The placid minded does not seek people’s crowd, he also yearns not the solitude of woods. Anywhere in any manner he remains even-minded.
Calmness and beatitude of the mind and intelligence are the supreme spiritual gain, goal and fruition. One who has attained these remains full, seeking and disturbed by nothing. No want and no dislike, no conflict and no contradiction, or no discomfiture of any kind are the illustrious distinction of the Knower. Such a one will have no fondness for crowds, nor yearning for solitude of the woods. They fall within dvandvas, his mind has transcended.
The unique merit of the Knower is his sense of adjustment and harmony with anything around. Wherever he is in, and in whichever manner, he is harmonious. Displeasure and dislike alone breathe turmoil to the mind, making it lose its spiritual grandeur.
As Shankara describes (in Yogatārāvalī 29 ): Let the Self-enlightened intelligence be immersed in nirvikalpa samadhi, or meander in the chest of beautiful damsels, or be in the midst of material and dull-witted people; let it rejoice in the company of wise and lofty people; even then the good and evil cast by the mind do not touch the omnipresent Self.
As long as one is in the world, dvandvas are inescapable. Running away from any of these is not ever the solution for the seeker. Purity of thought, vision and realization are the only way one can remain unaffected, unconditioned, stable and full. And this is by realizing the Self, the ‘I’, the sole presence, witnessing everything, existence and non-existence, bondage and liberation alike!