Ways to avoid negative emotions

When the three causes are in place, negative emotions will manifest. What can we do then?

1) Uproot the seed of negative emotions from the source, which we are incapable of at the moment.

2) Avoid the external cause and condition.

For example, avoid exposure to various advertisements or setting sight on the neighbour’s new car or new gadgets. This can help reduce the arising of desire and avoid certain suffering that comes with excessive desire. It is therefore advised by the Buddha that the monastics or real practitioners stay at remote and quiet places to do their practice, as there are fewer material goods there to stir up one’s desire and cause defilement to manifest. But this is not the best way.

3) Banish irrational ideas.

For example, when there is a new electronic product on the market, one may either feel upset if one can’t afford to buy or conceited if others can’t buy the same, thinking “only I have this bag, this luxury watch, the latest version of…; no one else in the office does.” This mindset breeds arrogance so that one is blind to others’ strengths and one’s own weaknesses.