Healing from distress

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

One day, one of my clients called me and said I was panicking and anxious today. When such situations happen, Can I listen to a podcast or engage myself in something to feel better?

Now, this is where the problem grows bigger and bigger.

When we are distressed, the first thing that we try to do is we try to suppress it, avoid it or turn away from it—thinking that by engaging our minds somewhere else, we would be free from our distress. Yes, sometimes these things can temporarily avoid the problem but may never solve the problem. One has to go to the root of where this distress arises and then how it takes shape in the form of thoughts and feelings. Developing this understanding and resilience when things go downhill and handling our thoughts and emotions is critical training we need.

We don't spend time training these aspects of the mind and emotions. Meditative practices are about training our minds. They help us to non objectively look into the functioning of our mind. Meditation helps us to look deeply into the arising of our thoughts and how we get stuck into them by reifying them. Negative thoughts further lead to strong emotions impairing our thinking.

In meditation, as we look deeply into the rising of thoughts and emotions, we don't strongly associate with them but gradually cultivate the capacity to let go. That is what comes to our rescue when the rubber meets the road when external circumstances trigger us. The benefit is that we don't get swept away by these challenges, but we can stay grounded and respond differently to these situations that happen to us.