Help Yourself Through Equanimity

by Gelek Rimpoche

When we talk about equanimity and equality, it is about you and me, it means that me and others are equal. So yes, theoretically and politically, we accept that, but practically really we don't. That's where we are today. When we talk about the motivation of the precious mind, when we talk about pure love and pure compassion, that is another thing. Many of us feel quite comfortable with love and compassion, but when you look carefully it is more attachment than pure love. The moment we use words like, “all sentient beings,” or, “all living beings,” we begin to feel uncomfortable. It is impossible to imagine and impossible to think of loving all of those. That shows us: where is the pure love within us really?

I hope that what I am talking to you this morning is not too harsh; I think it is the reality. Sometimes, we need to throw that in, so that you have some idea of what pure love is really all about. We can dismiss it and say, “without attachment it is pure love," but what do you mean by attachment? The love we are comfortable with, is the one with attachment. We have love-addiction. There is an advantage too. I am not saying that every love is bad. Look at families. Whatever family dynamic has been cemented, that is love. Whatever society has done to keep itself together, is through love. So even though it is with attachment, it is very useful. Honestly. But in the long run, from the Buddha's and the bodhisattvas' point of view, it might not be the right love. However, even that has a lot of advantages. It even makes the individual cool down. You may be burning with anger and hatred, but that love will be like a little bit of cold water poured over that huge burning sensation. You know, I don't have to say it. We have all experienced that comfort that this love can give us. That's why we are addicted to it. That's why we enjoy that, and that's why we are also suffering. There is the first love, and then there are problems, and then we are tolerating those problems. If we have to develop tolerance for the purpose of something very positive, it is quite difficult. But we have tremendous tolerance in the service of attachment. That is human nature. It is not human nature as such, but it is our addiction. It is our addiction to love and comfort. For the sake of that little comfort, for the feeling of soft and gentle care, for the sake of feeling loved, we are willing to sacrifice so much. That shows the human capability - when it is going the wrong way. We are willing to tolerate everything.

If you are a spiritual practitioner that very addiction, that very tolerance should be able to be used for pure love. If you do so, then every work you do, every effort you make, will become absolutely worthwhile, and absolutely beautiful and beneficial, for not only yourself, but for all beings. The benefit to all beings is actually the benefit for yourself. Many of those are very funny. When you look at positive and negative, virtuous and non-virtuous, there are lots of twists and turns.

Doing something for the benefit of others, and even making sacrifices, or doing enjoyable things, or whatever, all become virtues, because you are serving and helping those who need it, the weaker sections of society. We always look at the economically weak or health-wise weak and educationally weak. But truly the weaker section is more than that. Actually all of us are very weak in our virtue. All of us are very, very weak in our positive karma. All of us are very weak in our capability. All of us are very fragile through hatred, obsession, hatred, attachment, jealousy. We are weak too, you and me, who are here today, we are all weak, very weak in our faith, in our pure love. Perhaps that is even not existing. We are very weak in our tolerance. In every one of us there is tremendous weakness and fragility. When we talk about the 'weaker section' we are talking about ourselves.