Developing Equanimity: An Inner Resource for Agility and Resilience
If you’ve ever used term “Zen” to casually describe someone who is calm, you’ve tapped into the essence of equanimity. Someone practiced in equanimity stays balanced and serene under stressful situations. They have more emotional resilience. Brad Cousins, CEO and founder of Ingage Human Capital Strategies, says, “The stress of discontinuous environments experienced by entrepreneurs, innovators, and leaders…all require a level of equanimity in order to remain resilience.”
What is Equanimity?
Equanimity (eck-qua-NIM-ity) is a state where we feel emotions but don’t get tangled up in them. It can be improved through practice. Buddhist scholar, Peter Harvey, described it as the opposite of James Bond’s martini, “stirred but not shaken.” Cultivating equanimity allows us to better respond to challenging situations. For example, a speeding driver cuts you off on the freeway. You first feel fear, a useful trigger that compels you to hit the brakes to avoid collision. But with equanimity, you don’t dwell on the situation once the moment has passed. You don’t spiral into road rage or loop on fabricated stories about bloody crashes that might have happened but didn’t. Equanimity bolsters your ability to actively move on to whatever is required in the next moment.
Equanimity is especially important for leaders. A modern leader acts as a coach, putting situations into perspective and giving the team cues on how to interpret and act. Research shows that many leaders react poorly under pressure. A recent study of 1300 employees disclosed that in difficult situations 53% of leaders become more close-minded and controlling and 45% become more upset and emotional. These are hardly the traits needed for the agility and resilience.
When something unexpected happens - whether it’s a minor setback or a crisis, a little bonus or a major victory - a leader’s response ripples through the organization and sets the tone. If a leader exhibits equanimity, the organization tends to stay calm which improves the team’s ability to respond appropriately in the moment and to what’s up next. A good youth sports coach hugs her team following their big win and then gets them focused on preparing for the next game.
Some people worry that equanimity means living without passion. They fret that people may take advantage of them or that equanimity could make them indifferent towards suffering. They may be afraid that without constant emotional stimulus they would be unable to achieve. However, equanimity isn’t apathy, resignation, or passivity. Equanimity is active and increases the accuracy of action. We allow ourselves to be moved by the difficult aspects of life, by uncertainty, injustice, pain, or loss, whether personal or public and we train our minds so that these things do not disturb our serenity. Once the driver who cut you off has raced away, ruminating on the past incident robs you of the opportunities embedded in the current moment. Equanimity means that you don’t keep reacting to non-reality, to the things that are not happening now.
Equanimity acknowledges a fundamental truth about our complex world: we may never know the full story and we can never know the future. A Buddhist fable tells of a poor farmer who can barely make ends meet. One day a valuable wild stallion unexpectedly dances into his barn. “You are so fortunate,” exclaim his neighbors. “Maybe,” replies the farmer. The next day, the farmer’s son begins to train the horse, but the horse rebels and breaks the son’s leg. “You are so unfortunate,” sigh his neighbors. “Maybe,” replies the farmer. A week later, the king’s army rides into the area, conscripting young men for a treacherous war, but because the farmer’s son is laid up with his injury he is not drafted. “You are so fortunate,” rejoice his neighbors. “Maybe,” replies the farmer.
The Physiology of Equanimity
When a situation pushes our buttons, our sympathetic nervous system responds with a physiological response. Adrenaline surges. Breathing becomes shallow. Hearts race. Muscles tense in readiness. The sympathetic nervous system chemistry, the so-called “fight-or-flight” reaction, increases mental focus and prepares us for action like a gazelle leaping at the rustling of bushes to escape from a leopard. This reaction, while critical to survival, evolved to be used only occasionally. Later, the gazelle shakes off the reaction. Humans tend not to shake it off. Instead, we make up stories and continue the situation in our heads even though the reality is past. Frequent or long-lasting use of the sympathetic nervous system damages health, and its tunnel-vision hinders our abilities to do anything but react.
Equanimity practices put the brakes on the fight-or-flight system and help engage our parasympathetic nervous system, the so-called “rest-and-digest” response. When our parasympathetic nervous system takes over, a hormone called acetylcholine is released letting your body and mind know it’s okay to relax. The enormous health benefits of staying relaxed are well-researched. There is increasing evidence that the practices that lead to greater equanimity also improve decision-making by reducing impulsivity and other factors.
Courtesy of Faye Cornish on Unsplash
Practices for Developing Equanimity
It's impossible to completely avoid the leopards or rude drivers in our fast-paced, uncertain world. Nor would you want to. It’s important to get on the road and go somewhere, even if the journey contains risks. To take on challenging problems and accomplish big things requires inner strength. Also, it’s not effective to try to shut down emotion or go numb in the presence of difficulty. These strategies not only disable our ability to react to the leopard in the bush but since the emotions are still present, they tend to leak out in the form of micro-aggressions towards bystanders or ourselves. The only way forward is to face the fear and move through it with equanimity. We will never reach the point of complete and continuous equanimity, but practice will reduce the intensity, duration, and magnitude of emotional entanglement.
Developing equanimity requires two types of practices – proactive practices to build strength and reactive practices to use as first aid when things get tough.
Practices to Build Strength
Proactive, protective practices strengthen the muscles of equanimity ahead of the need to use them so that you are strong and ready. You don’t have to meet difficult situations unprepared.
Practice mindfulness. Marketers know that every journey towards change starts with awareness. We must first be aware of something happening before we can redirect its energy. Therefore, mindfulness is essential for equanimity. Mindfulness exercises bring attention to the moment revealing the physical and emotional cues that stress is present. There are hundreds of books, videos, training, and apps to help you increase mindfulness.
Hang out with difficulty in a safe space. I first encountered the concept of equanimity while practicing Aikido, a defensive martial art. In the dojo I not only practiced techniques, but also inner skills like how to avoid impulsively jerking back when someone shoved a hand in my face. You can create a safe space to practice equanimity in many ways. Do something just a little scary everyday – it’s especially helpful to do this with friends or a coach. Keep breathing through the scary parts and practice staying calm in the moment. Learn your triggers. Take baby steps to bring thoughts of challenging people or situations into your meditation practice where you can observe how your reactions rise and dissipate.
Don’t make it worse. Some stress is inevitable and sometimes you want to purposefully take on difficult tasks. But a lot of stress is pointless. Avoid excessive stimulus – social media, daily news hype, people who are out of control. These deplete your reserves so that less of your strength is available when needed.
Stay strong. Emotions and equanimity happen in the body. Build your health foundations. Get enough sleep every night and avoid getting too hungry or tired.
More strategies for untangling
First Aid Practices
The other type of practice builds a repertoire of reactive tools that you can use at the point you notice the physiological signals that your sympathetic nervous system going into overdrive. When you get off kilter, these practices help you come back into balance.
Slow your breath. Slow, purposeful breathing helps engage the parasympathetic nervous system. Repeating calming words and phrases also help, such as “May I be protected and safe.”
Ask countering questions. When you find yourself upset, ask “vertical” questions such as “am I sure this is happening to me in the moment and not just in my mind?”, “what else is happening right now?”, “what is okay right now?” Vertical questioning is a psychological method that helps a person consciously go inward to incorporate facts into their thinking at moments when their imagination runs amok.
Engage in activities that you know help calm you. Go for a walk, meditate, spend time in nature, with children, or listen to music.
The next time you find leopards prowling in the bushes or when a jerk cuts you off in traffic you can remind yourself that equanimity is possible. “If you say to yourself, ‘it is what it is, and it’s kind of shitty,’ you’ve moved closer to acceptance,” said Aaron Balick, psychotherapist, and author of The Little Book of Calm. “That’s just it. In that moment, it’s shitty. With equanimity, shitty can be okay. Not fun, but okay.”