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Guide Meditation: Balance

Introduction

So it's 7:00 AM here in California, and locally I can offer you a good morning and say I am happy to be together. Good day and greetings to everyone around the globe who are participating.

The theme for this guided meditation is balance—finding a balance when we sit. I liken it a little bit to finding the midpoint of a rowboat. It might be a fairly stable, wide rowboat, but still a rowboat. We find the midpoint, the center of gravity of the boat, and stand there with our legs firmly on the floor to keep our balance. Maybe the upper part of our torso is not moving so much, but our legs are going with the gentle rocking of the boat. We're constantly making small adjustments. The stronger we are in our legs and torso, the easier it is to keep our balance.

In meditation, we are also developing a kind of inner strength and a skill at staying balanced, both to recognize when we get off balance and to have the strength to come back and stay in balance.

The most simple way it works in meditation is to stay balanced without any kind of movement towards our experience or any movement away. We sit without any wanting or not wanting, without any movement in which we get pulled into our thoughts or pushed by the experience of what's happening. Rather, physically and also in the heart and mind, we stay balanced. We stay in that center place where there is a strength and stability. It is there that wisdom and clear seeing can operate—faculties we lose when we start getting involved in things or rejecting things.

We stay in that midpoint of the boat of our life. Of course, we'll go a little bit off. Part of the equanimity^[1] in practice is to appreciate that, just like in a rowboat, we will get pulled this way and that way, get picked up, and get involved in all these things. But hopefully not so much, and hopefully with very gentle, maybe even loving course corrections. We say, "No, stay here. Come back. See clearly what's happening so we can stay balanced." We come back to that peaceful, still place inside—a dynamic balance, a dynamic peacefulness. I don't think that you have to rest on your meditation laurels and just stay peaceful without being engaged, alert, and mindful to stay right here.

Guided Meditation

With that as an introduction, assume a posture that manifests a degree of balance.

One way to begin with balance is to rock back and forth. If you're sitting upright, maybe sway back and forth and then make smaller and smaller sways, looking for a place of balance. Find the balance of the torso on the sitting bones, the balance of your weight against whatever support is being received.

Then, feel up the spine, up the torso, and make small adjustments to feel a sense that everything is balanced. Partly, that means the weight of our torso is stacked up in a way that feels aligned with a center line within, so that we're not leaning forward where part of our weight is in front of that center of gravity, or falling behind it. We are looking for that balance.

Adjust the hands and arms so they feel balanced as well, so they're not pulled too far forward or pulled too far down, dragging on the shoulders. If you're sitting, you might be able to pull your hands back from the knees a little bit. Sometimes putting a cushion or something on top of your thighs or your ankles holds the hands up more, which can feel more balanced and support the balance of the torso.

Then close the eyes. With the eyes closed and sitting still, again feel the body from the inside. Feel where there is balance, where there is stability in the body. Feel where there's a kind of groundedness of your body against whatever supports you upright, whatever supports your weight. Feel that stability, groundedness, rootedness.

Feel whatever seems stable within this physical stability. Some people might feel it in the lower torso, around the hips and pelvis. Some people might feel it in the lower back or in the belly, or maybe in the area of the solar plexus, behind and above the diaphragm.

Maybe there can be a feeling of some stability as you relax your shoulders and soften. It may be a stability in the shoulders supporting the neck, maybe in the back of the neck, in the way that area supports the weight of the head.

There is a way in which tension and holding, even if it's stable tension, is a kind of agitation. Greater stability and balance is found by relaxing some of the extra tension in the body. Soften the muscles of the face. These are muscles that are sometimes constantly engaged in daily life to express ourselves and communicate to the world—smiles, frowns, scowls, and fears held in the muscles of the face. It's a compassionate thing for the face, on the exhale, to let the muscles ease, not having to work so much around the eyes, forehead, and jaw.

Do the same thing with agitation and restlessness in the chest, if there is something there. Relax in the chest, softening and easing up without the kind of instability that comes from resistance, holding ourselves and our life at bay.

Then soften in the belly. Feel a release of the weight of the belly, letting that weight release downward to create some inner stability in the lower torso.

Then feel whatever restlessness, agitation, or energetics there are in the mind. Maybe in the area of the brain, or anywhere that is associated for you with your mental and emotional activity. As you exhale, relax the mind. Relax the mental activity. Slow things down in the mind. Soften the mind and feel the softness of the mind.

Gently notice, as we sit here for a minute or so, any movements towards or away. Notice any being pulled into something like our thoughts, or any kind of movement of recoiling, pulling back, or being pushed back. Any wanting, any not wanting.

Simply notice that. Perhaps allow it to be there if it's there, feeling it, sensing what it's like for the body and the mind to have this movement for and against. Feel how maybe there's not much balance there, or that there's some imbalance.

On the next couple of exhales, see if you can release any for and against, wanting and not wanting. Release it enough to feel that your life, mind, and heart come into a balanced stability, or come into a little bit more of a balanced stability than when it wasn't stable.

Now, really experience the breathing body, the body breathing. It's almost like the awareness gently lands onto the body breathing.

This is where we feel the gentle rowboat, where the gentle waves are breathing in and out, the movements of the body expanding and contracting, the air moving in and out through the nostrils.

See if it's easy enough to establish a gentle, soft stability and steadiness with the breathing. As you feel any other pull and push, moving for or against experience, wanting and not wanting, keep finding your stability. Keep coming back to the breathing. Let the breathing support you.

Let the breathing be the place that you stand or feel, so you're not so easily pulled into for and against. Stay balanced in the body, the body breathing. With the mind having landed on the breathing, you are not easily pulled into wanting and not wanting.

If there are little movements of wanting and not wanting, it's okay. That's the place we use to find our way back to balance right here, breathing, centered on the breathing body.

Reflections

As we come to the end of this sitting, I have a question for you. How might your kindness, your love, your compassion benefit from having an inner stability and an inner balance?

How can kindness, love, and compassion benefit from not being pulled into reacting for or against? Without being pulled into desires or pulled into aversion?

To be able to open our hearts with care and goodwill towards others while remaining balanced, without wants and not-wants, without anxiety creating imbalance. Perhaps even feeling a stability in the kindness, the goodwill, the love, the compassion.

Maybe you can imagine, with whatever balanced stability and calm you have now sitting here, bringing to mind someone for whom you have friendliness, goodwill, compassion, and love. Imagine sitting together, walking together, and remaining balanced and stable in your goodwill, in your friendliness. Imagine not being pulled into some of the complexities that can exist in these relationships of wanting and not wanting, protecting or fearing, holding back or giving too much.

Our friendliness and our goodwill is one of the great resources we have. It can be one of the foundations for Buddhist practice.

May it be that all beings find a way to be balanced and stable in their happiness, safety, and peacefulness. May all beings find stability, steadiness, and strength in their goodwill and heartfelt care for others. And may we, in our balance and stability for goodwill and friendliness, contribute to making it easier for others to be that way.

May the benefits of this meditation be something that we bring into the world of our daily life, that we're ready to share and stay close to.

May all beings be happy. May all beings everywhere be free.