Some Thoughts on Depression
Neuro chemical imbalance arises from the body. The type of body arises from karma. What body and all the problems with it and inherited diseases and imbalances are all from karma not illusionary thinking. What body we are going to take birth in is 100% due to karmic imprints/instincts/residuals. How can some phenomena arise from karma and some don’t. The trigger factor is your mind entering that body in which your karma has led you to it. There is no spiritual indictment for listing the reason why depression arises on an ultimate level.
So if your depression comes from:
1. Neuro-chemical imbalance, get treatment
2. From childhood abuse, get counseling.
3. From anger and expectations- talk about it-stop your expectations of others-accept the situation and move on.
4. From being hurt/cheated/used-talk and counseling-letting go
5. And many combinations of the above and more.
Whether your depression arises from 1-5, is the temporary environmental point at this time, but if you do not have the karma to experience depression, then no matter what the environment is, you will not. Of course there is treatment for it, whether the treatment will be effective or not, will depend on how strong the karma is. Hence doing certain practices combined with treatment will be of tremendous help as I have seen in my students in the last 20 years.
Before doing practices, a teacher must mention the ultimate causes then offer the practices by tradition. Mentioning the causes of depression IS NOT AN INDICTMENT so do not assume it to be due to your projections. But simply a open and kind illustration of the real cause to help people start to see it another way and to take responsibility for those who have not. To not be a victim. So when I take the time to explain, I give the cause and the result, not so much all the in betweens because the in betweens are different and have thousands of combinations.
Example, from deep ignorance arises attachments. From attachments arise the grasping. From grasping you crave objects. From objects, you acquire, you want and demand a sense of permanence. When not permanent, you wish to ‘force’ it to be permanent-then all the actions to force something to be permanent makes all the karmas arise. The arisal of the karmas are stored. From this storage, a trigger point is necessary from the environments we take birth in. When triggered, the latent karma opens. When opened we experience. The experience can lead to stronger reactions and even more and more accumulation of karma like a snowball effect down a snow mountain…by the time the snow ball reaches the bottom of the mountain, it can be an avalanche.
The dharma is not easy to listen to…because some people take it as criticism. But Dharma should not be just feel good only for the moment but for deeper contemplations. When we learn more and understand deeper, it is not always pleasant, but our ignorance, attachments are not one with us…it can be removed…before removal we must recognize it-pleasant or unpleasant-once we recognize it, we can learn the methods to remove it..once removed eventually, all afflictions of mind and body will be removed. This is no indictment or condemnation, just a Dharma talk. None of my Dharma talk whether pleasant to hear for the moment or not, should not be taken as offense, but for deeper contemplations and knowledge. It is meant to benefit and that is why I spend my time here hoping to benefit those I will never meet and far away.
Tsem Rinpoche
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The reason we are in depression is because of karma. We are the creator of the situation that we endure. While we may not be able to avoid experiencing the karma we should not dwell in unhappiness but accept the condition and find ways to move on. Dharma is the antidote of our unhappiness and cravings . It is only by understanding the origins of our negative mindset that we can free ourselves. The more we learn and practise dharma , the more we learn about ourselves. And from here we should learn to improve and be a better person. Therefore it is important to have an open mind to learn and practise dharma.
Life is never been easy. Bad things happen. We feel stuck, sad and crying wishing things were different. We wanted a change for a better but in the same time we afraid of changes. The fear of uncertainty and failure stop us from moving forward.
We should always remind ourselves that what and how we view ourselves and the environment merely projections of our mind. It is our ignorance that keeps us grasping on to something that make us suffer. Dharma is the antidote to help us.
Listen to Dharma with open heart. Contemplate and apply it in daily life. Our life will change. No matter how hopeless and depressed we are, Buddha’s teachings promise we can change when we learn and apply the dharma consistently.
Thank you Guru for sharing this article, now I understand a thing or two about depression. I’m running an old folks and some of the patients here do suffer from depression. At least now I can understand their real problems and maybe I can talk them out of it.
Dear Rinpoche
This is a very good dharma teachings. I must admit that the first time when I read this article, it is quite hard for me to agree and think thing through. But, when I read again, I must admit that my depression came from my own karma, and, the reason I have depression it is because I do not believe in karma.
I refuse to admit it is my own doing, so that I can actually blame all my depression to others and I can avoid from taking responsibility. Some how, by reading again this article, whenever a depression mood came to attacked me, it is like an antidote to my depression, I could actually “see” how this mood arise and apply the advise that Rinpoche gave in this article. When I begin to let go and take responsibility, my mind begin to ease and I have more peace within myself.
Dharma is truly an antidote for daily life.
Thank you Rinpoche for this precious teachings.
With folded hand,
Freon
Self-examination of one’s depression is very necessary. It’s like a mirror looking back at oneself, be it positive or negative. When we have examined deeply, then only we can be true to ourselves. No more hiding but rather an acceptance.
Like Rinpoche has mentioned, then we can apply some Dharma. There are a combination of few methods such as focusing out by helping others and mantra recitation. When we help others out of their situations,we are actually helping ourselves too. We will not be so tied up with one’s own problem. Next, recitation of Lama Tsongkhapa mantra is also good. Rinpoche has mentioned many times that recitation of Migsetma can counter depression or lack of self worth. https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/tsem-tulku-rinpoche/me/tsongkapas-daily-practice-video-commentary.html . I learnt that Dorje Shugden mantra is is good too.
Just a sharing from what I know. Hope this helps as this has helped me in the past too.
Thank you Rinpoche for this.
With our ego and self centred nature, we blame others and be victims of all that happen to us and our environment, as such we famously say WE ARE STRESSED and thereafter WE ARE DEPRESSED.
HE the 25th Tsem Rinpoche, kindly gives us a short Dharma talk on the reason why we are so afflicted by depression.
A great lesson to take hold of our lives to be happy and free of depression and unhappiness. A great lesson to be learnt.
This article is very important to assist people around us, most of us only take care of our body, we never take care of our mind, and the result of this imbalance is depression. We get depressed for not being the person we want to be. We get depressed when we unable to get what we want . For all, we depress is because of “Me”. Example , MY problems, MY sadness, MY past, MY MY MY …” That is why we suffer, because of we only concentrate on ourself, it kept us trapped in that depression.This is the reason our minds get disturbed.
In dharma learning , self grasping or egotism is often the basic cause of feeling depressed. SO we need to understand dharma and believe that by learning dharma we can change our own mind.
Thanks Rinpoche for sharing this, it is really helpful for the people who get depression. Yes, the depression actually come from Karma, our mind led by our karma so what we feel/think is because of our karma. Sometimes we feel unhappy but could not find out the reason I think it is because of our karma as it controls our mind. BUT it can be changed by knowing and applying Dharma, when we practise Dharma our mind transform, once it transform, we would not be suffer by depression as the feeling come from our mind.
This is such an important teaching, that can help our fellow man about how we can approach the subject of depression. For some who may have had depression for a long time and even view depression as a constant companion. Still for many people who do not subscribe to previous lives, the only outlet I can think of is for them to blame outer conditions and factors, how we were raised up, this can work for a while but somehow the mind knows. The mind knows if we blame it on external conditions and factors the mind knows we are deceiving ourselves. Eventually when the mind strips away that delusion, we are back to square one again.
Dear RInpoche,
Thank you for blogging about depression. I believe many of us do have depression attacks as we are not able to see pass some of the things that are happening around us. When this happens, it makes us feel lost and just resentful of everything that is going on. Harping on something that has already pass, just because we are not able to let it go.
Thank you for reminding us that why sometimes people shy away from Dharma as they felt that it is personal attacks, but instead it is not. It is just ways that we are understanding ourselves better now and we felt that things that are being taught in Dharma are talking about us.
Through Dharma, we are able to pick up knowledge that would help improve ourselves. Although difficult, but it is able to do so with constant reminders within ourselves. Only ourselves would be able to change who we are, no one or no other factor around us would be able to do so.
Once again, thank you Rinpoche for sharing with us this article to let us know the importance of our own imprints. Thank you.
Depression is the darkness that envelope the mind and what the mind touches.
Having suffered depression for a while and having found no answers nor relieves from counseling, that I realized there can only be 1 answer. It is 100% due to karmic imprints. With this awareness, it is paramount to work on mind transformation to eliminate causes to such Karma.
Thank You Rinpoche for this post.
Thank you Rinpoche for the sharing. I never thought the Dharma talk is a criticism or offense. It is so profound and gives us chances and opportunities to contemplate and check our inner minds.
This article reminded me not to hold on to the attachment. Let go the attachment and I will be happy. Don’t plan and expect too much because they are all my own projections. I should only try my best on everything I do. Let go of the results, praises and own expectation so that I will not increase my bad karma.
Rinpochela, thank you so much for this teaching. There are so many people these days that suffer from depression… I personally know a few people suffering from depression and some of them started having these symptoms since they are as young as 11 years old!
Depression is truly a terrible condition, and those having depression, they really should get help (unfortunately most of the time, real depression patients would never admit they have depression and try their best to hide it). It’s terrible because it pulls down a person’s quality of life… their functionality decreases and they fail to live life to their fullest potential. On top of that, the people around them would suffer very much too…
Yes, the people around them suffer very much… Imagine, the person we love… say our mother, father, siblings or even our best friend, have depression. And everyday it is like a ticking time bomb, we dont know when they will blow up and take a knife and slit their wrists… and at that moment, the sense of hopelessness we feel for not being able to help them, sometimes is really overwhelming.
If there is anything that I would wish for at this moment, it would be for everyone having depression to be free of this suffering.
i have always had bouts of depression where I would feel unhappy for days and sometimes even weeks and I just conceal it. I think the reasons for my sadnesses is that I always think too highly of the world and have high expectations, just like I have high expectations upon myself. The higher the expectations that harder I fall when I fail. Thus, I have slowly learned to expect less from others and myself. Yet, I feel like I am not doing enough because of my lowered expectations.
The Dharma may not be easy to listen to but it is pretty much without fault. The only way that one can deviate from the Dharma is internal issues or a teacher who is not suited to teach that person due to broken samaya or previous karmic connections. The Dharma is in a way critical advice as it digs deep and solves problems at their roots.
Thank you for this great article, Rinpoche.
I feel depression being a state of mind is how we perceive things. Is as what was written in the article, forcing things to be permanent then karma arises… from there if we cannot have what we want, depression forms…if it was a serious case.
Dharma keeps us in check and how we control our minds…
Thank you Rinpoche for the sharing on the topic of depression.From my personal experience,we would encounter this sought of ill feeling of depression at some point in time in our lives.It is how we deal with it in order to pull yourself out of this state of mind.
As mention,learning to let go is a good start.To forgive and to forget will be a turning point to recovery.
If the karma imprint is very strong.Then we will encounter a relentless crave to replay that negative thought that traeger that sad emotion over and over again.It is an action that is beyond our logical thinking.
We certainly hope that those victims of depression could come to understand the nature or course of their illness and learn to let go and go on with their lives.
Having a kind and compassionate Guru to guide them will certainly help out tremendously on the road of recovery for them.
As said, having been blessed with a fully endowed body, one has the opportunity to attain full enlightenment, or failing which, nirvana or at least a higher state of existence. Of course, the level of one’s attainment depends largely upon one’s mental scope and motivation. Being in samsara, it has been singled out in all dharma practices, that in the root of all our sufferings herin lies in existent, the detested enemy of Dharma practice, “the mental affliction” – which is so ignorantly cherished and adored, laying so close to our heart. This enemy has led us by the nose to all kinds of pains and sufferings for a long, long time. We mus discard this detested enemy of “depression” of bad thoughts once and for all, otherwise it will force us to collect accumulation of bad karmas anew, again and again in our dharma practice. Virtuous karma must be developed by totally abandoning all unvirtuous actions, which is the most practical of all Lord Buddha’s teachings. It is this practice which determines one’s future, giving us the ultimate joy! Om mani padme hung.
Dear Tsem Rinpoche,
depression is often like a black dog. 🙂 Sometimes so little and sweet that you laugh at him and live with him. But sometimes he’s so big, that you aren’t able to take the bus with him 🙂
To know this is a bodything and also karma helps to laugh. Do you know Robin Williams? The sad clown.
But i think too, that there are big chances in it to get it over …love and light Tsem ^^
The form or body we bring into this world, as well as the nature of its suffering is the result of Karma- a result of causes we created before. Hence,too, with the problem of depression. We had created a cause, and this cause we had created determines the nature of our depression and how or whether it is to be cured.
The true causes of our suffering of depression would be the negative delusions arising from ignorance, such as grasping, as well as karma. When triggered, the karma for depression opens. From then ,it is how we handle and react to the situation. If we react strongly in a negative fashion, we will create more and more negative karma, and more suffering.
We need to understand the dharma in the situation and contemplate on it deeply. We learn to accept and let go.
Thank you Tsem Rinpoche. This teaching could not be more apt as I had just slipped into a minor depression state upon receiving another unexpected news. Depression is indeed my ‘thing’, my old time friend. Many thanks to those who commented and shared their personal experience too, these really ring a bell to me, a very loud one. Thank you.
This article is extremely timely. With the recent and very sudden death of the famous actor Robin Williams, depression is so common amongst us.
I will be forwarding this article to a few people in the media as they are now covering more extensively on this topic across all major newspaper.
Thanks Rinpoche for sharing.
I used to suffer from depression for many years until I met Rinpoche. Rinpoche told me many times to reduce my projections on others and situations as this was causing my depression. Removing all projections would not be realistic for me at the moment. But reducing them would be more workable.
It took me many years to be able to reduce my projections. Faking it didn’t help because my depressions didn’t decrease. But when I went mentally flat out, it was a period of painful awakening of how hypocritical I was and how arrogant my views and thoughts were. My projections on others were unrealistic and biased. I always lamented why others didn’t understand me. But now I know.
Just like how others have projections on me, I also had projections on them. These projections are our perceptions of people, objects and situations that are clouded by our deluded mind. Since my perceptions were not 100% accurate, then my judgments must be inaccurate as well. If my judgments are inaccurate, what basis do I have to react negatively when people and situations turn out not favorable?
Hence, why get so attached to my projections? I felt silly but relieved at the same time once I understood that my depressions all came from my strong attachments to wrong view!!!
It’s been a good 3 years since I have had any depression. I actually forgot about it until I read this article. I thank my guru, Tsem Rinpoche for his care, guidance and creative ways always in helping me come to some realisations which in this case helped me with depression.
Most of us have our moods, our ups and downs. It is said women has it at least once a month during menstruation (lol). However there are those who seems to be trapped in a prolonged state of despair that threaten to completely take control of their lives. Often people in depression would blame others and their environment for putting them in their state of despair. Some do blame themselves and in the hopelessness of thinking one cannot do anything about it, many also become suicidal.
It is refreshing to learn the Buddhism viewpoint on depression, that it arises rom our karma. The karma we experience is from the results of our own actions. We are ultimately responsible. But having said that we are also in control. If our actions can lead to negative results, so can our actions lead to positive results. Depression can be overcome no matter what the “worldly” causes.
Although this teaching was given by Rinpoche in year 2011, it is very timely to bring this up again to help us deal with this silent killer. Very fresh on our minds would be the sudden death of our favourite all time funny guy Robin Williams who brought so much tears of joy to us via his movies.So rich in material and fame but still find life not worth living ! OM MANI PADME HUNG. Pray for his swift and good rebirth !
I know many people around me who are plagued by such illness. People of different age and background.They have one common issue, ie they are not happy with themselves.Both physical self or the environment they live in, the people around them etc. They feel trapped !
The study and practice on the Buddha Wheel of Life with its 12 dependent links, as described by Rinpoche above, would be one solution to depression. How we create all our own sufferings and we bring it with us life after life; unless we apply the Buddha’s teachings and antidotes to get out of samsara !
Thank you Rinpoche. Lots more contemplation on these subjects will make us realise that we need to work hard and fast and effectively to get out of samsara. To start with, have pure Guru Devotion for the blessings !
Thank you, Rinpoche. I understand now.
I just discovered this great reminder teaching from Rinpoche as I googled something on “depression” + “Tsem Rinpoche” to see what comes up! Because I’m hearing some friends stressing out and going into their comfort zones, zoning out, and basically being in depression. It’s sad how we make ourselves “the victim” and feel powerless. All due to ignorance which leads to strong attachments. How Rinpoche has illustrated here clearly how we create our own avalanche, triggering our karma that’s stored is logical. It is like because of wanting something so badly, something to be ever permanent that we do all we can to prevent change, not knowing that this is exactly what will cause us to lose the very thing we cherished that is not permanent. Only permanent is Dharma, it is hard for many to understand this. But if only we just try to apply it, one quickly gets to snap out of the poor self-pity mode and wake up to a powerful new you. I wish many of friends know the Dharma and practice a little, at least it would save them the trouble from feeling useless.
Dharma is not easy to listen to for people like me who has lots of wrong perceptions on how things are. It is not easy for someone who has lots of pride to hear, let alone to listen or to contemplate. But the point here is that dharma is what we must practice so to be able to apply antidote for problems we have. Dharma is not an alternative or choice, it is the way. That is to say whether we “believe” in it or not, it still works because it is the truth of how things are.
Thanks Tulku Rinpoche…..i learn something from here in regards to depression….
thanks…
Shelly Tai on 23may2011
Firstly I have to said thanks to Rinpoche for giving us so much dharma teaching, because of the teaching it has help me to overcome m problems. Now I be able to deal with any problems more easily and contemplate it and come out with the solution by using dharma.At last I wish I will have the merit to continue m dharma journey by benefiting myself and others. Once again I would like to said thank you Rinpoche.
Depression… It’s been something ongoing here in my life for many years.
Some days it feels like I am living in an insane asylum, all the crazy, nutty “people” (just thoughts, really) living in my head. I guess it might just be echoes. From where? Must be cause and effect. Cause and effect means emptiness. Sometimes it helps me, to examine the depression voices/thoughts/feelings like that. Also to question, do they have a shape? A colour? Where do they go to? It is just a series of mind moments with no owner. Etc.
It’s very interesting and helpful, Buddhist Logic and Psychology.
I wish I knew more of this kind of practical information in order to practise better. Buddhism provides many practical tools for working with our states of mind, from focus and insight meditation techniques to logical refutation of the lies our minds tell us to beautiful practices that put us in touch with Enlightened Beings who can help and inspire us with their amazing wisdom qualities and immense compassionate will and power to help us develop the same qualities.
These are a few of the things I have discovered and have appreciated in the last few months since I became interested once more in Dharma after a break of quite some years. It’s been tremendously practical in dealing with all the craziness, the self blame, the depression, the self hate, the fear, the anger … etc., etc. It’s ongoing. I’m a work in progress, as they say.
It’s very hard living with depression and other afflictions. Realistically speaking, I can’t expect massive changes in a matter of months after roughly 18 years or so of living with depression and other afflictions in this lifetime, but I can do my best according to my capacity every day or as much as I am able, to make a new, better future by creating the causes for happiness, by planting the seeds that will ripen as happiness in future. Depression is not intrinsic to our minds and it IS possible to become a happy, realised, loving, useful person who can help others. Being a beginner, I don’t know much yet but am trying to learn all the basics and gradually learning how to practise.
Depression is tricky because one can take failures on the Path as a stick to beat oneself and make one feel bad and even more depressed if one is not careful. “I’m Bad” is one of the worst enemies on my Path, in my opinion, because he is a big fat liar and thief of time to develop my virtues and decrease my afflictions! lol In fact, he is utterly useless! There’s absolutely nothing he can do to improve a situation, that I am aware of. And he hampers things as soon as he arises and I react. So, best to keep moving forward and not cling or react to him at all; it’s a two way street in the sense it also takes me to hang on to him when he calls whereas if he just passes through it’s like a whispy cloud in the sky blowing past overhead and no rain. That seems to be the best way I know how to manage him and his companions for the time being. I hope to learn more.
Many humble thanks to all my Teachers for helping to deal with this crazy mind. I wish You all Long, Long, Long Life, GREAT HEALTH, and Perfect and Quick manifestation of all your wishes, Forever. May we never be separate in all my lives and may I, too, accomplish the Path and remain until Samsara is totally free of suffering and its causes, and all beings established in the state of Unexcelled Perfect Enlightenment.
~Some thoughts from a beginner who experiences depression, offered in the hope that they might be helpful to others who also suffer. Please forgive any mistakes due to my own ignorance/lack of knowledge and experience.
“Depression is impermanent and not my true self.” : )
Thank you for this beautiful teaching.
Rinpoche,
Thank you for your time talking about Dharma and depression. I have also written about depression from the perspective of a student who has suffered with depression and also watched others suffer from it:
http://walkingthepath.info/?p=834
If writing it benefits only one other than myself then I am happy.
I use to hate the idea of thinking that my depression or my problems were due to karma. I found so much comfort in playing other, since it takes the responsibility away from me. Now, I’ve realized that when I accept my depression or any state as due to my karma I can face it better since it is in my power to better myself. No one can fix my problems but me. Thank you for your guidance Rinpoche.
Dear Rinpoche,
Thank you so much for providing a beautiful teaching on depression and how it is not permanent in it is nature as well as providing the antidote and getting it solved. It is very clear…I will share this to as much people as possible as i know there are many people out there who suffer from depression.
Once again, Thank you so much as this is a really powerful and useful antidote for my own depression as well as many others…
Thank you so much for this blog. When I read your blog , it is giving me so much about how to contemplate deeper my difficulties and let go of it.
I am forever grateful for your precious guidance on depression.
Thank you so much for this blog writing. Very useful for me as I have experienced several episodes of depressions. I think the causes are my own unreasonable projections and expectations. In addition to the habbit of reliving unpleasant experiences over and over again.
I found that purging my projections, expectations, and the habbit of reliving projection over and over again is so painful like purging bad blood. But once removed, I think the effort is really worth it :-).
Much love
Valentina