Free The Tibetan Yoga of Breath: Breathing Practices for Healing the Body and Cultivating Wisdom by Anyen Rinpoche, Allison Choying Zangmo

As time passes, the body is not capable of sustaining its high energy, so the entire system can collapse and we can experience burnout. The energy of the body becomes heavy and exhausted.
    P ROFILE OF D EPRESSION
     
    Like anxiety, depression is an imbalance of the air element, as it is accompanied by clouds of negative thoughts. However, depression is also an expression of an imbalance in the earth element. This results in the mental, emotional, and physical heaviness we feel when we are depressed.
    From the point of view of Tibetan philosophy, depression is a state of mind that is highly influenced by our attitudes and thought patterns, our breathing, our karma—perhaps some of us might say our deeply ingrained habits—and our day-to-day behavior. And likewise, depression is treatable because contemplative practiceand wind energy training address all of these major causes of depression simultaneously.
    From the point of view of Western medicine, depression manifests as a result of genetics, environment, nutrition, habits of mind and thought patterns, brain chemistry, and/or physical illness. When enough of these depression-prone factors present—or even a strong dose of one of these factors presents—a depressed state of body and mind can result. There may be no common cause of depression, but there is a common result.
    Though the origins of depression vary, depressed individuals share the tendencies of feeling exhausted, defeated, and powerless. When we are depressed, we underestimate our ability to cope with daily stressors. Our outlook on life becomes gloomy, coloring our thoughts and interactions and causing them to spiral out of control. Feeling exhausted and emotionally overwhelmed, our ability to deal with everyday situations is compromised. We often choose to withdraw from everyday life.
    Because depression arises from a variety of causes and conditions, it can also be treated in a variety of ways. Altering brain chemistry with medication clearly helps some people. Exercise has also been shown to be as effective at relieving depression as medication in some studies. 14 But medical research also demonstrates that brain chemistry and function is altered by changes in the way we think! For example, cognitive therapy has been shown to be as effective as medication in the treatment of depression. 15
    There are clearly things you can do and practice to benefit your state of mind, regardless of the origin of your depression. Working with one or a combination of the contributing factors of depression helps us to put our energy in motion and create change in body and mind. If depression were solely based on one cause, such as genetics or the chemical balance in the brain, we might be correct in feeling that there is nothing we can do to heal ourselves. But thinking of depression as an imbalance in the elements can be empowering. We each have the ability to bring something that is out of balance back into balance.
    We tend to think of anxiety and depression as being very different types of imbalances. However, as we have already learned, depression and anxiety frequently occur together, and depression is often preceded by anxiety. One way to understand this is that the racing thought patterns of anxiety and the continual release of stress hormones tax the system so much that it simply collapses, and can manifest as depression.
    From the point of view of wind energy, depression and anxiety are different expressions of the same root. Western medicine has a similar view. For example, anxiety and depression often respond to the same sorts of interventions: cognitive behavioral therapy, medications, yoga, and breath yoga. Additionally, decreased oxygenation of brain cells is implicated in both anxiety and depression, and both conditions are characterized by shallow, thoracic breathing. This suggests that deep abdominal breathing is beneficial to those suffering from anxiety and depression.
    How does abdominal breathing benefit