By Roshi Joan Halifax on September 22, 2020
The Four Boundless Abodes of lovingkindness, compassion, altruistic joy, and equanimity were introduced to me by Buddhist teacher Sharon Salzberg in the early 1970’s. ...I was a Zen person, and a bit skeptical of such a “nice” practice. But Sharon told me to just do the practice, internally work with the phrases associated with each of the “abodes” and that they would change my life. Well, why not? I said to myself. And so I began....
But this evening, before autumn equinox, and in the midst of political turmoil, a global pandemic, climate meltdown, racist violence, and an upcoming election that looks complicated and compromised, my mind turns toward equanimity, the most challenging of the abodes for me...
... it was Bernie [Glassman] who gave me the strongest lessons about equanimity, that capacity to maintain balance in the midst of any conditions, no matter how strange, no matter how tough. He would sit in the charnel ground of Auschwitz and be an unshakeable presence in the midst of a grotesque and cruel history that was hard to even imagine and nearly impossible to stomach... He did this with imperturbable equanimity, a strong back, and also a soft front....
...One of the functions of equanimity is not to get blown off balance by any one of the “the eight worldly dharmas” of pleasure and pain; praise and blame; disgrace and fame; and loss and gain. One needs to put one’s center of mass over a base of support, like tight rope walkers..., not to be pulled off balance by the worldly winds. Equanimity protects us by giving us a base of support for the mass of our lives....
In the polarized conditions of our current world, it is pretty challenging for most of us to maintain our balance and a good heart in the midst of so much negativity and uncertainty. One doesn’t want to be a by-stander, on the one hand, dissociated from the suffering within and around us. And many of us are very socially engaged, so socially by-standing is not an option. But one of the things I have learned from being a long time Zen practitioner is the gift of the “grandmother’s heart.” Eihei Dogen puts it this way: “You can understand all of Buddhism, but you cannot go beyond your abilities and your intelligence unless you have robaishin, grandmother heart/mind, the heart/mind of great compassion.”
A good grandmother doesn’t take her life personally. She is not a by-stander but rather one who “looks over;” she has the heart of equanimity informed by lovingkindness, compassion, and joy in the well-being of others; this kind of grandmother within us offers whatever she can, without expecting anything in return.
At this time of equinox, I think we could use a big dose of “grandmother’s heart,” a bit more of justice as well as love in our world. Life is in need of balance on this day of fall equinox, 2020. And life is in the balance. May we find our way to robaishin before too much more time passes.
We are all on that tight rope now, no matter what party we belong to, no matter our age, gender, ethnicity, neighborhood. Let’s find that immoveable center, that plumb line that aims toward gravity. Let’s find that strong back that supports our soft front, and let’s find or call out our grandmother’s heart.