How to Be Sick by Toni Bernhard, Sylvia Boorstein

wasn’t doing the right kind of exercise. I rested at every opportunity, and exercise? It was an exercise just getting to the appointment. When it was clear his treatment wasn’t going to work for me, he dropped me . . . like a hot potato.
     

Equanimity Practices
     
    In the 1990s, when the Thai Forest monk Ajahn Jumnian came for his annual visit to Spirit Rock, I faithfully attended. Bubbling over—as he always was—with joy and laughter, one day he suddenly began discoursing on equanimity. I got out a pen and took these notes:
    When people say, “Ajahn, let’s go for a beautiful walk,” fine I’ll go. If they don’t ask, that’s fine too. I don’t expect a walk to be any more satisfying than sitting alone. It could be hot or windy out there. If people bring me delicious food, great. If they don’t, great. I need to diet anyway. If I’m feeling good, that’s okay. If I’m sick, that’s okay too. It’s a great excuse to lie down.
     
     
     
    These few sentences, scribbled on a scrap of paper as Jack Kornfield translated, have become the centerpiece of equanimity practice for me. I rediscovered the notes several years after becoming sick. Reading them with my new circumstance in mind, I understood that the essence of equanimity is accepting life as it comes to us without blaming anything or anyone—including ourselves. I’d been getting despondent when a treatment didn’t work and becoming angry when a doctor didn’t live up to my expectations. I was trying to control the uncontrollable. Some treatments work. Some don’t. Some doctors come through for us. Some don’t.
     
    The challenge is to not let this insight slip into indifference, because indifference is a subtle aversion to life as it comes to us. Indifference turns the serene acceptance of “Things are as they are” into “Things are as they are—so who cares?” This is why my notes from Ajahn Jumnian’s visit and my memory of the joy that emanated from him are still so inspiring. Now I cultivate equanimity by saying, “If this medication helps, that will be great. If it doesn’t, no blame. It wasn’t what my body needed.” “If this doctor turns out to be responsive, that will be nice. If he or she doesn’t, that’s okay. Any given doctor is going to be how he or she is going to be. It’s not in my control.”
     
    I try to remember Ajahn Jumnian’s little gem when I’m faced with the unpredictability of being able to participate in activities or visit with people. Early on in my illness, I bought tickets to the Sacramento Opera’s production of Carmen. I thought that even if Tony and I could only stay for Act I of the matinee, it would still be a wonderful experience. But on the day of opera, I was too sick to leave the house. I was terribly resentful and angry that we couldn’t go through with the plans I’d so carefully made—including calling to find out how long each act lasted and where the closest disabled parking was. The resentment and anger turned to tears, making it harder for Tony. I simply did not have a strong enough equanimity practice to handle the uncertainty and unpredictability that had so unexpectedly become my constant companion in life.
     
    Fast-forward six years. An old family friend was in town and Tony invited him to dinner. I carefully arranged my week so I wouldn’t have other commitments in the days leading up to the dinner. This greatly increased the likelihood that I’d be able to join him and Tony for a bit even though I rarely leave the bedroom after 5:30. But on the evening he came, I was too sick to visit. Had we happened to have scheduled the dinner the night before, I would have been able to socialize for a while.
     
    However, I didn’t react the same way I had to the missed opera experience. I didn’t lie in the bedroom and cry that night. Instead I recalled Ajahn Jumnian’s words and said to myself, “If I could have joined them, that would have been nice. Since I can’t, that