RYI STUDENT BLOG

                                                                            I.                                                                                                                  What is the deep listening?                                          Sema is a greeting from the secret ones                            ...

After finishing 5 kora at Boudha stupa, I went to one tea stall. The taste of the tea was so good and it was made by an old lady, around my grandma’s age. I asked her about the background story of Boudha during her childhood.  She started telling me the story of Boudhanath. Once upon time, Boudha was a very beautiful village adorned in all directions by thousands of trees and flowers, blooming through all four seasons. Different kinds of insects made noises that sounded like bells. Different birds tweeted like a melody-queen. The main source of local peoples’ income was from agriculture. Almost 90 percent of people were farmers and all the locals were Tamang. Usually, Tamang people worked very hard in the day time but at the night they all needed to have rakshi (local whisky). Boudha’s local people were living autonomously, a simple life. After finishing the conversation with the old lady, I got to know some back ground story of Boudha. It made me reflect on the hi...

I took this photo when I finished school one day, chancing upon the monks who had just finished their evening Puja. Their yellow robes were rather conspicuous against the white walls and marble ground. This reminds me of some words said by previous masters in those commentaries, that one should respect even tiny piece s of red or yellow cloth , as they are representations  of the auspicious Three Jewels. In this so-called " time of degeneration " , we are still able to study full-time the dharma, the scientific method that brings mundane and super-mundane benefits to both ourselves and others, and get to call ourselves practitioners , I guess for this , or for this scene alone , I am already grateful. This is my first time in this country. As a first-year BA student at Rangjung Yeshe Institute, my focus here is on the Tibetan language and Buddhist philosophy. The language course here is very intensive: B efore I came here, I’ve finished the alphabet and pronun...

  Once, in the middle of a conversation, someone asked me: “Why are you here at RYI?” For a few seconds, many things came to my mind, but my answer was pretty straightforward: “I am here because I want to study the Dharma”.  Later on, I thought that this was an interesting question; a question I have asked myself several times throughout the academic year in different ways. Usually, at the beginning of the semester, when everything is smooth and relaxed, the question arises as a joyful expression: “Why have not I come here earlier?” However, with the stress for the assignments and the exams, the question turns into a more comic expression. Sometimes with a certain rebellious mood: “What the heck am I doing here?” Or some other times even with a deep existential inquiry: “What is the real meaning of all these studies?” Luckily, all these questions vanish when the exams are over and I am enjoying my holidays…   Nonetheless, I want to answer again this questi...

             When I decided to study Buddhism at RYI, I had three main reasons to do so: first, I wanted to make the Dharma a bigger part of my life, and as the lazy person that I am, forcing myself to spend every day reading and learning about it for about 4 years seems like the right ting to do. Second, I was convinced that Buddhism was the only thing that I would not lose interest in after studying it for a couple of years. And finally, I have just always really been in love with Nepal after my first visit in 2007, so living here seemed like a pretty natural thing to do. Now, after more than a year of studying here, I think it is time to check my reasons again and see in how far they still matter. Prayerflags reflect in a little pond – seen on a hike to Nagi Gompa 1. Has the Dharma become a bigger part of my life? Definitely. Being surrounded by it 24/7 I would really have to make an effort to not be influenced by i...

For those are in search of dharma teachings, Nepal is the right place to be.  Since this land is an ancient Buddhist country, various teachings from different Buddhist traditions are still preserved well. The most influential is Tibetan Buddhism and wherever one goes in Nepal, one will see monks and nuns from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. The masters from that lineage are kind and easily accessible. One will encounter the precious teachings being given to the public without any charge almost everyday around the Boudhanath Stupa.  Importantly, most of those who give teachings are very experienced and always ready to bestow blessings to anyone. They attract not only local Tibetan and Nepalese but also thousand people from the west and other part of the east. Regarding the masters, Tsonyi Rinpoche is a great example of a master from the Tibetan tradition.  His teaching which took place a few days ago was one of most penetrating teachings I have ever had. His word...

I learned the Tibetan alphabet years ago but I had never learned the language itself until I came to RYI. What did actually inspire me to follow my dream to be a translator? Seeing many translators translating Rinpoche’s teaching directly from Tibetan to English and other languages. Won’t it be incredible to be able to understand Rinpoche’s precious words without even waiting for translations? Surely it will. Won’t it be even more beneficial if you were able to be a medium through which Rinpoche connects to his upcoming and current students? Definitely it will be! Wow, I dream of this every day. Dream to be a translator so that words of Dharma can be listened to in native language and understood exactly the way Rinpoche wants us to. When I first heard about RYI - co-incidentally via Kyabje Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche- I was so glad to get a chance to study in-depth about Buddhism. On top of that, learning Himalayan language especially Tibetan and Sanskrit grabbed my attention....

“It is only natural that various obstacles and hurdles occur in the spreading of the True  Dharma’s rule. However, to overcome or ward off these Dharma-opposing elements while  remaining true in mind, body and speech is another personal dharma and duty of each of the  sanghas.”  As various hurdles arise in my path, born from the fruition of the seeds of my own  past actions, I find myself taking solace in these words uttered by my Guru. Three and a half years ago when the bud of the Dharma’s flower began to sprout in my  heart, immense motivation arose in me with regard to seeking liberation from the sorrows of  the world. But with the passage of time, as the reality of the difficulties of the path began to  be more visible, and the need to replace motivation with discipline took form, the various  hurdles that had arisen seemed to overcome me, a naïve traveler on the path, and as such  the budding flower was prevented from b...

Nepal is truly a Shambala for me. In Nepal, you see dharma, you feel dharma, and you hear dharma all the time. Every day you are inspired to practice dharma by being around so many physical representations of the enlightened body, speech, and mind of the Buddha.  One of my favorite experiences here has been attending  drupchen , which means “great accomplishment.”  Drupchen  is a Vajrayana Buddhist practice in which the entire Sangha, including both monks and lay practitioners, gets together to read an important  sadhana.  The  drupchen  that I recently attended was called the  Ngakso drupchen . In this  drupchen,  we read a sadhana  that is a  terma  (treasure) hidden by Guru Rinpoche and revealed by the Great Terton Dechen Chogyur Lingpa. During the  drupchen,  while everyone is reciting the  sadhana , the monks play a rich symphony of religiously inspired music with a variety of instruments...

My new path started at the end of he monsoon season of 2012, when I first entered the class in the monastery, grabbed myself a cushion, and tried to understand how I am supposed to cross my legs, and to make them stay crossed, for the next hour and a half. When the Lopon (a term which I had no idea at that time what it meant) entered the class, I stood up like everyone - but unlike everyone else, I stayed frozen in my place, amazed by what's going on around me. Amazed by this new world into which I stepped. When I first landed here my Tibetan vocabulary (or what I thought was Tibetan) was limited to two words: "dalai" and "lama", and honestly, even the meaning of those two I didn't quite understand (it turns out they are Mongolian loan-words), and the only connection I had to the dharma was a picture of me next to a stupa from a trip I once made to India. But still there was something that drew me to come here, to Nepal, to study Tibetan and to try ...

It is semester break for the students of the study programs at Rangjung Yeshe Institute. Being a BA student myself, I enjoy the open schedule after an intense period of study while completing the fall semester. Now, the many practice opportunities here in Boudha easily fill my schedule yet again! However, I find delight in the fruits of study: in conversations, interactions and while listening to teachings, I keep encountering the material studied during the previous semesters and it seems to continue to connect the dots of knowledge further and further. Especially the teachings on dependent origination that many of us contemplated through the presentation of Mipham Rinpoches “Gateway to Knowledge”, keeps being a wonderful framework for any daily encounter. - How did my meal come about? How come, I heard of some event at a particular time? How is it that I meet the people I meet? All these events seem almost magic, considering the reflection of not being in control myse...