One thing that everybody notices when they see the image or statue of Buddha is his peaceful face. He became so peaceful because he attained the state of enlightenment. He got rid of all the pain, pleasure, and learned to control negative emotions. He actually detached from all emotions.
There are thousands of books, scriptures, videos and even a religion that teaches how to become enlightened like Buddha. Do you know he was a great king before he left the material world and went in search of the meaning of life?
Don’t worry, you do not need to leave your daily life and go to the jungle to meditate and become peaceful like him. He has done the job for us and told us what we need to do to find fulfillment in life.
Though he has advised a number of practices, the one thing that definitely worked for me is detachment. Detachment from all negative emotions has simply made my life so peaceful. I suffer less from anxiety attacks, depression and I know how to control my anger and lust.
Before we continue, just ask this to yourself, do you control your emotions or your emotions control you?
What is detachment from emotions?
As per Wikipedia, Emotional detachment in psychology means the inability to connect to others on an emotional level or it is the process of coping with certain situations that trigger negative emotions in us.
So if you are mentally healthy and you have control over your thoughts then detachment is a clear choice for us.
It is the process of detaching yourself from emotions that you generate in your day to day life. Though it is highly beneficial at a personal level, it may have negative effects on the social level too.
Please note – emotional detachment is not any kind of physical or mental exercise but a spiritual process. Though the highest achievement of emotional detachment can lead you to permanent peacefulness and blissfulness, it will also lead you to detachment from experiences of such emotions in life. Imagine yourself feeling neither happy nor sad. How would you feel?
As per most believed theory, there are 4 types of basic emotions:
Anger, Fear, Joy, and Sadness
The happiness of getting newly married or getting a promotion in the job fades away over time. Similarly, the grief after someone’s death or losing your partner will also disappear. All the emotions are temporary and will ultimately fade away with time. So what is the point of getting attached to any one of them?
In a study, it has been found that negative emotions such as sadness remain 4 times longer than happy emotions. All the emotions are there so that you can experience the beauty of life. But how you long these emotions persist also determine the quality of your life.
Therefore, when I realized my emotions are just temporary reactions to the events in my life, I choose to detach from them and enjoy life as it is. The ever joyful, blissful and so beautiful life.
While detachment from all emotions will ultimately lead to a state of permanent peace, it is advisable to progress by detaching from negative emotions first.
But the question arises; can’t we just detach from negative emotions and remain happy always?
I would say NO. We have been experiencing different emotions every day since our birth. These emotions are generated subconsciously and affect how we feel in our day to day life.
How emotions are generated depends upon a number of factors such as:
The result of our work
Other’s behavior towards us
Our feelings towards others
Our expectations, etc.
If everything goes according to us and the way we expect it to be, then we will feel happy and accomplished. If anything bothers us then negative emotion dominates.
Effects of negative emotions
Well, I will not write much about this. Everyone already knows how they feel when they are going through negative emotions. Frustration, depression, anger, irritation, helplessness and all sort of such feelings overtake our peace.
You will have increased heart rate, blood pressure, severe headache and in many cases, there are a lot of crying and heartaches.
Remember - these are all natural and if there are negative emotions then there will be such kind of sufferings.
How to control them?
Just as our thoughts, our emotions are natural too. For most people, their thoughts and emotions don’t come and go as per their wish. They come and go depending upon the situations they are going through.
Many situations are beyond our control but how we respond to them is definitely in our hands. So we can assume, our emotions are in our control too.
When you pick up a fight with someone, I am sure you will just forget about things I am telling you in this post and will wish to break that person’s nose.
You may read books, articles, watch videos on how to control your emotions and anger unless you are not able to practice the teachings, it will not impact your life.
So how can you implement the teachings in your daily life?
1. Meditation
In every article, I give first preference to meditation only. There’s a reason behind that. I used to be short-tempered and had a very restless mind. Meditation has worked for me and millions like me.
Meditation works in the background of your subconscious mind. When you start meditating regularly, you won’t see any immediate effect except relaxation. But after a couple of months, you will find yourself to be a slightly different person.
It’s not the force of dripping droplets of water that make a hole in the rock, but the continuous impact. Similarly, regular meditation practice will leave you as a better person with a deep understanding of life and peace. Learn more about meditation here.
2. The Event Analysis
This technique helps in most of the cases. But anger requires a quicker response. So if you are well trained, you can control your anger too.
For me, the event analysis means trying to understand the reality of any situation. For example, when I broke up, I had two choices, either to remain depressed or to move on and enjoy my life.
The obvious choice was to move on but these clear choices are not always that easy, right? It took me almost 2 years to figure out that relationship. It took me so much time because it was kind of a shock to me.
You don’t necessarily have to spend so much time to get over something. If you are suffering from any kind of emotion, here’s what you need to do, analyze:
Why did it happen? (The situation that resulted in generating such emotions)
Were you responsible for that?
If yes then just forgive yourself and move on
If no, relax it was not in your control
Why other person did so? (If the situation is caused by the action of another person)
Will the current situation impact your life after 5 years? If no, then there’s no point in lamenting.
What would have happened if you have not gone through such a situation?
3. Connect the dots
I believe everything happens for a reason. I may not understand what I am doing now and wherever the current situation is leading to in my life, but when I look into my past, I realize everything happened at just the perfect time to reach where I am now.
And certainly, I am at the best point of my life as of now. Not financially stable, not in any relationship, not an easy life but definitely in terms of life experience.
So connect the dots. When you see your past life events were just necessary, you will be at peace. It also gives strength to deal with the current problems.
4. Being Spiritual.
Being spiritual doesn’t mean to leave the world and live in isolation. Spirituality is a way of living life with awareness and our consciousness fully active. It is a way of living life in the moment and acknowledging the current situations.
Consider reading why spirituality is necessary for a peaceful life?
Experience life. That is the reason life exists. To experience life.
5. Complete detachment
You can say the state of complete detachment as a state of enlightenment. If you are not bothered about the materialistic life then whatever emotion it is, be it happiness, sadness, anger, joy, you will be at peace.
This state of complete detachment from emotions signifies a life full of blissfulness. Just pick up any enlightened person you have heard of. What did they do? Their primary purpose was service to others. Why? Because they realized, everything is the same. This Universe is made out of the same consciousness and we are all part of the same thing.
So we are one. When we all are one, there is nothing like yours or mine. Everything is just there. And hence your primary task is to enjoy life, experience every moment without being attached to any of them.
Conclusion
The more you are attached to your emotions, the more dominating they will be in your life. You need to decide if you want to control your life or you want your emotions to control it. Every emotion will lead you to make certain decisions in life that further leads to different kinds of situations. So it is advisable to not let your emotions influence your decision.
Experience the emotions. These are the beautiful creation of life. Experience them, enjoy them and detach from your emotion. Your peaceful life can be motivation for others.
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