My co-worker in the next cube has had a long-lasting cold with periodic coughs and sneezes. When he coughs/sneezes, I watch a wave of tensing/releasing pass through my torso. The wave passes through in a second, and leaves almost no residue--meaning that there is no long-lasting effect in me, no train of thought about how difficult this is to bear, no continuing tension, no anger.
This is remarkable and incredibly wonderful. I am seeing what it means to stop a certain kind of suffering. Indeed, the "first arrow" of the disturbing sound is unpleasant. But its unpleasantness is only a tiny fraction of the unpleasantness of the "second arrow" that my psyche used to habitually inflict upon itself. In the past, anxiety and resistance regarding these disturbances would accumulate in my body and mind, creating fatigue and crankiness. I still get fatigued and cranky, but not over this.
(See the Sallatha Sutta for the Buddha's teaching about the first and second arrows.)
I could not have stopped this "second arrow" through force of will. If I could have, I would have long ago, because I knew how to intellectually. My ability to stop the second arrow comes from the direct seeing of the workings of my mind that I have experienced over the past several months. Woot!
Similarly, whenever he (or any of my office neighbors) throws something in the trash, I feel disturbed. I think my psyche imagines that I am being thrown in the trash. But now, I let go of that feeling immediately. In the past it used to stick.
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