Thanissaro Bhikkhu on Equanimity

"When other people do good, you can see it as a sign that there are people in this world who do good. You get some energy from that. Otherwise, if all you can see are other people’s drawbacks, your own goodness gets stale and shriveled. You have to see their good points as well. When you can notice them, that’s energy for you. Don’t be jealous of them. They’ve got some good — sometimes they’ve got some good better than you have. Well, here’s your chance to see a good example. When other people act in ways that are really bad, you can remind yourself, “Okay, this is what bad actions look like from outside. Maybe I’ve got some actions just like that.” So regardless of what other people do, you’ve got to learn how to think in ways that help liberate your mind from being a slave to their actions or making your moods depend on their actions. You have to learn how to develop the right mood to practice, to energize yourself to practice, so you need for your motivation to come...

"Most of us spend our lives feeding off our moods, looking for happy moods because those are the fun ones to feed on. But once you’ve put the mind in a position of feeding off its moods, you find that it’s got a lot of other things to feed on as well, such as depression or sorrow. Once you create that kind of mouth and stomach for the mind, hoping to feed off the good moods, it’s open to take in the sad moods as well. This happens in your daily life and in your meditation, too. The reason we keep doing this is because we feel that moods at least create the spice of life. If the mind didn’t have moods, we’d feel like we were robots. The idea of a mind without moods sounds like oatmeal nothing added to it, i.e. pretty miserable, pretty dull. But stop and think about the dangers of our moods. They can induce us to do all kinds of unskillful things. If we get really depressed, we get apathetic. Nothing seems to matter — you lose any sense of concern for the results of you...

"When other people do good, you can see it as a sign that there are people in this world who do good. You get some energy from that. Otherwise, if all you can see are other people’s drawbacks, your own goodness gets stale and shriveled. You have to see their good points as well. When you can notice them, that’s energy for you. Don’t be jealous of them. They’ve got some good — sometimes they’ve got some good better than you have. Well, here’s your chance to see a good example. When other people act in ways that are really bad, you can remind yourself, “Okay, this is what bad actions look like from outside. Maybe I’ve got some actions just like that.” So regardless of what other people do, you’ve got to learn how to think in ways that help liberate your mind from being a slave to their actions or making your moods depend on their actions. You have to learn how to develop the right mood to practice, to energize yourself to practice, so you need for your motivation to come from within...

"Most of us spend our lives feeding off our moods, looking for happy moods because those are the fun ones to feed on. But once you’ve put the mind in a position of feeding off its moods, you find that it’s got a lot of other things to feed on as well, such as depression or sorrow. Once you create that kind of mouth and stomach for the mind, hoping to feed off the good moods, it’s open to take in the sad moods as well. This happens in your daily life and in your meditation, too. The reason we keep doing this is because we feel that moods at least create the spice of life. If the mind didn’t have moods, we’d feel like we were robots. The idea of a mind without moods sounds like oatmeal nothing added to it, i.e. pretty miserable, pretty dull. But stop and think about the dangers of our moods. They can induce us to do all kinds of unskillful things. If we get really depressed, we get apathetic. Nothing seems to matter — you lose any sense of concern for the results of your actions. Wh...