Watch Sogyal Rinpoche teach: Happiness is up to you!

Sogyal Rinpoche (centre, front row) and the conference speakers and organizers in Killarney.
Photograph by Chinch Gryniewicz

At the Rigpa conference, Compassion and Presence: Spiritual Care for the Living and Dying, held in April 2009 in Killarney, Ireland, eight hundred people, including hundreds of health care professionals and caregivers from around world, heard Sogyal Rinpoche's profound teachings on how meditation can help us to meet the challenges that we face in our lives today.

Rinpoche taught that, in order to truly be able to help others, we need to work with our own minds, which begins with the practice of meditation. He said:

As the cloud-like thoughts and emotions fade away through meditation, the sky-like nature of our true being is revealed, and, shining from it, our buddha nature, like the sun. And, just as both light and warmth blaze from the sun, wisdom and loving compassion radiate out from the mind's innermost nature.

To read more about the conference, which was organised by Rigpa's Spiritual Care Education Programme, go to www.rigpa.org.

Watch a short extract from Rinpoche's teaching, The Heart of Compassion.



You can order a DVD of the full teaching from ZAM, the Rigpa shop.

Study Tibetan Buddhism at Rigpa's Shedra East in 2010

Would you like to deepen your knowledge and understanding of Buddhist teachings? Or maybe even train to become a Tibetan translator or Buddhist scholar? Then why not join Rigpa's Shedra East in 2010.

The Rigpa Shedra (study college) - which takes place every winter in the sacred place of Pharping, in the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal - is a traditional and comprehensive Buddhist education programme focusing on the in-depth study of classic Buddhist texts and the Tibetan language. It is under the guidance of Khenpo Namdrol and is hosted by him at his Palyul Retreat Centre.

Next year, Shedra East will take place from January-April 2010 (exact dates to be confirmed). It is open to all Rigpa students and it is not necessary to have attended the Shedra previously.

In 2010, Shedra students who have already attended two or more years of shedra, will study the Introduction to the Middle Way (Skt. Madhyamakāvatāra; Tib. Uma la Jukpa), Chandrakirti’s classic commentary on the meaning of Nagarjuna’s Mulamadhyamaka-karika.

As always, Tibetan language courses on different levels will be offered.

For more information, go to www.rigpashedra.org, and to apply to attend Rigpa Shedra East 2010, click here.

Buddhism is Modern - A teaching by Sogyal Rinpoche from 2009

In March 2009, Sogyal Rinpoche gave two days of teachings in Thimpu, Bhutan on Buddhism is Modern. These were later shown on Bhutanese television.

Here is a short extract.

Sogyal Rinpoche teaching at recent All Mandala Retreat at Lerab Ling

Sogyal Rinpoche teaching in the temple during the recent All Mandala Retreat at Lerab Ling.