Here is a meditation practice advised by the Dalai Lama when you feel like you are going overwhelmed with negative emotions.
Seen in ‘Buddhism daily‘ by Nathalie Chassériau, I decided to summarize it as this is a pleasant and beneficial practice.
You have just quarreled and you feel that negative emotions are taking over. You obviously can not calm down and you need to calm down.
1) Sit in a place that feels good to you. Understand that the crisis you have just passed is not impossible to overcome even if it seems really unfair. Stop accusing the other since this will lead to nothing.
Your vision of reality may be wrong, or you are bound to negative karma accumulated during your previous lives.
2) Through your imagination, visualize a fire. Be aware that the nature of fire is to burn, just as the nature of a mind is to be exposed to suffering. But, like the prehistoric man who learned to tame the fire to discover its benefits, you will succeed in overcoming your negative emotions to progress.
3) If your partner accuses you: remember that his reproaches force you to question yourself, and to free yourself from your indulgence towards yourself.
4) If you’re jealous, focus on what your partner brings you rather than the harm he or she is doing to you. Ask yourself about the causes of your infidelity and understand that you may have some responsibility, as in everything that happens to you.
This practice is difficult at first. You have to hang on and use it several times before this way of thinking is automatic . Once we understand that we are detaching from our negative emotions faster than before, we can have how good it is beneficial.
…
Mary
