Yogi: If I call a close family member and they don’t answer, I start to worry.

Sayadaw: And you think what could be happening? If you think that way, how do you feel? You get more and more worried, right? So, if you’re aware of the process – thinking comes and the mind suffers – you need to know that it is a wrong thought. If you continue to think, the mind continues to suffer. 

If you can see the process, slowly the mind becomes wiser and you don’t want to continue to think that way.

If certain thoughts cause the mind to suffer, you should not continue to think those thoughts; don’t allow them to grow, or else the mind suffers even more.

If you observe this process repeatedly, the mind will eventually understand what to do.

For me, when a thought causes my mind to suffer, the mind immediately stops that thought. I’m not so silly as to allow the thought to hurt the mind even more.

Just change to a neutral object and try to stay peacefully in the present; there is no need to suffer from negative thoughts.