Equanimity is balance everywhere
“Equanimity is Balance everywhere. Balance with the force of wisdom being included in a compassionate effort” Sharon Salzberg
This month we explored Richard Freeman and Mary Taylor’s book Feeling Happy: The Yoga of Body, Heart, and Mind. We shared practices and contemplations geared to remind us that real happiness lies deep within and remains untouched by the external experience of life. A difficult concept to grasp but an essential one in the path of Yoga.
In the Bhagavad Gita Krishna tells Arjuna that he is not merely this body, that there is something beyond the body that transcends suffering. In the Yoga Sutras Patanjali tells us that real happiness lies in mastering one’s mind. What do these two things really mean? It’s easy to superficially grasp these concepts but to become intimate with them as the light on the path to liberation from suffering, that is the real practice.
You may find yourself wondering how Asana fits into all this?
Well we have a body, and this is a great blessing. In this philosophy of Yoga, the body is the vessel, the tool we have at our disposal to reach liberation from suffering. Through the body, and the mind we come to know the truth of who we are, this is a journey that requires a lot of presence and willingness of introspection, self observation and discipline. We do this in steps. The first step is we must learn to take care of the body. In the yogic tradition the body is made up of many sheaths or layers, at the core of it is the subtle forces known as prana. Prana is often described as the winds of the body, though it is the life force, it is at the core of all things that are. It moves, it has specific functions and directions. When these winds get obstructed dis-ease happens. disease can manifest in the emotional, mental or physical body. Asana with awareness on breath(pranayama) is the tool we have to rid the body of obstruction by bringing alignment, harmony, circulation and most importantly giving us the awareness of body by feeling into it’s messages - embodied experience. Once the body is steady, things within it fluid and in harmony Asana with PRANAYAMA begins to have an impact on the nervous system. In Sharon’s words ‘Equanimity is balance everywhere’, when the body is settled we respond to the external world from a place of ease. The nervous system and the fluid state of the body are directly related to our breath. The relationship goes both ways, but as things become un-obstructed in the body the breath becomes spacious, our awareness of it becomes sharpened. This leads to the the effect of Asana with PRANAYAMA on the mind. When we are aware of our our bodies in space, rooted to the earth and to life around us, of the breath coming and going as life happens, we suddenly have options. We can choose to pause before reacting to what is in front of us. We can choose to act or refrain from action if we can remember our feet rooted to the earth, our breath rooted to our bodies and to the prana of all of life. We remember we are not alone, we are interconnected to all of life. We remember we are not separate. With this kind of spaciousness - equanimity - we can choose to remain witness to what is happening in the moment without getting emotionally entangled in it, without creating personal stories.
Remaining objective in the midst of challenge aware that you have a body, tethered to the earth, that you have a mind that generates story lines and a breath that can help to remain rooted in the body is the great gift of Yoga. When mastered this can lead to liberation from suffering. When we wake up to this, we have a choice. Like Arjuna on the battlefield, we can choose from an embodied state how we want to live out our dharma, our duty in this world. What skillful action can I take next?
In the words on Richard Freeman and Mary Taylor:
The ability to notice, track, and consciously respond, rather than unconsciously react, to suffering is a powerful form of mindfulness practice. It calls on an integrated embodied experience, in which the mind is clear and both the visceral and intuitive sense of the experience is seamlessly interwoven into the mental alertness.”
“When you are absorbed by your story of who you think you are and where you think you are going, you can’t find your way to the here and now. meditation helps you train your mind. Training your mind leads to clarity. Clear thinking sees through illusions that stop you from feeling happy”
From Feeling happy