When you learn how to suffer, you suffer much less.
— Thích Nhất Hạnh
*****
To cultivate equanimity we practice catching ourselves when we feel attraction or aversion, before it hardens into grasping or negativity.
— Pema Chödrön
*****
The near enemy of equanimity is indifference or callousness. We may appear serene if we say, “I’m not attached. It doesn’t matter what happens anyway, because it’s all transitory.” We feel a certain peaceful relief because we withdraw from experience and from the energies of life. But indifference is based on fear. True equanimity is not a withdrawal; it is a balanced engagement with all aspects of life. It is opening to the whole of life with composure and ease of mind, accepting the beautiful and terrifying nature of all things. Equanimity embraces the loved and the unloved, the agreeable and the disagreeable, the pleasure and pain. It eliminates clinging and aversion.
— Jack Kornfield
*****
Give me the serenity to accept
the things that cannot be changed,
the courage to change the things
which can be changed,
and the wisdom to distinguish
one from the other.
Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
accepting hardship as a pathway to peace.
— Reinhold Niebuhr, Serenity Prayer
the things that cannot be changed,
the courage to change the things
which can be changed,
and the wisdom to distinguish
one from the other.
Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
accepting hardship as a pathway to peace.
— Reinhold Niebuhr, Serenity Prayer
*****
Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word 'happy' would loose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. It is far better to take things as they come along with patience and equanimity.
— Carl Jung
*****
Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are incapable of forming such opinions.
— Albert Einstein
*****
There are two types of seeds in the mind: those that create anger, fear, frustration, jealousy, hatred and those that create love, compassion, equanimity and joy. Spirituality is germination and sprouting of the second group and transforming the first group.
— Amit Ray
*****
There often seems to be a playfulness to wise people, as if either their equanimity has as its source this playfulness or the playfulness flows from the equanimity; and they can persuade other people who are in a state of agitation to calm down and manage a smile.
— Edward Hoagland
*****
Gratitude, not understanding, is the secret to joy and equanimity.
— Anne Lamott
*****
If you go deeper and deeper into your own heart, you'll be living in a world with less fear, isolation, and loneliness.
— Sharon Salzberg
*****
And more from Sharon Salzberg to reflect and meditate on:
- All beings are the owners of their karma. Their happiness and unhappiness depend upon their actions, not upon my wishes for them.
- May we all accept things as they are.
- May we be undisturbed by the comings and goings of events.
- I will care for you but cannot keep you from suffering.
- I wish you happiness but cannot make your choices for you.
*****
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