Handling Thoughts and Emotions Swami Bhoomananda Tirtha

Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru. I was thinking about the mind and the mind-handling process. About handling the mind, here is a method which is instantly effective. But I wonder whether you will receive this message properly, reflect upon it well and apply it in the manner intended.

A thought becomes bad when the emotional notes it brings about are bad. A thought may arise in the mind and as soon as it arises, some emotions are triggered. These emotions instantly engulf your system. Which part of your system gets engulfed, is a matter of further detail. Your eyes, lips, legs or hands may be affected; or, your breathing and heart-beat may change. It is an intricate biological process.

But these are only outer expressions. Our focus is on what happens at the mind level. The thought produces a psychological offshoot. The moment a thought arises, its emotional effects generally follow. When it happens, try to intercept the emergence of the thought and the resultant emotional flux. See whether you can understand how these emotions are surging forth.

After all, a thought has arisen in the mind. Let it arise. As a wave in the sea, the mind expresses itself in the form of a thought. And where does the thought arise? It is within the mind itself. Consequently, a number of emotions may arise. Let them. Simply tell yourself that you don't like to follow them. When you take this stand, effects of the thought automatically become weak.

The right way of dealing with these emotions needs understanding the process fully well. Each thought is a mental expression. Whatever is in the mind, that alone is in the thought. Do not be moved by emotional flux. Resolve that you will not allow yourself to be swayed by it.

Instead of following the emotions, which are but the effects of the thought, you should go into the content or the substance of the thought. When you do so, you are making the thoughts thinner, lighter and feebler. Then you will not be carried away by the resultant emotions. With this idea if you sit, and allow the mind to think, you will find an altogether different emphasis and outcome.

Let any thought come. Suppose a thought arises: "I would like to scold this person". There are seven words. These seven words are written where? Are they not generated by the mind, in the mind itself? As the mind writes on itself, the substance is not non-mind. It continues to remain as the mind itself. Thoughts originate and disappear. See them as the mind alone as mind substance alone. When, in this manner, you start looking into the content or substance of the thought-process, the emotional results will simply be non-operative, nonfunctional. This is such a wonderful method. At most, it may require a little patience.

This is jnaana saadhana. This belongs to a very high level of knowledge. I am not asking you not to have bad thoughts. I only say: When the bad thoughts come, do not get ruffled and affected. If you want to eliminate them, simply have a feeling that you should eliminate them. And don't allow them to carry you through. The power to remain unaffected is also ingrained in the mind process.

While the mind compels you to follow the thought-process, the mind also has the potential and the power to recede. It can empower you not to follow the thought-process.

Constricting, harmful and negative thoughts have to be eliminated and in their place expansive, elevating and evolutional thoughts are to be encouraged. It is actually a process whereby you abide within the mind and remain focused there. If you go on doing this for a few hours a hundred or two hundred hours you will find the quality of the mind changes.

Do it and see. Instead of being a stockpile of bad thoughts, the mind will become a treasure-house of good and noble ideas. And you will reach a stage where the mind will start stimulating you with expansive and elevational thoughts.

Be assured that this possibility is within your reach. The level from which each individual saadhaka starts may be different. Depending upon how dense your bad thoughts are, the length and intensity of your saadhana may differ.

But certainly it is possible to deal with the mind. Observe the mind, observe the thoughts, and make the mind lighter, feebler and thinner. And there will come a time when the thought process becomes extremely thin. It will come to an almost stop. Finally, it will become completely still.

Harih Om Tat Sat. Jai Guru.