Ayya Santussika: Obsessing or Processing?

So warm greetings to everyone and I'd like to offer a few words of reflection on obsessive thinking. Because I think probably everyone has dealt with this in their life at one time or another. I was really, I think it's valuable to reflect on when our thinking becomes obsessive versus when we're processing. And how we know the difference. And it's helpful to think about, I think it's helpful to look at examples in our own life and in the lives of the people around us. I found throughout my practice that it's sometimes easier to notice these mental patterns in others first and to observe how they work, not with a sense of being judgmental about it or certainly not like, I don't do that. Because most of the time whatever we're noticing we actually do do that. It's valuable to see it in someone else because it's easier to observe sometimes and then look at, you know, what do I do? I do that. Or how do I do that? One of the stories from my family's history was my mother's family. There were five children and one of them had a mental health condition. And of course this is like 80 or 90 years ago. And there wasn't much understanding, acknowledgement, support for that kind of thing. But this child, one of her older sisters would get extremely angry just kind of like a switch would flip. And she'd become violent and it was really difficult for her parents to manage to try to keep her safe, to try to keep the other kids safe. My mother told me that her sister was chasing her with a knife once. You know, I mean it was an extreme problem. And as this child grew up, one of the things that happened was that she went to my grandmother, her mom's sisters and her mother. So the grandma in this case, told them all these stories about how terrible she was treated at home. And how she was treated differently from her brothers and sisters. And the extended family members believed it. And they didn't talk to my grandmother about it. And then the other siblings in that family started to shun my grandmother and my grandfather. And it was so painful for my grandmother. Eventually, there was some understanding around this, but in later years, my grandmother lived next door to my mom and they would take a walk every day. And my mom told me that my grandma talked about this situation with her siblings every day over and over again. It was all past. Many of them had passed away already. But she kept talking about this very painful experience. And this is obsession. This is the mind obsessing over something. And it's something you can't really do anything about. And in reflection, you know, like what is the nature of obsessive thinking versus, like I said, processing. And before we get deeper into that, I just think of another couple of examples. I've seen that I saw a similar pattern in my own mom, because she was becoming obsessed with certain things that happened in the family. And you can hear it because you hear the same story over and over, right? I can recall being obsessed about a work situation in my own life where, you know, it just feels like you're thinking about this so much that things other people tell you, you see how it relates to your problem. It's extremely self focused oftentimes. And of course, you know, we, when we are sharing with each other what's happening in our lives, one of the things I hear over and over is people feeling very obsessed with the news. For example, it's another thing that we can really get obsessed by. I also had a period of time when I was pretty obsessed with climate change. And I think what's valuable about all this to talk about it and to reflect on it is that we really can shift our thinking that's, you know, obviously we're very concerned about whatever it is that's going on. But we can shift that thinking into something productive where we're actually processing. Or actually moving in the direction of coming to terms with whatever it is that has happened or is happening. And of course, that coming to terms is different depending on the context, depending on the situation. There are times when a dilemma comes up in life where you really don't know what to do. And that then processing sometimes is helpful to be pro to process with another person. And if you're going to process something with someone, it's not just replaying the grievance or the difficulty or the circumstance, but it's first of all, you have to choose a good person to do it with. And the qualities of a good person for processing are that they're not going to share this with anyone else. They're going to listen and they're not just going to jump in with all of their own opinions. They're not just going to jump on the bandwagon and agree with you about everything, but they're also going to really listen. They're not going to get upset and caught up in the same story you're talking about. They're going to reflect back what you were dealing with in a way that starts to open it up. So what does that look like? It's not about denying what you're saying either. And we can look at this in our own mind when we process internally. It's not about trying to push it down, shove it away, deny it. I think what really changes things, what really causes the processing is looking at it from the perspective of Dhamma, whatever it is. I mean, like I said, I was pretty obsessed with climate change for a while, reading about it a lot, listening to the reports about it, the scientific papers that were coming out about it, the organizations that were working on it, and so on and so on. And it's like, well, how do you process something like climate change? It's so outside of our control. It's so huge. It has so many causes behind it. And so one phase that a person can go through is just really being angry or upset that this is happening, kind of blaming. And it doesn't lead to peace. It doesn't lead to contentment. It doesn't lead to resolution. But when we start to look at something like that from the perspective of Dhamma, then we know that things change. We know that everything in this conventional reality, this world, all the worlds, all of the planets, solar systems, the universe, whatever we can see, hear, taste, touch, smell, think. It all changes. And even though we can say it shouldn't be changing this fast or it shouldn't be changing now or it shouldn't be changing in this way, it is. So looking at it from the perspective of Dhamma is really to accept the way things actually are in this present moment. That's the first step. This is how it is. And then this is its nature. The nature to change the human nature to look for the reasons, which is a good thing because we find the reasons for the karmic results of our actions. And we have an opportunity to change that for the better. And looking at the natural way that things are, that they change and because we don't want them to change or we are attached to things, we cling to things and we suffer. And all of that is based on the mistaken belief that this is somehow me or mine. So it's like our ability to reflect on this and to realize the truth of it helps to resolve it as an issue in our experience. And I think we can, I know, we can apply this to everything. We can apply it to what we hear on the news. We can apply it to anything that is happening in our life. But it's not a dismissal. It's not like, oh yeah, there's climate change. Oh yeah, there's a war. Oh yeah, it's just how it is in Sengsara. That's a different kind of bypassing. It's not really processing. It's not really coming to a resolution. So as I was reflecting on this, I was thinking, thought of the Sutta where the Buddha's mother, stepmother Mahapajapati. Came to him and asked for a teaching in brief and I'm going to share the text with you so we can look at it together. So this is from the Angutra Nakhaya in the book of Eats, number 53. And this translation is from Venerable Vigubodhi. And we see the little intro here. It's a very short Sutta. On one occasion, the Blessed One was dwelling at Vaisali in the hall of the peat roof in the Great Wood. And then Mahapajapati, go to me, approach the Blessed One, paid homage to him, stood to one side and said to him, Bantay, it would be good if the Blessed One would teach me the Dhamma in brief. So that having heard the Dhamma from the Blessed One, I might dwell alone, withdrawn, heedful, ardent and resolute. So this happens frequently in the Suttas. One of the Buddha's disciples will come to him and ask for this. It's like he'd me a theme to reflect on and I'm going to go off by myself basically in retreat and really like soak that in and work through that. And who knows, maybe I'll get enlightened and often they do. So this is what he says to her. Those things of which you might know, these things lead to passion, not to dispassion. So in other words, it heats us up instead of calming us down. Think about how it feels to watch the news. Or to have some kind of disagreement with someone. Or think about that same incident over and over again that happened. Who knows how long ago or whatever. It leads to bondage, not to detachment. So it leads to being... Yeah, go ahead, Tal. Thank you. It leads to being caught up, oppressed by the thinking. It leads to building up of something or acquiring more things, not to dismantling, to letting go. It leads to strong desires, increase in our desires instead of letting go of desires, having few wishes. It leads to non-contemplate instead of contentment. It leads to company. It leads to more kind of interactivity and instead of solitude. Thank you, Tal. It leads to laziness, whatever might lead us to laziness. It leads to laziness and not to arousing energy. It leads to being difficult to support and not being easy to support. So we can look at this list. If we're thinking about something over and over, and then you should definitely recognize, he said, this is not the dharma. This is not the discipline. This is not the teaching of the teacher, the Buddha. But go to me, those things of which you might know, these things lead to dispassion and not passion, to detachment and not bondage, to dismantling and not to building up, fewness of desires, not strong desires, leading to contentment and not to non-contentment, to solitude, not to more interaction and company, to arousing energy and not to laziness, to being easy to support, not difficult to support. And you should definitely recognize this is the dharma. This is the discipline. This is the teaching of the teacher. So we think about, like, okay, reflecting on that topic that keeps coming up and how we look at it and how we think about it. So I should say there are some things, like maybe we're in a really difficult situation. It's actually abusive. We're physically in danger. Then it's very important to find that resolution and peacefulness by trying to get away, really, really put up those boundaries and separate ourselves from that situation as best as we can. And, but beyond that, when there's no real physical danger, there's no real ongoing, might say, oppression that can't be ignored, can't be seen in his true light as something that I can stop engaging in. That's when we need to learn how to stop engaging in it. I told somebody recently, I haven't really listened to the news since the beginning of 2026. And it was a very brief interaction, but the person was kind of wild. That was probably a good idea. And of course, I'm not saying that's the right thing for everyone. But what I saw in myself was this is taking my mental energy. This is taking my time, my attention, and I can't do anything about it. I can't do anything really to help it more than what I'm doing by encouraging people to live a virtuous life and to participate in their society in a way that supports the increase of goodness. So really pay attention. What can I do? What can I really do to make this better? And if there isn't anything I can do, then how can I relate to it in a way that brings peace, that brings contentment, that brings more wisdom and understanding? And an acceptance of samsara the way samsara is, because this spinning over a particular issue, when we see that it doesn't help, it doesn't change, it only pulls us down and we are suffering from bondage instead of freedom, instead of relief. And the wisdom of the dhamma ultimately brings us to understanding that we can be happy and at peace in the midst of all of this change. We can still kindly and compassionately look after those other living beings in our sphere of influence or in our proximity, or even our proximity online becomes anywhere in the world. But to do that we have to be, or we put it this way, to do that. The freer we are from being caught up in these things that we can't change, the more effectively we can do that, looking after ourselves, looking after each other. And we can appreciate and understand the situations that we get into as human beings and how we might help each other, like, oh, support each other in seeing what really helps and what really doesn't. So sometimes when someone talks to me about something that they're working through, like if my grandmother showed up and we could talk about that situation with her family, I know that if she thought about the dhamma, she would be able to come to peace with it, to see that this is the kind of thing that happens in human life. People misunderstand. We don't go back to the person and talk to them to find out what the real story is. And we can recognize how important it is to do that, even if it feels uncomfortable to confront someone. The Buddha would often say, did you do this? He'd call the person to him. Did you do this? Yes. And then what do you do? What do you do for that spiritual recovery or that recovery in a relationship? Maybe we can work something out with someone else, or maybe we just have to work it out ourselves inside. Coming to peace with whatever we did in the past, whatever they did in the past, recognizing that it's the past. It's a memory. It's sankharas. It's not something we want to continue to wound ourselves with by thinking through it again and again. So this talk, I think, is a little bit related to one from a couple to three weeks ago on guilt. And I really think this whole area of exploration can be so helpful because we don't want to carry these mental tendencies that keep us locked in place. Like, we're never really locked in place, but it can feel that way. That's the bondage. But keep us trapped, that we can actually open the door of the cell ourselves and walk free. Seeing that sankharas have no real substance. That's not reality. It's just convention. That we can do that without dismissing things, but just seeing them from what they actually are. Constant, changing landscape. Constant, imperfect understanding and imperfect actions. And allow the kindness and compassion to arise in us. The forgiveness to arise in us. The letting go to happen. So I'm going to stop there and invite your examples and questions because I really appreciate how the examples that are coming up in one's own life can help to elucidate and expand our repertoire of approaches to these things. So thank you and please let me know what you think. Marilyn. I used to be in conflict resolution in that field and so I still get a newsletter from the conflict resolution people. And last week she talked about a thing called calcified narratives. I think that's what we do. They become calcified and stuck. And I think when I see that, that's easier to let that go and how then you can open up the conversation to resolve this. Anyway, I like that. I just want to share that. Yeah, that's really good. That's a really good label. I think, you know, to really help us like am I in this kind of is it calcified? Am I just repeating the same story? Am I just repeating the same story? Even though the characters change, even though the circumstances change, am I still just repeating the same story? I don't have to do that. We can learn and let it go. Yeah, thank you Marilyn. Yeah, you're muted. Yeah, I love that calcified narrative. I have some of those and they become part of the identity. They become part of the identity, part of my view of myself. Yes. So this is really helpful. Thank you. Yeah, the first step is noticing it. Yeah. You know, because when we're caught up in it, we don't see that I'm just so focused on this. I remember being in a conversation one time with my son and a friend. And my son was telling it talking to us about something and I was so focused on this problem that I was going through with work that I related something he was saying to, you know, my obsession. And the friend said, you can't even hear that this conversation is not about you. I'm like, oh my God. It was kind of like a slap in the face and it was like a real support and waking me up. You know, it's like, no, yeah, not everything is about this thing I'm going through, you know. Out of the mouth of babes. Yeah. One time when my son was about 10 and he and me and his father were having this conversation I can't remember. And he said, well, it's not very important. And my son at age 10 or something said, well, it's very important to mom. So, you know, out of the mouth of babes sometimes when we're listening. And they weren't babes. Your guys weren't babes at that point, but it just reminded me. Yeah, I mean, it's, yeah, it's really valuable to have good friends that can help us see that we're obsessing. And to recognize that we can't just like, say I'm not going to think about this anymore. We've probably all tried that that that kind of suppressing it doesn't work. And being with the feeling being present with that, you know, using the first three noble truths and working with what we're experiencing but letting go of the story. You start getting that this world is like a soap opera, it just keeps going over the same material. And it keeps changing it can't stay steady as you get better it gets worse it gets better it gets worse it's just like the news today and pick it up six months from now without looking in between it's going to sound pretty much. Well, I don't know, but seems to me like same old thing. And again, it doesn't mean we don't do everything we can to help move it in the right direction. We need to do that to Merrill. I was reminded of another thing that came up in conflict resolution field they said that if you find that people are repeating the same thing over and over. The reason people do that is because they think you're not listening they think you're not you're not getting in so the way the way to stop them, like is to hear them, and then stay back to them. So is what you're saying this, and then that opens up the engagement, you know, and in a way I think you're saying we need to do that to ourselves to right. So like, do you really mean this or what's this like, hear yourself, I guess, but also have a friend who can actually hear what you're saying and that you believe they hear I guess, really, I don't know. Yeah, I find that the wisdom part of my mind can talk to that other part of my mind, you know, the people who are doing internal family systems therapy really they're they're very much resonating with this kind of approach. You know, it's like, yeah, there's, there's the ability to see what we're experiencing with the drama, through the lens of the drama. And that's, that's what's necessary for awakening. And when we, when we do that when we start to become skilled in kind of abiding in them, abiding in that peacefulness, not just a mind and not I'm not talking about a mind that stops thinking, it might, but maybe not that's not the point. But the point is that what's what we're abiding in is that peace and serenity that kind of pure consciousness energy. And from that place of wisdom, we can observe the experiences that the conditioned mind and kind of some mood self is experiencing. When we se