Search results for: "Equanimity"

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  2. Effortlessness Through Effort
     … It’s equanimity—and not necessarily skillful equanimity at that. The other effortless meditation comes after you’ve actually put in a lot of effort to solve the different problems that come up in the mind until you’ve worked through the various hooks of the different thoughts and emotions that pull you away from the present moment, so that the next time that … 
  3. Wise About Mistakes
     … That attitude starts with goodwill for yourself, goodwill for all beings; compassion for yourself, compassion for all beings; empathetic joy for yourself and for all beings; equanimity for yourself and for all beings. The equanimity, of course, is for realizing that you can’t go back and change things. It doesn’t mean that you’re indifferent as to what you’re going to … 
  4. Fires of the Mind
     … But you develop equanimity. In fact, if you get yourself all tied up about remorse about the past, then it’s hard to do skillful things in the present moment because your energy is being siphoned off. Just make up your mind, “Okay, what I did in the past is past; what we’re going to focus on now is the present moment.” On … 
  5. The Skillful Heart
    Every evening we have that chant, the brahmavihāras, the sublime attitudes, developing thoughts of goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity, because these are our motivations on the path. We have goodwill for ourselves and goodwill for all beings because we’re looking for a happiness that’s harmless: doesn’t harm us, doesn’t harm anyone else. **This is a quality of a good … 
  6. Broad, Tall, & Deep
     … Now, there are also times when you have to develop equanimity. Regardless of how much you might want somebody to be happy, it’s not going to happen right away. So you have to develop equanimity around that. But again, that, too, has to be measureless, a quality you develop so that you can call on it whenever you need it. You also want … 
  7. Wake Up from Addiction
     … And as the mind goes through the stages of concentration, you finally get to a point where the mind feels very equanimous. It’s not excited about anything but it feels okay right here—and okay not in a small way. Okay in a big way. Everything feels very stable, on an even keel. You feel really at home, settled down here. That equanimity … 
  8. Anchored in the Present
     … And as you’re abandoning greed and distress, you have to learn how to watch that act of abandoning with equanimity. That equanimity is a mental quality. So all frames of reference are there as you’re focused on the breath. You don’t leave the breath to look at the others. It’s just that you take that activity of staying focused on … 
  9. Rooted in Desire
     … Or, simply trying to develop equanimity for whatever comes up: The Buddha says that’s limited equanimity; it’s a path that goes nowhere. You look at the Buddha himself: What kind of person was he? He looked at his life and saw that it wasn’t satisfactory. He wanted something better than the happiness he had, and he was willing to sacrifice everything … 
  10. Anapanasati Day
     … serenity, concentration, equanimity. The equanimity goes through many stages until it yields what’s called non-fashioning. Nothing being done at all. You’re not making any self out of things. You’re not making any world out of things. It’s just dhammas, and you let them all go. That’s where there’s true knowledge and release. So, tonight is the night … 
  11. The Uses of Right Concentration
     … Settle in and indulge in the pleasure or the equanimity of that particular state of concentration. Learn to enjoy it. You’ll find that this is something that you can really delight in. And you should try to notice that feeling of delight, because it’s going to play an important role later when you use concentration to develop discernment. In the meantime, you … 
  12. Potentials for Good
     … As the Buddha says, when you develop patience, equanimity, kindness, and goodwill, even though these qualities may be focused on other people and your relationship with them, your mind benefits as well. In other words, you protect other people through your patience, you protect other people through your equanimity, your goodwill and your sympathy, your kindness, and you protect yourself as well. You’re … 
  13. Virtues Bright & Neither Dark nor Bright
     … It’s a way of showing compassion, empathetic joy, equanimity—equanimity in the sense that you realize there are some things you would like to gain, but the only way you could gain them would be by taking the precepts, so you realize you have to give them up. With empathetic joy, you see other people are wealthy and you’re not wealthy, but … 
  14. The Larger View
     … This is also why we have the chant spreading goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity, extending these thoughts, these attitudes, to all beings. Because again, it helps us to see the larger picture: We’re all suffering. We all want happiness and yet we’re all doing stupid things, some more stupid than others, but all our actions are based on our desire to … 
  15. Tranquility & Insight Through Jhāna
     … States of right concentration all the way up through the dimension of nothingness are called perception attainments, and the different levels of jhāna are defined by the feeling tone—pleasure and rapture in the first jhāna, more pleasure and rapture in the second, just pleasure in the third, and equanimity in the fourth. So you’re dealing directly with these three fabrications. You get … 
  16. Furnishing Your Home for the Mind
     … You have to develop equanimity for the areas you can’t change, so that you can focus your efforts on areas where you can be of benefit. either for yourself or others. Otherwise, you keep pushing against a brick wall with nothing to show for it except the pattern of the bricks on your hands. So equanimity’s what brings wisdom into your goodwill … 
  17. Time Well Spent
     … There’s equanimity when things don’t go well—but it’s not the kind of equanimity that just gives up. It’s the kind where, if you have to make a retreat, it’s a strategic retreat, so that when things get better, conditions get better, you can continue with your work. All the perfections get developed as part of the path. Then … 
  18. Bringing Right resolve
     … If you can’t help them, you have to develop equanimity. The same for yourself: There are some areas where you can’t change the conditions of your life that are causing hardship, but you can learn how not to suffer because of it. So you develop equanimity for the conditions you can’t change, and you focus your compassion on the areas where … 
  19. Kamma & Rebirth—A Handful of Leaves
     … Finally, to counteract the effects of past bad actions, the Buddha tells you to develop a mind that’s unlimited—in other words, your goodwill and your equanimity are unlimited. You train yourself to wish for the happiness of everybody, no matter who. No matter how good they’ve been, no matter how bad they’ve been, you tell yourself you don’t want … 
  20. Bare Attention
     … He calls it equanimity. Even equanimity, here, is a fabricated state of mind. You make up your mind that you’re not going to respond to anything. You’re just going to watch. That’s a very strong intention right there. And sometimes, that’s all you need to deal with whatever is coming up. Sometimes it’s all you can do with whatever … 
  21. Subduing Greed & Distress
     … We start out the meditation with that chant—thoughts of goodwill, thoughts of compassion, thoughts of empathetic joy, thoughts of equanimity for everyone—as a way of disentangling ourselves from the narratives of the day and the narratives of our lives. Whatever anyone has done to us, we have goodwill for them. Anyone who we know is suffering right now, we have compassion. As … 
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