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“Thus it is with meditation, young monk,” said the Buddha. “In meditation and spiritual efforts, as in all things, balance is always best.”

In 1990, I went to Tibet with some of my teachers and a group of Westerners. There at Gyangze, I was delighted to find two huge old copper prayer wheels. They were filled with mantras and prayers, and with huge calligraphed Sanskrit syllables engraved on their exteriors. Gigantic prayer wheels such as these are sometimes found at pilgrimage sites and near the entrances to monasteries. One walks around them in a clockwise direction, turning them like spinning tops or huge mantra-embossed, blessing-filled merry-go-rounds. Practitioners circumambulate them, setting these prayers in motion through the turning of the wheel while they quietly chant and pray in the contemplative mood of a walking meditation.

These huge, heavy prayer wheels at Gyangze were slick with oil from the millions of pilgrims’ hands that had touched and turned them over the centuries. If one of these large prayer wheels were still, it would be almost impossible to get it started. And if it was already going, and you pushed too hard, it would get out of synch, jerk, and rattle off its axis. But if the prayer wheel was moving at an easy regular speed, you could keep it in motion almost without touch; all that was required was walking along and giving it a gentle turn every now and then with a light hand on the handles of the wooden rim.

Right Effort is not always goal- and achievement-oriented; it also includes the subtler virtues of nondoing, of yielding, and going with the greater flow. When Paul McCartney sang “Let It Be,” we all responded to his words. Through Right Effort we learn how to do the best we can in life, living fully and with all our heart—and then let go, knowing that whatever happens, happens. The universe is beyond our control, anyway. Trying to control things creates more stress, struggle, and irritating friction in the greater system.

This balanced combination of effort, inner detachment, and genuine equanimity helps us to come home within ourselves, and arrive at a feeling of inner peace and oneness. We can live in the total fullness of being, just as we are, rather than always striving for the illusory pot of gold at the end of some vivid yet intangible rainbow. This great letting go and letting be brings forth the soulful wisdom of allowing, of being precisely where you are, who you are, and what you are—beyond running toward or away from anything. All this running to-and-fro is a symptom of attachment and aversion, and is unfulfilling in the ultimate analysis.

The Buddha said, “There is no way to happiness and peace. Happiness and peace is the way.”

INSPIRED EFFORT: A MEDITATION ON

THE FOUR DIVINE ABODES

Bodhisattvas are impelled by the motivation to bring about enlightenment and ease suffering on a universal scale. This ambitious task may seem daunting, but Bodhisattvas—moved by the travails of the world, and of their loved ones too—are powerfully motivated to accomplish it. This kind of transcendent undertaking requires Perfection of Effort—one of the Six Principles of Enlightened Living, the Six Paramitas, which we discussed earlier. These six virtues propel us, like a warm updraft, on to the heights of enlightenment.

The Best Place to Live:

A Meditation on the Four

Divine Abodes

Some of us grew up with a fantasy about someday living in a sublime mansionlike setting. The Dharma says that this is not just a fantasy: It is possible to live in a divine abode by making an effort to cultivate sublime states of being, known as the Brahma Viharas or Four Noblest Qualities of Mind. These delightful states of being are:

Loving-kindness and friendliness (known as metta)

Compassion and empathy

Joy and rejoicing

Equanimity and peace of mind

Meditation practice can help us live in such a state—all the time. That’s why the Brahma Viharas are called divine abodes. They are places to be and places to live. These abodes describe an atmosphere that we can create and carry with