Smile at Fear: Awakening the True Heart of Bravery

Not knowing the nature of fear, you can’t go beyond it. But once you know your cowardice, once you know where the stumbling block is, you just have to climb over it—maybe just three and a half steps.

Windhorse could be described as a bank or storehouse of energy, which is the product of genuineness. If you’re a beginning warrior, first you have a flash of genuineness. Then, having recognized your genuineness, you automatically experience health and wholesomeness. Finally, you feel the spark or the wind of lungta, windhorse. In a fully developed

Windhorse arises in the environment of Great Eastern Sun vision, which creates an atmosphere of sacredness in which you are constantly moving forward and recharging your energy. You feel that you are truly leading your life in the fullest sense.

We have made our journey, we have gotten this far, and we can go on. That’s basically what we call the Great Eastern Sun view. There’s nothing particularly glamorous about it. It is a simple attitude. Beyond that, we have the interest or the desire, as well as the ability, to continue this journey. There is a spark that exists within us that allows

So the real way to share our understanding with others is to cheer ourselves up to begin with.

Naturally existing interest in the world is part of the Great Eastern Sun vision. Even though you might be doing something quite repetitive, like working in a factory or at a fast-food restaurant, whatever you are doing, you find that every minute of every hour is a new chapter, or at least a new page, in your life.

The magical trick or practice, the key to relating with others, is to project the physical and psychological healthiness of lungta, or windhorse. You might have had a terrible day, but when you turn your mind to communicating with others in the Shambhala style, you tune yourself in to lungta. You feel good, healthy, and ready to launch.

This unconditional confidence manifests in our lives as appreciation: appreciation of our intelligence, our sympathy toward ourselves and others, appreciation of good food and drink, appreciation for our meditation practice. Appreciating the details of life begins to open up our life so that it is no longer purely a struggle but a jolly good life.

So we are simply trying to feel ourselves, appreciate ourselves. The whole presentation of the way of the warrior is based on this gentleness.