One way we work with strong emotions and overwhelming thoughts is called “touch and go.”
Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche: “As an individual you relate with what is happening around you. We could use the phrase “touch and go.” You touch or contact the experience of actually being there, then you let go. That touch-and-go process applies to your awareness of your breath and also to your awareness of day-to-day living. Touch is the sense of existence, that you are who you are…The go part is that you do not hang on to that. You do not sustain your sense of being, but you let go of it…
Touch is not simply the general awareness of being. It also applies to mindfulness of your individual states of mind. That is, your mental state of aggression or lust also has to be touched. Such states have to be acknowledged. However, you do not just acknowledge them and push them off. You need to look at them without suppression or shying away…In shamatha, you don’t just sign off. You acknowledge what is happening and you look at it…
It is possible to twist the logic, and relate to meditating and coming back to the breath as a way of avoiding problems, but such avoidance is itself a problem…You might thingk that you don’t have to pay attention to all those little embarrassments that happen in your life; instead, you could regard them as unimportant and come back tot he breath. However, in doing so, you are patching over your problems…It is important to look at those embarrassments then then come back to the breath.”
So, if the mind wanders into difficult emotions, images, or feelings, we first touch or acknowledge this energy. Only after touching, do we let go. Touch does not mean analyze. We are not thinking about these emotions and energies. Rather, we lightly touch and acknowledge that something difficult has arisen, and then we let go and return to just being and breathing.
Touch brings a further sense of gentleness and humanity. Letting go helps us not get stuck or hooked by the emotion. We need both the touch and the go.
At any point during our practice session, especially if there are difficult emotions or physical pains, we can always take a fresh start. We can relax, let go, and begin with a sense of innocence or freshness. Each moment is an opportunity for freshness. This is another helpful way to work with emotions. There is always more room, more space, more freshness.
In the process of moving through these various concentric circles of emotions, we learn more about our mind and emotions and we learn to gather the power and strength of our inherent mindfulness. This gives us increasing confidence that we know how to work with our life, fantasies, discursive thoughts, subtle thoughts, etc. We can have a personal experience of the basic workability of our mind, even if this is just a glimpse. This confidence is very precious and inherent as a human being.
