Date: 08/02/2025 08/03/2025
Location: Star River Meditation Center
Teacher: Yunquan Huang
Dharma Knowledge
Observing Emotions through the Lens of the Dharma
In Buddhist practice, emotions are not seen as enemies, nor are they simply labeled as good or bad. The Buddha did not teach us to suppress emotions or blindly follow them, but rather to observe them with mindfulness and wisdom. Emotions are not obstacles to be eliminated—they are valuable teachers, gateways through which we can understand ourselves more deeply, see the roots of attachment, and walk the path of liberation.
First, Buddhism recognizes emotions as part of the aggregate of feeling (vedanā)—one of the five skandhas or components of human experience. Emotions arise naturally from contact between the senses and the world. A sound, a word, a memory, or an internal thought can trigger a whole cascade of emotional responses. These responses often occur automatically, before we even realize it. But rather than condemning this process, the Buddha encouraged us to train the mind to be aware of what is arising, moment by moment.
In the Dharma, emotions are not judged by moral value, but observed in terms of their causal nature and impermanence. All emotions—joy, anger, sadness, desire—arise due to causes and conditions. They are not “you.” They are not permanent. They are not absolute. They come, they stay for a time, and they pass. When we see that emotions are conditioned phenomena, we stop clinging to them as part of our identity. We no longer say, “I am angry,” but rather, “Anger is arising.”
This is crucial: emotions are real, but not lasting. When we’re caught in a powerful emotion, it feels like it will never end. But meditation reveals their nature: they rise and fall like waves on the ocean. As the Diamond Sutra reminds us: “All conditioned phenomena are like dreams, illusions, bubbles, shadows.” When we see this truth, we can relate to emotions with patience and steadiness, rather than panic or suppression.
The first step in working with emotions is acknowledging their presence. This means we don’t deny, repress, or shame ourselves for feeling. Some people think being a “spiritual person” means having no anger or fear. But the Buddha never said that. He taught us to observe emotions—not to pretend they don’t exist. Simply recognizing “Sadness is here” or “Jealousy is arising” with calm presence is already a powerful step in practice.
The next step is to observe the process of emotion: How did this arise? What triggered it? Is it linked to a desire, an expectation, a belief? What story is the mind telling right now? This kind of observation does not mean overanalyzing, but gently tracking the emotional current, without being swept away by it. We learn to stay with the feeling, to be present with it, to breathe with it. That presence itself is transformative.
This is the power of mindfulness. Not to fight emotions, but to embrace them with clarity. When we are mindful in the midst of emotional storms, we can stop reacting blindly. We begin to see choice. We learn that we are not the emotion—we are the awareness holding it. And in that space, insight is born.
Over time, we realize that emotions themselves are not the problem. The problem lies in our misunderstanding, resistance, and identification. When we no longer resist emotions, when we stop saying, “This should not be happening,” we free ourselves. When we no longer define ourselves by what we feel, we recover our vastness.
Thus, emotions are not barriers to awakening—they are opportunities for awakening. Through Dharma practice, we learn to befriend our emotions, observe them skillfully, and discover the deep truths they carry. In doing so, emotions no longer pull us into suffering—they become fertile ground for cultivating wisdom, compassion, and inner freedom.
