What Is Balance?

I was nearing the end of a two week course studying Buddhism and meditation at a monastery on the outskirts of Kathmandu, Nepal. And I, along with my classmates, had an opportunity to ask the abbot, Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup, questions.

One of the answers has stayed with me to this day.

It’s helped me to frame what ‘balance’ in life looks and feels like.

The question asked was:

So, I was with this girl. And it was amazing - I was so high and it felt so good. Then, she dumped me. And I went so low, it was awful.

Then, later, I met another girl. And it was okay - not too high, not too low. Like, it was alriiight (shrugging his shoulders).

Is that the middle path?

We’d been talking about the Buddhist concept of the middle way which refers to the avoidance of extremes in life - not too much pleasure and not too much asceticism.

After a longer answer which was translated from Tibetan into English, he closed with this line, “You know that feeling you had with the first girl? That’s your middle way.”

It struck me there that balance was about feeling good.

It was about emotion.

It wasn’t about the time spent doing certain things, it was how I was focused and feeling.

Today, I know I’m in balance when I’m consistently ranging from satisfaction or contentment to an even a more elevated state.

I make better decisions (which contribute to my overall balance on all subjects) when I feel good. If I’m stressed or tired or angry or worried, my behaviour and choices reflect it.

This was in my head today and wanted to share it with you.

I hope this finds you well and able to chill out in the quiet of your mind for a bit (if you want to!) today to practice your feeling of balance.

(image: mandy j daniels)

Unconditional Appreciation

As I look around, there’s so much to appreciate. This amazing home, the sunshine, the heat (yes to summer!), this computer, clean water, my clothes, friends and so much more.

Focusing upon those things in our lives that help us feel good trains our focus in the direction of what we want. It also allows for easier access to ideas that align with our desires.

Conscious and consistent appreciation helps us to build momentum in that positive-feeling direction and provides emotional stability along the way. Like having your sea legs throughout the day.

But, there’s a catch. Appreciation of what’s already in the world requires observing (or re-living in your mind) something that has manifested in order to feel good.

Which means that your emotion is conditional upon what’s already manifested.

It’s not at all a bad thing, but it doesn’t fully set you free.

It’s an emotion based on something outside of you.

What about feeling satisfaction from thought alone? Or sitting in the sensation of contentment, simply because you can?

Lately, I’ve been exploring the power of unconditional appreciation.

I see it like the skill of feeling good independent of conditions.

This might look like sitting still, closing your eyes, quieting your mind and setting an intention that you want to feel satisfaction, and then relishing in the feeling it for its own sake.

Or, embodying an emotion because you want to, not because you’re responding to anything in your environment.

Or, carving out an inner space where you conjure emotions through a daydream and allow that to be enough.

It’s focusing into an elevated emotion because you can, without needing a reason.

This way, the world doesn’t have to be a certain way in order for you to feel a certain way.

This matters because when things go awry, if we’ve trained ourselves, first into prioritizing feeling good, and second, into knowing how to do that even if the outcome we want hasn’t occurred, we know how to access that reference point of feeling good without needing to observe a result.

If you can train yourself to feel happy in the absence of what you want, now you’re free.

It importantly means that you’re in the same vibrational vicinity as that which you want, which allows you receive the right impulse that will take you towards it.

In making peace with where you are it doesn’t mean that you’re accepting it as what you want, it means that you’ve been able to find a feeling that matches the feeling you want life to give you.

But you found it first unconditionally.

And with enough practice and tuning, more of that feeling will become accessible, and you’ll start to notice that the world begins to give you conditions that match it.

(Photo: Dawson City, Yukon by mjd)