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From my meditation teacher: Will Kabat-Zinn: When a strong mind-state, thought, or emotion arises, meet it with awareness. When you are awake to what is appearing in the mind and body, fear, sadness, anxiety, loneliness, it becomes an aspect of experience rather than the whole of it. It becomes an object to you. It arises within something that is bigger, a space so vast that it can include whatever comes. With awareness, that which arises becomes an object “in” experience. This makes all the difference. When not witnessed in awareness, mind and body states, thoughts and feelings, views and opinions, have total shaping power. Without awareness you effectively become the experience, the experience becomes the “way things are.” It shapes your consciousness. It shapes the world. When you meet strong mind-states with awareness you can use your feelings, your fear, anxiety, as useful information but not let them take over your mind. We need clear minds in times of crisis so that we can help each other, so that we can meet the conditions of the moment with wisdom, clarity, and love. Notice if there is a tendency to project your fear onto others or onto groups of people. Pandemics historically can lead to harmful “othering”, to racism and xenophobia. The whole world appears within your own being, your natural awareness. This is the true ground of connection and connectedness.
