พระอาจารย์สุรพงค์อธิบายว่าอุเบกขาบารมีนั้นแตกต่างจากความเฉยแบบอัพยากตะ เพราะประกอบด้วยปัญญา ความเพียร และความอดทน และไม่อาจเกิดขึ้นได้โดยลำพัง แต่ต้องอาศัยบารมีอีกเก้าข้อที่สั่งสมมาก่อนเป็นฐานรองรับ ก่อนนำเข้าสู่การนั่งสมาธิ อุทิศส่วนบุญ แผ่เมตตา และอธิษฐานจิตPhra Ajarn Suraphong explains that the perfection of equanimity is not the same as indifference — it is built from wisdom, effort, and patience, and cannot stand on its own. It requires all nine of the preceding perfections as its foundation. The talk then moves into a full guided sit: dedicating merit, radiating loving-kindness, and a closing aspiration.
Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration: Where Practice Begins
Phra Ajarn Suraphong opens by restating the principle that practice consists of two parts: and . Right comes first — the Buddha laid out the order this way, mindfulness before concentration. Right mindfulness simply means keeping awareness resting with the body, so the mind settles firmly within the body. Once the mind is settled in the body, the drawing-in of pure energy begins, cleansing both body and mind together.
Three Natures Competing to Rule the House
He teaches that both body and mind need a good ruler watching over them, and that there are three natures at play: , , and (). All three compete to seize the seat of the mind, in order to control the body and all its resources toward their own ends.
The wholesome aims to bring , prosperity, peace, goodness, , and into the world. The unwholesome is the opposite — it aims to destroy beings and the world, bringing every kind of harm, danger, and obstacle. The indeterminate takes neither good nor bad — it stays neutral, but this is a kind of neutrality entirely different from equanimity.
Equanimity Is Not the Neutrality of the Indeterminate
He stresses this point clearly: equanimity is not the same as the indeterminate, which takes neither good nor bad. Equanimity does not let emotion drift toward delight, nor let feeling drift toward aversion. It abides in the settled stillness of the equanimity-state, which is composed of wisdom that sees things as they truly are; effort directed at not drifting toward delight or aversion; that resists drifting toward delight or aversion; sincerity and uprightness; and truthfulness — abiding in knowledge, understanding, and truth, without letting emotion drift toward delight or aversion. All of this serves to keep the mind in balance, truth, and integrity — grounded in aspiration and .
The Perfection of Equanimity: Resting on Nine Other Perfections
This is the heart of today's teaching. He explains that equanimity requires the foundation of loving-kindness to support it — and, taken further, all nine of the other perfections are what support equanimity. Equanimity necessarily depends on generosity, morality, renunciation, wisdom, effort, patience, truthfulness, resolution, and loving-kindness as its supporting foundation — missing even one of these, it cannot stand.
This is why the perfection of equanimity is the very last of the ten perfections — the one that requires every other quality to support it, so that we can abide free of delight and aversion. Equanimity is therefore of great importance, fitting with the Buddha's teaching in the Noble Eightfold Path's factor of right mindfulness: that monks should clearly know body, feeling, mind, and mental objects, in order to remove covetousness and grief regarding the world.
Delight and Aversion Toward the Five Sense Pleasures
He explains that delight and aversion in the world means delight and aversion toward the five sense pleasures — forms, sounds, smells, tastes, and touch — which are mental objects. The outer world consists of these five, experienced through the outer sense bases: eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind. Once the five senses register something, the information is sent to the mind and a mental object arises. After that registration, whichever nature happens to be ruling the house at that moment — wholesome, unwholesome, or indeterminate — uses the human body and mind to act toward its own purpose.
Choosing the Side of Wholesome States
He teaches that existing in this world has a purpose, and we must choose a side. We already know not to do evil, so what remains is choosing between the indeterminate and the wholesome. The indeterminate merely burns through the time of a human life — the same routine, morning, noon, and evening, gaining nothing, unable to build a good future for us. Yet our life, both now and in the future, depends entirely on wholesome states. We must therefore choose the side of the wholesome and act in accordance with it, so the wholesome can use our time and resources to bring benefit, now and in the future.
The simplest thing to do is simply to keep knowing — to be aware of our own body, aware of what we're currently aware of. The clarity of mindfulness differs from the clarity of : mindfulness only knows what it knows, while clear comprehension knows the state itself, penetrating into its details ever more deeply, without end.
The Sphere of Knowing Settles In the Mind, the Triple Gem Shines
When we sustain awareness without lapsing, knowing what we know, resting on the meditation object we've chosen well — one with a clear and continuous signal — the sphere of knowing draws in the pure energy called merit through the center of its own brightness. This pure energy goes on to cleanse the stains that create the many forms of obstacle known as , freeing us from suffering and danger.
Wholesome states can only be established in one place: the mind. When a wholesome state is established, it means the wholesome system has successfully seized the seat of the mind. The appears shining clear within us. The Triple Gem appears radiant at our center, and we appear radiant at its center; both we and the noble ones appear shining at the center of nibbāna, among countless enlightened beings. They take our elements — seeing, remembering, thinking, knowing, earth, water, fire, wind, space, and consciousness — and make them clear and pure, freeing us from bondage to the lord of delusion.
Dedicating Merit and Radiating Loving-Kindness
As the stream of merit flows through the center of our body and mind, he has us dedicate this merit to our ancestors — recalling our forebears, parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, teachers who have shown us kindness, the guardian spirits who help and support us, and all beings we have ever wronged in past lives, our karmic counterparties, asking for mutual forgiveness.
Having dedicated merit, he leads an aspiration of goodwill for the world and all beings, that all may be free from suffering and share happiness equally, then has us expand this loving-kindness-filled heart — covering our home, spreading across village, district, province, country, and finally the entire world, until it becomes a radiant crystal sphere, clean and pure, through loving-kindness's special power to dissolve resentment and irritation from the heart — and expanding further, across the countless stars and galaxies of the boundless cosmos.
Closing Aspiration
In closing, Phra Ajarn leads an aspiration for success to be established in us now and in all lives to come. May the merit and blessings of our teachers and our own accumulated goodness since beginningless time combine into sacred, potent merit. May we be freed from misfortune, karmic results, demonic obstruction, and obstacles of every kind; may greed, hatred, delusion, lust, , wrong view, craving, and clinging come to an end; may we gain the eye that sees the Dhamma and penetrate the knowledge of ; may we be strong in health and steadfast in spirit as we build perfections toward nibbāna. He closes by asking that old wrongdoing be forgiven, and that new merit bear fruit successfully for us all.