A simple example of what I mean by this, is that sometimes meditators may focus on the concentration side of the meditation. They may like to do a lot of mindfulness of breathing because it's calming and we do need a certain amount of calm in our life. We don't want to lose that capacity to watch the breathing and to be mindful of the hindrances arising and passing, but some people then believe that "letting go" of thought is all there is about the practice. They may not wish to then delve into the wrong views which they hold deep within the mind, and start to transform them.
As we do Wise Reflection meditation, we come in contact with a lot of our views that we hold about the world. Views which we may not know are influencing our emotional life, how we view life, and our reactions to life. For instance, some people may even resist doing Compassion/Lovingkindness meditation in the way that we do it here, by this I mean focusing on the Dukkha of the subject, feeling compassion for them, and developing Compassion/Lovingkindness. These people don't want to think of other people, they prefer to forget them, and be indifferent to them. So when we do types of Compassion/Lovingkindness here, we also focus on difficult people, which some people may not wish to do. So this is a Dukkha that we hold within our mind, this not wanting to consider certain kinds of people. And we may not want to look at and resolve this by transforming our view. These are some examples of reflection.
If we only let go of thought and develop calm and peacefulness, we may then meet situations where it's difficult to react wisely to people, because it's interfering with our calm mind state. However, all mind states arise and pass due to conditions, so can we focus more on the impermanence of moment-to-moment experience? Focusing on our reaction to experience will enable us to deal with pleasant, unpleasant and neutral experiences that come to us.
One way that people will focus more on the calming is to push their thoughts away and not wish to use the mindfulness practice of the hindrances, which is so important in letting go of the deeper forms of Dukkha within ourselves and developing more insight. Some people, when they do meditation, if any thoughts arise they may use the power of their will to push them away, to get calm and peace, rather than learning how to note some of their negative mind states.
Learning how to develop compassion for those difficult places in our mind, by understanding our own Dukkha within our mind, this enables compassion to be ignited. Then we can understand others much more easily. It becomes much easier for us to open to difficult people. So if we don't open to our own difficulties, it's very difficult to open to others.
In the Satipattana Sutta, the Buddha asks us to see the hindrances "internally and externally". If we've never been able to see them within ourselves, we will never be able to follow this instruction, to see the hindrance behind the personality of the other person, because we'll be too lost in our reaction to the other person.
So these are a few ways that reflection can help you in your practice.