After a busy and unusually long day at the office, I walked the roughly two miles home so that I could find bulletin boards for a teaching announcement from my church, the Guhyasamaja Center. I figured there would be several boards at the coffee shops and neighborhood stores that line 17th Street and U Street.

As I walked, I was very still inside. My mind was actually quiet, and I felt incredibly content. After all, posting flyers about a series of Buddhist teachings is certainly worthwhile, but there was something more. I didn’t realize what it was until I found myself taking a detour that took me a couple of blocks out of my way. It wasn’t a wrong turn, per se, but an almost subconscious action on my part to keep that still feeling going.

When I arrived home and stepped into my front yard, I took a mental snapshot of the moment and decided that, at that exact point in time, that was the feeling I’d like to have for the rest of my life: total peace and tranquility, not happy or sad, but simply present in a state of satisfied existence.

That feeling, I think, is what Buddha and the teachers are talking about when they speak of equanimity. How fortunate was I to spend 45 minutes in that state.