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Window of Well Being

For those of you who came in after I introduced myself, I'm Hilary and I'm here subbing for Diana. Welcome everyone. It's really sweet to be here. Is the sound okay? Okay, and thank you. I noticed that people were starting to get a little cool. So, Jim, I think you came in just the right time to turn down the air conditioning. I'm going to put my spectacles on so I can see something.

Tonight I want to talk about what I like to call the window of well-being. Has anybody heard of the window of well-being before? Okay. In this world of many distractions, our practice brings us home to our being. We learn to sit still and turn our awareness inward and find out what wants to be known. Can we learn to be present for whatever arises and just make space for it without grasping on to thoughts or pushing away feelings?

When I first started meditating, I think it was 22 years ago, maybe 23 by now, I had a hard time being with all the thoughts buzzing around in my head. Does anybody have that problem? [Laughter] Right. And I had this wrong idea about how meditation was going to stop my thoughts. Has anybody thought that, too? "Okay, I'm going to stop thinking, right?" And then it's like, "Oh, wait a minute. [Laughter] I got that wrong."

But I began to get more still and quiet, and meditating for a while didn't feel calming. It felt more like being in a popcorn machine. Pop, pop, pop, all these thoughts. And my mind was making these kernels of popcorn, so that I could project my thoughts onto the screen of my mind, narrating my life, right? What happened before, what's going to happen in the future?

Over time, the practice began to settle, and I learned to make space for the thoughts without latching onto them and adding onto them. I used to think of this as a train station. A thought would come to the train station, and then I would just let it go. But inevitably, another train would get attached to that one, and then another one. Pretty soon, I had a very long train full of cars that was heading out of the station. We're just noticing when that was happening, and then bringing awareness back to this present moment, right now.

After a while, I began to look forward to meditating. I used to think of this as a spa for my mind, a little spa time. The thoughts began just to settle into the background, my awareness was more in the foreground, and my anxiety lessened. Is anybody feeling that sense of calm in your practice? Some. And some maybe not.

Until one day, about a year into my practice, when I least expected it, these long-buried experiences and emotions began to bubble up. I would not say bubble up, they began to erupt like a volcanic eruption, and I was taken by surprise. I was like, "Oh, wait a minute. I'm supposed to be sitting here being calm. What is this?"

Nobody told me that this could happen, right? When we get quiet, the parts of ourselves that we've repressed, we've turned away from, we've ignored, may come knocking, wanting our attention. Because now they're like, "Oh, you're quiet, right? You're seeming peaceful. Right now I can come and you can attend to me."

Michael Stone at this Well of Light—it is just a website I found—he says, "When something in our lives was too overwhelming to feel, too much, too fast, too soon, the nervous system adapted. Over hundreds of thousands of years, this intelligence has evolved to protect us. It learned to numb, distance, defend, in absence. To take us out of immediate experience when it was unsafe to stay. These were not mistakes. They were acts of survival. But over time these strategies become patterns and those patterns become identity. Not as who we truly are. But as the lens through which we see the world and create our reality."

So this conditioning that we talk about in our mindfulness practice, these long-held patterns of ignoring, suppressing, running away from thoughts, feelings, sensations, can keep us in reactivity. We're either pushing away what feels uncomfortable or we're getting sucked into them like a black hole.

Learning to turn towards what is present without aversion or clinging is the essential practice of mindfulness. And this requires the cultivation of equanimity. In Buddhism, equanimity is considered one of the most sublime of the Brahma Viharas^[1]. The four divine abodes. The first is mettā, loving kindness. The second is muditā, which is the joy at the happiness of others. The third is karuṇā, compassion. And the fourth is upekkhā, equanimity. It is a way of being with what is without grasping or pushing away.

There's another Pali word for equanimity I just discovered, tatramajjhattatā^[2], which means to stand in the middle of. It is kind of like the eye of the hurricane. It's very calm in the center while all the storms are whirling around outside; standing in the middle of there is some calm.

In somatic therapies, standing in the middle is known as the window of tolerance. Has anybody heard of that before? Yeah, some of you. But I think tolerance isn't the best word. It has this connotation of bearing up under something and a kind of bracing. Whereas equanimity is more of an openness to what is. There's this analogy of life being like a rope that is passing through our hands. If you try to grab onto it, you're going to get rope burn. If you hold it loosely and let the rope go passing through your hands, you won't get those blisters.

Instead of a window of tolerance, I like to think of equanimity as the window of well-being. Which is nice because the acronym is WOW. [Laughter] It's the middle way between hyperarousal such as anxiety and anger, and hypoarousal such as numbness and depression.

But it's not a steady state, right? It's not a flat line, this window of well-being, because that would feel really stagnant. If everything was just okay and I'm not troubled by anything, I might not actually feel any kind of joy or happiness, either.

This can happen in our window of well-being if it becomes too constricted because we're being too avoidant of what is. Instead, equanimity is a range of being, a waving line of ups and downs, going with the flow.

The question for us is how can we widen this window of well-being so that minor frustrations, disappointments, and grief don't bump us out of this equanimity? Because when we feel overwhelmed, these gentle waves can become these towering peaks and deep valleys. We can get triggered into this hyperactivation of anxiety or anger. And when this stress becomes too much, it's like a circuit breaker. When we've been at a too-high level of stress, the circuit breaker flips and our nervous system can then descend into feelings of hypoarousal, in which we feel numb, checked out, and dissociated.

So, I have this handy-dandy little picture here. This is equanimity in the middle. As you can see, it's a nice wide range. There are these ups and downs of everyday life. If we get bumped out of this, we end up in anxiety, and if we're in anxiety too long, we crash down through equanimity into hypoarousal, into dissociation, numbness, which is depression.

How do we widen this window of equanimity? And when we are bumped out of it, because we will be, how do we come back to center? How do we turn back to that window?

First, I would like to explore this idea of equanimity. What are the qualities of being equanimous? I like the eight C's of IFS, Internal Family Systems. Is anybody familiar with that? A few people. Just close your eyes for a moment, and I'm going to read the eight C's, and I want you to feel how they land in your body, in your being.

Curiosity. Calm. Clarity. Compassion. Confidence. Courage. Creativity. Connectedness.

And you can open your eyes again. Just curious, just by reading some of these qualities that we might attribute to equanimity, do people feel a little more equanimity, a little more equanimous? Some people no, some people yes.

Are there qualities that you might add to this list? Something that feels more like equanimity for you. Is there anybody who wants to just share?

Audience member: For me, I would say open and kind of porous.

Open and porous. Nice. Yeah. Just being okay is okay. It's a really good place to be. Yes.

Audience member: Dispassion.

Dispassion. Yes, we're going to talk a little bit about that as we go forward. Thank you. Anybody else?

Audience member: Balance, trusting.

Yeah, these are all wonderful qualities of equanimity. We talk about causes and conditions in Buddhism. What are the causes and conditions that help us to be equanimous? Anybody want to share anything? Obviously, meditating is one of them. What helps you to be equanimous?

Audience member: Seeing the impermanence of things.

Right, seeing impermanence, not holding on. Thank you.

Audience member: I was going to say non-attachment.

Non-attachment. Yeah, not clinging, not pushing away, right? It's being in the middle of.

There are things that we can engage in that can be helpful in helping us to be equanimous. I went through a really traumatic experience and my nervous system was extremely hyper-vigilant and I was finding it difficult to meditate. I found that when I would walk in a beautiful garden, my nervous system would power down. I would go to an art gallery and see beautiful paintings. Again, my nervous system would power down, or listening to calming music. Sometimes when we are feeling overwhelmed and we go to sit and it feels too much, it's really helpful to be able to have some external resources to make our way back to our meditation.

What happens to us when there is some kind of a stimulus and we get reactive? Maybe we get anxious. A wave of emotion comes. That's the first step and then we may feel agitated that we have this feeling. How many of us have thought to ourselves, "I'm anxious. Oh, no, I'm anxious that I'm anxious," right? You start layering. We talked about the first arrow in Buddhism and then you add the second and the third and it makes it worse. This magnifies the emotion and perhaps bumps us out of that window of well-being into hyper or hypoarousal.

The most important aspect of equanimity is not to become blended with an emotion. Some people say non-attachment, so that is another description of this—not becoming blended with an emotion. In mindfulness, we would call being blended over-identification. We typically might say, "I am anxious." You hear the I am quality of the words that we use. With that kind of thought, we're blended. There's no space between our awareness and that anxiety, right? We are the anxiety. And so, it might feel like that feeling is taking over our bodies.

Guided Meditation

Let's just practice with getting a little reactive and then returning to the window of well-being. You might want to just close your eyes or have a soft gaze. First taking a slightly deeper breath in and out.

And then tuning into awareness. In Hakomi training, there's this idea of sitting in your back body. As though your awareness is not in the forefront. You're not leaning into it, but your awareness is sitting back. Just being aware of what is present in this moment.

Noticing what are you aware of? Is there a thought or a feeling or a sensation that wants your attention? If it's a thought, you might hear the thought in your mind. But your awareness is the one who is listening. The awareness is not the thought. It is the one who is listening.

Do you notice any kind of constriction maybe in your body? Or any kind of discomfort? Or maybe a strong emotion. Your awareness is the one that is noticing. Perhaps noticing where that is in your body.

And then being able to name it, giving it a name. So if you feel some anxiety, you might say, "I am anxious." But noticing that I am-ness. "I am anxious." Or "I am sad."

Then to create a little more space between your awareness and the feeling, you might say, "I feel anxiety." Going from I am to I feel.

And then stepping back a little more, you might say, "I am aware that I feel anxiety." I am aware that I feel whatever it is that you're noticing.

And then stepping back just a little bit more and saying, "I'm aware that a part of me feels anxiety."

And dropping the I am altogether and stepping back yet a little bit more, "Anxiety is present."

Do you see how there's more space now? Because there's no more of the I am-ness. There's not this blendedness with whatever you're feeling. It is present here. It's not all of you.

You might take slower, deeper breaths. Feeling your sit bones in your seat. Feeling your feet on the ground. And bringing a little self-compassion to whatever you're feeling. And if there's some discomfort, you might place a hand on that part of you that feels constricted. Perhaps saying something comforting: "I'm here, I feel you, I see you, I care."

If it feels like too much to be with whatever is present, you can always open your eyes and look around and find something pleasant that feels nourishing. And if what you're trying to be with still feels too much, you could always move a little, get up, get a drink of water, take a walk. But before you leave whatever has come for your attention, saying, "I'm sorry I can't be with you right now, but I'll be back when I feel a little more settled. I'll be back for you."

And so the feeling, the sensation, whatever is causing constriction begins to trust you. As you begin to feel less afraid of being with what is, your feelings, your thoughts, your sensations will be less afraid of you, and you'll be able to befriend whatever arises.

If you would like to, you can open your eyes or continue to have them closed, whatever feels right for you. Did anybody feel any kind of beginning of a separation? Yeah.

Reflection

When we say things like, "I am afraid, I am angry, I am sad," we are so blended, right? There's no space for equanimity. When we begin to create some space, the awareness is aware of, "Oh, this is present." Not I am, but "Oh, sadness is here. I see you."

One of the fundamental teachings of Buddhism is that change is the only thing that is certain. The Buddha spoke of impermanence. However, most of us are afraid of change. Is anybody afraid of change? Unless things are really bad. If I'm sitting in the dentist's office and he's drilling my teeth, I really am into change, [Laughter] right? Things are bad, we want them to change, but mostly we want security, right? We want certainty.

But the truth is that everything changes, including our thoughts and our feelings. Because we're not able to let them come and go in that gentle wave, going with the flow, we often get stuck in them and they become more solidified. They become an identity.

Language can reinforce this. In the English language, evidently, we have more nouns than verbs. People, places, things. We think this is the way things are, solid and unchanging. They're nouns. However, this is a view that we see life through. In some other languages, there's a different way of perceiving the world. A world of verbs instead of nouns.

Robin Wall Kimmerer, does anybody know her? She's wonderful. She is a Native American woman who also grew up in her Native American Potawatomi language, where everything is living and alive. Plants, animals, rocks, soil, water, air, sky, earth, all changing, all engaged in a never-ending process of becoming. We are human beings. We are always changing from moment to moment. Our cells are being replaced. Our thoughts are coming and going. Our emotions are coming and going.

I was listening to a podcast recently on SAND, the Science and Nonduality, and there was a Native American elder and psychologist Eduardo Duran, who was speaking about the soul wound. He explained that the traditional indigenous view is that everything is a subject. Instead of being an inanimate object, everything is a subject. Everything is a verb. So, when one of his clients comes to him and says, "I am depressed," he says, "Depression is visiting you. What does it have to say?"

Huh, what an idea, right? Instead of saying, "I'm anxious," we might say, "Anxiety is visiting." Hello, what do you have to tell me?

I'm sure everyone has heard this lovely Sufi poem by Rumi, The Guest House.

This being is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they're a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

Now, I have to say meeting all of these strong emotions that we may have at the door laughing is a little high bar. [Laughter] But, can we meet them with some open-heartedness? Pema Chödrön said, "Many people think the goal of spirituality is to get to the place where there is only light, but that is not freedom. Freedom is being able to stand in the pitch black and the blinding light with the same open heart."

What an aspiration, right? We are all going through, individually, collectively, some darkness. And it can be very destabilizing and settling. There's this article by Margaret Cullen in Tricycle magazine, Seeing with Grandmother's Eyes. Does anybody have or did have a grandmother who was sweet and kind, or a grandfather? Someone who was kindly like a grandmother or grandfather? I hope so.

In Buddhist teaching, she says a metaphor that is often used for equanimity is grandmotherly love. Whether it is seeing with a grandmother's eyes or relating through a grandmother's heart, the grandmother is able to love fully without being caught in the dramas of her grandchildren's lives. She doesn't take things personally and sees all children as deserving of love and care. A grandmother's eyes are quiet eyes. They neither seek to possess nor disown. Her gaze epitomizes unconditional goodwill.

Can we see our thoughts, our feelings, our sensations through the eyes of a grandmother or grandfather? With unconditional goodwill. It's only seeing with these kindly eyes the comings and goings of our thoughts and sensations, of our relationships, of our careers, our youth, everything else that is changing. It is then that we will be able to live with equanimity in this window of well-being.

I just want to end with a quote. Teacher and author Suzanne Anderson says, "This moment we are living in isn't inviting us to escape what is difficult or uncertain. It's not asking us to rise above the darkness or transcend it. It's asking us to stay, to become more deeply rooted, more fully present, more intimately embodied in the very terrain we once tried to leave. When we are willing to meet the shadow not as something to get rid of, but as a part of ourselves to understand and integrate, something begins to unlock. Energy that has been bound up in old patterns becomes available. Perception widens. We develop the capacity to hold more complexity without collapsing. We become less driven by unconscious fear and more guided by an inner coherence that can meet what is actually here."

May we cultivate equanimity in our practice as we learn to widen and live in this window of well-being, letting these thoughts and feelings and sensations move through us. And softening the hardened soil of this past conditioning and seeing our experience through kind eyes.

Q&A and Reflections

I hope that something has been helpful for you in your practice. We'll have about 10 minutes now of just reflection and if you would like to ask questions or any comments, feel free to do that now.

Audience member: Thank you for the expansion of that definition because I've been working with that with a somatic counselor and it's really helpful. Tolerance is an interesting word because it's almost like it's not anxiety or anything, it's just that you have to kind of put up with it. I like to think of it as opening this window and you're becoming more tolerant. But well-being is even better. So, thank you for that. As we were meditating, I really noticed something which was dread. When I was dropping into the meditation, I noticed that I had this dread. I recognized it and it was tears. I was sad. So, it wasn't like visiting, it was more like I got to feel this. I'm sitting there going like, "I'm dreading feeling it." I'm not letting myself feel it. But in the meditation, I felt it. And I was crying. So, I really made a connection between the dread and the fact that that was telling me something. It was like the visitor saying, "You really should go into this." Usually if you're walking around you're not really there to be able to drop in. But the meditation allowed me to do that. It made more sense after you talked about it what I was experiencing.

Hilary: Right. Thank you so much. Right, the dread, and usually we feel that and we run away, right? It can be confusing sometimes, because the dread can feel like my body's telling me something: "I need to run away now." It triggers that fight or flight. And so turning towards what is arising can feel so frightening. "What's going to happen? What do I do then?"

I think it's really important to have some steps that one takes in understanding why it's beneficial. Why is it beneficial to turn towards those feelings? I came to this practice in my mid-40s and I had spent decades running away with dread from the things I did not want to be with. And it did not make them go away, right? They're still in there. And they're still wanting, needing some attention, some comfort.

Can we be with them? Can they trust us to be with them? And we don't do that all at once. We don't go, "Okay, I'm going to dive into the middle of my worst trauma and I'm going to stay there." It's not that at all. It's a touching in. "I see you. I feel you." It's creating a space. "I see that you are there." And then over time we can be with a little more, a little more, and have some more compassion for it, instead of holding it all at arm's length. That's what I did at first. It's like, "Okay, I see you. Stay over there."

In mindful self-compassion training, there's this lovely analogy where a feeling comes knocking on the front door of your house. Boom, boom, boom, you know? It's like fear or something. And you look through the peephole and it's like, "No, I'm not going to open the door. This fear is out there, but I'm afraid." And so eventually, you just open the door and it's like, "Okay, sit here. There's a chair in the foyer here. Just don't bother me." And then eventually, you say, "Okay, you can wander around in the house." And then ultimately, you invite them into the living room or the family room, sit down on the couch with them, and say, "Hello, fear. Tell me, what are you afraid of? I'm here."

We develop that, little by little. We develop that competence in doing that. Thank you for that. Any other comments, questions?

Audience member: I so appreciated the poem that you read by Rumi and what you were just saying. I don't know if this is from the canon or what, but once in a Dharma talk, I heard a very similar story actually from the Buddha that Mara^[3] or demons would visit him and he would welcome them in. I found that whole imagery of welcoming these feelings, dreads, demons, as visitors helpful. To me that reminds me that they're visitors and they're passing through and that helps with the non-attachment. So thank you for that reminder this evening.

Hilary: Yeah, don't you love that? Turning the words into verbs rather than nouns. When they're nouns, they're here to stay. When they're verbs, they have that -ing ending. They're visiting. And so they don't get stuck that way. Yeah, thank you.

Audience member: I just had a comment to piggyback off of your comment. What I've learned during the practices is the layering of emotions, and I've really appreciated the ability to sit with stillness and realize that sometimes when I'm feeling something, to turn into it because there's a chance to find the other layers. So something at face value isn't always it. I've found sometimes with anger, underneath it is fear, or dread with sadness, and that there are just so many layers to it. Being able to sit with it allows me to kind of uncover those and then process them. You felt the release it sounded like, and that feels really good. I think that's part of the experience, being able to also release that emotion so it doesn't stick with us in our body.

Hilary: Yeah, I love that. Because there are so often times so many layers. A lot of times underneath anger is fear and there's sadness, right? And to be able to uncover that and to be with all of them with some compassion in itself can help release. Because those feelings are no longer feeling alone and abandoned and exiled, you know? Just the loving kindness, the presence turning towards can really help to release some of that. Thank you.

Well, we have come to the end of our time, so I just want to thank you and dedicate the merit of our practice. May our practice help us to become more equanimous and to feel the gentle rolling of the ups and downs. As we try to widen that window of well-being and just really be here for whatever is in our own lives and the lives of others, and just bring more peace and kindness and compassion into life and the world. It really needs that. So, thank you very much. And I will be here for a few more minutes if there's anything that you wanted to talk to me about, feel free to do that. Thank you.