Relational Equanimity.

By Pablo Das (HHC, SEP)

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Have you ever really thought hard about precisely what power one person has to condition the happiness or wellbeing of another person?

Here’s what we can’t do…

We cannot control what a person thinks. We cannot control what a person says. We cannot control a person’s actions.

We CAN control our own thoughts, speech and actions in such a way as to do our best not cause harm to others, but that’s not the same as conditioning someone else’s happiness and wellbeing.

In Buddhism there is a group of 4 teachings that are thought of a “heart practices”. The last few articles I wrote cover the first three; kindness compassion and sympathetic joy. When practiced formally, they involve the recitation of phrases that represent wishes for others. “May you be happy, successful and free from suffering”. But what does wishing someone well really accomplish? The answer is two things.

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First, the practices are good for us. They each counter a type of self generated suffering involved with hatred, being punitive and jealousy. They feel better in the body and mind. They support positive emotions. Kindness compassion and appreciation are simply good for the practitioner.

Second, they serve as motivators for speech and action which support us to hurt others less.

But wishing someone well does not have a particular impact on the other person. It doesn’t condition their happiness and wellbeing. The fact is, each person is responsible for their own happiness. Each person must grapple with their own thoughts, stories and belief systems. They must manage their trauma, grief, emotions and challenges. Each person is responsible for their own speech and actions. The Buddha often talked about diligently working out ones own liberation.

There is very little we can do to impact happiness in another. Probably the most important thing we can do is be present. Sometimes we can offer some wisdom. We can teach what we know. Sometimes we can share our resources. Maybe even intervene once or twice. But in the end each of us is responsible to work out our own liberation from suffering. No one outside ourselves can do it for us. This is not to say that we do it alone. We can’t. We do it in community and with helping professionals and wisdom holders and friends. But in the end, we are responsible for our won lives.

This is why I love the fourth of the heart practices: Relational Equanimity. It serves as a reality check to the other three. It says, it’s wonder full to cultivate kindness and compassion and wish people well, but “peoples happiness or lack of happiness depend on their actions and not one’s wishes for them.

When I truly grasped the profound implications of that teaching, I started teaching this one first in the group of heart practices. When we start by acknowledging that we are limited in our ability to condition happiness in others and that ones happiness depends on their actions and not anyones wishes, that changes the meaning of the other three. It tells you very clearly what you cannot do with those practices.

In real world practice, this is most obvious when someone is in active addiction. You can care for someone very deeply. You can wish for and even try to support an end to their suffering. You can try to get them into rehab. You can be present. But what you have to quickly come to terms with is that unless the person is willing to take full responsibility for themselves, there’s nothing you can really do to keep them well. And sometimes, because of how painful, disruptive and dangerous it can be to be around a person in active addiction, sometimes you have to cut ties altogether and hope that they re able to work out their own liberation from addiction.

In buddhist circles, relational equanimity isn’t a particularly popular teaching. There are entire retreats set aside for kindness. Lot’s of books on compassion. But this other truth, becoming clear on reality and the limitations of those practices to condition happiness in a mother person is essential in understand \ing the real meaning and power of kindness and compassion. Without it, we run the risk of enabling and codependency and just setting ourselves up to be hurt over and over again.