Fear of ghosts

He was terribly afraid of ghosts, no one knew why, perhaps because as a child he had heard too many ghost stories and they had sunk in and haunted him. Now he was in grade 12 of upper secondary school and still afraid of ghosts. He dared not sleep alone in a room. The toilet was outside, so at night he had to shake his older brother awake to go with him, or he threatened that if the brother wouldn't come he would pee in the basin kept in the room and the brother could put up with the smell. In the daytime, if asked to go upstairs to the altar to fetch something for his mother, someone had to go with him. In the end nobody could stand his fear of ghosts any longer, so they went to look for a psychologist to treat him.
The psychologist explained at length that there were no ghosts at all, it was all made up and there was nothing to fear. He insisted stubbornly that he himself had seen a ghost. Seen how? He told how once he went into the kitchen and saw his grandmother sitting with her back to him at the dining table, eating something. He paid no attention, hurriedly took a spoon for his mother and handed it to her, and then saw his grandmother playing with little Hồng out in the yard. He ran back to the kitchen and she was gone. He went out and asked his grandmother whether she had come into the kitchen to eat something, and she said she hadn't been in the kitchen all this time. His face turned green. At night while he slept, someone kept walking around the room, sometimes standing looking at him, then rummaging through his exercise books to look at them. He told it but no one believed him, so he had to carry his fear of ghosts alone. He told it so passionately that the psychologist gave up.
His family took him to a sorcerer to have the evil spirits dealt with. By this point the family seemed to believe there really were ghosts. The sorcerer performed a rite, muttering some chant, and gave him a talisman to keep in his pocket so that ghosts would not come near. The next morning he had to stay away from school because he had not slept, having witnessed ghosts fighting ghosts in the room. The family hurriedly took the talisman and burned it.
Then they took him to a temple for help. The monk smiled and led him around the temple garden, chatting casually about all sorts of things in the world. Then the monk pointed at a column of ants crawling on the ground and asked whether he felt affection for the ants. He said no. The monk said that was the reason he was afraid of ghosts. Even if he studied up to a doctorate he would not understand this strange theory. What did ants have to do with ghosts? The monk said that when love is great enough, people lose their groundless fears. If he practised loving all people and all creatures, he would naturally gain inner strength and no longer be afraid. He asked, so love makes ghosts vanish? The monk said, love does not make anyone vanish, but it makes us no longer afraid of anyone.
He went home and practised loving: loving the ants, loving his parents, loving his grandparents, loving the neighbours, loving relatives, loving teachers, loving friends, loving the birds in the morning, loving the frogs in the evening, loving the soldiers who stand in rain and sun, loving the hard-working labourers at construction sites, loving the sanitation workers who sweep the neighbourhood, loving the grass, leaves and flowers...
After several months of practising love in this way, he saw a ghost again. He took some rice out to the pond to throw to the fish, and suddenly saw a human figure sitting on the other side of the pond looking at him sadly. He had a very clear feeling that he was no longer afraid, but felt sympathy. He had a feeling of understanding that the one sitting there wanted something to eat. He ran into the house and brought out some food. The figure was gone, but he left a bowl of rice on the edge of the pond and murmured an invitation for that person to eat, then went inside. He felt very clearly that he was no longer afraid of ghosts.
Once in class a big, burly classmate came at him furiously, wanting to fight. He faced him calmly and spoke properly, and the big fellow listened and no longer bullied him. He felt that apart from no longer being afraid of ghosts, he was no longer afraid of many other things as well 💀

Whether ghosts exist or not, love is a treatment for fear in a person's mind. When we have a broad, loving heart, we have a strange inner strength, unspoken and unnoisy, silent but very powerful. This power of love makes our other abilities grow along with it. We become smarter, calmer, more patient and more delicate, so we work more effectively. Especially in our dealings with others, we and they naturally understand and like one another more easily.

But it is not easy to love. If we leave things alone and do nothing, we cannot love anyone, except those who treat us well first, such as parents, family and kind people. We love back only passively. Only a person of wisdom and ethics knows how to "train" in order to grow the love in their heart for all beings and all things. We must tell ourselves, order ourselves and force ourselves to love everything. By forcing ourselves like this, ordering ourselves like this, telling ourselves like this, after a long time love will begin to appear little by little. Then a marvel will come into our lives.