“When you move in the middle of the world of the senses,
free from attachment and aversion alike,
peace comes where all pains end,
and you live in the wisdom of Being”.
– Bhagavad Gita, c 400 BC
Most of us have negative thoughts without recognizing that they are negative. These will often be justified with all of our intellect and reason, even at the cost of relationships. Negative thoughts are like an invisible foundation for our lives, a layer of heavy cement that we put there ourselves; one we hold on to a lot, some people even die or kill to defend their thoughts.
Let’s examine what we mean by negative thoughts. They are not just what we think, for example, when someone cuts us off while driving and we feel angry, or when we feel hurt by the thoughtless words of a friend or family member, or when another bill arrives and financial worries mount. It’s not just what goes through our minds when we feel the pain of grief, or the end of a relationship, or the suffering of an illness. Rather, negative thoughts are found in all those moments in our lives when we experience more subtle feelings of boredom, resentment, loneliness, underlying anxiety, hidden guilt, etc. Such thoughts often include ‘should’, ‘shouldn’t’, ‘want to’, ‘need to’, ‘but’ and ‘because’. These are simply justifications and defenses for these thoughts.
Negative thoughts are like a virus that entered our thinking as a habit in childhood and made us sick, physically, mentally, or emotionally, and for most of us, it has never gone away.
The reason why we get sick due to such thoughts is because we take them as true for us, and this leads us to suffer.
In themselves thoughts are harmless. It is only when we become attached to them and believe them that suffering arises. For example, if I have a thought that says ‘my partner watches 3 hours of TV every day’, this in itself does not make me feel any stress as it is a statement of fact. But if I have the thought ‘my partner shouldn’t watch so much TV’, I have become attached to this idea and have an expectation that reality should change. Suffering arises from the stress of seeing that reality is not so, and from not being able to accept it. A Zen monk, Bokuju, said: “This is the only meditation I know. While I eat, I eat. While I walk, I walk. And while I am sleepy, I sleep. Whatever happens, happens. I never interfere.”
As this quote suggests, the cure for this virus is really very simple and profound, it is the acceptance of reality as it is in each moment without resistance. It is detachment from the drama of life (judgments and opinions), but fully participating in the stage of life (what it simply is). To take this step back first and foremost requires an open mind and a willingness to inquire into one’s own beliefs. A willingness to see that it is the thought about someone that has held us captive and not the person or event itself, since reality itself is neutral. Reality just happens. The reality simply is.
However, for most of us, our experience of reality is neither neutral nor tolerant; rather reality receives all kinds of interpretations, value judgments, labels, images, definitions and is constantly being analyzed, although not consciously. It is this constant mental activity of images and beliefs that constitutes the veil that lies between people in all relationships, and is commonly considered life. As Jiddu Krishnamurti said in Freedom From The Known, ‘All our relationships are really imaginary, that is, based on an image, formed by thought.’ We are rarely present to reality as it is and to people as they are. Our closely guarded beliefs about people are the very obstacles to achieving the kind of relationships we deep down seek. We are our worst enemy.
Sri Ramana Maharshi, (1879 -1950), the Indian sage who attained liberation at the age of 16, said: “Creation is neither good nor bad; it is as it is. It is the human mind that puts all kinds of constructions on her, seeing things from her own angle and interpreting them according to her own interests. A woman is just a woman, but one mind calls her “mother”, another “sister”, and still another “aunt”, and so on. successively. they hate snakes, and are indifferent to the grass and stones by the wayside. These value judgments are the cause of all the misery in the world. Creation is like a peepul tree: birds come to eat its fruit , or take refuge in its branches. , men cool off in its shade, but some may hang themselves in it. Yet the tree continues to lead its quiet life, carefree and unaware of all the uses to which it is put. It is the human mind The one who creates her own difficulties and then cries out for help.”
The greatest way we create our own difficulties is when we believe that our thoughts and concepts reflect reality. But actually they are our REQUIREMENTS. We NEED our husbands to be more forthcoming, we WANT our wives to behave a certain way, we EXPECT our children to do what WE want them to do when they grow up, we resent when friends don’t treat us RIGHT. In this process of arrogant expectations, real life passes us by, and along the way we become confused, disappointed, angry, and emotionally exhausted. Life was meant to turn out better than this! He was not meant to feel such struggles! It goes without saying that we all know the impact of such emotions and stress on physical health as well.
When one is ready to address the cry for help that Sri Ramana Maharshi mentions, whatever the external trigger for it to occur, and there usually is one, whether due to a life-shaking event, profound loss, or simply emotional exhaustion , then we can begin to question what we have taken for granted up to now. We begin to be kinder to ourselves and allow the deeper questions that we have kept hidden to surface. Who I am? What is my purpose? What is life? Often counseling is advantageous at this point, as such deep and honest questioning can be experienced as a painful process, but courageous perseverance is necessary, as such catharsis is a privilege. Osho, another great Indian sage, said: “In this world, the greatest courage is to put the mind aside. The bravest man is the one who can see the world without the barrier of the mind, as it is. It is tremendously different.” , completely beautiful. There is no one who is inferior and there is no one who is superior, there are no distinctions.”
By letting go of false aspects of ourselves, our fears gradually begin to release and life begins to flow more smoothly. Our posture becomes less negative and more positive. Our view of the world can change and our relationships become more meaningful and fulfilling. Let’s look at some examples of how such a transformation can affect a person’s life.
A man who feels angry because his father died when he was two years old and has the belief that his father could not have cared for him since he left him or that he himself was worthless can see how painful these thoughts are. that they are the source of his anger and suffering, not his father’s death, and that he has also brought anger to his relationship with his own son. He can also see, and feel, that his father is actually a lot with him in his memories, because where do people exist if not in our thoughts?
A woman who is in pain because her partner ended their relationship may see that it is the thought that she cannot bear to be alone now that is holding her captive, not her partner leaving, which she may actually be able to do. . accept as the right thing for both of you.
A daughter who doesn’t get along with her mother because her mother doesn’t listen to her may see that this very thought is what prevents her from caring and listening to her mother in the first place.
So when we investigate our beliefs about ourselves and others and see that this is where our pain comes from, a burden begins to lift, a dead weight that begins to part. This does not mean that we can live without beliefs. But it is what we believe that causes the unsatisfactory effects in our lives. Adyashanti, a US-based spiritual teacher, says that when we let go of the ego, we see that “the only thing that could really be called the self is simply the thoughts we have about it.” Another spiritual teacher, Dadahagwan, said, “Once you get rid of the wrong beliefs and hold the right belief for a while, you will reach your original place, after which it is no longer necessary to hold any beliefs. Then your job is done.” fact… It is because a person does not have the knowledge of how to get rid of a wrong belief that has been wandering aimlessly in the world life after life, he does not know how to get rid of it.Infinite lifetimes have passed without getting rid of a single wrong belief “.
Beliefs are a burden. And without this burden, we stop arguing with reality, and instead of trying to make the world fit our explanations and expectations, we can see the world as it really is. The puzzle piece has found its rightful place. Things become one, merging in harmony. The imagined world is finally abandoned in favor of the real one.
In the act of favoring the real world, we take responsibility for our shadow; and perhaps discover the full and comprehensive sense of wholeness in doing so. Seeing how we project beliefs and opinions onto others immediately starts a chain reaction of energy that propels us further and further into detachment. Ironically though, that detachment comes hand in hand with true feeling; the two are not separate. Feelings become permissible. We begin to see that we have lived most of our lives like icebergs, letting only the tip show through, and that now it is okay to risk being emotional, feeling our fears and moving beyond them to a life where we truly we can give and receive love.
It is through the journey we take in and through our mind that we become the master of it. Until we do this, we will continue to be victims. Gradually, our mind reprograms itself to lower the volume of constant value judgments and evaluations. This feels good and is a much-needed relief. We are reaching our original and unscathed state that is the birthright of all human beings.
Therefore, as we become masters of turning failures into breakthroughs, we enter a place where we find peace, joy, and a sense of coming home. The suffering is felt in a new way, with a purpose, gradually becoming shorter in duration, until it no longer has a resting place here, nothing to hold on to, no hook. We begin to experience what freedom really means. We move beyond a life based on separation and duality – good/bad, right/wrong, masculine/feminine, me/you, pleasure/pain – to live a life more at one with others, more authentic and more true to ourselves . As we learn to be present to what simply is, we begin to intuitively know what action to take in any given situation, and confusion and inner conflict lessen.
And so we learn to empty ourselves of what filled our unsatisfied vessels and simply to be. We enter a conscious path of self-realization where we give in and surrender to what is.
In The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle says:
“In the surrendered state you see very clearly what needs to be done, and you take action, doing one thing at a time and concentrating on one thing at a time. Learn from nature. See how everything is accomplished and how the miracle of Life unfolds without dissatisfaction or unhappiness. That is why Jesus said: ‘Look at the lilies, how they grow. They neither work nor spin.’
Are you willing to be like a lily?