Whatever Happens, you Lose Nothing. Relax! || AP Neem Candies

Acharya Prashant: You are standing, and a fellow comes over and slaps you hard on your shoulder from behind. The automated response is to turn back and look at him. But if he is a friend, then the same touch or hit or a slap often becomes a matter of rejoicing. But if he is a stranger, then the whole thing gets triggered off, often into something bigger.

We tell ourselves what to be triggered by. This is not merely a matter of culpability; this is potentially a matter of our freedom. Because if you can tell yourself to get triggered, agitated, or disturbed, then you can also, probably, equally tell yourself not to get triggered.

It is not events but the meanings that you hold of them that agitate you.

You are in a building and the fire alarm goes off, and you can get quite scared. But if someone comes over and tells you, “Oh, it’s just a mock drill, it’s just a simulation. No need to worry,” then the same alarm can keep buzzing or ringing; you don’t bother. Now the meanings of those sounds have changed. The sound in itself was not a trigger, the meaning you added to it was. And it is at your discretion whether or not to add that meaning.

Ultimately, if something is stealing your peace, it is certain that you are supplying that event with one definite meaning, and that meaning is: the event means disturbance, the event means loss. And there is nobody outside of you, mind you, who can tell whether or not that internal loss is happening to you. Only you come forth and claim that a particular event translates into an internal loss for you.

External losses anybody can vouch for. If somebody walked away with your shirt, the entire world can see, that there has been an external loss. But the external loss translates into an internal loss as well. It’s something that only you claim and internally certify to yourself. That is your own personal story. That is the meaning that you add to events.

“Something happened.” Now the happening is worldly and therefore in the realm of facts. “Something happened.” Until this point, you are strictly in the realm of facts. But now, you extend the story and move into the world of subjective interpretations. And you have to remember that that interpretation is not a fact.

That interpretation is not compulsory; that interpretation is your own decision. It is your own personal choice. And the interpretation is: “I lost something, I got reduced,” or “I am about to be reduced, there is a threat.” And if you are about to be reduced, then this is an existential threat, not an ordinary one; obviously, an inner reaction system will set off; obviously, there would be nervousness, palpitations, and panic.

Why must anything ever mean an internal reduction to you? Why is the outer-inner relationship so one-on-one and compulsory? Why must an external loss mean an internal loss as well and vice versa?

I am asking you, would you still get triggered if external losses are merely external losses and mean nothing to you internally? Tell me, please.

Questioner: When we read or hear news that is related to others, it does not trigger the same reaction.

Acharya Prashant: A great happening in the world that you do not take to be related to yourself, does it bother you greatly? It doesn’t because you do not enforce the ‘outer equals inner’ rule in such cases. But the moment you bring about, bring in that dangerous equation, that dubious identity, ‘outer is inner’, that is the moment you start shivering and panicking. Do you get this?

We decide our triggers, they don’t just happen. And once you have declared that you have lost something precious in an inner way, then obviously you are conditioned to do everything that you can to defend your inner world.

The inner world is who you are. The inner world is where you live. Therefore, if you get hurt there, it is like death—death to the self. The living organism is not going to easily tolerate death, so it is bound to react. But it is going to react, I repeat, only if you tell it that it is under threat, that it is facing a situation of some deep loss.

Why do you keep telling yourself that you are facing a situation of internal loss? Why must you?

Questioner: I never knew there was a choice.

Acharya Prashant: There is a choice. It is also not hardbound or automatic. We tell stories to ourselves and those stories become our life, and you have a choice over the stories that you narrate.

Consider a very basic example. A lot of things keep happening in the outside world without your knowledge or when you are asleep. Does any inner loss occur? It doesn’t. If the inner loss were as factual as the external loss, then along with the external happening the internal one would have automatically happened. But it doesn't happen.

So, it is not the happening that troubles you; it is your story that troubles you. And the story always ends with the statement, “…and now there is an internal loss.” That is one thing that you will find common to all your scary stories. They all contain this one common statement, “…and now there is an internal loss.” And equally, you have several regaling stories. They contain the statement, “…and now there is an internal gain.”

Questioner: Acharya Ji, how to get rid of something that is going on in the mind again and again, something that is not very pleasurable but still keeps on repeating itself?

Acharya Prashant: Whatsoever is running in your mind may keep running; the mind needs stories.

Full article link: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/articles/let-no-external-loss-hit-your-core-1_c708878

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