Search results for: "Equanimity"
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- Success Through Maturity… And one monk said, “Yes, I practice breath meditation.” The Buddha asked him, “What kind of breath meditation do you do?” The monk replied, “I put aside hopes and expectations for the future, thoughts about the past, and—equanimous in the present moment—I breathe in, I breathe out.” Which sounds like a lot of the meditation instructions you may get at a meditation …
- Pleasant Practice, Painful Practice… a sense for rapture when you need extra energy, a sense of equanimity when you want the energy level to calm down? You bring all these things together with the breath because these are the different ways we shape our experience. If we do* any* of them in ignorance, there’s going to be suffering. So we try to do this with knowledge and …
- Merit: Actively Happy… What that vision of happiness actually describes is equanimity, and not even a good kind of equanimity. It’s more resignation. When the Buddha talked about happiness, he talked about ultimate happiness, absolute happiness, a happiness that doesn’t change. He never said that things are outside of your control. In fact, the whole path is learning how to take control of your life …
- Goodwill as Restraint… If any aversion comes up for anybody, the Buddha says to develop equanimity. They’re all very interesting pairings: especially the equanimity for aversion. We’re usually told that goodwill is the antidote for anger. But sometimes there are cases where someone has done something and it’s really hard to feel goodwill for that person. But at the very least you can say …
- Truths of the Will… What are the perfections? Generosity, virtue, renunciation, discernment, energy, tolerance or endurance, truth, determination, goodwill, and equanimity. Sometimes when conditions are difficult, you’ve got to work on the equanimity and the endurance. Other times when opportunities are good, you have to work more on the energy, not to let good opportunities pass you by. When you keep these qualities in mind, you find …
- Right Livelihood… The Buddha himself compared the happiness, pleasure, and equanimity that come from concentration to kinds of food. His image was of a fortress at the edge of a frontier, and different qualities in the path correspond to different aspects of the fortress. There’s discernment, which is like a slippery wall that the enemy can’t climb up. Learning is like a range of …
- Goodwill for the Real World… In those cases, you’re not going to do anything to harm them, but at the same time, you have to develop an attitude of equanimity. Equanimity isn’t cold-heartedness. It’s just realizing that there are some people you cannot influence, no matter how intense your goodwill, so you have to focus your efforts on people who will respond to your goodwill …
- On the Path of the Breath… You can develop qualities of goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, or equanimity. You can think about the Buddha, the Dhamma, the Sangha. All of these are valid topics of meditation. They’re there to inspire the mind, to gladden the heart. You can think about the good times you’ve been generous in the past, when you didn’t really have to share something but …
- Pain & the Middle Way… We don’t just sit here saying, “Well, I’m just going to be equanimous about everything that comes up and patient with everything that comes up.” That can last for the amount of time your determination is strong. But the mind gets hungry. Without some sense of well-being that it can go for blatantly, it’s going to go secretly, when you …
- Past Intentions, Present Intentions… This is where equanimity is important in the meditation. Whatever’s going to come up from past intentions, you’ve got to have a lot of equanimity toward it. You don’t get excited about it, you don’t get depressed about it, you just note that it’s there and work on what you can do right now. All of this is part …
- Voices in the Mind… Another’s to try to develop thoughts of compassion; thoughts of equanimity; paying them no mind and no attention. And then reflecting on the principle of karma, that if you get involved with them it’s just going to be an endless round. Whatever they may have done to you can probably be traced back to some old karma of yours. So the reflection …
- Ānāpānasati Day… As the mind gets concentrated, it settles into equanimity. The equanimity that comes when your needs for a sense of inner well-being have been met allows you to view yourself, to view the world, with a lot more stability. Then, based on these seven qualities, you gain clear knowing and release. So it’s all there in breath meditation. Ajaan Fuang summarizes it …
- Step Outside the World… mindfulness, analysis of qualities, persistence, rapture, calm, concentration, and equanimity. Mindfulness leads you there, and then when you get to the fourth jhana—where you’ve got the last two factors for awakening—you’ve got purity of mindfulness. That’s the only place where mindfulness is really pure. At the same time, the mind is really solid. It’s firmly in its frame …
- Choices in the Present… Sometimes you develop the analyzing side that goes along with wisdom and discernment; at other times, you develop the calmer side that goes along with concentration, equanimity, serenity. So you to have lots of options here in the present moment. You’re not just stuck with whatever comes up. You realize that in this field of seeds here you have lots of different kinds …
- Joy in Getting It Right… Equanimity not of the flesh—the equanimity that comes when getting into fourth jhana—is also something you have to develop. As for the mind states, they’re usually paired—concentrated, unconcentrated; released, unreleased—the implication being, if you think of the duties of the four noble truths, that if an unskillful mind state is there, you want to switch it over to its …
- Friends with Pain… Then you follow them up with thoughts of equanimity, reflecting on the truth that we all are heir to our actions. The things we experience in life are due to our actions. These thoughts serve several purposes. One is to remind you that no matter how much you may want other people to be happy, there are cases where because of their past actions …
- Inner Discontent… He doesn’t tell you to accept everything with equanimity or just let it be. A sense of contentment, a sense of equanimity works in some cases, but not all. Admittedly, an important part of the practice is learning to gain a sense of when you can just let things be, either because you don’t want to get involved with them at all …
- The Desire for Things to Be Different… The first two ajaans, who were senior to Ajaan Chah, basically said, “Practice equanimity.” But Ajaan Chah said, “Well, equanimity is useful, but you have to apply wisdom at the same time.” So you don’t just let go, let go, leaving things as they are. Have some good sense about what you should let go and leave alone, and what you really have …
- Delight… You can’t just tell yourself, “Well, the Buddha teaches us to be equanimous about all things, so try to clone that equanimous attitude about your defilements, too.” That doesn’t give you much strength. The desire to stick with the path needs to be nourished. You need to learn how to talk to yourself about what a good path this is. Ultimately, it …
- The Wheel of Dhamma… You hear descriptions of the awakened mind and you think, “Okay, it’s equanimous and patient. I’ll will be equanimous and patient, and not try to strive, not to strive for anything, because the awakened mind doesn’t strive.” But the reason the awakened mind doesn’t strive is because it’s already arrived at where it wants to go. As long as …
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