How to deal with anxiety associated with surroundings/environment?
Upvote:1
Anxiety can arise due to external circumstance.
Ven. Sariputta taught:
DN34:1.5.2: What four things are helpful?
DN34:1.5.3: Four situations:
DN34:1.5.4: living in a suitable region, relying on good people, being rightly resolved in oneself, and past merit.
Living in a bad neighborhood is indeed stressful. If the neighborhood is a given and you cannot move, find and rely on good people. If good people are not available, live ethically to be worth of the company of good people.
Anxiety can also arise internally:
MN22:18.2: “Sir, can there be anxiety about what doesn’t exist externally?” MN22:18.3: “There can, mendicant,” said the Buddha.
MN22:18.4: “It’s when someone thinks,
MN22:18.5: ‘Oh, but it used to be mine, and it is mine no more.
MN22:18.6: Oh, but it could be mine, and I will get it no more.’
The remedies for internal anxiety are explained further in MN22:
MN22:19.1: “But can there be no anxiety about what doesn’t exist externally?”
MN22:19.2: “There can, mendicant,” said the Buddha.
MN22:19.3: “It’s when someone doesn’t think,
MN22:19.4: ‘Oh, but it used to be mine, and it is mine no more.
MN22:19.5: Oh, but it could be mine, and I will get it no more.’
MN22 is quite extensive and discusses other such cases, and may therefore be of some help in your situation.
A key point to understand in MN22 is that possessiveness (i.e., "mine") is a trigger for anxiety. For example, if we miss the pleasant neighbors from our old neighborhood, we might grow sad and feel helpless. Therefore, focusing on the loss causes anxiety.
However, if we focus on being a nice neighbor, then our new neighborhood now has a nice neighbor. We become that nice neighbor and bake cookies for our neighbors and say "hello!".
And that is the essence of practicing unlimited love, compassion, rejoicing and equanimity. We can look inside ourselves and let that light shine forth to brighten the world.
So it is not a matter of denial. It is a matter of affirmation and giving. It is about sensing a lack and giving what is needed.
Upvote:1
You say that your anxiety arises from ...
... incidents that get reported in the area everyday.
So one more suggestion is, don't just beware of the incidents but beware of the reports.
I mean, some people for example watch the news on television, or maybe they read social media, and get upset because the news is bad. One of the remedies for that is to stop paying much attention to the news.
Beware that "news reports" is usually bad by definition no matter where you are -- because everything that isn't "an incident" isn't ever "reported" in that way -- and so "the reports" always give a one-sided and sometimes overly-pessimistic view of reality.
To beware of what (sense-inputs) you pay attention to and become passionate about in some way, might be called guarding the sense doors. It's usually used to warn against superficially-attractive objects but I think it's applicable to any sense-input that you might be attached to, including ones which evoke fear.
Upvote:4
Good neighborhood, living in areas where wrong view doesn't domain, is actually a prerequisite for good practice (one of the first greatest blessings/protection), good householder, so which attachments keeps him not from seeking to dwell on good, better, place? Once understanding is firm, of course, it wouldn't matter that much any more, still, even Arahats dwell there where it's pleasing to dwell. So one fear needs to win over another. Good situation to find out the cause of inflexibility and feeling bond.
- To reside in a suitable location... is the highest blessing
- Countries to leave & counties to go
- 6. Sevanāsuttaṁ-That should be followed after
(ps: don't take the unqualified commentaries of rude and ignorant neighbors here to serious if desiring to resist here...)
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