One popular human strategy for dealing with difficulty is autosuggestion: when something nasty pops up, you convince yourself it is pleasant rather than unpleasant. Rather than hide it or disguise it, you need to examine it to death. This is not the spirit of Ah Q, not that kind of self-deception. Instead, it’s about directly facing it and thoroughly examining it.
We advise you not to implant feelings that you don’t really have or avoid feelings that you do have. If you are miserable, you are miserable. This is the reality; that is what is happening. So confront that. Look it square in the eye without flinching. When you are having a bad time, examine the badness. That is, observe that experience objectively. This is very hard. Once you are caught up in emotions, you can no longer observe objectively. So, when a scientist observes nature, they usually can remain relatively objective. This is because at that time they are free from emotions and have a spirit of seeking truth. However, observing oneself is very difficult because one can get caught up in emotions, and then the objective attitude is gone. Like a scientist: if he gets angry today, he won’t have the mood to observe his experiments. His mind will run away, and when he thinks about what made him angry, he may forget to observe his experiments. Such things happen. When conducting experiments in a bad mood, accidents can happen or you might forget to observe. Similarly, when observing our emotions or problems, there is a force. Once there is mental activity, there is a force or fire heading straight to your heart. So it’s really hard to confront difficulties at this time. You’re suffering, but you still need to maintain an objective attitude. This is truly contradictory. However, your awareness is still there. Although you’re suffering, you still need to maintain awareness and mindfulness. Even though you’re suffering, even though you have some negative emotions or attitudes, you need to cultivate your awareness. Your awareness needs to be present. As long as you maintain awareness, negative emotions will gradually disappear.