Vitakkasanthana Sutta "in the same way, if evil, unskillful thoughts — imbued with desire, aversion or delusion — still arise in the monk while he is scrutinizing the drawbacks of those thoughts, he should pay no mind and pay no attention to those thoughts. As he is paying no mind and paying no attention to them, those evil, unskillful thoughts are abandoned and subside. With their abandoning, he steadies his mind right within, settles it, unifies it, and concentrates it."


How does one pay no mind / no attention to thoughts? Diverting one's attention was the 1st method, but how is this meant to be?
When you watch a sad movie, you may feel sad at some points. But you won't carry the sadness with you and become depressed, would you? When you stop watching the movie, you immediately forget about it.

Similarly, you treat the evil unskillful thoughts here like they were some movie appearing in your mind, and ignore them.