12/25/2025
You may notice something very interesting when you slow down. As you experience more space in your mind, there is more distance between you and your emotional reactions.
You may still react out of habit, but these reactions don’t really have their hooks in you. You may react out of attachment, for example, without feeling very attached, or you may say something aggressive without really feeling the emotion of aggression. Seeing this is the beginning of being able to separate your true nature from your habits.
It’s important to know that these emotional reactions are not who we really are. They come from learned social conventions, from what we’ve been taught to value and how we’ve been taught to react. For instance, someone cuts you off on the highway and you find yourself reacting aggressively, the way you’ve seen others do. You might even be surprised by the intensity of your reaction. In moments like this, try to slow down and reflect on your reactions. You may find them to be at odds with the way you would naturally respond.
Many habitual tendencies spring from seeds of a past we can’t even trace. They lie dormant in the alaya consciousness until they’re activated by particular causes and conditions — at which point we find ourselves reacting with attachment, jealousy, insecurity, or aggression.
Regardless of where they come from, we must learn to disassociate ourselves from neurotic habitual tendencies. This doesn’t mean not responding to things; it means bringing awareness to our reactions. Seeing that they are neither permanent nor solid, we can relate to them in a way that is intelligent and beneficial.
Emotions can only overtake us when we’re unaware of them. Then it’s like the tail wagging the dog. This makes us feel bad about ourselves. Tremendous self-aggression can arise in the mind that automatically reacts.
But labeling our emotions as terrible or wrong has a puritanical slant. It implies that they should never occur, that we should be as pure and enlightened as a buddha. Trying to suppress reactions, however, creates explosions later. Try instead to work with your mind in a way that is more mature and more in accord with practice.
The difference between not reacting and suppressing reactions lies in awareness. The key is to maintain awareness of the nature of the reaction, as well as its expression. Remember that these habitual tendencies arise not just from this life. They come from many lives of reacting in habitual ways. And although they may be complex, deep, and difficult to clear up, they don’t have to be so intimidating — because our habits are not who we truly are.
This is the difference between nature and habit.
~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche in, It's Up to You. The Practice of Self-Reflection on the Buddhist Path: https://amzn.to/3KZPppu
