One youngster comes to me very
depressed and asks this question "Why is God creating so many
difficulties for us? How to handle stress?" I tell this youngster to
reflect on this beautiful story:
A man goes
to a shop, picks up a beautiful cup and says "my god this cup is so
beautiful" and suddenly the cup starts talking to the man. The cup
starts saying "O man, I am beautiful right now, but what was the state
of my being before the pot-maker made me a beautiful pot?
Before I
was sheer mud and the pot-maker pulled me out of the mud from the mother
earth and I felt why that pot-maker is so cruel, he has separated me
from mother earth. I felt a tremendous pain. And the pot-maker said,
"Just wait." Then he put me and churned me, when I was churned I felt so
giddy, so painful, so stressful, I asked the pot-maker "Why are you so
cruel?" the pot-maker said, "Just wait." Then he put me into a oven and
heated me up, I felt completely burnt. There was tremendous pain and I
asked the pot-maker "Why are you so cruel?" and the pot-maker said,
"Just wait."
Then he
poured hot paint on me and I felt the fume and the pain, I again asked
the pot-maker "Why are you so cruel?" and the pot-maker said, "Just
wait." Then again he put me into an oven and heated it to make me more
strong, I felt life is so painful hence pleaded the pot-maker and the
pot-maker said, "Just wait."
And after that the pot-maker took me to the mirror and said, "Now look at yourself". And surprisingly I found myself so beautiful.
When god
gives us lot of trouble, it appears god is very cruel but we need
patience and we have to wait. When bad things happen to good people,
they become better and not bitter.
With this understanding, let us not be against difficulty. Understand difficulty is a part of a purifying process. A purifying process at present which we cannot understand and hence we need faith and we need trust.
Let us
understand how to handle stress with this background. You can be
affected by stress from two angles. There is an internal stress and
there is an external stress. Nobody can avoid stress; one has to only
manage stress. Managing stress can be internal and also external.
The
internal stress is; your thoughts can create stress, your values can
create stress, and your beliefs can create stress, meaning thereby your
stress is coming from your mind more from the outer world. Many people
suffer not from heart attack – they suffer from thought-attack.
For
example, when somebody says you are an idiot, we get so hurt, we get so
victimized. My boss has called me an idiot and I am feeling tremendous
pain. Now where does this stress come from? If my boss has called me an
idiot, I have to ask myself "am I an idiot"?
If I am an
idiot nothing to be upset about; and if I am not an idiot, then also
nothing to be upset about! It is the perception of the boss. But why do
we suffer from that stress? I suffer not because my boss has called me
an idiot but because of the thought-attack.
I may say
the boss has called me an idiot; therefore I am suffering? It is true
that the words are unpleasant. But what hurts is the interpretation of
the unpleasant word. The thought in me interprets. That is pain and
therefore it becomes pain. Much of our stress is our mind interpreting
it as pain. So we suffer from thought-attack more than heart attack
~Swami Sukhabodhananda
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Managing Stress
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