Many people worry about their family and future. For example, some husbands worry that their beautiful wives may go out with other men. At the same time, some wives worry that their handsome young husbands may leave them or spend their time with other girls. Some unmarried people worry about how to get married. Some married couples worry about how to get children.

People who have children worry about how best to bring up and educate their children. People worry about their parents, sons, daughters, sisters and brothers, friends and collegues etc. And then they wonder whether their children or sisters and brothers will take care of them when they are old.

Human life is full of worries and fear. Many people face worries and misery on a daily basis. For example, people fear for the well-being of their son, fear for the well-being of their daughter, have fear of enemies, fear of hunger, fear of sickness, fear of loss of wealth and possession, fear of old age, fear of death and fear of a next existence. So people have many fears all throughout their daily life. These worries are our own making, not others‘ making.

Why do people worry? There is only one answer. People worry because of the concept of “me” and “mine” (atta). Due to this concept, people have an unclear understanding, just as in: this is my son, my car, my house, my country and my family so on. From this belief of self, a person develops wrong ideas of “me” and “mine”, together with all cravings, selfish desires, pride and other evil thoughts.

Therefore people must train their mind to realize the truth and to understand the real nature of their worries. People should try to overcome these worries and fear by realizing and understanding the origin of all worries – selfish desires. When we discover that there are selfish desires (me and mine, atta in Pali) in our mind, we need to pay attention. We observe these selfish desires as mental states and strive to free ourselves from them.

Ashin Labhasami