The Shambhala Principle by Sakyong Mipham

Author:Sakyong Mipham [Mipham, Sakyong]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-7704-3744-2
Publisher: Potter/TenSpeed/Harmony
Published: 2013-05-06T16:00:00+00:00

11

CHEER YOURSELF UP

ONE MORNING, MY father asked if I was depressed. I told him I felt a little down. Somehow he could tell that I was waiting for him to give me some bit of inspirational wisdom. The instruction he offered was not what I’d expected. He looked at me and said, “Be where you are and who you are. That’s how to cheer yourself up.” Sometimes he would say, “Just do it.” In this case, I must have looked puzzled, because he went on to explain that depression is the vanguard of obstacles and negativity, and that cheerfulness helps us guard against complication and adversity. In my life, his simple advice seems constantly to be proving itself true.

He might have said, “It’s going to be okay,” as parents often do, but my father did not say it was going to be okay. In fact, he went on to say that right now the world is indeed depressed. On the surface many of us might think otherwise. Food and medicine are more widely available. As well, there are a number of stable governments. Technology makes it possible for millions of people to be connected. To say that the world is depressed seems contrary to how the world appears.

However, in using the word depressed, my father was not referring to the world’s technological progress or apparent economic prowess. Rather, he was pointing to the depressed state of the human spirit. Despite the modern world’s efficiency and industry, at an emotional level, the human spirit has been dampened, pressed down. It is at a low point, connected in particular to a habitual sense of inadequacy. We are in an age where depression arises from people feeling disempowered. There is a resolute feeling that the world may not in fact be all that good. With fundamental doubt about the purpose of our existence, an air of depression begins to suffocate all of us.

Naturally, when we feel that we are faulty, we mistreat ourselves, and then we mistreat others in the same way. When this lasts for a while, that depressed and aggressive state becomes the norm, and anything not depressing begins to appear naïve or unsophisticated. Even our nature appears insubstantial and small.

Thus, the psychic repercussions of materialism and the ceremony of unworthiness have created a depressed culture, and the product of that culture is cynicism and doubt. Our sense perceptions are padded. Generally speaking, we are spooked by our own thoughts. Self-doubt arises, and we start doubting others. We forget about bravery as our minds are consumed by doubt, becoming unstable and fickle. Saying and doing negative things begins to make sense, and developing our warrior mind seems completely unrealistic. We have fallen into the cowardly realms, where the mind is trapped and depressed. It buys into aggression as a way to accomplish things. We have great confidence in anger, we are really certain that aggression is going to work, and we forget about patience and compassion—even toward ourselves.

The mind that arises

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