Last month, I wrote about a simple phrase I was reminded of during a one-day Vipassana workshop: “As it is.” As it is, is a deceptively simple yet mind-changing phrase to be repeated like a mantra when things we want to happen don’t happen and those we don’t want to happen do. Lately, I've had an opportunity to practice this mantra in a very practical way. I'm getting older. Like many things that come with getting older, my blood pressure has been creeping up. It's not dramatically high....

I recently attended a one-day Vipassana meditation retreat. It wasn't my first experience with Vipassana, but sometimes the simplest reminders arrive precisely when we need them most. Throughout the day, one phrase echoed repeatedly in my mind: "As it is." Three ordinary words. Yet they hold extraordinary wisdom. We spend so much of our lives resisting reality. We want the weather to be different. We wish people would behave differently. We replay yesterday, hoping to rewrite it, or worry...

In the practice of Vipassana meditation, as taught by S. N. Goenka, two qualities are emphasized repeatedly: awareness and equanimity. Goenka often described them as “the two wings of a bird.” With only one wing, a bird cannot fly. In the same way, awareness without equanimity can lead to frustration or feelings of overwhelm, while equanimity without awareness becomes numbness or avoidance. Together, however, they become the forces that gradually free the mind. Awareness is the ability to...