UnF*ck Your Brain: Feminist Self-Help for Everyone 472. How Equanimity Can Strengthen Your Mind & Save the World: A Conversation with Margaret Cullen
Mar 5, 2026
Margaret Cullen, a psychotherapist and longtime meditator who wrote Quiet Strength, explains equanimity as balanced engagement rather than apathy. She discusses how it speeds recovery from fear and anger, links to nervous system regulation, and helps avoid performative outrage. Practical alternatives to meditation and perspective tools for calmer, more effective action are highlighted.
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Equanimity Lets You Feel Without Melodrama
- Equanimity means feeling the full range of emotions without getting caught in melodrama.
- Margaret Cullen contrasts caring deeply with wasting energy on rumination and papancha, amplified by 24/7 news and social algorithms.
Equanimity Is Recovery And Resilience
- Equanimity is both a state you return to and a capacity to recover balance quickly after being hijacked.
- Cullen emphasizes increasing your window of tolerance so you're less frequently overwhelmed and recover faster.
Equanimity Mirrors Nervous System Flexibility
- Equanimity maps onto nervous system regulation and polyvagal ideas of healthy variability.
- Cullen links pliability of the vagus and the ability to get aroused and recover as central to equanimity.
