In our Buddhist practice, we often talk about cultivating the four Immeasurable Virtues – Loving-kindness, Compassion, Sympathetic Joy, and Equanimity. Together, these qualities help us open up, connect with others more deeply, and enjoy our lives more fully. Sometimes the virtue of Equanimity gets a little misunderstood or even underrated, but it’s through Equanimity practice that we cultivate balance, calmness and steadiness in ourselves. It’s our sense of emotional stability and inner peace that helps us face challenges, stresses, anxiety and difficulties.
I think Equanimity is deeply connected to Spaciousness – our ability to be the space for whatever comes into our lives. More about that in a minute. Spaciousness is a sense of ease and openness that helps us respond skillfully, stay curious, be generous and feel grateful.
Those things are really important when we face challenges, loss, and hardships because our natural response is to contract, to get tight and small and hard. Suffering is the result of wanting our situation to be different than it is, so when something difficult happens, we resist, we push away or close off. This could manifest in many ways. It might feel like you can’t breathe, it might feel physically tight or hot or stuck. We might indulge in distractions, and they might not be healthy for us, but we do it so that we don’t have to be where we are. None of those things are helpful, and none of them change our circumstances.
It makes sense that Spaciousness is ease and freedom. There’s room, and we can meet our life right where we are without needing it to be different. For that reason, Equanimity is not cold, aloof or disinterested. It’s steady, rooted, and centered in our own wisdom, and our own faith and confidence. Our meditation practices can help us cultivate Spaciousness and a sense of Equanimity so that we’re less likely to close up and push away, and we’re more able to stay present and mindful and engaged. Come what may.
PRACTICE
Settle in your posture. Stable base. Relax your shoulders and hands. Close your eyes. Take a few slow, mindful breaths… full inhalation, pause for a moment, and long slow exhalation. Allow your breathing to settle into a natural rhythm, no need to make it special. Just let the body breathe itself.
May we feel balanced and peaceful in this moment.
May we feel the benefit of a mind that is calm and at ease.
Thoughts arise and pass away. There’s no need to get involved with them.
Feel yourself in your seat. Feel yourself in this space. You might notice sensations in your body, warmth or coolness, tingling, tightness, an itch. There’s no need to do anything. Just stay. Just breathe.
Let the breath move like a breeze. We rest in this spacious, open awareness.
Sounds come and go. Thoughts and feelings come and go.
Like clouds drifting through a wide sky.
There’s nothing to cling to, and nothing to push away.
May we feel balanced and peaceful in this moment.
May we feel the benefit of a quiet mind.
Knowing that nothing is permanent or lasting, may we rest in the understanding that all things arise and pass away.
Images come and go. Memories come and go. Plans for the future are not necessary in this moment. May we be settled and grounded in this moment.
It may be that unpleasant thoughts arise. Anger, regret, grief, guilt, sadness. Notice how your body feels, where you notice the sensation. Breathing in and breathing out, feel the sense of spaciousness you naturally have. Unpleasant feelings and emotions also arise and pass away. There’s nothing to resist or fight in this moment. Nothing to cling to in this moment.
We rest in the understanding that all things arise and pass away.
We feel the benefit of a mind that is calm and at ease.
We rest with a quiet mind and a peaceful heart.
Let the breath move like a breeze. We rest in this spacious, open awareness.
MEDITATION: AWARENESS OF SOUNDS
Settle in your posture. Stable base. Relax your shoulders and hands. Close your eyes.
Take a few slow, mindful breaths to further settle into your seat.
Let your breathing be natural, there’s no need to follow it or focus on it right now.
Relax your mind. Enjoy the ease of sitting and breathing.
As we’re breathing and settling into quiet, see if you can notice sounds. There’s no need to listen intently. Just notice what you hear.
Rather than thinking about them, narrating, judging or labeling them, simply let sounds come into your awareness and move through it or move around in the space of your awareness.
Some sounds arise, last for a bit or a moment, and then pass away.
Other sounds last longer, maybe in the background. They too arise and eventually cease.
Each sound is a little lesson in impermanence. Here and then gone.
There’s nothing to cling to and nothing push away. There is just our awareness, in this present moment, and the next moment and the next.
Do you catch yourself thinking, lost in thought? Where did the sounds go when we’re thinking? Where did awareness go?
Let go of thinking. Come back to your own gentle open awareness. Sounds move easily in and out of your mind.
Only sounds.
No clinging.
No pushing away.
No judgments or labels.
Just this. Just this. Just this.
This teaching was given by Ven. Shim'min at our Spring Retreat, April 12, 2025