Tara Brach - Part 2: A Heart that is Ready for Anything - The Gateway of Equanimity

Episode Date: December 12, 2024

In a world where the pace and magnitude of change is beyond anything ever experienced by humans, we are being called to cultivate the qualities of calm, inner balance and a steady, wise heart. These two talks look at the conditioning that fuels our emotional reactivity, and the practices that cultivate equanimity, resilience and a full, openhearted presence. We dedicate to these practices for the sake of our own freedom, and the wellbeing of all beings.

Greetings. We offer these podcasts freely, and your support really makes a difference. To make a donation, please visit tarabrock.com. Amosay, welcome. Thank you for being here. I'd like to begin with one of my favorite stories. It's about a couple who are from the Northwest, and they decide to go to Florida to thought out during particularly icy winter, and they planned to stay at the same hotel where they spent their honeymoon 20 years earlier. And because of their hectic schedules, it was decided that the husband would leave day earlier. And he flew to Florida on Thursday, and his wife's going to fly down on Friday. So he goes down there and he checks into the hotel and he decides to send an email to her.

And accidentally he leaves out a letter in her email address. and then just sends it without realizing the error. Meanwhile, somewhere in Houston, a widow just returned home from her husband's funeral, and he was a minister who was called home to glory, you know, following a heart attack. So the widow decided to check her e-mail since she was expecting messages from relatives and friends. And after reading the first message, she screamed and she fainted. So her son rushes into the room, finds his mother lying on the floor and he saw the computer screen, and this is what was on it. The email subject line said, too, my loving wife, and the subject said, I've arrived.

I know you're surprised to hear from me so soon. It was a quick trip. I've just arrived and been checked in. I see that everything has been prepared for your arrival tomorrow. Looking forward to seeing you then. I hope you're... journey is as uneventful as mind was. P.S. sure is hot down here. We spend so many moments living in a emotional reaction to our ideas about the world, about what's happening. And they might or might not be a useful reflection of what's real. Most of our thoughts are fear-driven, and they keep us worried. I mean, you might consider how much your mood and your views are shaped by what comes

through on social media, text, emails, what comes through on the news. I mean, it's designed to arouse anger, fear, our wanting. You know, there are algorithms we know this that are designed to manipulate our attention. so our attention gets more hooked by stuff that gets us emotionally charged up. In our current world, the speed of our world, the actual pace of change, the fire hose of information, it's increasingly difficult to calm down, to quiet our limbic brain, you know, to come into open-hearted presence. The writer, Andy Lamott, says almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.

We need to unplug from devices, but also from that reactive cycling in our body mind that keeps us leaning ahead and tensing against what's around the corner. So today's reflection, and this is really a part two, is on culturalizing. cultivating equanimity, which is a spacious, non-reactive, open presence. I've been describing it in the term, a heart that's ready for anything, which comes from a Buddhist master. It's a description of a heart that is ready for whatever and therefore allows us to be fully here in this moment, loving, creative. So by way of a brief recap in case you missed last week, the Buddhists describe the divine abodes, the places of homecoming,

in terms of loving kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity. So equanimity is the fourth of them. And as you explore these abodes, these dwelling places of the divine, What becomes clear is that equanimity, that openness, that spacious presence actually is what makes the other expressions of love possible. So equanimity is our nervous system when our limbic brain is not activated. It's parasympathetic nervous system is on, which correlates with feeling nourished and relaxed and having an open focus of attention. And as we know, we spend the major swaths of our life to different degrees activated, where our system is tense, where our tensions more narrow and fixated.

So both Buddhist psychology and Western psychology describe the basic process of activation, that life is this continuous kind of flow of pleasant and unpleasant experiences. And when there's pleasure, let's say we have a pleasant taste, there is, comes with that, is this wanting to hold on to the pleasantness, to have more, there's grasping. And then when there's unpleasantness, say the bad feelings that come when somebody criticizes us, there's a desire to push away, to get back at somebody. We want to resist and not feel that. So unpleasantness brings up fight, flight, freeze. In the moments we're reactive, let's say we're feeling angry.

We feed the anger with stories to justify our anger. Let's say we're fearful. We feed the stories of what's going to go wrong. Let's say there's craving for a drink of alcohol. we might say to ourselves, well, I'll feel better if I just have one. One won't hurt. So this means that rather than mindful presence with the feelings that come up, unpleasantness and unpleasantness, rather than mindful presence, we stay caught in the emotional reactivity. The stories feed it. And often, if we start to investigate, there are really stories that are designed

to protect us from feeling wrong or bad. Some years ago, I came across this, this is a description of how people respond to accidents on their insurance forms because there's a question saying, what's the reason for the accident? And I just want to share a few with you. Going to work at 7 a.m. this morning, I drove out of my drive straight into a bus. The bus was five minutes early. Another. I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law and headed over the embankment. The other car collided with mine without giving warning of its intention. I collided with a stationary truck coming the other way. I was on my way to the doctor with rear end trouble when my universal joint gave way

causing me to have an accident. And just a couple more. I was thrown from the cars that left the road. I was later found in a ditch by some stray cows. My car was legally parked as it backed into another vehicle. I was backing my car out of the driveway in the usual manner when it was struck by the other car in the same place who had been struck several times before.

The point here is, instead of presence or equanimity when stuff comes up, in many moments, we wrap it with and are living in defensive stories, blaming stories, worry stories to help us feel, we worried to help us feel actually more prepared. So last week, we explored the path to equanimity through mindful contact with what's arising. And this talk will continue a bit more on this path of how to bring mindful presence to what's arising. And we'll also explore two other pathways to equanimity. One is remembering impermanent and one is remembering love.

Okay, so the pathway of mindful presence. Let's just practice for a few moments. Stick it, grounded and embodied in this. And you might take a moment, a sense how you're sitting, feel your posture, maybe close your eyes or lower your gaze, and then turn the attention inward. just to feel a few nice, full, deep breaths. And the intention of this practice is cultivating that heart space that can include what's here without reacting. And in particular, we're going to focus on a relationship.

So I invite you to bring to mind a person you care about with whom you've had a relationship. the range of, you know, difficult, reactive moments and good times. So bring to mind that person. Then bring to mind an example of a situation where it was unpleasant, where you did react. Perhaps it was a time where you were feeling judged or where you felt intimidated or fearful or angry or hurt. Somehow, rather their behavior or the interactions brought up unpleasantness, aversion, and the more you actually go right into a situation and let yourself get in touch with the unpleasantness. And as you do, as you get in touch with the feelings of blame or anger or

hurt or whatever's there, you might put your hand on your heart and just say this to, this too I'm including this feel kindness towards whatever's there and include it and so this is real this comes up this too so you're letting it be and just get a sense of yourself when you're letting be what's here you're letting the wave be part of the ocean breathe feel yourself holding space for what's here and then bring to mind a situation with this person that was very gratifying where it was pleasant, where there was connecting, maybe fun, humor, appreciation exchange, feelings of love, and again, let yourself get really in touch with it. And just as you did before, as you feel it, the pleasantness of it, this too, including it. These are waves in the ocean.

Let yourself feel it. And sense your own being when you're including this too. Let both situations be in your mind at the same time. Situation that brought up unpleasantness. The situation that brought up pleasantness. And sense the ground of awareness, the kindness that can include all of it. Sense the space of presence that can allow all to be there with a kind of tenderness. And sense the ease that comes when all is included.

Spacious, accepting, at ease. The poet Dorothy Hunt writes, Do you think peace will come some other place than here, some other time than now, in some other heart than yours? Peace is this moment without judgment. That is all. This moment in the heart space

where everything that is is welcome. In these final moments, just imagine this heart space where everything that is is welcome, a heart that is ready for anything. A heart space that includes the pleasant, the unpleasant,

a heart space that's intrinsically free. So as you're ready, taking a few full breaths and coming back. And I hope that gives you a little little bit of a taste of the power of equanimity that you're really inhabiting a spacious presence that lets the unpleasantness and the pleasantness be there. And the key really is learning to stay. Just staying with what's there, this too. You know, when we're activated, the times we most need mindfulness, it's hardest to be with what's here. It's like we're on this bicycle and the more

triggered we get, the faster we're biking away from the present moment. So the pathway to equanimity is to stop peddling. Stay with our experience. This too and this and this, no matter what. It's unconditional presence, no matter what. And it could mean staying with emotional reactivity you have towards yourself or another person or the world, but you're staying with what's arising inside. There's a story I've always loved about someone who was having a reaction to another person at a meditation retreat. And we teach a lot of retreats about how to stay awake and in our bodies when we're walking.

It's a beautiful meditation. You have a starting point and you take 15 paces and then you turn around and you come back and you realize you're not really trying to get anywhere, but you're finding a sense of presence with what is. So one woman really didn't like walking meditation. She was having difficulty with it, and she was actually assigned by one teacher to stop sitting and do a whole day of walking meditation. And they negotiated and agreed on a half day. So after it was over, she wrote a note to describe what happened, and I want to read you this note. Long walking meditation all morning. Assignment completed. Thank you. Now I can meditate while moving.

I thought I might discover why I've been so resistant to it, but no, circumstances taught me something else instead. I chose to walk in the annex walking room because it's small, beautiful, and usually quiet. Today, however, it was noisy as hell. There was some guy in there walking as the little engine that could wearing noisy boots. Well, I thought, surely he'll be gone when the walking period ends. No such luck. This madman pounded his way through an hour and a half, except when he paused to drink or remove a noisy layer of clothing. I tried Meta, that's loving kindness. Surely must have a lot of pain to be so driven.

Then I realized I wanted to kill the SOB. I stood there noting, hate, hate, this too, this do. Later I stood in the middle of the room and wept, tears, tears, this too, this too. then I got to the point that I realized that whatever problem he had was his, not mine. After that, I got quiet, and he was just sound, and so I walked and breathed, and he paced and pounded, and pretty soon, it was all the same to me, his noise, my breath, the movement of my body. After an hour and a half he left, and it was incredibly quiet, which was different,

but not as much better as I'd expected, mostly just. different. Thank you. That's the note. Our suffering is that we want life different than it is right in this moment. If it's different, then I'll be okay. Often we want ourselves to change, then I'll be okay. Our body, our personality, our behavior. Or we want to change another person and then things will be okay. Or change the world. The only true freedom is this space of equanimity that says this too, this heart space that welcomes the moment, that's at peace with the moment. And as I emphasized last week in case you're thinking, yeah, but how is we going to ever fight

for the changes we need to have in this world, it's that presence, that capacity to say this to and honestly contact what's here without pushing it away that actually gives rise to the actions in the world that actually can transform. Okay, so the first gateway that we're exploring together to equanimity is unconditional presence, learning to stay, no matter what, this too, this too, including resistance to the discomfort, We might say unpleasantness and say this too, not liking it, wanting it to go away, this too, everything can be included. The second pathway to acronymity is impermanence.

And if you've lost a loved one, if you've gotten a life-threatening diagnosis, you've probably noticed that when we really register the truth of this changing world, it puts everything in perspective. We're living in a larger reality, more and more intimate with the truth of living and dying, and usually more open and cherishing the moment. I remember with my dad dying, it just hit me this reality of, oh,

there's no future with him in his form, in this beloved form. And it catapulted me into a limit, space of really feeling his timeless spirit, a purity of love. But I had a really face, oh, it ends. In our habitual states of mind, impermanence is an idea, but it's not a directly experienced reality. We habitually hold on to what will inevitably change. It's like it's been described as a moving rope and we're grasping it and getting rope burn.

getting rope burn. That's the basic cause of suffering. So unless we face and open wide to the truth of change of loss, our reactivity blocks presence. We're not really here and we're not available to the full creative flow of loving. Story that I've always remembered about Kafka when he was an older man. He spent time sitting in a park and one day a little girl walked by him. She had tears running down her face and he asked her to stop and tell him what was wrong and she said, I'm missing my doll. She's lost. And he said, well, I'll look around and he tried. He didn't find the doll. But he told her to come back and I'll see if I can find her. So a few days later the girl returns and Kafka's there without a doll but he said, I have a note from her. I have a note from her.

He said, and he read the note and the note said, I've gone off to travel some around the world. Please don't worry about me. I'm fine. The girl was somewhat relieved. She returned to the park every week or so and Kafka would be there with a note from the doll. And the girl was too young to read, so he'd read the note telling her of the doll's adventures. Well, Kafka got much thicker. to the park one last time. This time he had brought a doll and he handed it to the girl and said

that, well, travels had really changed her. Some years later, when the girl was a young woman, she found and read a note that had been rolled up and placed in the doll's hands. This is what it said. You will lose everyone you love, but the love will always return in new forms. When we open to the truth of change, without resistance, we come to realize the changeless light and love that shines through all. We're available to the love that lives in all beings. We can inhabit this heart space that welcomes whatever comes and goes. And this remembrance, it really translates into how we move through our ordinary day, how we relate to all the parts of our life

that are coming, going, our work, our home, our possessions. Buddhist master Ajan Cha, he would hold up a glass and he'd say, do you see this glass? He'd say, I love this glass. It holds the water admirably. When the sun shines on it, it reflects the light beautifully. When I tap it, it has a lovely ring. Yet for me, this glass is already broken.

When the wind knocks it over or my elbow knocks it off the shelf and it falls to the ground shatters, I say, of course. But when I understand that this little glass is already broken, every minute with it is precious. Can we feel that? Can we sense the fragility and the fleetingness of a sunset or of our child's youth? the laughter of a dear one, the sound of the rain. So again, impermanence is something most people will say, yeah, I get it, I know, it's all passing, we're all going to die, but unless we contemplate it deeply in a very embodied way, it stays mental. It's not a true realization.

Ticknat Han teaches about a hug. I remember the first time I was at a retreat with a very dear friend, and teaching colleague Luisa Montero Diaz. And we were, this is probably 40 years ago, something like that. We went to a retreat with him and at the end of the retreat, you'd have us get into pairs and Louisa and I did this together. And you're supposed to look at each other, look into each other's eyes and then hug each each other and as you're hugging, you really feel the other person's very real, you really feel

the other person is very real, you're breathing and hugging with your whole body, and both people reflect. You do three breaths. So in the first breath, I'm going to die. The second breath, you're going to die. And the third is, and we have just these precious moments. The blessing of realizing impermanence or cherishing what's here. That quantum space, that open presence that lets life come and go and cherishes the moment. You can explore this as you do the reflection based on this hugging meditation. You might just get a taste right now. Take a moment and bring to mind someone you care about. And just imagine looking in their eyes and they're looking in your eyes. Now imagine that you're hugging. You're going to do three breaths and

first breath is I'm going to die, just realizing that, breathing, saying that to yourself. And second breath, you're going to die. And just know the truth of that. And then the third breath, we have just these precious moments. And sense the cherishing, sense the space of presence, the spaciousness. It's right here. Okay. So we've, talked about the gateways of unconditional presence, of remembering impermanence. The divine abodes that I've been mentioning, love and kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity, the first three actually become gateways to equanimity. They're all interrelated, but any moment of awakening warmth in your heart, and you'll find you're inhabiting a larger field.

There's more balance, there's more openness, there's more ease. Jonathan and I, my husband and I have a mutual friend who went through a very long, painful separation and then a difficult divorce. And during one conversation Jonathan had with him, our friend was saying that he was, you know, how angry and upset he was with his wife or to be X, how hostile she was being, how she was getting so, she was all legal and there was no room for mediating, how much it was costing them. You know, he just felt like she was dragging them both through hell. And so Jonathan invited him into a short practice. And he asked him just to tell him what in his life that's going on right now that he was grateful for.

And he said, oh, well, I have this deepening connection with my team. and he described that and Jonathan had him pause and feel the goodness of that and his gratitude for that. And then he said, and there's this friend I've had for many years, a woman who we have a really deep connection and she could be the one, you know, and again he had, he had him feel the gratitude for that and embody it and let it just really fill him. And then he talked about his work and how incredibly creative and rewarding it was. again, feel that gratitude, let it fill you. After that, Jonathan invited him to go back to bring to mind the situation with his wife and just sense how he was holding it. And he pretty quickly

just said, oh, she's really hurting. I have to walk through this with as much kindness as possible. So Jonathan shared the story with me and I was just so touched. at the power of gratitude to give us perspective, to open us into equanimity, wisdom, kindness. So we're exploring the different ways of cultivating equanimity. The gift is that we then can respond to situations from our most awake, creative, loving place inside, just like our friend who said, all she's hurting. There's a story I heard years ago about the violinist Ishtak Burlman, and this may be partly fabricated, but the message is so true and powerful. I want to share this story supposedly took place 1995 stage at Lincoln Center. Ishtak Perlman has

polio, and he had as a ritual at the beginning of these concerts, a slow entrance, he's on crutches, and he sits and then does the clasps on his legs and he gets ready to play. And at this time, he played the first few bars and then one of the strings on the violin broke. And the audience could hear it snap and they figured you have to get up and put on the clasphom and go across stage and find another violin. But he waited a moment. He closed his eyes. He signaled for the conductor to begin again. and he played from where he had left off

and played with just huge passion and power and purity and most would think it's impossible play symphonic work with just three strings but he didn't assume that and people say they could see him modulating and changing or recomposing the piece in his head and when he finished there was this awesome silence in the room and then people rose and burst out in cheers It was just an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium.

And he smiled and he wiped the sweat from his brow and he raised his bow to quiet everyone and he said, and this wasn't boastful and quiet, maybe hence of a reverent tone. You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left. we each have gifts to offer the world, our care and kindness, our creativity, our service, our wisdom, and the capacity to come home to equanimity to this open presence, it lets us find out how much music we can make. It lets us love without holding back. And it's also a force towards healing the planet. You know, when we're caught up and fight flight, it's contagious.

We contribute to the agitation of a limbic world, a world that's really caught in that dividedness of us, them, a world where there's just so much of a sense of reacting to this fear of a threatening other, an enemy other. When we get triggered and fearful, we dehumanize others. We forget our belonging. In the deepest way, we lose sight of the dignity and preciousness of all life forms. So the pathway to equanimity brings us home, brings us to a space where we can really hold and cherish life.

And I was very touched by a story I heard that occurred at the beginning of the Iraq War when U.S. Army and Marines were closing in on Baghdad. at. And a reporter described what appeared to be a disaster in the making because a small unit of American soldiers was walking along a street and a job when hundreds of Iraqis poured out of the buildings on either side. And they had fists waving and their throats taught. And they were pressing in on the Americans who glanced at one another in terror. And the Iraqis were yelling. They were frantic with rage, basically, at the military invading their home. And from the way the lens was lurching, the cameraman seemed as frightened as the soldiers.

Okay, so there's fear all around, which is, of course, contagious. And a reporter thought, this is it. A shot will come from somewhere. Americans will open fire in the world will witness the Maila massacre of the Iraq War, which that massacre was this mass murder by, the U.S. Army of unarmed, terrified civilians in South Vietnam. So at that moment, an American officer stepped through the crowd, holding his rifle high over his head with the barrel pointed to the ground, and against a backdrop of a seething crowd.

It was a striking gesture described as almost biblical humility. He yelled out, take a knee. And the soldiers looked at him as if he was crazy. then one after another, they're swaying in this bulky armor and gear, they knelt before the boiling crowd and pointed their guns at the ground. And the Iraqis fell silent. Their anger subsided. And the officer ordered his men to withdraw. I think that moves me so much because there's so much horror that we're bearing witness to in today's world of that sense of the enemy is not human and that it's okay to slaughter.

And we're just seeing it around the world in different places. And just to sense that possibility, the ripples that can happen when even a few can access a wise presence, that equanimous presence, and lead with respect and care towards others. It reminds us that we are family. We are kin, we belong together to this living web. As our world keeps speeding up and revving up, it's just natural that fear and mistrusts and divides grow, that the reactivity and violence grows. So we need the intentional cultivation of equanimity, of this balanced open presence that we've been exploring together. We need this in our collective consciousness.

And in our personal lives, it's really what allows us to meet the changes, the losses, the sorrows with an inner freedom and tenderness with peace. It really allows us to meet the passing of our body of this very life with peace. you know, I've witnessed it, those dying. I've witnessed that quality of sacred presence, the heart that's ready for anything, and the peace it brings. One meditation teacher, Mara Engel,

was dying of cancer and she wrote this. She said, my days are short, and as I grew weaker, I experience so much gratitude for my meditation. Not only the joy and ease it brought, but the hard parts for every bored and restless sitting and every fearful fantasy and every pain and ache I sat through and every itch I didn't scratch was a training for kindness, a training for the muscle for bearing witness for the trusting spirit that carries me now as I face my death. You know, I've been talking about how equanimity allows us to meet the challenges with a more non-reactive, open presence.

It also helps us meet the joys. In the last reflection, week ago, I shared this from William Blake and I want to read it again. He who binds to himself a joy does the wing at life destroy. He who kisses the joy as it flies. lives in eternity sunrise. So by way of closing, cultivating equanimity, this non-reactive presence, it's not a rigid undertaking. It's really a more process of deepening or listening, of a receptive attention that Ben can remember just say this too. Okay? And so this is what's happening. Now this. It's that heart.

space that welcomes. There's so much beauty and mystery and love in the world. And when we're reacting, including when we're striving to get somewhere else, we're not here. We miss so much. The Zen poet Ikyu. Every day, priests minutely examine the Dharma and endlessly chant complicated sutras. Before doing that though, they should learn how to read the love letters sent by the wind and rain, the snow and moon. With equanimity, we're here for those love letters, the amazing goodness that is available in the simplicity of the moments. So let's close together. We'll do a short reflection of equanimity as that weave of presence and love. you might take a moment to arrive.

Feel the movement of the breath. Feel this breathing body. Let yourself be aware of both the pleasant experiences and the unpleasant experiences. This too, and this, and this, sensing the quality of receptivity and presence. From this space, I invite you to bring to mind a relationship where you get triggered and lose eponymity.

And not to choose something that's like a 10 out of 10. Choose something where you just know you get off. It might be losing, kind of losing your temper and getting impatient with a child, launching into criticism with a partner. So have that situation in mind. And now shifting your attention, briefly, act on something that you love. Could be a person, could be a place, could be an activity, something you love that you really appreciate. And as that person or place comes to mind,

just sense what most brings up that sense of loving. What is it that brings up appreciation here? That tenderness. You just feel your heart. And you might mentally whispered, thank you. And if it's a person, include their name. Bring to mind something else. Another person, their situation, or place that brings up that gratitude, that appreciation, the feeling of loving. Let yourself feel the warmth in your heart. Let it be as big as it is. As you mentally whisper, thank you. And one more. Another person that you love, a place that you love, get close in and sense what you're loving, what brings it up, mentally whispering. Thank you. And from this space of loving and openness, gratitude, appreciation, let yourself again be remembering the trigger, the situation.

that's difficult. Let the reality of that be here, the frustration or hurt or judgments. And just notice what happens when you're witnessing it, holding it from a larger space, from more of a fullness of being, sense the heart space that can welcome

even the difficulties and hold with tenderness. And just paying attention to that heart space that edgeless open space of tenderness and what it means to welcome whatever arises, the freedom that comes with that, knowing this heart space as a true home, more true than any story. And once you know the way, you can return again and again living from the truth of what we are. You might sense as you still let that that situation be, in mind that there's more choice in how to respond, more creativity, from the space of equanimity. May all beings find a path of homecoming. May all beings realize the love, the light, that's our

true being. May we live from that loving presence, that spaciousness, that heart space. may it bring healing and justice and peace and compassion to our world. Thank you, friends, for your beautiful hearts, for your presence, love to each.