Lamp in the Darkness, A by Jack Kornfield

Author:Jack Kornfield [Kornfield, Jack]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FICTION/General
Publisher: Sounds True
Published: 2011-09-01T06:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

Equanimity and Peace

Let it be.

Paul McCartney

Mother Theresa was once interviewed for BBC television by Malcolm Muggeridge, and after spending nearly an hour with her as she worked with orphans and those who were dying, he said to her, “You know, this work is so wonderful, Mother Theresa, but in some way, it must be a little bit easier for you as a nun. You have such a simple life, you don’t have the complexities of a home, an insurance policy, the difficulties of marriage and relationship.” And she interrupted him and said, “No, no, no, I’m married too.” And she held up the gold ring that commemorated the wedding of the nuns in her order to Christ. She paused for a moment and then looked up at him and said, “And he can be very difficult sometimes.”

If it’s true for Mother Theresa, it’s true for all of us. We will all experience waves of gain and loss, of fame and disrepute, of praise and blame that wash over us within the vast turnings of life. Each of us has to find our way to keep a peaceful and steady heart in the midst of it all.

To do this, the natural love of the heart has to be balanced with the wisdom of equanimity. If we focus only on feelings of love and compassion without the balance of equanimity and peace, we can get overly attached to the way we want things to be. While we can love the world and hold the sorrows of the world in compassion, we also need equanimity and peace to teach us balance with the things we cannot change.

All the teachings summarized: “Not always so.”—Suzuki Roshi

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