If we want it, get it, and lose it, we suffer. If we don't want it, but can't keep it away, again we suffer. We often think the only way to create happiness is to try to control the outer circumstances of our lives, to try to fix what seems wrong or to get rid of everything that bothers us. But the real problem lies in our reaction to those circumstances. What we have to change is the mind and the way it experiences reality.
Emotionality is the by-product of hope and fear, attachment and aversion.
We have hope because we are attached to something we want. We have fear because we are averse to something we don't want. We need to stop the extreme swings of the emotional pendulum so that we can find a place of centeredness. When we first begin to work with the emotions, we apply the principle of iron cutting iron or diamond cutting diamond. We use thought to change thought.