Lately I have been inundated with thoughts of intimidating people in my family. My mind rewinds and plays the incident and cajoles me to react. While I was in this war in my mind, I realized that these are just sensations bothering me. I got swayed by thoughts and rehearsed my spiteful reaction to the other person in my mind and I could see the sensation getting calmed down. This realization snapped me out of the trail of thoughts with a jolt! I realized that ‘reaction’ is just to calm myself and will not matter to the opposite person.
I feel so tired and weak in front of the reactionary thoughts. How do I continuously be strong in this situation and stop getting affected by bitter thoughts?
Answer:
You just answered it yourself dear. You said that you realized that the moment you rehearsed the spiteful reaction in your mind, you observed the sensation calming down…. this is a BIGGGGG realization in itself. Buddha realized this too and therefore came up with his technique to just observe emotions/sensations without reacting.
Check if you learnt the following points from your own experience dear:
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- Reaction is just internal stress that you build for yourself. The external person can never create the stressful situation ‘inside’ you. He only creates the stressful energy situation ‘around you’. You are the one who breathes it in and creates it ‘inside yourself’ by reacting in your own head.
- The desire to open your mouth and say something is only a step 2 that follows the internal stress reaction that you already initiated within yourself first.
- The reaction only calms your internal boiling sensations and has no effect on the external stressful energy. The external situation continues its karmic cycle despite your reaction.
Burn in the emotional fire, churn inside, just experience the heat of the emotions and go deeper into them. Usually we don’t experience the heat of the emotions, the moment they come up, we make an attempt to get rid of them. Gather the courage to experience the emotion totally. Every emotion has a cycle. The cycle will end soon and emotion will have to expire in its time. The Veeraha [Courageous one] endures the churning until the cycle of the emotion is complete. Go through it willingly every-time it comes up. A day will come when the fire gives up on you as it has nothing remaining to burn and you come out like shining pure GOLD!
If you are looking for a shortcut, yoga, meditation, reading knowledge, etc will only give temporary relief, as that is Prabhava Gnyana [External Knowledge].
The permanent cure is only in growing stronger than the fire of the Emotional body. That is Swabhava Gnyana [Self – realization]. May you get there soon. Sukhi bhava!
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This is great question and a very helpful answer. I do have a follow up question. Being non-reactionary to the emotion sometimes brings the reaction up in my dream (which I feel is very bad of my mind). Is there anything else I can do in such a case.
Then you are not being non-reactive, you are suppressing emotion, these are 2 different things dear.
Thank you Ektaji. I Used to think I should be equanimous and not feel any emotion in a conflict,ie, try to have a straight line of the mind. So I stop emotions from coming up. But I realize the incident just gets shoved under the carpet and comes up in the mind later. Is that why we need to let the emotion express itself in the mind—to put a closure to it? Forced, temporary equanimity of the mind ( ie, no emotions allowed to rise) during a conflict is not the best course of action? Thanks!
Good idea to face the mental harrassment
Shiva
Dear Ektaji, I get that we need to observe and feel the emotions, My problem is after that my reaction is aggressive and my words are Razor Sharp.. How do i change this to a more calmer response?
Buddha suggests taking a few vows regarding ‘verbal action’. I will mention a couple here. 1] I will not use harsh speech. 2] I will not be cruel even if others are cruel. Maybe just starting with 2 vows might help. We can add more as we go.
Reason: Because before using harsh words, you revise them a zillion times within your own mind and boil in your own fire of hatred. The day you recognize that you harm yourself a zillion times more than the single expression to another person, that maturity will help you become stronger and more forgiving dear.