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False conceptions are exaggerated modes of thought that do not accord with the facts. Even if an object--an event, a person, or any other phenomenon--has a slightly favorable aspect, once the object is mistakenly seen as existing totally from its own side, true and real, mental projection exaggerates its goodness beyond what it actually is, resulting in lust. The same happens with anger and hatred; this time a negative factor is exaggerated, making the object seem to be a hundred percent negative, the result being deep disturbance. Recently, a psychotherapist told me that when we generate anger, ninety percent of the ugliness of the object of our anger is due to our own exaggeration. This is very much in conformity with the Buddhist idea of how afflictive emotions arise.
At the point when anger and lust are generated, reality is not seen; rather, an unreal mental projection of extreme badness or extreme goodness is seen, evoking twisted, unrealistic actions. All of this can be avoided by seeing the fuller picture revealed by paying attention to the dependent-arising of phenomena, the nexus of causes and conditions from which they arise and in which they exist.
Looked at this way, the disadvantages of afflictive emotions are obvious. If you want to be able to perceive the actual situation, you have to quit voluntarily submitting to afflictive emotions, because in each and every field, they obstruct perception of the facts.....
Love and compassion also involve strong feelings that can even make you cry with empathy, but they are induced not by exaggeration but by valid cognition of the plight of sentient beings, and the appropriateness of being concerned for their well-being. These feelings rely on insight into how beings suffer in the round of rebirth called "cyclic existence," and the depth of these feelings is enhanced through insight into impermanence and emptiness.... Though it is possible for love and compassion to be influenced by afflictive emotions, true love and compassion are unbiased and devoid of exaggeration, because they are founded on valid cognition of your relationship to others. The perspective of dependent-arising is supremely helpful in making sure that you appreciate the wider picture.
--from How to See Yourself As You Really Are by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, translated and edited by Jeffrey Hopkins, Ph.D.
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