Week 1
Experienced Practitioners: Cultivating Equanimity, Balancing the Heart
Home Practices Week 1 (10/7/2025)
The theme of the class is “learning to walk evenly on uneven ground,” using the framework of the 8 worldly winds:
- Praise and Blame (sometimes translated as praise and censure)
- Gain and Loss
- Success and Failure (also known as status and disgrace and fame and disrepute)
- Pleasure and Pain
Each week we will practice with one of the worldly winds.
This week, we will start with “Praise.”
Be aware of moments of being praised throughout the day, moments when you are being appreciated, thanked, delighted in. Be aware of moments when someone is grateful to you and is voicing that gratitude.
Be aware of your reaction to being praised. Do you push it away and reject it? Do you grasp onto it? Please practice responding to it with open heartedness, with delight in the delight of others. Notice if there is any stickiness. Notice the uneven ground, the ups and downs of mental states in relationship to being praised.
As well, please be aware of praising others, recognizing their beauty, goodness, wise and virtuous actions.
Maybe you even want to write thank you notes of appreciation to those you are grateful to throughout this week.
Week 2
Experienced Practitioners: Cultivating Equanimity, Balancing the Heart
Home Practices Week 2 (10/14/2025)
Please continue to practice with last week’s home practice: being aware of your reactions and responses to being praised, the practice of appreciating others, and appreciating the beautiful qualities you see expressing themselves in your actions, thoughts, and speech.
As well this week:
- Be aware of moments of being blamed or criticized throughout the day. Be aware of your reaction to being blamed or criticized. How do you react to it? How might you respond?
- Notice the uneven ground of conditions and the ups and downs in mental states that arise in relation to praise and blame.
- Be aware of moments when you blame or criticize yourself. Each time you become aware of the voices of self blame, contextualize these voices as “self blame is occurring here and now” and then allow yourself to be aware of the felt sense of the body.
- Be aware of blaming or criticizing others.
Week 3
Experienced Practitioners: Cultivating Equanimity, Balancing the Heart
Home Practices Week 3 (10/21/2025)
Please continue to practice with last week’s home practice: being aware of your reactions and responses to being praised or blamed, praising or blaming yourself, and praising or blaming others.
This week we’re moving into the theme of gain and loss.
In particular, through the week, be especially aware of moments of gaining something, of getting something you want, when conditions are as you want them to be. Observe your reactions and responses. Notice when you are accepting a gain as natural and to be appreciated and when you are clinging and attempting to hold on. Observe, don’t judge yourself, relax, and release.
Notice what kinds of gain matter most to you. What are you trying to accumulate? Is there tension in the wanting? Is there tension in the getting?
Week 4
Experienced Practitioners: Cultivating Equanimity, Balancing the Heart
Home Practices Week 4 (10/28/2025)
Please continue to be aware of reactions and responses to praise, blame, and gain. As well this week, pay particular attention to loss.
Be aware of big losses as well as very small losses through the day. Practicing with small losses can help us sustain attention when we experience bigger losses.
As we know, loss is often accompanied by strong emotions; be aware, allow, and see the emotions that arise as nature, as natural in the face of loss.