--- ai_generation_date: '2026-08-17' ai_model: gemini-3-pro-preview audiodharma: talks: - date: '2021-03-08' mp3_url: https://audiodharma.us-east-1.linodeobjects.com/talks/13104/20210308-Gil_Fronsdal-IMC-guided_meditation_49_balance.mp3 speakers: - speaker_name: Gil Fronsdal speaker_url: https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/1 talk_start_time_seconds: 0 title: Guided Meditation (49) Balance url: https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/13104 video_unavailable: false location_city: Redwood City, CA video_unavailable: false youtube: id: s4Dj9o4bb4s imprecise_upload_date: '2021-05-04' title: 'Guided Meditation: Balance' upload_date: null uploader_str: Insight Meditation Center uploader_url: https://www.youtube.com/@InsightMeditationCenter youtube_url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4Dj9o4bb4s --- # Guided Meditation (49) Balance - [Gil Fronsdal](https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/1) _This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video above. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers._ ## [Guided Meditation (49) Balance](https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/13104) So it's 7:00 AM here in California, and so locally I can offer you a good morning. Happy to be together, and good day and greetings for 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 us finding the midpoint of a rowboat. Maybe a fairly stable, wide rowboat, but still a rowboat. Finding the midpoint where there's the least amount of rocking, the center of gravity of the boat, and to stand there with our legs firmly on the floor of the boat and keep our balance. Maybe the upper part of our torso is not moving so much, but our legs are in fact going with the rocking of the boat. Maybe it's a gentle rocking, but still we're constantly making small adjustments. The stronger we are in our legs and torso, the easier it is to keep our balance. So in meditation, we're 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 to balance and stay in balance. The way it works in meditation, the most simple way, is to stay balanced without any kind of movement towards our experience, or any movement away. Any wanting or not wanting, any movement in which we get pulled by experience, pulled into our thoughts, pushed by thoughts, or pushed by the experience of what's happening. Rather, both physically and in the heart and the mind, we stay balanced. We stay in that center place where there's a strength and a stability where wisdom can operate, and clear seeing can operate. We lose that when we start getting involved in things or we start rejecting things. Staying in that midpoint of the boat of our life, of course, we'll go a little bit off. So part of the equanimity[^1] and practice is to appreciate that, of course, just like in a rowboat, we'll 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: "No, stay here. Come back, see clearly what's happening so we can stay balanced." Come back to that peaceful, still place, the balance place inside. The dynamic balance, the dynamic peacefulness. I don't think you have to rest on your meditation laurels and just stay peaceful without being engaged, alert, and mindful to stay here. So with that as an introduction, assume a posture that maybe 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 with the torso balanced on the sitting bones, a balance of your weight against whatever support is being received. Then to feel up the spine, up the torso, and to make small adjustments to feel a sense that everything is balanced. Partly that means that with the weight of our torso stacked up in a way that feels aligned with a center line within, we're not leaning forward where part of our weight is in front of that center of gravity, and some of it's not behind. We're looking for that balance. Do something where the hands and arms feel balanced as well, so they're not pulled too far forward or pulled too far down, pulling on the shoulders. If you're sitting, you might be able to pull your hands back from the knee a little bit, or sometimes put a cushion on your thighs or your ankles so the hands are held up more. This can feel more balanced and support the balance of the torso. And then to close the eyes. With the eyes closed and sitting still, again feeling the body from the inside and feeling where there is balance. Where there is stability in the body, where there's a kind of maybe even groundedness of your body against whatever supports you upright, whatever supports your weight. To feel that stability, groundedness, or rootedness. To feel whatever seems stable within physical stability. Some people might feel it in the lower torso, around the hips or pelvis. Some people might feel it in the lower back or in the belly, or maybe in the area of the solar plexus, behind or 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's 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. Softening the muscles of the face—these are muscles that are sometimes constantly engaged in daily life to express ourselves and communicate ourselves 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, to not have to work so much around the eyes, forehead, and jaw. The same thing with agitation and restlessness in the chest, if there is something. Relaxing in the chest, softening, easing up, without the kind of instability that comes from resistance, holding ourselves and our life at bay. Then softening in the belly, a kind of release of the weight of the belly, letting that weight release downward to create some inner stability in the lower torso. And then to feel whatever restlessness, agitation, or energetics there are in the mind. Maybe in the area associated with your mental and emotional activity. As you exhale, relaxing the mind, relaxing the mental activity. Slowing things down in the mind, softening the mind, and feeling the softness of the mind. And then gently noticing, as we sit here for a minute or so, any movements towards or away. Any being pulled into something like our thoughts, or any movement of recoiling, pulling back, or being pushed back. Any wanting, any not wanting. Just simply notice that. Perhaps allowing 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. Then 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 mind and heart comes into balanced stability, or comes into a little bit more of a balanced stability than it was when it wasn't stable. And then to really now experience the breathing body, the body breathing. 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. If it's easy enough, establish a kind of gentle, soft stability and steadiness with the breathing. And 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. Staying balanced in the body breathing. With the mind having landed on the breathing, the body breathing, not easily pulled into wanting and not wanting. If there are little movements of wanting and not wanting, it's okay. Those can be the place we use to find our way back to balance. Here, breathing, centered on the breathing body. ## Reflections on Balance and Goodwill And then 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 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 in 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. And maybe you can imagine that with whatever balanced stability and calm you have now sitting here, you can bring to mind someone for whom you have friendliness, goodwill, compassion, and love. Imagine sitting together, walking together, and for you to remain balanced and stable in your goodwill, in your friendliness. Not pulled into some of the complexities that can exist in these relationships of wanting and not wanting, protecting, fear, holding back, or giving too much. Our friendliness, 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, their heartfelt care for others. And may we, in our balance and stability for goodwill and friendliness, contribute to make it easier for others to be that way. May it be that the benefits of this meditation are something that we bring into the world of our daily life, that we're ready to share and stay close to those benefits. May all beings be happy. May all beings everywhere be free. --- [^1]: **Equanimity:** (Pali: _Upekkhā_) A balanced state of mind, characterized by mental calmness, non-attachment, and evenness of temper, especially in difficult situations. It is one of the Four Brahmavihāras (sublime attitudes) in Buddhism.