Day 13: Equanimity

Welcome to 40 Days of Mindfulness and Compassion Day 13!

 

Lecture

Yesterday we looked at the flavor of experience, which is sort of the background that is occurring beneath our experiences. This flavor can result in us being attracted, repulsed or indifferent to what is going on. And much of what is “going on” in our daily activities has to do with relationships. Our identities were formed at a young age via significant relationships and we continue to find meaning and identity in terms of relationships. In today’s practice we take relationships as the object of meditation.

In a very structured way, we begin to cultivate even-mindedness in the context of human relationships. In recent days we explored how experience is flavored and how we can observe and note our own experiences, thus becoming more mindful. Today we extend this work to the area of relationships.

The push and pull that underlies our perceptions and interpretations of the world is very much alive in our perceptions of others. This is an important and foundational practice and will be integral to much of the remaining 40 days.  I will have much more to say about this as we explore compassion in the upcoming weeks, but for now I will point toward the biased nature of much of our experience of others.

Our filtered perceptions of others are not value-neutral. We see others largely through the lenses of our biases, and importantly, such mis-representations result in emotional and cognitive responses. Another way of looking at is to say that we put others “into boxes” and we have differing emotional reactions depending what box a person or group of persons is in (according to our own internal projected framework).

For instance, suppose someone is injured or harmed in some way. If it is someone who is close to us or with him we identify, the response, which emerges, might be compassion. However, if it is someone we do not like or we associate with an undesirable group, the response might have a tinge of enjoyment or righteous retribution imbedded in it.  On the other hand, the response might be pity is it is someone that we feel affection for but see as lesser than our self. Or, we might even feel disgust if we feel that they are lesser and we lack affection.

The main point is that we often experience the world through the filter of ingrained and very subtle biases. And importantly, these biases are not value-neutral. The good news is that via mindfulness practice we can gain more insight into this process. I like to call it “softening the edges.” This is a relatively easy, but transformative practice, and one that can easily be integrated into daily life.

 

Meditation Tips

Meditation Tip #15: In meditations in which you are asked to reflect, an attitude of gentleness and looseness is very important. If you can, also bring a mindset of curiosity to the practice. Let go of any expectations and simply allow your mind to reflect on the statement or question that is given. Do not seek answers. Just mindfully be with the reflections.

 

 Meditation

 Day 13: Equanimity

  

Self-Reflective Activity

Practice reciting “just like me” in your mind throughout the day as you interact with others.

 

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