uring your next visit to Gomde California, you may notice that parts of our forest feel breezy and more open, that the oak and madrone trees have room to stretch their branches, and that the undergrowth in our campgrounds has largely been cleared away.

It is with heavy hearts that we share with you this message from Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche about the passing into parinirvana of our precious Kyabje Tsikey Chokling Rinpoche.

We are delighted to share the good news that today, on the 25th of the lunar month (Dakini Day), a grand Dzambhala Puja was held on behalf of Gomde California sangha members and donors.

At Rinpoche’s request and in preparation for the Fall Seminar, the Khenpos and Lamas of Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling have been giving online seminars over the past several weeks, and will continue all the way until Rinpoche’s seminar.The topics covered are: The Four Noble Truths, The Twelve Links of Dependent Origination, The Two Truths, The Four Mind Changings, and Development and Completion Stage. These teachings cover the profound and essential topics that serve as an excellent foundation for receiving Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche’s precious teachings on “Buddha Nature.”You can find complete details and registration information for the teachings with our Khenpos and Lamas on DharmaSun.org. When you register for one topic, you automatically receive access to the complete series of KNSL teachings, and gain access to all of the recordings for a limited time.Rinpoche encourages his students to study these topics with our Khenpos and Lamas in a detailed and thorough way. As Khenpo Pema Namgyal said in today’s teachings on the two truths: “If we haven’t used analysis to resolve the view, and we engage in meditation, we can cultivate shamatha, but will be unable to cultivate the clarity of vipashyana. Therefore, our meditation practice will not lead us out of samsara.”These teachings have been incredibly inspiring. To register, please click here. With very best wishes, DharmaSun Team For more information, you can also find the full KNSL Online Teaching Series announcement on the Gomde California programs page.

“The profound equality of all beings is only known in the moment in which ‘I’ no longer exists. Only through the recognition of emptiness is there stainless compassion. This stainless compassion, inseparable from emptiness, is none other than the ultimate samadhi.”—Phakchok Rinpoche, In the Footsteps of Bodhisattvas An authentic Buddhist master has the ability to precisely identify the unique positive qualities in a student and is able to direct those qualities towards virtuous activity—such that the student, the master, and those connected with both of them are benefited directly and indirectly. The master also has an equally powerful yet devastating ability to reveal the faults of the disciple, such that the student cannot help but face every shred of egotism with which students torture themselves, obscuring the fundamental goodness of their basic nature. In one of the Buddha’s famous teachings entitled the Samādhirāja Sūtra (Samadhi Raja Sutra) or “The King of Meditation,” the Buddha taught that attaining the awakened state—emptiness with a core of compassion—requires us to embrace this process guided by the teacher: to nurture our qualities of goodness such that they overwhelm our faults, and to clearly see the nasty habits of mind so they do not grow in power. Phakchok Rinpoche, Buddhist master and lineage-holder, clearly presents this path of authentic Buddhist training in his new book, In the Footsteps of Bodhisattvas. This process of purification can be long and gentle or short and intense, but according to all of the great Buddhist masters of the past—those incredible beings with whom you can spend ten years and never witness a moment of selfishness—it’s got to happen. If we want to be open, blissful, clear and intelligent, and if we want to enact effortless compassionate activity, we have to go through the process of assembling the conditions of …

Gomde California is delighted to now be streaming our Shakyamuni Buddha group practice every Sunday at 8 am PT on Facebook Live. Simply put, the more opportunities to share the Dharma with the world, the better. Led by Lama Kuzang Drolma, The Treasury of Blessings is a revered method to connected with the blessings of the Buddha. Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche has repeatedly encouraged our sangha to practice this sadhana, and he has taught on it extensively. You can his teachings on Dharma Sun, Rinpoche’s online home. If you have any questions, please contact us at programs@gomdeca.org. We are here to support your Dharma practice as possible during this time of increased care and caution.

On this 10th day of the lunar month, Gomde California is proud to announce that our translators-in-residence are setting out on a grand project: rendering “White Lotus: Background Teachings on the Treasury of Blessings” by Jamgon Mipham Rinpoche (1846-1912) into the English language for the first time. The marks a fresh phase in the work of Gomde CA’s Dharmachakra Translation Center, which for years has been home to advanced studies in Tibetan translation in close collaboration with the 84000 Project.

I have the pleasure of writing to you after spending an extraordinary few months at our Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling monastery in Boudhanath. During my time in Nepal I was able to meet with Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche to assist Gomde California, as well as witness a glimmer of the activity that issues forth from our main monastery to touch the world. Rinpoche kindly asked that I share with you some photos from the monastery, as well as a few personal insights, so that we might all take joy in the goodness of the community we support and of which we are a part. There is much to say, but I believe it all comes down to acknowledging love and wisdom.  Read more and view photos…