Dealing with Depression

Posted on by Sen.



The state of depression can be seen as an imbalanced low state, or in other words a low state of high intensity/momentum. It’s important to understand that depression can happen at two levels

  1. Physiological depression
  2. Mental depression

(these are not medical terms or categories, I’ve coined them for the purpose of my explanation)

What I mean by “physiological” depression is simply the condition where the body is energetically at an intensely low state – it’s normal for the body to go through low and high cycles, but an intense low state which disrupts the functional harmony is caused by the presence of high emotional momentum.

Mental depression is the condition created by the “thinking” going on in your mind. Of course, the mental depression eventually feeds into the body/physiology, after all emotions are nothing but stored-up “thought energy”. One can be aware of whether the depression is created by your current thinking or if it’s simply a physiological depression created by the emotional momentum accumulated over the past.

(Some events like a disease or physical injury can create an extended low state in the body, however in the absence of mental/emotional momentum the body is able to heal faster, and also, the depressive state doesn’t feel too intense)

To overcome physiological depression requires you to release the emotional accumulation in your body – I’ve discussed this in the post Releasing Suppressed Energy. Overcoming a mental depression requires you to see through an imbalanced/deluded thinking by bringing awareness to it, by gaining the right understanding. Mental depression is a call towards gaining a better understanding/perspective of life, and of yourself, and thus releasing the imbalanced patterns of thinking, whereas physiological depression is call towards releasing the past accumulation of emotions.

In most cases, it’s quite common to deal with physiological and mental depression at the same time – it’s because one feeds the other. What’s required is to first break this loop by addressing them individually, else the tendency is to unconsciously feed into loop – for example as soon as you sense a physiological/bodily depression, in the form of a strong low state in your body, you can create some negative interpretation about it, start panicking, start getting anxious, and thus create thought patterns that eventually lead to a mental depression. In the same way, when you are dealing with a mental depression, you can unconsciously start identifying with it, empowering the thoughts, giving it more momentum, and thus creating “thought energy” which is what gets stored up in the body as emotional momentum, which leads to physiological depression. The fact is that even when you’ve gained an aligned understanding of life, even when you’ve gained a full awareness of your negativity, it takes a while for the mental and physiological depression to ebb away – this is because it has a past momentum which takes time to release even though your current awareness/thinking is more aligned.

Depression is a call towards finding alignment

Thought is always the source of creation. Depression is an imbalanced state, but it’s still a “creation” of thought. Even physiological depression is the by-product of mental depression, after all without thought there is no accumulation of energy. Thought is the force that concentrates energy. To find wholeness in your thinking is the foundation to allowing a wholeness in your being. The very fact that you have the capacity to observe your thinking gives you the ability towards “conscious living”, whereby you no longer give in to an unconscious, and mechanical, movement of thinking in your mind, rather you develop the freedom to let go of what feels imbalanced thus creating the space for a balanced perspective to come in. The unconscious tendency is to be rooted in the momentum of the mind’s thinking without any space outside it – in such a case, an imbalance in the mind’s thinking directly affects your being, and your focus on this thinking keeps amplifying it, and it just becomes a vicious loop.

Depression is actually a wake up call towards gaining a better understanding of yourself, of life, of balance. If you get hung up on the state of depression you will fail to see the growth opportunity that’s being instigated in you by it. It’s not about trying to suppress depression, rather it’s about bringing a growth oriented perspective to it. If you are depressed there has to be a “reason” for it – depression is not a balanced state, and imbalance is “creation” and hence it was created (or is being created) through a certain way of thinking. Of course, the emotional energy of depression can be passed on genetically as “cellular memory”. However, a genetically inherited depression is also a creation of the past that can be released by you in the present – all imbalanced creations can be “undone” once you release the concentration of energy that’s keeping it in place. So it doesn’t matter if you are dealing with inherited depression or if you created it solely by yourself through your thinking, what’s pertinent is to come back to a place of conscious balance. Nothing is served from blame, it doesn’t matter who contributed to your depression, the fact is that if you want to find conscious balance you have to take full responsibility for “undoing” the imbalance in you, in your current awareness.

The higher-level cause of depression

It helps to see the cause of depression from a higher perspective. I mentioned in some past posts (for ex A Non-physical Perspective) about how one of the reasons life-energy/source goes into creation is for the purpose of “self-realization”. You can’t know who you are unless you see your opposite, light can’t know itself without dark, love can’t know itself without hatred, wholeness can’t know itself without experiencing the state of imbalance. Just imagine that you are the source, and you are already whole (unconsciously whole), but how do you consciously know your nature of wholeness if you’ve never experienced anything else? This is not some vague/ambiguous spiritual question, it’s just a very reasonable, rational, logical question. From the perspective of the source, in order to know its wholeness, it has to experience the imbalance. The source/life-energy is made up of two natures – light and dark (yin/yang), and it’s important to experience each of these natures, separately, as a part of self-realization. Of course, wholeness is the balance of light and dark nature, but to know what wholeness is one has to “consciously” balance/integrate both these natures in oneself. This is the reason why life goes into “duality” (of separating the light and dark, through imbalance) into order to realize “oneness”/wholeness consciously through a conscious integration. A “conscious integration” is simply an integration made from a place of choice/volition.

So how does the source accomplish this task of having a conscious realization of its wholeness? By creating streams of imbalance, streams projecting from the source, like river projects from an ocean – these streams can be called “streams of consciousness”. You can imagine two streams being created – one of the streams is imbalanced in light nature, and the other stream is imbalanced in dark nature. The beings that are created from the light-natured stream have an inherent imbalance towards light nature, and the beings that are created from the dark-natured stream have an inherent imbalance towards dark nature – neither of them is good or bad, they are just both imbalanced in their own way. So there is the source and its creation (the two streams of consciousness), the source is whole, but the streams of consciousness are not whole, they just hold the capacity to become whole again through conscious integration.

The source can now “experience” through these two streams of consciousness, it can experience what imbalance is and it can experience what it means to consciously come back to balance, and in this way can consciously know its natures. Imbalance always moves towards balance, so finding balance is inevitable, hence there is no real risk involved here, the beings that are created in imbalance eventually bound to find their balance. So in that sense it’s all just a play of life, deliberately created by life, thus the imbalance is not a mistake, it’s a requirement. Though I’ve explained it in an overly simplistic manner, you can get an idea of the higher level reasoning behind the creation of imbalance. Again, this is not some spiritual philosophy, it’s a very logical explanation of how life moves, and anyone who can observe life will always come to the same conclusion – this is the reason why enlightened teachers, no matter which part of the world they belong to, always come up with the same underlying teaching about life, they all, independently, come to the same realization about life.

Depression is a natural outcome of imbalance, an imbalance in light-nature leads to depression as does an imbalance towards dark nature. But depression is not a mistake, it’s simply something that’s needed so that you can consciously overcome it and thus experience conscious balance/freedom/wholeness. But the way to overcome depression is not by suppressing it or fighting it, it’s by understanding that it’s just an indication of an imbalance, and all that’s needed is to bring in an integration – if you have an imbalance in light nature, allow the integration of dark, and if you have an imbalance in dark nature allow the integration of light. Fighting the depression is like fighting the imbalance from a place of imbalance, it solves nothing. Also, you need to realize that the reason why you are feeling the imbalance is because it’s “needed” for you find conscious balance, so let go of the mindset of fuming over the imbalance, and look at it as a requirement for the evolution in your being towards finding conscious balance. Without this higher level perspective you are bound to have some narrow, deluded, thinking about the depression and thus keep fighting it in some way.

The relative causes of depression

Once you understand the higher level perspective on why depression got created, you have the right foundation to address the relative cause of depression in your life. Always remember that depression is simply the result of imbalance in one of the natures, light or dark. The only way to resolve an imbalance is to integrate the natures of light and dark in you. This integration happens naturally when you are in a state of total allowing. The logic is simple, life-energy naturally moves towards balance, when you are in the state of total allowing/openness you no longer resist the movement of life-energy in you and hence you naturally are brought to a state of balance. The state of allowing is more like a pointer than a technique, it’s important to “understand” the pointer rather than trying to get a technique out of it – to be truly open by itself means that you can’t try to apply it as a strategy. For example, sometimes openness requires you to allow yourself to show your anger at someone to let them know that you are not going to take their nonsense, and sometimes it requires you to simply allow the anger within without giving into any external reaction, you are no longer a prisoner to anger but you can use it when it’s needed as a part of wisdom – so you can see how it can’t follow a technique, it follows wisdom.

There are many relative causes of depression. Physical life can be challenging as it is and the state of imbalance, in your being, just makes it all the more difficult to deal with. A light-natured imbalance causes you to be meek, anxious, needy, whereas a dark natured imbalance causes you to be bitter, aggressive, greedy, and both these imbalances eventually lead to a net result of you ending up in creating circumstances that are miserable, which leads you to depression. The fact is that the relative causes just don’t matter, it doesn’t matter what circumstances you are in, it doesn’t matter what upbringing you had, it doesn’t matter what you inherited (cellular memory/genetics), the bottom line is that depression is inevitable, sooner or later, as a being, and it’s simply an indication, or wake-up call, for you to find a conscious balance. Your specific emotional/mental imbalances are simply the symptoms, your imbalanced external circumstances are also the symptoms, to root cause is an imbalance in the light, or dark nature, component in you and call is for you to work on finding a conscious balance.

The release of depression

A lot of people have a hard time understanding the state of allowing, it’s mostly because they try to see it from their place of imbalance. A person with an imbalance in light nature would see the state of allowing as some means to become more loving, more peaceful and more joyful – they are usually the ones who will ask – how do I feel good while allowing fear, how can I become more forgiving and loving, and I always reply that this not about finding a “good feeling” refuge, and it’s not about becoming more loving, this is about finding balance which would involve allowing the dark natured aspects within (of course balance eventually feels good, but the process is not rooted in feeling good but in allowing a real integration). A person with an imbalance in dark nature would see the state of allowing as some means to get an edge over others, to become more superior – their usual question is, how can I get richer/successful with this “method”, how can I have some cool experience that I can add to my basket of “accomplishments”. As you can see, each person seems to interpret the state of allowing from his/her imbalance. The state of allowing is about being open to an inner change, it’s not about enhancing your current inclinations that may be rooted in imbalance. The light natured person has to be open to the integration of dark and vice versa.

I can give a simplistic example of the two cases – a depressed light-natured person and a depressed dark natured person, and specify how each can find the required balance.

A depressed light natured person – The underlying cause of depression is usually a sense of powerlessness. You may have a hard time dealing with people, for example, your colleagues, your relatives, your boss or your spouse. You may have a hard time dealing with the competitiveness around you, the coldness of the dark-natured people, the unending struggle to make a living and the survival aspects of life. Some common ways of thinking present in a light natured person, in a state of depression, are as below

– Why can’t people be nice

– How could he/she cheat on me, I trusted him/her so much

– Why does everyone pick on me / no-one cares for me

– Why is there so much suffering in this world

– Why am I stuck in this work/job that feels so draining

These are just a few off the cuff examples, the questions are not important, it’s the fact that these questions are taken in from a place of powerlessness. You can sense the undertone of helplessness in these thoughts – this is basically the story of one’s life when one is imbalanced in light nature. Feeling powerless eventually leads to depression. The wake-up call, created by this depression, is for you integrate with your dark nature aspect. Of course the challenge is that your inherent “habit” is to cling to the ligh-natured aspects, and hence the dark nature would just feel alien to you, it may feel obnoxious, threatening or cold. However, the truth is that you already have the dark nature present in you, since you are life-energy, it’s just that you will have to consciously allow this nature to find its expression in you.

The state of allowing, in this case, has to be a re-connection with your sense of inner power. Let go of clinging to your sensitivity, your hurts, your insecurities, your neediness, just allow them to arise in you without needing to get involved with them – allow them in your thoughts, in your emotions, but don’t make them personal, don’t get identified with them. For a while, it can feel very unnatural to not get involved with these habitual patterns of thought/feeling, you may feel like you are actually suppressing yourself by not clinging to your usual imbalance, however this is not suppression this is just an openness towards letting go of your habitual movement towards identifying with your imbalance. You have to stay allowing without identification until you sense that you are truly free of the pull of these imbalanced patterns.

When you are in a state of allowing it’s very common for thoughts to arise about its “effectiveness”, you may wonder if anything is really happening, in fact you may feel “worse off” for while (it’s like dealing with withdrawal symptoms of an addiction), but all along you need to keep connecting with your sense of openness to what arises. Keep connecting with your inner power and sense your freedom to allow all these thoughts/emotions/sensitivities without clinging to them – it can make you feel detached, cold and uncaring, for a while, but that’s just part of the integration of dark nature. Once you hit balance you will not be able to sense the dark and light separately, it will just work in a unison, in a sense of wholeness.

A depressed dark natured person – The underlying cause of depression is usually a sense of greed. An imbalanced dark natured person operates from a place of wanting to acquire, of wanting to possess, without much sensitivity towards the means. If you are in such a state of being, you are likely to feel restless and agitated most of the time, and sooner or later your agitation takes you to the brink of depression. The restless energy is like an imbalanced high which can’t be maintained for long, and when it falls it falls to the opposite end of a real low. This forced low is highly depressing for such a person and it’s common for him/her to try unnatural means to get back to the high, only to create a more severe depression eventually. Some common thought patterns in such a person are as below

– Why can’t things happen faster

– Why can’t people agree with me more

– Why can’t I just party all the time

– I am going to prove myself to xyz/everyone

– Why can’t I just get what I want

The underlying tone is one of a restless desperation to get more, a hunger that has taken over sensitivity. They may come across as a being powerful (almost in an obnoxious way) but they are inherently empty within, there is a real void in their being because of disconnection with sensitivity. They are more like machines operating from a place of greed. Sooner or later depression does start setting in, mostly from the sense of inner emptiness or the desperation of being stuck in a low state/circumstance (an imbalanced high cannot be maintained for long, it’s just not supported by life’s natural balance). Losing out on some acquired status, a loss of importance/popularity, depleted finances (caused by over indulgence), broken relationships, could all the various circumstances of the low state created by the imbalance.

In such a person the state of allowing has to work as an openness towards re-connecting with “sensitivity”. The sense of letting go can feel threatening to your sense of power and control, it can make you feel vulnerable, and this is exactly the balance that’s needed for you to restore the imbalance of the dark nature in you. Your ego, in the state of imbalance, has gone towards arrogance, recklessness, in-sensitivity and shallowness, and it requires to be balanced towards sensitivity, compassion, humility and depth of character. Don’t be afraid if the state of allowing makes you feel like you are losing your rigid control, just allow this movement to happen in you; it should feel like a real surrender. The dark natured imbalance in your ego would resist any form of vulnerability to come in, however you will need to consciously let go of giving in to this pattern and be open to the integration of the light nature in you – as a part of the balance, you will see yourself becoming more sensitive, more empathetic, developing a depth in your being which was not present before.

The movement of balance

You can see how the state of allowing can have different connotations for different people depending on the nature of their imbalance. The state of allowing is simply the openness to integrate what’s imbalanced in you, and the integration happens naturally if you don’t suppress it. A person imbalanced in light nature will naturally find an integration towards inner power and a person imbalanced in dark nature will naturally find an integration towards sensitivity/humility.

One of the biggest hurdles towards allowing the balance is the fact that your “brain” is conditioned in your imbalance. The brain, as an organ, is designed to create neural pathways towards your most dominant patterns of thinking. Once they get created, these neural pathways end up reinforcing these patterns of thinking – it’s like neural pathways want to survive and hence they keep reinforcing themselves. The way that the brain reinforces its past patterns is through the mechanical process of repetition, it just keeps replaying the patterns of the created neural pathways in a mechanical fashion – it makes you think that the brain has a life of its own, that it’s arguing for a certain way of thinking, but in truth it’s just mechanical in the way it wants to reinforce the patterns familiar to it. If you’ve studied about how artificial intelligence can be created in robots through the use of neural networks, you can realize how robotic the brain really is.

This challenge of dealing with your brain’s conditioning, its robotic reinforcement of past patterns of imbalance, is what feels most draining during the state of allowing. One has to understand and be very aware of this robotic/mechanical nature of the brain to ensure that one breaks out of this loop of past conditioning. A few pointers for breaking out of this mechanical reinforcement are as below

– Spend time observing your brain, get a sense of all the repetitive patterns that are running mechanically in the brain (just observing your brain keenly, over a period of time, can give you a sense of all the repetitive patterns that are present in it). As you become more aware of these repetitive patterns, start working on consciously letting go of identifying with them as they arise. Don’t suppress them, just be allowing, without identification, until their pulls stops ebbing away.

– Understand that brain operates from conditioning and not always from wisdom – in many cases the brain is simply following a mechanical way of thinking based on its design and its projections have no realistic value. For example, the survival tendency in your brain can keep it in a constant state of anxiety about the future, coming up with all the negative projections possible, and this is just a mechanical thinking based on its design and conditioning. You need to consciously learn to let go of taking your brain’s interpretations on its face value, work on the capacity to have a space of independence from your brain’s conditioned thinking (this is what allows for true wisdom to come in).

– Aligned technology is always an assistance to evolution/growth in a being. The technology of internet is a great example of how it’s a huge assistance towards evolution by making information exchange so convenient and easy. I explain about a product – Brainev, in the post Eliminating Anxiety, which uses the brainwave entrainment technology (simulating balanced brainwave states), that I find to be very effective in releasing the momentum of imbalance in the brain. I find that the way it’s designed is very congruent with the state of allowing and works on gradual levels of training (using 6 mp3s from level-1 to level 6) the brain out of imbalanced frequencies/waves by simulating the balanced brainwaves.

– Be open to allowing changes in your reality. When you start balancing out internally you are bound to see external changes. It usually starts with the deconstruction of imbalanced elements in your reality, and this deconstruction can feel challenging since you were so used to that reality (even if it was dysfunctional). You can feel disoriented and anxious about where you are heading, and it’s a natural part of a transition. Allow these feelings of anxiety, confusion, insecurity or uncertainty to arise, in a state of total openness; it’s all part of the integration process. You will start sensing a natural order falling into place, in your reality, a natural wisdom playing out, as the balance starts setting in within you.

In conclusion, the perspective that you need to work with is that depression is a call towards balance and it’s inevitable in your journey as a being. Instead of adding a negative connotation to the state of depression, understand it to be a phase in your journey towards evolution/growth, towards finding conscious balance. The state of allowing is the most direct way to allow the integration of balance, but the way it works for you will be personal to you, even though the dynamics of the process are always the same, it’s simply a process towards integrating your light and dark nature creating an inner balance which then manifests in your external life.


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31 Comments

  1. Ian

    Sen,

    now the right understanding fall into its proper place even more. Thank you sen.

  2. Abhishek Gupta

    I needed this at this time and it is very insightful. Thank you, Sen, for all your writings till now.

  3. bill krien

    great article ,makes perfect sense. i was wondering what brainev does and if it realy can change the brains way of thinking ? what is your personal take on this? thanks Bill.

  4. Mandy

    Dear Sen

    This is a very interesting article. I sense BOTH imbalances as you describe them (light and dark nature) in myself. I seem to lurch from one to the other. Does that make any sense to you, and what would you advise?

    1. Anonymous

      this is exactly what happens to me too… i know i have both natures… not just one… just wanted to share that

    2. Mo

      this is exactly what happens to me too… i for sure have both natures …. not just one…and i go from one extreme nature to other… just wanted to throw that out there

    3. E

      I feel more light natured in my personal life and dark natured at work. It seems like I need to focus on different things depending on where I am. This seems like it could be exhausting. Any advice?

  5. Dev

    Great article Sen…

    One thought I had while reading your description of an individual who is imbalanced towards their dark nature is how does sex (or the need for it) come into play with this imbalance? Especially for men…the strong need for sexual gratification may lead to alienating or showing lack of empathy for others. It is my observation that this behavior can be exasterbated after one experiences being cheated on…as they are seeking to gain back control/power. Even though there is a part of you that knows you are exploiting or taking advantage of others (so there is an empathetic part of you that does exist), the need for sexual gratification trumps your empathetic side. Do you agree these are fair statements? If so, how does one implement enough light nature to overcome these sex-related needs (considering that the need for sex is a natural, evolutionary part of being human)?

    Thank you…love the blog!

  6. Jak

    Hi Sen,

    i was just wondering on how you would apply this to fears. For example i’m going through a slight stage of being fearful of heights, like say when i’m high up i just have no trust in my self. i feel like i could fall off the edge all the time, and then i get into a cycle of thinking, i shouldnt be thinking like that, it’s stupid. i was never fearful of heights when i was younger, so this makes it even more confusing.

    But how would i allow this dark nature within me? i’m obviously not going to jump off the edge, so how would allow this within me? do i just notice this fear and accept that it’s there through an inbalance? or just ignore it completely?

    Cheers

    Jak

    1. Ian

      Fear is one of the demensions of the mind, and it is necessary for living in physicality in order to avoid danger in a sense fear is a defense mechanism need for survival in fact a mind without fear is not normal. An emotion of fear or whatsoever (negative emotions or positive) is usualy associated with our thoughts of negative experience
      that everytime you think a negative thought there is also equavalent flavor of negative emotion that will arise…fear can be a reality or a delusional.

      In truth even in wholeness/balance (balance in light and dark nature) fear will continue to play its part in the mind (not delusional)
      but only losses its strong dominance, intensity, grip and influence in your being so that you cannot feel its strong presence within you anymore rather than fear only exist in thoughts without a flavor of that emotion that’s why it can be dealth easly with wisdom…you can’t realy eliminate fear…

      The point is that you cannot eliminate fear in your being because it is an essential component required for reaching balance even thought it losses its intensity…

      The point is that you have to find balance first by conciously integrating light and dark nature within you in a concious state of “allowing”. (not suppressing) It is not a technique to master but an attitude of being open, whatever it is.

      Say for example you can be allowing of yourself to feel fear, to experience it as a concious choice and wisdom and hence you are free from fear. I let sen explain this more better.

  7. Sarah

    Hello,

    Very good article. Definitely a new perspective on depression.

    I’ve been struggling with depression for a very long time, since I was a child. I’ve been under medication several times, but I’ve decided to try the natural way. No chemicals involved.Your article helped me see the other side and hopefully towards a brighter tomorrow.

    I just have one question to ask. Lately I’ve been experiencing a lot o muscular tension in my neck, even when I’m sleeping. I feel very uncomfortable and want it to stop. Could it be related to the storage of negative energy? Do you have any recommendations to ease it?

    Thank you. Apologies for my english, but it’s not my mother tongue.

    Female, 23 years old.

    1. Sen Post author

      Sarah, a lot emotional energy, that gets stored up in the body (or cellular space), can lead to issues like permanent muscular tension in some regions of the body – especially around the places where the chakras (energy nodes) of the body are located like the lower back, chest, neck and skull. As one releases the accumulated emotional energy, the body feels lighter within without any muscular tension. Of course, the release does take time (depending on the load) and it’s dependent on how open you are to allowing the accumulated emotional energy to come up (we can be unconsciously suppressive to the emotional energy, as it may be unpleasant in the body when it arises).

  8. Jayson Zahidul

    Dear Sen,

    Being dark natured as it should be to work as an openness towards re-connecting with “sensitivity” to find wholeness, I would like to know, how can I be sensitive without having emotional attachment? Is it possible to be sensitive without feelings of emotions?
    Then what would be the inner anesthesia (be emotionally independent)?

    Sincerely,

    Jayson Zahidul

    1. Sen Post author

      Jayson, sensitivity has nothing to do with an emotional intensity/momentum – sensitivity is just an aspect of your being, it’s an awareness. The emotional momentum is unnecessary for you be sensitive – you can be a sensitive person without any emotional momentum in your body/being, and that’s what the state of inner wholeness (what you called inner anesthesia) feels like. Inner wholeness is freedom from emotional momentum, it’s not a numb place of coldness or insensitivity. In fact in a state of wholeness you can be sensitive while working from a place of wisdom instead of being dominated by your sensitivity (or being a prisoner to your sensitivity).

  9. Waliezi promise

    Hi sen,indeed u re a great author.my understanding about the state of allowing which i belive i am practising is that u dnt hold unto thoughts and u dnt suppress thoughts ,you simply let go of identification or involvement with any thought the mind project, you simply let go of any futher understanding.i ve bn doing this since year along the line the mind became worried abt dis practise dat am doing it wrong until i read one of ur articles(the power of allowing) den i understood that is normal 4 the mind to get into confusion.thks sen u re doing a wonderful work.

  10. stormy

    Hi Sen,
    I’ve been dealing with depression & anxiety, especially social anxiety, my whole life. Since reading your blog, I’ve gone through the release process and -amazingly- all of the thoughts and mental clutter in my head are gone. I didn’t think it was possible, but it worked!
    Well, now that I am not bogged down by chatter in my mind, I’m starting to really go inside my body and see what’s there. One thing though that is coming up is that I’m very bored with life now and the thought of death seems more real now that my mind is uncluttered and not distracting me. I know the goal is to enjoy life and be happy and express yourself, but I keep thinking about death now. Not in a far off way like before, but now that my mind has stopped I see it in a different way. For example, I just can’t believe that we die. I truly now feel my soul inside my body and to think that my body and myself will just disappear (and so will the people I know) is very terrifying. These feelings and thoughts are VERY intense and it’s all I think about now, and I don’t know why. I went through the release process but now I’m stuck in this stage that’s not anxious and delusional, but not “happy” either… it’s just bored. And I think about how weird it really is to die. I think after the release process I feel more connected to myself, and it’s making it hard to understand death. How do I move out of this stage and enjoy life, especially knowing I’m eventually going to just disappear? I’m really trying. THank you!

    1. Sen Post author

      Stormy, you mentioned that – “I just can’t believe that we die. I truly now feel my soul inside my body and to think that my body and myself will just disappear is terrifying” – there are two statements you made there, one is that “I just can’t believe that we die” – which if you really notice is like an inner knowing in your being/soul – you just know your eternal nature, and hence the idea of disappearing altogether doesn’t make sense. You will just need to go with this inner knowing in your being that death is not for the being/soul, it’s only for the temporary vehicle which is your current body. The second statement you made about – “to think that my body and myself will just disappear is terrifying” – well, the it’s terrifying because it’s not really “reality”, reality is that your body does dissolve but you, as a being, don’t dissolve (only the physical can dissolve, not the non-physical) – so in that sense there is no death for you as a being.

      Of course, someone can contest that – “how do I know this” – what if we do disappear completely. My knowing comes from my awareness, it’s just a “knowing”, it’s not a belief. However, I don’t find my sense of security in my knowing either – it comes from my freedom towards anything that arises as a part of reality. Even if it turns out that everything that I am would just disappear after death of this body, I am totally fine with that, I am open to that. So, when I am giving you this understanding, it’s not from a place of trying to “reassure” you, rather from a place of stating my knowing – however, you cannot come to a place of true freedom by clinging to an certain knowing, rather from being open to anything that needs to arise, including that total “dissolution” of you. If it’s terrifying, just allow that fear also, allow it fully for what it is and you will move beyond it.

      As for getting “bored”, it’s just a phase. Just allow this feeling of “boredom”, or this sense of extreme ordinariness about life. In the state of real allowing you will get past this phase into a phase of “involvement” with life as it is. Life has its limitations, its ordinariness, but it’s also enjoyable in its own way, in all its limitations. If you are applying a thought of “boredom” to life, it just means that you are yet to integrate boredom with joy (dark and light), you are yet to find true wholeness. It’s just a phase, just ride through it in a state of allowing, without clinging to the energy of boredom.

    2. Markus

      Stormy, fear of death is yet another energy to release, as Sen states. After a near-physical-death event in my life, death changed from a vague event in the distant future to a possible reality any day. I struggled to accept this reality. However, letting it go became easier when I instead looked into what I would fear losing – certain relationships and experiences that held my focus. Letting go of the attachment to this person or that habit eased the process, like taking smaller bites out of a large meal. Soon, the fear of death was also a small bite, one that could be let go. Maybe such would help you make that fear into something that can be worked with?

  11. Jon

    Sen,

    How do I know I’ve completed my imbalanced state and now am in balance? I sense my inner freedom and feel my natural state. It’s irritating because I want to move on with my life. You say to allow fully what goes on, and I have, but its hard to stay open fully when I’m a high school student who needs to be able to focus on studying. I appreciate these posts sir they have helped me get my life together.

    Thanks

  12. mary

    sen!! i have been wanting a certain guy to fall in love with me, i want to that experience, and ever since i read your blogs, i got rid of my neediness, i made peace with the dark nature of that reality, i knew that when he falls in love with me i’m not going to be the happiest person. i have been allowing of every emotion and tension in my body! i became aware of my resistances towards that reality. its been almost 3 weeks or 4, and today i hear that this guy just had a girlfriend! plz sen can u help me understand? does it need more time? more than 3 weeks to see results? or maybe my past is still affecting my present?because i have been so imbalanced in my life, just recently in those 3 weeks i have become balanced! because i am not willing to give up, i know that i am able to create any reality.

    1. Markus

      mary, do not forget that there is someone else in your fantasy! He has free will and may have very different wishes and desires that do not fit yours. No amount of wishing or hoping will force another to fit into what you want – that is an ego based desire, not one coming from a place of balance.

  13. asli

    Dear Sen,

    I also have this boredom problem, I am not occupied with death, I can relate to your knowing but I’m bored to death. Since I live more in the now (without trying), I feel quite bored most of the time. I guess it is a good thing since I haven’t that bored since my childhood. I realize that I was always engaging in meaningless and constant activity to avoid this boredom, I guess you’re right, it is also a part of the release. Any more insights on how to integrate it with the dimension of joy?

  14. j

    Dear Sen,

    Thank you for taking the time to share these critical ideas!

    I just have one (major) Issue. I used to be able to meditate succesfully- I would emerge happy and focus.

    However for the past two years, any sort of directing the mind or meditation leaves me spacy, ungrounded and detatched- bringing me further into suffering not away.

    I understand that maybe I need to do less try and more be, but what used to work simply does not.

    This state ungroundedness has momentum so that any additional effort to be present, even on an activity such as reading makes it worse.

    I do also have high mind momentum.

    My fear is that there is some biological reason for this…but then how do I make the spiritual growth that I need to fix it? It is like a catch 22!

    Thank you!

    J

  15. Marcy

    Hi Sen!
    What are your views on breathing exercises or pranayam in the treatment for depression,anxiety?

  16. Lara

    Hi Sen!
    I feel lucky to have found your articles. What you say makes so much sense. My question is about the light and dark side of depression. What if you are both light and dark but not balanced? How do you control being both sides and bringing both together in the right manner?

    Thanks

  17. Ahlan

    Hi Sen,

    I have been going through a major release since the past 2 days. I feel very depressed and in a low state.

    I understand about not suppressing these feelings and allowing them to arise and not resist.

    I have a question about ur statement “JUST ALLOW THEM TO ARISE IN YOU WITHOUT NEEDING TO GET INVOLVED WITH THEM” I want to seek clarification of what u mean by dont get involved.

    I am imbalanced in light nature and am currently going through a career crisis. I feel extremely depressed and I know this is because of the past accumulated energy. I have a strong awareness and can see the pattern of thoughts that are causing this. I can clearly see through my thinking and realize that this is the cause of my feelings.

    Since I am allowing myself to feel depressed and can see through my thinking clearly: Is this what u mean by “not get involved”? Does having a strong awareness about what is going on inside of u lead to not getting involved?

    As u wrote “IT CAN MAKE YOU FEEL DETACHED, COLD AND UNCARING” How can I feel cold and uncaring when I am actually allowing myself to feel these emotions arising within?

    I request a reply from Sen or other readers of this forum.

    1. Mark

      Ahlan,

      If you can see through the thoughts clearly is another mean by not getting involved. Based on my experience is, when I am on the release, I can see my mind visualizing images, thinking thoughts, telling me some things to do (some of them seemed reasonable) in middle of what I described as chaos inside my mind. Not getting involved means, you can observe the minds, the thoughts, see what it tells u to do, but without putting it into action immediately (because our mind is clouded by emotions, so any actions might seem reasonable and or normal), however, it is a choice if u still want to do it, but prepare for the consequences. And another means of not getting involved is, you are not identified with it.

      Detach, cold and uncaring, means you see something as what it is without attaching yourself to it. I also have light nature imbalances, and in my case is in love aspect, toward my partner. After some time of the release process, I am starting to see as what she is, I can ignore her if I want, I can not looking for her, others might think that I am cold or uncaring but the truth is, I am care about her, it’s just my care, is shifting to objective care (used to be unconsciouss care), I can call her when i feel she need attention, care, not calling her every minute, every seconds in a day. And remember, “IT CAN MAKE YOU FEEL DETACHED, COLD AND UNCARING”, it is just a feeling.

      Sorry if my words make u confused, I am not good at explaining spiritual things. Hope this help

  18. Ahlan

    Thanks Mark. That perspective helped. In one of the replies Sen says “don’t try to use some forced coldness/detachment/numbness as a means of protection.”

    What I understand is when u r experiencing the emotions just see through the emotions clearly while at the same time feeling them and not trying to escape their intensity. When u see, observe, understand their patterns, understand that it is the mechanical way of thinking of the mind.
    I think this is what it means by staying identified.
    When I feel depressed and say a thought crosses my mind “Why am I stuck in this work/job that feels so draining” If this feels depressing and makes me feel vulnerable. I understand not suppressing. I feel sort of powerless to this thought. So how do i bring in my dark nature to integrate it with my powerless ight nature?

  19. Blue

    Dear All….

    I know I am in state of depression…but this time so weird as can have positive thoughts and yet they also feel so weird..so loud…like there are contradictory voices going on . one calls itself the protector, the other the saboteur ( yes, I studied quite a lot of psychology yet this is almost a hindrance in this illness as I know all of the terminology) for example..’You know you will get through this ..you have done it before…so lets look beyond this illness ( you call it release right ?) and look at your dream…and then I get photos of what I would like in my life…and the other voice says..ha ha ha..you will never get that…no no….you will be in this bed and suffering fro the rest of your life…you had a good life…now it is time for suffering….I ask myself whether I am in fact schizophrenic and then label this nervous breakdown..just thinking thinking all the time..cannot sleep…hard to get out of house yet last year travelling the world…HELP

  20. Lander

    Blue, your mind gathered a momentum that high, that you dont have other option, but to realise what mind really is, (to face a real truth-logic-science of your being) and thing is you can’t fix your mind with mind, but with other, more inteligent capacity in you has to take control.
    Sen wrote about all this dynamics on this blog, in details, so take your time reading, take your time connecting with the space of awareness (space that is able to observe mind without judgments), so to allow release of this past mind momentum, and finally balance into new, consciouss way of living your life.
    It will take some time, several months, releases will come in layers and can be unpleasant, but this is what is needed to go through to this inevitable change.

  21. Dip

    Hi ! This is my personal experience … And I find that anulom-vilom Pranayam work best for depression … As earlier I had it since last may be 2-3 yrs bt since last six month I m doing this pranayam for 40 mins Daily ,and now I feel it totally cured… If u want u can extend the time duration of it depending yr requirement … Best of luck for yr new journey towards endless joy and happiness .

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