Why do we hurt ourselves or others?
We all experience strong emotions like fear, anger, sorrow or jealousy from time to time. Often these emotions are so overwhelming that it feels as if this negative energy will destroy our peace and well-being. Since we cannot bear to look at the real cause of our suffering, we push our emotions into the depths of our consciousness. And then we keep ourselves busy to ensure that these unwelcome guests do not come to pay us a visit.
We engage ourselves with other ‘guests’ – mindless eating, watching TV, reading a book or listening to music. We do anything and everything we can to fill our attention with something. This is the practice of repressing or adopting an embargo response.
We deny and suppress our emotions until they finally explode and cause hurt to ourselves and others. But an emotion is just an emotion. It comes, it stays for a while, and then it goes away. Why should we hurt ourselves or others just because of one emotion? We are so much more than them. With mindfulness, we can practise stopping and calming the emotion first and then follow it by looking deeply to discover its true nature. If we can do that, we are able to transform our emotions.
Strong emotions are like a storm and to stand in the middle of a storm is dangerous. Yet that’s what most of us do when we get upset; we stay out in the storm of our feelings, and they overwhelm us. One very effective method of stopping and calming ourselves in this storm is belly breathing . We focus on our belly and practise mindful breathing, giving all our attention to rise and fall of the abdomen. We don’t think of anything. We just breathe. Practising in this way for 10 or 15 minutes will allow strong emotions to pass.
Think of a tree during a storm; its branches and leaves swaying violently in the strong wind. We may feel that the tree is vulnerable and may not be able to survive the storm. But if we shift our attention to the trunk, we see that the tree is solid and deeply rooted in the ground. When we are gripped by a strong emotion, our mind is like vulnerable branches. But when we focus on our trunk – the abdomen – we will feel stable and solid. Only after we have allowed the storm to pass and calmed ourselves, can we begin to look deeply and identify the source of that painful emotion for transformation to take place.
If we can weather our storms and embrace our emotions even once, we will have a little more peace and will be less afraid of any strong emotion the next time it comes up. Remember an emotion is just an emotion.
Excerpted from ‘Fear – Essential Wisdom for Getting Through the Storm’. Ahimsa Trust is organising a series of events led by Br Phap Huu and other monastics from Thich Nhat Hanh’s Plum Village tradition in Feb 2026
Disclaimer
Views expressed above are the author’s own.
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