equanimity

The autumnal equinox has arrived in the northern hemisphere. At the time of the equinox, light and dark find balance. Even here in the Rockies, day and night are of equal length for a little while. And the leaves put on a fiery show before winter descends.

This is the perfect time to offer a prayer of gratitude to Earth and Sky; gratitude for the comforting rhythms of our cyclic seasons; autumn follows summer just as surely as night follows day.

Get out in Nature now. Ask Mama Earth and Papa Sky to show you how to find balance and equanimity in the midst of all the chaos and change washing over the planet right now.

Thank you beautiful Earth and Sky for the oxygen, water, food and shelter you provide that make life possible. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Today is the autumnal equinox. Autumn has officially arrived.

An equinox is the moment in which Earth’s equator lines up perfectly with the center of our Sun’s disk. This occurs only twice each year, in March and September.

At the time of an equinox, our Sun rises directly in the east and sets directly in the west. Day and night are precisely equal at the equator — and very close to equal everywhere else on the globe.

Metaphysical thoughts on the equinox from MysticMamma:

Symbolically, it can be viewed as the point when day meets night, where opposites meet on equal ground, where we can integrate the duality within the oneness of existence.

The ancients, who knew themselves to be at one with the Earth, honored these planetary shifts as important reflections of life. As above so below, As within, so without.

This eternal medicine reminds us of the equanimity necessary to reconcile opposites…

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Thoughts on equanimity and balance from BuddhaNet:

Equanimity is a perfect, unshakable balance of mind, rooted in insight. Looking at the world around us, and looking into our own heart, we see clearly how difficult it is to attain and maintain balance of mind.

Looking into life we notice how it continually moves between contrasts: rise and fall, success and failure, loss and gain, honour and blame. We feel how our heart responds to all this happiness and sorrow, delight and despair, disappointment and satisfaction, hope and fear. These waves of emotion carry us up and fling us down; and no sooner do we find rest, than we are in the power of a new wave again. How can we expect to get a footing on the crest of the waves? How shall we erect the building of our lives in the midst of this ever restless ocean of existence, if not on the Island of Equanimity.

A world where that little share of happiness allotted to beings is mostly secured after many disappointments, failures and defeats; a world where only the courage to start anew, again and again, promises success; a world where scanty joy grows amidst sickness, separation and death; a world where beings who were a short while ago connected with us by sympathetic joy, are at the next moment in want of our compassion – such a world needs equanimity…

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Spend a few moments meditating with Mama Earth today. May she help you find your sense of balance and equanimity in the midst of all the waves of change and chaos.