Emotions Can Be Governed

People often say, ‘This is simply my personality,’ or ‘How could someone change at my age?’ It is true that long-established tendencies and habits do not change easily. But that does not mean we must accept every emotion arising now as an inescapable fate.

An emotion is not the whole of who I am. It is one phenomenon appearing in the mind right now. Anger, hurt, fear, and hatred may arise. Just as weather changes, the conditions of the mind change; when conditions gather, an emotion appears, and when conditions shift, it subsides.

The important point is not to deny emotion or press it down. Nor is it to immediately say whatever the emotion tells us to say. Awareness is acknowledging, just as it is, that this emotion has arisen and watching it.

If, instead, we immediately believe an emotion to be ourselves, it carries us along. When we think, ‘I am anger,’ it is easy to mistake anger's words for the words we must speak. But when we see, ‘Anger is arising in my mind right now,’ a small space opens between emotion and action. That space is where practice begins.

Feeling angry does not mean we must act out the anger. We can first notice that anger has arisen and watch it for a moment. Even while the force of the emotion remains, space appears in which to choose whether or not to pour that force into speech and action.

In Buddhism, awareness is not a cold observation of emotion. It is seeing with wisdom where suffering has arisen and turning that energy toward compassion so it does not harm ourselves or others. Practice is choosing the next word and action wisely without being dragged along by emotion.

Emotions are like clouds. Just as clouds form in the sky and disperse, emotions arise and pass according to conditions. A cloudy sky does not become nothing but cloud. In the same way, anger arising in the mind does not make me anger itself.

When we grasp an emotion, it becomes attachment; when we follow it as it is, it easily becomes karma. But when we recognize and watch it, the same emotion becomes material for practice. It is all right if awareness came a little late. If words have already been spoken, reflect on them and cultivate the habit of noticing a little sooner next time.

Personality bears the traces of long habit, while emotion is a movement of the moment. Repeatedly noticing those momentary movements changes our habits of reaction. As those habits change, personality, relationships, and the direction of life can also change little by little.

Practice, then, is not becoming a person who feels no emotion at all. It is becoming someone who knows when emotion arises, is not carried away by it, and can choose the next action with compassion and wisdom. It is not erasing emotion, but becoming its master.