Updated: July 10, 2022

I’ve noticed how painful emotions are often preceded by a thought. 

Not necessarily every single time, but often. It could be a conscious thought or a deeply held belief that causes you to contract.

That thought or belief — along with all the others — is just a story I create about my experience. It doesn’t really exist. Like a rainbow, a dream, or mirage, the thought appears and, sooner or later, it dissolves—unless you weave it into a story.

Knowing this — truly knowing this — is the ultimate way to end your own suffering. And to stop causing suffering for others.

The Buddha said:

“Know all things to be like this:
A mirage, a cloud castle,
A dream, an apparition,
Without essence, but with qualities that can be seen.

Know all things to be like this:
As the moon in a bright sky
In some clear lake reflected,
Though to that lake the moon has never moved.

Know all things to be like this:
As an echo that derives
From music, sounds, and weeping,
Yet in that echo is no melody.

Know all things to be like this:
As a magician makes illusions
Of horses, oxen, carts and other things,
Nothing is as it appears.”

How can you come to know this dream-like quality of your thoughts, emotions, and life itself and, in so doing, release yourself from the snare of suffering?

Thoughts and emotions seem to tumble one after another — thousands each day — the strong ones picking up momentum and wrecking your peace of mind. 

These distressing thought-seeds are the fruit of our habitual patterns of mind. Too often, they compel us to engage in discordant speech or action, only strengthening the cycle of suffering.

This is the problem: Identifying fully with your thoughts and emotions.

By firmly believing thoughts and emotions are YOU, you allow them to color your mood and steer the course of your life. This seemingly continuous stream of thoughts and emotions appears to be all that occurs in your mind, all that you are.

But that’s not true!

Discover the Space Between Thoughts 

You can discover for yourself there’s a gap between each thought. 

When a past thought has ceased and a future thought has not yet arisen, you will always find a gap, as brief and elusive as it may initially seem.

In mindfulness meditation, you allow thoughts and emotions to slow down to make this gap more and more apparent. You place your attention on an object like the breath or awareness of whatever arises in the mind. When you discover you’re distracted, you bring your mind back to the present moment.

Slowly, slowly, the mind settles and you find greater inner peace.

The practice of mindfulness, also known as calm abiding, is the foundation of advanced forms of meditation. Mindfulness meditation allows your mind to settle into a state of peace and find a greater sense of stability so you’re not caught by every thought or emotion that passes through your mind.

Through calm abiding you can begin to taste the spacious, open, limitless quality of mind.

Once a student called Apa Pant kept asking the renown Buddhist teacher, Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö how to meditate. He replied:

“Look, it’s like this: When the past thought has ceased, and the future thought has not yet risen, isn’t there a gap? Well, prolong it. That is meditation.”—from The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

Go Beyond Stillness Into Insight

Discovering the stillness of mind and resting in the present moment is an excellent accomplishment. But often these moments of peace are mistaken as the ultimate purpose of meditation itself. 

Mindfulness is simply the first stage of meditation not the end-game. Although you may enjoy a greater level of peace, the problem with calm abiding on its own is that strong emotional winds can still knock you over. 

The practice of mindfulness by itself will not lead to a more lasting liberation from suffering.

The real purpose of calm abiding is to create the space and stability in which the clarity of mind can emerge. It is only through the lens of insight, that you will come to see and appreciate the illusory ever-changing quality of ordinary mind and existence as spoken of in the quote from Buddha above, in essence:

“Know all things to be like this:
A mirage, a cloud castle,
A dream, an apparition,
Without essence, but with qualities that can be seen.”

Through insight, you discover your true nature — beyond all the thoughts and emotions — limitless, aware, and replete with compassionate energy. It’s this recognition that brings true freedom and an ultimate peace that goes beyond the stillness or movement of mind.

This pure awareness is always with you. After all, who or what knows or sees that you are thinking when you observe thoughts in meditation?

By observing my own mind, I’ve seen how often a thought will trigger a cascade of emotion. Through coming to understand their transitory and illusory nature, there have been times when thoughts and emotions lost their power to drag me into pain and suffering. 

Thus, I know its possible to put an end to mind-made suffering. In fact, it can happen in any moment when you’re able to drop a painful, self-created storyline.

It takes time to establish calm abiding through meditation and insight into the illusory nature of mind through contemplation. But they’re incredibly powerful tools that can help you lessen your suffering.

I didn’t conjure this up myself. 

The cessation of suffering is one of the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths, his first and most fundamental teaching after awakening.

Closing Thoughts

So much of our suffering is unnecessary. It’s just ideas in our mind that lead to attachment and aversion and a strongly held belief that things should be a certain way.

It’s crazy to think that we cause ourselves so much suffering. But that’s how it is.

I would love for you to suffer less. If there is one thing I could tell you to that end, it would be this:

You are not your thoughts and emotions!

Realizing this — even once — is the first step to freeing yourself from their tyranny.

[Photo by Jure Širić]

Thank you for your presence, I know your time is precious!  Don’t forget to  sign up for Wild Arisings, my twice monthly letters from the heart filled with insights, inspiration, and ideas to help you connect with and live from your truest self. 

You might also like to check out my  Living with Ease course or visit my Self-Care Shop. May you be happy, well, and safe – always.  With love, Sandra