Co-Creating a Vision of Shambhala

In May, I attended a series of programs in Mexico, the Ziji Collective International Summit, and Ziji Leadership Retreat. You may remember last year I attended the Summit in San Fransisco, which I wrote a blog post about. This year it was hosted by the Mexico City sangha, and was accompanied by a 5 day retreat at Casa Werma, which were both written about for the Shambhala Times here and here. There’s also a video about the Summit. I’m not going to talk much about my experiences there, as I think all of that captures it quite well.

Rather, what I’ve been chewing on since I got back from Mexico is the question: “What do I want to bring back to Portland?” What struck me most deeply at this series of programs was the feeling of how incredibly relevant the Shambhala teachings are, the deep sense that so much is possible here. We had a taste of that possibility in our program, creating something that was diverse, collaborative and totally fresh. The year prior, at the San Fransisco Summit, Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche addressed those gathered, and empowered us with the idea of making Shambhala “something we can be proud of”. I had the feeling at the end of this years program that this was a Shambhala I could be proud of.

When I came back home, I will admit that I felt a bit disappointed. I think many of us have probably felt that experience coming home from a big program or retreat, and probably some of the energy you come home with is a form of elation, which is inevitably going to fade. Another aspect of this disappointment was realizing that we seem to still have a ways to go as a community, both locally and internationally, to live up to the goals we have set for ourselves. We aspire to be diverse, but are largely not a very diverse group, in age, race, economic class, gender identification or cultural background. We aspire to help the world, and yet it feels we can sometimes insulate ourselves into a fantasy “Shambhala world,” disconnected from the cries for help that the world is constantly giving us.

My typical way of working with that feeling that not enough is being done is to just go do it, to take it on myself as a responsibility and act. But in this case, I’ve had to acknowledge that option isn’t really available to me- not only are these challenges larger than me, I also do not have the time to afford expanding my work much further within Shambhala. Without the option of doing more, I tried resting in the idea that I’m doing what I can, but this really left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

Certainly, we have things to be proud of within our Shambhala community. While in Mexico, I was floored by meeting those engaged with Speak Up Chicago, which is profiled in this CBS special (skip to 18:30 to get to Chicago stuff). And here locally, we have what I feel to be our under-appreciated gem, the Prison Program, giving opportunities for practice and teaching to inmates at the Oregon State Penitentiary. But if we are really going to make enlightened society possible, this needs to be just the beginning of our work in the world. And if I don’t have the time to make it happen, who will?

A turning point came today, attending the celebration of the 20^th Anniversary of the Sakyong’s enthronement. Rinpoche, in his address [which starts at about 59 minutes into the video], called upon the Shambhala Community to get involved, to create and manifest a vision for the world, and to look towards the future. He was speaking to exactly what I felt challenged by, and asking us to engage in it; it was so pertinent I nearly cried. It made me realize that his words in San Fransisco weren’t just directed at young people, it was for all of us. He spoke of how this work can’t be accomplished by himself alone, and if he can’t accomplish it alone, I certainly cannot. We can work together to make Shambhala something we can be proud of, together.

Inspired by this, I realized what I would like to bring back from Mexico for this community is an opportunity to together create what we would like our vision to be. This opportunity was afforded to me in Mexico, and I would like to give back that opportunity to our community. To do this, I would like to offer to organize a salon dinner or series of dinners where we could discuss this further. There, with food, conversation, and meditation, we can find what we’d like to see our community engaged in, and create our own vision of an enlightened society.

Please fill this out if you are interested, and I will get back to you on when and where this may be happening. If anyone would like to chat about this more, or hear more about my experiences in Mexico, please feel free to reach out at [email protected].

May we work to manifest our vision for a basically good society.

Corey Adkins