Wednesday, April 29, 2020
"For all the trouble under the sun
There be a remedy or there be none
If there be a remedy, go and find it
If there be none, never mind it
The opening statement of a Dickens novel, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" has carried its age well, as applicable now as when written. In our present time the story is far too real. Real events confront us: the pandemic, polarization, divisional legacies, regressive tensions, social fears, and a cultural immaturity that seemingly cannot move beyond a harrowing adolescence. To have no intense positions at this time seems either an act of avoidance or simply ignorance. Given these circumstances, the question for us is what to do, or not do, how to respond, or not respond, how to be in this moment of history authentically, and how to be real in the making of a real world.
The Buddhist tradition in its methodology has historically had a separate life from the waves of social dynamics, but being on the same sea it has been effected and does effected it all along. Since waves are not diminishing, it may be time to access our equipment, our nautical tools - the oars, sail, rudder, sextant, etc., on this dharma boat of ours, this raft to the other shore. Our essential equipment includes prajna or wisdom, and karuna or compassion, and there are many others, all imbued with the meditation practice itself. One tool often in the background is upeksa or equanimity. It may be time to also bring this piece of equipment out. It may be a good rudder for us at this time, perhaps even a good sail.
In Buddhist tradition it is said the fourth dhyana, the fourth stage of meditative absorption, called upeksa-dhyana or equanimity, was the state in which the Buddha woke up. The story goes that the Buddha was in nirvikalpajnana, or non-discursive awareness, and in releasing any preference for the pleasure that accompanied it, he entered into the stage of equanimity. Apparently it was this position that created a basis or place for enlightenment to come forward. Later in Buddhist history there arose the four brahmaviharas, the "divine abodes," also called apramanas: loving kindness, empathic joy, compassion and equanimity. Apramana means to be immeasurable. They are called immeasurable because they extend limitlessly in all directions to encompass everyone, and because one never finishes them, there is always more to do. Equanimity, as the last of the immeasurables, is said to be their summation and to embrace them all.
To take on an investigation of equanimity, we first must do the difficult work of confronting our apparent innate tendency to hold views, to have fixed preferences, and even acknowledge their capacity to develop into a set bias. To like chocolate ice cream rather than vanilla is not a problem, but to judge those vanilla lovers as wrong could be. Cognitive biases come in many flavours: there is confirmation bias, hindsight bias, blind-spot bias, availability bias, self-justification bias, consistency bias, negativity bias, etc. To have a political position or an issue important to us without any bias or exclusion must be acknowledged as a task of great effort or even courage. So how then do we meet our views, our likes and dislikes, even our preference for chocolate over vanilla, and take on this apramana of equanimity?
The definitions of equanimity include: evenness of temper, emotional composure, calmness and steadiness, especially amid trying circumstances, fairness of mind, impartiality. The Latin root "aequus" means "even, equal," and together with the Latin "animus" (mind or spirit) becomes "aequanimitas" - equal mind." Equal in meaning or value is "equivalent." Equal in significance, power or weight is called "equipollent." Another variant, "equipoise," means to hold or bring two elements into relative status, and may be compared with the word "balance." This common word is much used in spiritual and self-help discussions, but as a straightforward verb it means to just maintain or make level what was not. There are some earlier Buddhist translations that mis-define upeksa "indifference." But upeksa is clearly neither a dry neutrality or a cool aloofness. And as it is not a thought or emotion but a sustained, non-reactive state of view and activity, it then may carry aspects of detachment and sustain a mutual forbearance toward all conditions that present themselves. Equanimity does not assume passivity or withdrawal however, but rather an energy and intention to meet a situation as it is, that is, in full context. The Buddha said the mind of equanimity is "abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility and without ill-will."
Should "there be a remedy," and should we wish to find it, take up and employ the "equipment" of equanimity, we might start by looking into an early sixth century teaching, a commentary by the Yogacaran teacher Sthiramati of a text called Trimsika. This teacher opens upeksa into three complimentary parts. He says that equanimity is equilibrium (in sanskrit: samata), equanimity is also a tranquil flow of mind (prasathata), and equanimity is effortlessness (anabhogata). A study by Gadjin M. Nagao, entitled the "Tranquil Flow of Mind: An Interpretation of Upeksa" has brought this teaching into contemporary thought.
Samata, translated as equilibrium, is also understood as “equality," - equality of existence and non-existence, of self and other, perception and non-perception, equality of all dharmas, equality of all beings. To hold both together is equilibrium. This is not to neglect differentiating characteristics of each. Thich Nhat Hanh describes this as an "overview," that is, to look over the situation, see the complete picture, as if from a hilltop, after coming from dense trees below. From this open viewpoint, the expanse of the forest, the context of each tree, even the spaces between the trees are recognized together, and each tree remains unique.
Samata has a connection to the more familiar "samadhi.” Both have the common root "sama." Sama translates as “same” and samata then reads as “sameness.” Vasubandu, the author of the above Trimsika text, had a brother monk named Asanga, another great Yogacarian scholar, who wrote of samata this way:
Now you should know that the bodhisattva, because of his long-time engagement with the knowledge of dharma-selflessness, having understood the inexpressibility of all dharmas as they really are, does not imagine any dharma; otherwise he would not grasp “given thing only” as precisely “Suchness only.” It does not occur to him, “This is the given thing only, and this other, the Suchness only.” In clear understanding the bodhisattva courses, and coursing in this supreme understanding with insight into Suchness, he sees all dharmas as they really are, i.e., as being absolutely the same. And seeing everywhere sameness, his mind likewise, he attains to supreme equanimity.
Commentary by the translator Janice Dean Willis clarifies this statement:
The passage is clear in identifying Suchness (tathata) with sameness of essential nature (samata). Because of this realization of sameness, the bodhisattva does not imagine any dharma. That is, because he no longer possesses discursive thought or constructive imagination - which superimposes constructs, judgments, designations and distinctions - he perceives no distinctions when viewing dharmas; but rather, when seeing dharmas, he sees Suchness.
This is an invitation to actually negotiate the world without such superimpositions. When we see sameness, we see the efficiency of the world as it is, and the world being sameness sees us. To know and be known in this way is to dwell in equanimity.
The original commentator Sthiramati, as explained by Professor Nagao, approaches samata in a more specific and pragmatic way, fundamentally how we might “do” samata, or how to prepare the ground on which it can manifest. Sthiramati says that the mind can habitually encamp in or fluctuate toward polarities. Toward one pole is the experience of sinking, subjugation, depression, contraction, aversion (called laya in Sanskrit), and on the other pole is agitation from mental excitement, exaltation, anxiousness, tension (auddhatya). To uplift the laya state with vipassana, one's intuitive discernment and bright awareness, brings one back from the sinking state. To pacify the agitation with shamatha, one's tranquil settling into one-pointed awareness, brings one back from the mentally excited state. These are sometimes called the two wings of meditation. When both wings are in harmony, working together, the bird flies well. With dualities are released, what then remains? Polarities or any of the dualities of existence need not be negated or neutralized. The presupposition of the edges of dualities as being the juicy parts and the middle being dry or uninteresting, is supplanted with insight that the middle way is where the work is done, where the flow is from, and is the vital engine for all the parts. The middle way is essentially functional, optimizing a moderating balance that includes the non-contradiction of opposites, where each may be complimentary even in opposition.
Sthiramati then applies this balance (samata, sameness or equilibrium) to a mental state called "prasathata" - the tranquil flow of mind. This term's core meaning is release, repose, remiss, pacify, forgive, specifically releasing the differences among things. The mind in samata is straightforward: direct, focused, undeviating, while also being flexible and adaptable, and not scheming, without any of the strategies of the merchant mind, the mind that wants to cut a deal or make a bargain. When the mind is correct: it is upright, in readiness, concentrated, aware, appropriate, free of inequities, and without delusion. So the mind straightforwardly and correctly releases or relaxes into the moment and is of the moment, and there is conveyance or "coursing in one's path." This is the tranquil flow of mind.
The third aspect is "anabhogata" or effortlessness. With this quality Sthirmati brings to equanimity familiarity and a sense of ease. Like an ordinary trip, comfortable in our car, on a familiar road - we know how to drive, know the route, and are not in a hurry. So with equanimity, an assumed natural state where all distinctions are saturated with sameness even when expressing uniqueness. It is both ordinary and intimate. We have a natural impetus to "look over" and see the whole and its parts working together, just as we naturally negotiate the driving view, the road before us. Stiramati says "the stage of effortlessness of the mind is reached by one for whom there is no need to make any effort to obtain remedies for mental depression or mental exaltation." With anabhogata, there is natural movement toward the center, as when in pouring there is movement to the center of the bowl, or like a thrown ball going forward from its center of mass. Likewise, a natural progression sees sameness, as Asanga says, as suchness: sees (along with distinguishing characteristics) that reality has no mark, it is markless or formless (animitta), and is in truth "sunya" or empty of own-being.
Bringing these aspects together, we can define uppeksa or equanimity as "a natural and tranquil flow of mind imbued with the sameness of things." So, from here, where do we take this attribute? In our meditation, it finds expression as the forbearance and hosting of whatever arises in mind and body, balanced with intended focus and clarity of place. In daily life, in seeing and appropriately meeting whatever arises in this conditioned existence, balanced with an overview of the sameness of all dharmas. Without abandoning our love of chocolate ice cream (or vanilla), without neglecting our response and responsibility to what needs to be made right, and without not taking care of the details in our local domain, we can choose to stand upright in equanimity. We invite ourselves to maintain those immeasurable appramanas: loving kindness, empathic joy, compassion, and finally join and embrace them all with equanimity. The river actually starts from where we are, from here. From its source where the water begins, it is flowing down to the ocean, merging with all things. Taking up the equipment of equanimity, we get into our boat, move onto the water and meet the world.
