Inner Balance / Equanimity

Inner Balance (also known as Equanimity) is the ability to not interfere with the sensory experiences as they arise and pass in a kind of hands-off relationship to the sensory event.

Training this skill is like giving permission to sensory experiences to fully express themselves and allowing them to freely come, be, and go without any resistance. There are no efforts to push the sensory experiences away and no attempts to grasp onto any of them. An open and relaxed posture of your body may contribute to this openness. If you use labels, you may also enhance the Inner Balance skill with a gentle, welcoming, and loving tone in your voice. If it is possible to let go of any judgment in your mind intentionally, this also cultivates the skill of Inner Balance / Equanimity.

Background Equanimity: When you are focussing on a particular object, you may experience distractions: other sensory experiences that may try to grasp your attention. For example, you are focussing on a restful body sensation, and at the same time, there are some thoughts (mental images or mental talk) that try to steal the spotlight of your attention. By allowing the distracting sensory experiences (e.g. inner voice and mental impressions in the above example) to freely come and go on their own in the background of your awareness, without bothering them and without interfering with them, you still develop the Equanimity skill. You don’t need to suppress the distractions. You are not focussing on them. 

Foreground Equanimity: By allowing the sensory experience that you are focussing on to fully express itself and allowing it to freely come, be, and go without any resistance, you develop the skill of Equanimity.

In all situations, irrespective of where you place the focus of your attention, you can develop Equanimity with all sensory experiences.