Yogi: There was much aversion the whole day yesterday. I wanted it to stop but it was not possible.

I was very much stuck with mental pain from depression over the last 2-3 years. I’m afraid that it won’t stop.

I feel better today, but there’s the fear that it will come again.

Sayadaw: It is true that for someone who has had depression and mental pain, it is something you really don’t want to face or to deal with and you’ll rather that it is not there because it is so painful. I understand that.

When it comes and you cannot watch it directly, consider the aversion to be someone you don’t like. They are sitting beside you and you cannot tell them to go away, but you do your mindfulness.

Watch something else – pay attention to a neutral object. If the aversion pops up in your awareness, acknowledge it, put it aside and go back to your neutral object because what you’re doing is building mindfulness. That’s the important thing.

Right now, the mindfulness is not strong enough to face the aversion; so, you need to build the mindfulness for it to become strong enough to face the mind.

Eventually, we’ll have to face the aversion. If we do not have the strength to face the aversion, it will never go away. So, we need to build the mindfulness until it’s strong enough and then there will come a day when you face the aversion and learn about it.

Now, just watching something else will slowly make the aversion fade away. Sometimes it comes again and you do the same thing over again, put it aside like someone you don’t like and slowly build your mindfulness and do that again and again, until the mind becomes powerful enough.