Search results for: "Equanimity"

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  2. Stupid about Pleasure
     … Simply because you can sit here and be very blissful, very equanimous, doesn’t mean that you’re going to see the connections between unskillful pleasures and their negative consequences. That insight requires an act of determination. You really have to be heedful to remind yourself that these issues are either/or. You have to work at developing the strength and determination of discernment … 
  3. Mindfulness of Breathing: Four in One
     … There are all these parts, but they all come together right here at the breath—the feelings of pleasure that come from being attentive to the breath, the mind state that’s alert and mindful of the breath, and the mental quality of watching breath, feelings, and mind with equanimity. What this means is that you’re trying to take 16 and make them … 
  4. In Alignment
     … And then you’re being equanimous about what comes up, which gives you the mental quality you’re looking for. So all four frames of reference are right here. But the breath is the anchor to help keep the other things from drifting away. In this way, you bring things into alignment. You can keep them in alignment as the mind shudders and wobbles … 
  5. Protection for the Holidays
     … Some forms of equanimity should be pursued and others should not. Remember that our feelings are not handed to us ready-made. As the Buddha said, there’s an element of fabrication in terms of which feelings you’re going to focus on, and which ones you’re going to ignore. When you focus on certain potentials, you actually turn them into full-fledged … 
  6. Meaning & Happiness
     … Discernment, endurance, effort, truthfulness, determination good-will, equanimity: These are all good qualities to develop inside. And a life devoted to developing them is a meaningful life. It heads some place. A life devoted to relationships just ends with death or separation. But a life devoted to the perfections leaves you with the perfections you’ve developed. You carry those over to the next … 
  7. Food for Endurance
     … Right concentration is always defined by the feeling tone—either rapture and pleasure, or just pleasure on its own, or equanimity—all of which are good feelings that you can give rise to from within, totally independent of anything outside. That’s how you make the most of your inner resources. There’s an incident in Thai history where a neighboring country came in … 
  8. The Missing Truth
     … mindfulness, your analysis of what’s going on in the present moment, your persistence, a sense of rapture, calm, concentration, equanimity. Those are things you try to give rise to when they’re not there. When they are there, you try to maintain them. This is how all four of the establishings of mindfulness work together. As you develop them, then this really becomes … 
  9. A Frame for the Day
     … This is why equanimity is also one of the topics of the brahmaviharas: learning how not to get worked up about things you can’t change. This is another good thing to think about. As for mental fabrications, those are perceptions and feelings. Start with the perception of which of your belongings are valuable, and which ones not. You’ve got to hold those … 
  10. Recollecting the Buddha
     … He notices that we tend to live in household pleasure, household pain, household equanimity. We get things we like and we’re happy. That’s household pleasure. We get things we don’t like and we’re unhappy. That’s household pain. We decide to be neutral about things, and we can do that for a while, but then we go back to being … 
  11. At Home in Your Own Skin
     … It’s easier to have genuine feelings of goodwill for the other person and it’s easier also to develop equanimity when that’s the skillful choice, the skillful response. This is why meditating is not a selfish act. It puts you in a position where you can be more skillful both in your inside worlds and in your outside worlds. And it gives … 
  12. Building Character
     … There’s the list of the perfections—generosity, virtue, renunciation, discernment, persistence, endurance—all those good Capricorn virtues; truth, determination, goodwill, equanimity. As Ajaan Fuang liked to say, when the Buddha was born in all his many lifetimes up until he became a Buddha, he was born for the sake of mastering these perfections. The list of good spiritual materialism in the suttas is … 
  13. Stop Weaving
     … This is why equanimity is such an important skill to develop. Good things come, bad things come: Learn to keep the mind on an even keel so that you can see how they come and then see how they go. Watching them coming and going, you begin to realize you don’t have to burden yourself down with them. You don’t have to … 
  14. Delight in the Dhamma
     … Does the Buddha want us to have a totally equanimous blank emotional state? The answer is, “No.” He actually recommends six kinds of delight on the path—and not just for the path. He says these kinds of delight can take you all the way to the ending of the effluents. There are passages that talk about where the Buddha himself delights in some … 
  15. At Home in Jhana
     … You can add the second jhana, the third jhāna, and the fourth jhana, so that it becomes a spacious home, especially when you take equanimity of the fourth jhana and apply it to the dimensions of infinite space or infinite consciousness. It’s an enormous home. But everything you need is right here. It’s simply a matter of taking the time and developing … 
  16. The Gift of Discernment
    When we think of the Buddha’s compassion, the first teaching that comes to mind is often the brahmaviharas, in which he teaches us to develop goodwill for all beings, compassion for all who are suffering, empathetic joy for all who are happy, and equanimity so that these other three qualities don’t cause us to suffer from all the suffering in the world … 
  17. Fear of the Truth
     … the fact that you are capable of doing these things; you are capable of being more mindful, more concentrated, gaining more discernment, developing more patience, more equanimity, more compassion for others. Sometimes this confidence is hard to gain. It takes a while. But as you keep chipping away, chipping away, you find that your confidence becomes confirmed, verified. And yes, this does work. You … 
  18. How to Really Depend on Yourself
     … Then develop some equanimity around the issues of the day so that you can settle down with the breath. Or you can contemplate the inconstancy of the distractions that would pull you away from the breath. You can contemplate the fact that they’re not under your control, they’re not really yours. You don’t have to identify with them. Sometimes it’s … 
  19. The Mind’s Ostinato
     … As he saw it, it was just a moment of great equanimity. But passing away, what happened there, he had no idea. It didn’t make any sense. The idea that the Buddha would have passed away into something unconditioned made no sense to him, because he said, “After all, human beings are conditioned realities. We’re biological creatures.” So I had a conversation … 
  20. Patience & Curiosity
     … So the Buddha taught Rahula patience, endurance, equanimity, as a basic prerequisite for then working with the breath. Working with the breath wasn’t just a matter of accepting what’s already there. Some of the steps of breath meditation require that you sit and watch, and others require that you actively interfere, that you play around with the breath, do things with the … 
  21. You Can’t Eat the Buddha
     … That’s where you have to develop equanimity. You don’t grasp onto them saying, “Please stay here and suffer so I can feel good about being compassionate.” That’s just another way of saying, “Even though it hurts you to stay, please be here for me when I need you.” The Buddha’s final nibbana was the opposite of that, and it was … 
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