" Everyday, many people approaches me with different type of problems to be solve including LOVE, MONEY, SOME SEEKING FOR BETTER LIFE and ...etc...
Your problems eventually became part of mine..
By using magical items with positive energy to help you is one of the solution, however cultivating the right attitude and mindset of facing your problems in life is more crucial to fix all the problems in your life~
Sharing Of Another Useful Tips For You To Enhance Your Life As A Whole~"
OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF
PROBLEMS
This is the real point, to
overcome the aversion, the fear of problems.
Now, how do we do
that?
First of all, we contemplate the uselessness of seeing problems as
unfavourable, of having anxiety and worry as problems arise. It is useless
because our worry and our anxiety do not address or resolve the problem.
I think I made the point
last time that a lot of us believe our happiness or unhappiness is out of our
control. It has something to do with the outside world. Something to do with
the food I eat, or the way I sleep, you know. Or what other people do or say or
think.
We do not realize that
anxiety and worry are subjective states of mind that we can deal with. We do
not have to maintain them to be manifest in our minds.
A very simple approach was
mentioned by Shantideva, that when we recognize that we are worrying, our mind
is upset about some- thing. The great danger is not the problem that made us
upset. The great danger is being upset, because that makes us habitually miser-
able. This is really the essence. Realize that if anything is going to hurt me,
it is my very own misery that is going to hurt me, because that creates the
environment for more misery.
TWO WAYS TO APPROACH
PROBLEMS
If we recognize that we are
upset, we can apply Shantideva’s simple approach. And we think about what is it
that is upsetting us. We think, can this problem be resolved? And if that which
is upsetting us can be resolved, then we ask ourselves, “Why are you upset? Why
be miserable? It can be resolved, and if you just wallow in pity and misery,
you are a fool!”
That is what we say to
ourselves, we say to our mind, to our self- cherishing thought. We say, “Mind,
you are crazy!”
Other people will say we are
crazy if they see us talking to our- selves. We say, “Mind, you are absolutely
crazy. You are a masochist.
You are hurting yourself.
You are being upset and miserable about this problem which can be resolved.”
So what if the answer came,
“The problem cannot be resolved. The problem is irreversible.” The answer is
the same. We say, “Mind, why are you miserable? Your self-pity, your misery is
only com-pounding the problem. It has
happened. It cannot be reversed. If you continue to be miserable, you are
pouring salt into the wound, you are creating a dangerous situation where you
can be hurt much more.” It is like you are an exposed wound, you are terribly
sensi- tive. The slightest thing going wrong now is going to make you suffer
enormously.
And is that not true?
You know, when we are
unhappy, the slightest thing to go wrong in our lives makes it seem so much
worse. We experience great mis-ery and emotional upset.
On the other hand, if our
mind is happy, then problems are not even noticed. The small things that would
have upset us when we are down are not even noticed as problems when we are
happy.
So, again, this emphasizes
the subjective responsibility in whether we are happy or not, and also the
opportunity that we can train our mind.
The first point is that we
are trying to overcome the mind that sees worry and anxiety and misery, seeing
problems as undesirable.
We are trying to overcome
that.
And so, the first is seeing the uselessness of misery, and then thegreat harm.
Second is seeing
the great harm, seeing things as really bad, seeing problems as problems, as
being unfavourable. Anxiety saps our strength of mind. As I have already begun
to mention this point, when our strength of mind is depleted by anxiety, then
suffering arises very frequently in our mind. On the other hand, if we do not
see them as heavy problems, we can bear things easily.
Tenbel Nyima says, “Because
of anxiety, you are ceaselessly op- pressed by unhappy feelings and even small
sufferings are intolerable.”
NOT DWELLING ON PROBLEMS
He gives an example. When
we are meditating, we try to block out the sensory world. We find a quiet
place, and sit down and meditate and not be distracted by sounds, sights,
smells and so on.
If we allow our minds to be
aware of noises and other distrac- tions, it is impossible to generate
concentration. Similarly, if we allow our minds to dwell on the characteristics
of suffering, then we will never be able to dwell in peace.
It is very much the nature
of our mind to dwell on problems. Even if we try to sit and meditate, very
often we bring up a problem.
Maybe we have not actually
been thinking about it. But when we meditate and relive the situation, relive
the argument, again and again, and try to think of something better to say, or
something hurtful to say. And we suffer. We may start crying.
We might have a problem,
which we put out of our mind during the day when we were at work. At work,
while this problem is out of our mind, we are okay. We are communicating, we
are laughing, we are joking because we have put it out of our mind. But then,
when we are alone the problem comes back, and we start crying.
Now, is it the problem
coming back? Not at all.
The problem happened last week, last year, 10 years ago. But if we allow our minds to reflect
upon it the tears come, the sorrow comes. It is not the problem that is causing
the tears. It is our mind not letting go. It is our mind reliving and abiding
in the sorrow, in the unhappiness.
As long as
we do that, we will never be free. We must gain the courage to get on with life,
to see things or deal with life in the present moment and to deal with the new
situations in life.
If we allow ourselves to be
unhappy because of past events, we will not be able to experience much
happiness. Our capacity to enjoy the present moment is severely impaired.
Because it is psychological,
there is the opportunity to change it.
If we had really enjoyed
running or walking, for example, and we lost our legs... all right, then it is
difficult to experience the joy of running or walking without legs. But that is
physical.
But a suffering mind is
self-inflicted pain. Perhaps we used to enjoy the company of our children, of
our family. And now, we can- not enjoy them because we are unable to let go of
the sorrow of some- thing else.
That happens so often. We
can free ourselves. We must free our- selves, and not only to be able to
experience happiness. That is not even the motivation. The reason is to
maintain our mind in a pos- itive state, to practise Dharma. So what we do now
is develop the attitude of being happy when problems arise. All right?
DEVELOPING AN ATTITUDE
OF
HAPPINESS WHEN PROBLEMS ARISE
The conversation, up until
now, has been about the first main point of abandoning the thought
that sees problems as problems, that has anxiety and aversion to
problems. Aversion to problems is of no value. That is the essence of what we
have been trying to establish up to this point.
To support that, the next point
is to develop the attitude of being
happy that problems arise.
Tenbel Nyima says that we should practise cultivating joy by considering
suffering as an aid to the Path.
That is the essence: That
whatever occurs in our life can assist us in spiritual growth, in developing
our minds positively on the Path.
Therefore, we can genuinely
gain happiness when so-called problems arise, because they are useful
opportunities to work on our minds. And our minds are the very substance of our
spiritual Path.
A spiritual practitioner is
like a sculptor who begins with a block of marble. Michaelangelo turned
shapeless blocks into magnificent sculpture. So, similarly, our minds are
spiritually ugly. Spiritually, they have sharp edges, and are unpleasant.
The spiritual Path is to
make our minds so beautiful that joy will arise in the hearts of whoever looks
at us, whoever thinks of us, who- ever hears our name.
We try to make our bodies
beautiful. The advertisements on TV show that we spend a lot of money trying to
be physically beautiful.
We try and try again, but it
is a difficult process. Anyway, as we get older we cannot retain beauty in our
bodies, no matter what we do.
But our minds are different.
Our minds can be sculpted, changed, and made so beautiful that they can become
objects of pleasure for all beings in the universe. Even when we become old.
Just as when people look at
a very attractive person, they feel very happy, then immeasurably more so, when
they see somebody whose mind is subdued, whose mind is one-ness with
loving-kind- ness, compassion and wisdom. That brings continuing delight and
inspiration for themselves to transform their minds.
We are limited with what we
can do with our bodies. But there is no limitation with what we can do with our
minds. We must be convinced there is no limitation. We can achieve full
Buddhahood.
All sentient beings can. And
we must, to fulfil our obligations to all beings who have been our mothers. We
must be the sculptor who transforms our minds.
" Credits To The Original Sources. Extracted Parts Of The Book From Transforming Problems Into The Path by Thubten Gyatso "
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