Weather the Weather
Observing thoughts and emotions as weather patterns that arise and pass, without identifying with them.
Just as the sky remains unchanged by passing weather, our awareness remains untouched by thoughts and emotions. When we recognize that moods are like weather - sometimes sunny, sometimes stormy - we stop taking them so personally. Research shows that viewing emotions as temporary states rather than fixed traits increases emotional resilience and reduces depression. In Zen, we learn to be the sky, not the weather. This doesn't mean suppressing feelings but recognizing that no mental state is permanent. The storm will pass; the sky endures.
You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather.
Written about in
- What Zen says about anger
Moods are treated as weather crossing an unchanged sky, and the instruction is to be the sky. That is not the same as pretending the storm is not there.