The Buddha gave us the teachings of Brahma-vihara, the four sublime states of mind: Metta or loving kindness, karuna or compassion, mudita or sympathetic joy, upekkha or equanimity. These are also known as the Four Boundless States, the Four Immeasurables, and the Four Abodes because they ought to become the mind's dwelling-places where we feel constantly ‘at home’.
Many early students or practitioners often learn to their surprise that the hardest to put into practice is the third state of mind, mudita, a word from Sanskrit and Pali that has no clear corresponding word in English. The combination of words ‘sympathetic joy’ feels rather awkward; sympathy is commonly used in the sense of feeling bad for others; but this suggests an unselfish joy in the good fortune of others.
It is both remarkable and curious that it is more difficult for most of us to find joy in other's good fortune than to have compassion for them. Buddhist teacher Nyanaponika Thera, asking, ‘Is Unselfish Joy Practicable?’ points out that while it is relatively easy to naturally feel compassion in situations which demand them, it mostly requires ‘deliberate effort’ to delight in the joys and successes of others.
Understanding that happiness is not a limited commodity -- and being able to rejoice in the good fortune of others -- challenges some of our unconscious assumptions. We have so many deeply conditioned, constrictive mind-states. Whether we admit it or not, easy-to-arouse judgment and envy, a tendency to compare and demean and greed and prejudice narrow our perceptions. Naturally but oddly, a nagging sense of insufficiency is programmed into us humans. So too is a sense of scarcity of resources. So, things like sufficiency, abundance, sympathetic joy must become learned and deliberately chosen responses.
Think about it: Compassion is aroused when someone is going through a hard time; it’s not that difficult to evoke. But sympathetic joy must be awakened when someone – maybe even a close friend or family member; often someone we already don’t feel so well-disposed towards – is doing well materially, emotionally, spiritually. And here’s the rub -- perhaps they are doing much better than I am at this point in time. I imagine I deserve the same, if not more or better. So the comparisons begin; the sense of injustice or lurking envy. And in all this churning of feelings in me -- feelings I don’t even particularly like, or may not name or understand – I’m supposed to feel joy at your success?
Yet, within me, within you, lies buried this capacity for mudita; we all nurture within us a natural tendency towards mutual aid and co-operative action. The thing is, it lies at a deeper level than envy or judgementality, and needs to be invited to come out of hiding.
To develop mudita, we can teach ourselves to go with deliberate intention to this ‘place’ inside of us, where we keep ‘practicing’ seeing other people as complete and complex beings in their own right, not just as characters in our unfolding personal drama. We remind ourselves that all beings, without exception, are blessed with good times and challenged with bad ones in the fabric of our lives.
The purposeful cultivation of mudita is an important phase in our maturing as human beings. Rather than a childish response of why-me or why-not-me, when active compassion and unselfish joy work in us, our acts of caring service go beyond simply compliant or indifferently carried out routine tasks. We truly recognise how interrelated we all are, and act accordingly.
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