Question: “Hi, I’d like to ask ur advice. I’m very concerned about how people judge me, sometimes it becomes a huge weight. I’m so afraid of looking stupid in front of people. I’m terrified of judgement cause anything other people say could be true, and in the worst case it is (according to my mind). I read about emptiness and studied a bit of buddhism. Every time I think about it I understand that it is not good to be so concerned. But sometimes it is a feeling so strong. Could u please help me?”
Show me what other people are saying? Show me the judgments or words? I want you to physically put it in my hand. You can’t, right? Words are like blank bullets – they can’t kill you, but they can hurt you if you’re unprotected. Our protected mind is like a bullet-proof vest. It’s there to stop the bullet from penetrating our body. Likewise, we train our mind to be word-proof vests to stop negative words and actions from penetrating our mind.
If I called you a purple cow, does that actually make you a purple cow? Or if I called you a giant tree or something because you’re so tall, are you physically a giant made out of a tree? Absolutely not.
As unenlightened beings, we assume that we are our minds and our minds are us, but in reality our mind is separate from us, but because it’s attached to us and we constantly listen to it, we come to the conclusion that everything we think is true. Why do we suffer? Because our mind tells us that this or that is a bad situation and that we should feel bad, depressed, sad, anxious, etc. about it and it causes us to suffer.
Truly happy people are happy because they don’t allow their false judgments to take over situations and their lives. If we can’t see the beauty in a chaotic world, then all we have left is suffering.
That is a major meditation practice – to meditate on the trueness of things. If you “think” people are saying things about you, sit down and meditate on those words. Meditate on the truthness and faleness of those words and break through their untrue gates. When we can start doing that for everything, we become much happier and peaceful people.
Smile and be well!