For a formal practice to cultivate equanimity, begin with some calming breaths or a mantra meditation. Once you feel calm, reflect on your desire for happiness and freedom from suffering, both for yourself and for others. Contemplate your desire to serve the needs of others and to be compassionately engaged in the world. Acknowledge both the joy and the suffering that exist throughout the world—the good deeds and the evil ones. As you continue to breathe into your heart’s center, acknowledge the necessity of balancing your desire to make positive change in the world with the reality that you cannot control the actions of others.

Bring to mind the image of someone for whom you have no strong feelings one way or the other. With this person in your mind’s eye, repeat the following phrases to yourself, coordinating with the outbreath if you like:

• All beings like yourself are responsible for their own actions.
• Suffering or happiness is created through one’s relationship to experience, not by experience itself.
• Although I wish only the best for you, I know that your happiness or unhappiness depends on your actions, not on my wishes for you.
• May you not be caught in reactivity.

Feel free to use other similar, appropriate phrases of your own devising. After a few minutes, shift your attention to your benefactors, including teachers, friends, family and the unseen workers who keep the societal infrastructure working. Silently repeat the phrases to yourself as you contemplate these benefactors.

After several minutes, begin to reflect on your loved ones, directing the phrases to them, followed by the difficult people in your life. While feeling kindness, compassion, and joy for those we love comes more easily than it does for those with whom we have difficulty, it is often the opposite with equanimity. It’s a lot easier to accept that those we dislike are responsible for their own happiness than it is for those we care for deeply, because we feel more attachment to them. Whatever your experience, simply note any reactivity and see if you can be equanimous with your reactivity! Broaden your reach after a few minutes to include all beings everywhere throughout the world, and then finally contemplate equanimity in regard to yourself, noticing how taking responsibility for your own happiness and unhappiness can feel the hardest of all.

• All beings, including myself, are responsible for their own actions.
• Suffering or happiness is created through one’s relationship to experience, not by experience itself.
• Although I wish only the best for myself, I know that my happiness or unhappiness depends on my actions, not my wishes for myself.
• May I not be caught in reactivity.

adapted from Yoga Journal by Frank Boccio

Frank Jude Boccio is a teacher of yoga and Zen Buddhism and the author of Mindfulness Yoga. Find him at mindfulnessyoga.net.

Meditation Timer for Your Meditation Practice

The Walnut Digital Zen Clock’s long-resonating Tibetan bell-like chime makes waking up and meditating a beautiful experience – its progressive chimes begin your day with grace. When the clock’s alarm is triggered, the acoustic chime bar is struck just once … 3-1/2 minutes later it strikes again … chime strikes become more frequent over 10 minutes … eventually striking every 5 seconds until shut off. As they become more frequent, the gentle chimes will always wake you up or bring you out of your meditation.   Your body really doesn’t need to be awakened harshly, with a Zen Clock you’re awakened more gradually and thus more naturally.  Unlike artificial recorded sounds coming out of a tiny speaker in a plastic box, natural acoustic sounds transform your bedroom or office environment.

The Digital Zen Clock also serves as a countdown and interval timer for yoga, meditation, bodywork, etc.; and it can also be set to chime on the hour as a tool for “mindfulness.”

Find the Entire Family of Meditation Timer and Gongs at Now & Zen's Store in Boulder

Now & Zen’s Meditation Timer Store

1638 Pearl Street

Boulder, CO 80302

(800) 779-6383

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