Search results for: "Equanimity"
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- Catch Yourself Lying to Yourself… Watching the mind doesn’t mean just watching whatever comes up and being passive or accepting or equanimous about it. It means looking for deceit, which is a different process entirely. Meditation is basically a process of catching yourself doing things that you didn’t notice you were doing, that you were ignorant of. And ignorance usually comes from two different sources. One is …
- To Delight in the Path… As for delight in developing, of course, that means delight in developing skillful qualities—things like mindfulness and alertness, based on goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity. There are lots of good qualities you can develop in the heart and mind. Then the Buddha says you try to delight in seclusion—delighting in the fact that you’re not being bombarded all the time …
- Eyes in the Back of Your Head… There’s going to be a sense of form, a feeling of pleasure or equanimity, and then the perception that keeps you there. Then there’s the running commentary. This is sankhara, fabrication, and that can exist on many levels. In the beginning of concentration, when you’re actively working through the body, it’s pretty blatant. On the more subtle levels of concentration …
- The Limits of Old Kamma… This means that when you’re accepting the situation in the present, it’s partly accepting the limitations and learning how to be equanimous about them, but also accepting that there are lots of potentials for freedom here. If you really want true happiness, you try to make the most of those. The Dhamma is not for people who want to be told they …
- Holding On to the Path… You’re left with equanimity. At the same time, your perception of the whole process changes. You begin to see the breath in the body not so much as in-and-out breathing, but as a quality of energy that fills the body. So you change your perceptions as well. In the third set, when your focus is on the mind, you sensitize yourself …
- Birth Is Suffering… in other words, resolve on goodwill or equanimity, as may be appropriate, trying to have goodwill for all, even people who are really difficult. The purpose of this is to pull you out of the different sides of conflicts in a way that’s not escapist, in a way that actually is good for the people involved in the conflict. If you can help …
- For Goodness’ Sake… generosity, virtue, renunciation, persistence, endurance, truth, determination, goodwill, and equanimity. Goodwill stands out as good-heartedness. A lot of the others, though, are types of strength, which we may not associate with a good heart, but for the heart to be truly good requires strength. If you start out with good intentions but you can’t carry them through, they don’t really mean …
- Working Hypotheses… Even if it’s just the idea that you want to stay with a broad awareness, trying to be as equanimous and non-reactive as possible, that is a choice you’re making. When you hold on to that perception, that too is an activity. Then you want to look at the results. If the results are good, stick with what you’re going …
- Customs of the Noble Ones… having a very strong sense of what you really want in life, then using the practice of concentration, using the practice of stilling the mind with a sense of ease, well-being, and ultimately equanimity, to keep you on the path, to keep you energized all along the way. When you have this kind of energy, then you can let go of all the …
- Restraint… But remember that even measureless goodwill, measureless compassion, measureless empathetic joy, measureless equanimity are forms of restraint. You develop these measureless attitudes so as to be very careful about what you do. You realize if you really have goodwill for all beings, you don’t want to harm them. That means you have to say No to any random thoughts, any random words, acts …
- Shaping Your Breath, Shaping Your Life… As the Buddha says, you train it in discernment, you train it in virtue, you train it in the unlimited (by which it means unlimited goodwill, compassion, empathetic joy, and equanimity), and you train it so that it’s not easily overcome by pleasure or pain. With that state of mind, any past bad karma, when it yields its results, is barely going to …
- Intelligence of the Heart… But this is why goodwill has to be backed up by equanimity, because you realize that a lot of people are not going to do that. Yet if you can engage with people on the assumption that your engagement could push them in that direction or inspire them in that direction, then your engagement with other people is really useful. It’s something you …
- Twigs & Branches… All about equanimity.” That’s not the case. If it’s all about anything, it’s all about nibbana. As for everything else, you use distinctions between what helps you get to nibbana and what gets in the way. So you have to fabricate the thinking. Fabricate those value judgments that will help you make distinctions and decide: “Is this heading in the right …
- The Breath All the Way… The Buddha was once advising the monks to practice breath meditation, and one of the monks said, “I already practice breath meditation.” So the Buddha asked him, “What kind of breath meditation do you practice?” The monk replied, “I put aside thoughts of the past, don’t hanker after thoughts of the future, and try to keep the mind at equanimity in the present …
- Analysis of Qualities… It’s a lot easier to come into the present moment with a sense of equanimity, with a sense of solidity, confidence that this is something you can do, and it’s something important to do. The chant we had just now on aging, illness, death, and action, is only part of the Buddha’s recommendation for how to reflect on those things. He …
- Trading Up… As you let go of these things as they seem gross, the mind reaches a state of perfect balance and equanimity, an extreme but very subtle sense of well-being. And it’s from that sense of well-being that you can look at the ways in which the mind creates its suffering for itself and you can begin to pry them away. So …
- Limitations… generosity, virtue, renunciation, discernment, persistence, endurance, truth, determination, goodwill, and equanimity. That’s the traditional list of good qualities that you can develop as you go through life in the world. You aim at developing those qualities as much as you can. As for the effect you leave behind in the world, you do your best, realizing that there will be limitations. But the …
- Why Train the Mind… We want to develop the equanimity and the equilibrium that allows us to accept the fact that both of those kinds of qualities are there in the mind. Because it’s only when you see them and admit them that you can do something about them. You begin to figure out: Why is it that, even when things are going well, the mind can …
- The Power of Truth… Then he would say first you develop this concentration with directed thought and evaluation—that’s a jhana practice—then without directed thought and evaluation, with enjoyment, with equanimity. In other words, you take it through all the four jhanas. One of the basic themes of concentration practice is just this: establishing mindfulness. There are lots of passages you can cite, showing that the …
- Things Aren’t as They Should Be… So, in that sense, the idea that things are as they should be helps you to develop an attitude of equanimity: This is what you’ve got to work with. But you don’t stop there, and this is where the idea that things are as they should be is actually very harmful. On the one hand, it seems to imply, “Well, it’s …
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