Thanissaro Bhikkhu on Equanimity

"When we come to the meditation, the Buddha says that when there’s householder distress, you should try to cure it with renunciate distress. That’s a step a lot of us would like to skip. Renunciate distress there is realizing that there is a goal that other people have attained, it is possible, but you’re not there yet, and you think about all that needs to be done. Some people find this so discouraging that they aim for equanimity as something halfway between householder and renunciate joy, but they’re actually going back to householder equanimity. They comfort themselves with the idea that “Maybe there’s nothing to attain” or “If I try to have an attainment, I’m creating suffering and stress for myself right now. I’m getting upset over something I can’t see, so I might as well learn how to accept the way things are.” They try to anesthetize themselves to the distress, and end up with a very calm state, but again, it isn’t solidly based. It needs constant shoring up. You see th...

"In another sutta — Majjhima 137 — the Buddha talks about different ways of relating to pain, pleasure, and equanimity. There’s the pain, pleasure, and equanimity of a householder on the one side, and the pain, pleasure, and equanimity of a renunciate on the other. The pain of a householder is not getting what you want in terms of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, tactile sensations, and mental events. That’s householder pain. The pleasure of a householder is getting what you want in terms of the six senses. The equanimity of a householder is being determined that your mind will not be affected by any of the input of the six senses. Now, for most of us when we encounter householder pain, we try to find householder pleasures. But the Buddha said that a more skillful way of dealing with householder pain when you meet with it, is to go for renunciate pain, which is what I mentioned before: the desire to reach the goal, which at the moment is painful because you’re not there yet. The sa...

"I have a student back East who’s on the autistic spectrum. She told me one time she could never understand why Dhamma teachers like to extol equanimity as the goal of the practice. As she said, she’s pretty equanimous all the time, and it’s not much of a goal. And the Buddha himself never said that it was the goal. It’s the last of the factors for awakening, and that’s led some people to think that that’s what the factors for awakening are aimed at. But all the factors are parts of the path. They’re meant to lead to something better than they are. They’re all means to an end. They’re tools for arriving at the ultimate happiness. There’s no place where the Buddha says nibbana is the ultimate equanimity. It’s always “the ultimate happiness.” So the question is: What role does equanimity play on the path? The first thing to notice is that sometimes it’s regarded as skillful and sometimes it’s not. When it makes you lazy, it’s not part of the path." ~ Thanissaro Bhi...

"Two points about limitless equanimity: 1) When skillful, it’s not a generalized indifference to everything. Instead, it’s meant to focus your efforts on areas that will pay off in terms of true happiness. 2) It’s not the goal. Instead, it’s a useful emotion to develop on the way to something much higher and more satisfying." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Meditation in Practice"

"Someone once asked Ajaan Fuang what kind of food he liked. And his answer was, “The food in front of me.” And that’s the attitude you’ve got to take toward your meditation. What kind of breath do you like? Well, learn to like the breath in front of you. What kind of meditation do you like? Learn to like the meditation you’re doing right now. Don’t worry about what yesterday’s meditation was like, whether it was better than today’s or worse or whatever. It’s gone, it’s past. You want to be on good terms with what you’ve got right here. That’s the essence of the meditation, learning how to relate to what’s right here right now in such a way that you’re causing yourself the least suffering and actually working toward a stable happiness. Even though a good part of the practice is aimed at the future — there is a goal at the end of the path, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise — but a large part of that goal there in the future lies in learning how to relate well to what you’ve got ...

"Equanimity is not the goal. We’re not here just to be equanimous about things, because there’s a sense of powerlessness in equanimity. You realize that there are things you simply cannot change as long as you’re in this world dealing with other people. They may decide they want to go to war. What are you going to do? You can protest, but what if they decide they’re not going to listen to the protests? What if they mow the protesters down? People do unskillful things all over the world all the time. This is the world we’re born into — and this is one of the relatively good ones. So equanimity cannot be the goal. But the fact that the reflection on equanimity is also the same as the reflection that leads to a motivation to want to practice the path, shows that when the Buddha teaches us equanimity, it’s not just a general indifference. When you have equanimity for all beings, it’s not just saying, “Well, who cares?” It’s more to focus you. There are a lot of things you cannot chan...

"We’re here to arrive at the ultimate happiness. Equanimity, as part of the path, helps get you there. But it’s not the whole path, and it’s not the essence of where we want to go. Always keep these points in mind so that you can develop the skillful kind of equanimity that helps you. Stay away from the unskillful kinds: the kinds that are lazy or defeatist or — in Ajaan Fuang’s terminology — the small-hearted equanimity that just gets depressed and gives up. Those are not the equanimities that the Buddha was teaching. He was teaching large-hearted equanimity, in Ajaan Fuang’s phrase, that has space for the effort that needs to be put into the practice. And happiness is going to result, both along the way and when you arrive at the goal." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Equanimity as a Skill" (Meditations10)

"Two points about limitless equanimity: 1) When skillful, it’s not a generalized indifference to everything. Instead, it’s meant to focus your efforts on areas that will pay off in terms of true happiness. 2) It’s not the goal. Instead, it’s a useful emotion to develop on the way to something much higher and more satisfying." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Meditation in Practice"

"The Buddha never told us just to sit there and accept things. You accept the way things function in terms of your actions and then you train the mind to use that principle of cause and effect to create a path. The equanimity is part of that path, but it’s not the whole path — and it’s not the goal. Recently I heard of a monk trained in the forest tradition saying that equanimity was the goal and we’re here to arrive at right view, accepting the fact that everything is inconstant, arises and passes away, and just be okay with that — which is appalling. The Buddha never taught that, nor did the great ajaans. His images, their images, for people on the path are never images of people who just sit back and accept. They’re people who are searching, people who are engaged in a battle, people who are trying to develop skills. Now, equanimity has a role in developing a skill. It has a role in battles. It has a role in searches. In other words, you look and look and look and when you don’...

"I have a student back East who’s on the autistic spectrum. She told me one time she could never understand why Dhamma teachers like to extol equanimity as the goal of the practice. As she said, she’s pretty equanimous all the time, and it’s not much of a goal. And the Buddha himself never said that it was the goal. It’s the last of the factors for awakening, and that’s led some people to think that that’s what the factors for awakening are aimed at. But all the factors are parts of the path. They’re meant to lead to something better than they are. They’re all means to an end. They’re tools for arriving at the ultimate happiness. There’s no place where the Buddha says nibbana is the ultimate equanimity. It’s always “the ultimate happiness.” So the question is: What role does equanimity play on the path? The first thing to notice is that sometimes it’s regarded as skillful and sometimes it’s not. When it makes you lazy, it’s not part of the path." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Eq...