It creates S P A C E between you and your emotions (predominantly I am talking about hostile negative ones). With practice, you can see them arising from a distance. In seeing, they dissipate. They loose strong hold on you. You do not become your emotions but you see them as they are from a distance. It does not get rid of them as many would believe however, it completely changes your relationship with them. It is impossible to get rid of them. They are natural states. If you try to get rid of them, suppress or push them away, they become even stronger. Meditation breaks the identification with these negative emotions. Instead of becoming angry, you become aware of your anger. Instead of becoming outright unhappy, you acquire the ability to closely observe your thoughts that make you unhappy. With awareness, there comes a choice and choice leads to right action.
Next time when you are in the grip of a negative emotion, such as anger; Pause and tell yourself in the middle of that anger -“The thoughts I am thinking now are making me angry” and see what happens. Suddenly, you will realise that you have a choice to come to the surface than getting completely drowned by the waves of anger. We do not deliberately choose our emotions. They just appear. Emotion is an autonomous response generated by the default state of mind. Nobody consciously decides to be angry. Nobody chooses to be unhappy out of their own will. It happens on autopilot mode. Meditation allows you to shift to manual mode and gain complete control. Being aware of your anger is different from being angry. When you are being angry, you don’t know how to “be” otherwise. You are completely in the grip of an emotion. You don’t know how to exist in any other way.
Meditation brings the awareness that prevents you from being completely lost in the twister of these negative emotions.
Just seeing is enough and Meditation is a tool that allows you to see.
Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. – Viktor Frankl
