The Essentiality of Equanimity

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The Essentiality of Equanimity How to Balance Your Emotions In our pursuit of higher ambition we are constantly juggling between dichotomies - success and failure, attachment and aversion, hope and despair, happiness and misery. The State of EquanimityIn our day-to-day struggle for existence we are led to confront these dualities of life which narrow our perspectives to one of the two limiting states: success or failure, happiness or misery etc., but there could be a situation when the two are balanced. In such a condition, one has neither the feeling of attachment with success and the resulting feeling of hope and joy, nor that of aversion to failure and the

opposed feeling of despair and misery. That is the state of equanimity in activities, speech or thoughts.Scientific AnalogyThe concept of equanimity corresponds to the "(dynamic) state of equilibrium" used in physical sciences, when the tendency for change in opposed directions is nearly balanced. Also, in thermodynamics, if the system in changing from one state to another the output of work gets minimized then it is far from the equilibrium condition. Extending the simile, state of equanimity is best suited for achieving optimum success in any objective by an aspirant on the path of spirituality. Theological Analogy The Bhagavad Gita explains the principle of equanimity thus: "Attachment and aversion by sense organs for respective objects are natural; let no one come under their sway; they are his foes…notions of heat and cold, of pain and pleasure have a beginning and an end, are impermanent in nature…bear them patiently…be contented with whatever comes without effort, remain unaffected by pairs of opposites". It also says that the serene minded person alone, to whom dualities do not disturb, is easily set free from bondage of samsara (world / cycle of rebirth) and attain moksha (salvation). Literary AnalogyThis is precisely

what Samuel Taylor Coleridge upholds in his Biographia Literaria where he talks of the "reconciliation of opposites" to reach a state of heightened sense perception or imagination that creates sublime poetry. Even Abraham Lincoln had emphasized the need of equanimity during the Civil War where the outcome was uncertain: "Let us have faith that right makes might and in that faith let us do our duty as we understand it". William Wordsworth, the romantic poet has said in Tintern Abbey that when "the breath of this corporeal frame" and "the motion of our human blood" are suspended, "…we are laid asleep / In body, and become a living soul:While with an eye made quiet by the powerOf harmony, and the deep power of joy,We see into the life of things." The Three Gates to

HellMotivated by desire to succeed we toss ourselves into the storm of materialistic world. Success makes us happy and may lead to yet another vaulting desire, which ultimately may breed greed in us. But, conversely, all our efforts may amount to a colossal failure. Then the intense feeling of despair leads to anger. No wonder, the Bhagavad Gita (16.21) names desire, greed and anger, as "the three gates to hell". Equanimity leads to NirvanaEquanimity as a spiritual state can be gained by yoga and meditation. A person who believes in karma or duty may practice equanimity in his karma with evenness of mind, nonchalant about the karma-phal or outcome. A gyani or a wise person, pitches his wisdom in firmness detached from all emotions. Such a "knower of self" is a samdarsi or one who finds

everyone equal, who envisions the supreme Self in all beings and all beings in the Self. A dhyan yogi (one on the path of meditation), for whom Supreme is the object of realization, holds pleasures and pain in the same balance. For a bhakti yogi (one on the path of devotion) equanimity is attained through his compassion towards all and in his removing himself from all duality. Thus the undeluded reach the eternal abode, the freedom from worldly bondage, the nirvana. With Love, Sree

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