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NOVEMBER 2005 UPDATE

Dear Friends,

Our precious human lives never cease to amaze me. During the last 7 weeks, I've had the fortune to be with and learn from many exceptional people. The last week of September was our 11th Annual Buddhist Monastic Conference, this year held at Shasta Abbey. Being with so many sincere Western monastic practitioners was a true blessing.

Hwee Leng and Soon Ann
Then it was on to Thailand; one of my teachers has asked me to learn more about practice in the Theravada tradition. Barry Flaming (a former DFFer who now works in Thailand) and Hwee Leng and Soon Ann (dear friends and students from Singapore) joined me in the trip to Wat Marp Jan, a monastery in the jungles of southern Thailand.

Tan Achalo, a friend who is an Australian Theravadin monk, kindly arranged for me to meet his teacher Ajahn Anand, the Wat's abbot, and to stay there. Ajahn Anand generously gave a small group of us teachings on the four foundations of mindfulness and the practice of samatha and vipassana, which were translated from Thai into English by Tan Sukhitto, an Israeli monk, and Tan Achalo. Ajahn Anand has a strong connection with Kuan Yin (Chenrezig) and is building a Kuan Yin temple at the Wat, so there was a nice meeting of Theravada and Mahayana.

I was the first bhikshuni (fully ordained nun) to visit the Wat as this ordination is not currently available in Thailand. While I did not go on alms round with the monks—I preferred to meditate in my room in the early morning—I did join them for the one meal we ate each day in the morning. The remainder of the day we spent listening, discussing, and transcribing the teachings, and in the evening the community gathered in the temple on the hill for evening chanting and meditation.

In order to deepen their understanding of the body and the nature of cyclic existence, Thai monks have the practice of attending an autopsy. I requested Ajahn Anand to join them and found it helpful for meditation. Throughout our visit, the kindness of the abbot and monks and the generosity of the lay followers was touching and I rejoiced in the delight they experience in giving.

His Holiness laughing with Venerable

From Thailand, Hwee Leng and I went to Dharamsala, India, where I was fortunate tohave an audience with H. H. the Dalai Lama and to visit my teacher (and member of the Abbey's advisory board) Geshe Sonam Rinchen. They were both delighted with my stories of the stay at Wat Marp Jan and I hope my visit will enable these excellent masters from these two Buddhist traditions to meet each other in the future.

We also visited Thosamling, a new monastery and educational institute for Western Buddhist nuns and lay women, located in the valley below Dharamsala. Begun by Ven. Zangmo, a Dutch nun, Thosamling is functioning well. We enjoyed a tour, lunch, and a Dharma discussion with the residents there.

We then went to Dolma Ling for a meeting with Betsy Napper, Ven. Tenzin Palmo, Ven. Lobsang Dechen, and Ven. Tenzin Dolma. We discussed the possibility of introducing the bhikshuni ordination into the Tibetan tradition. His Holiness is eager to have research about this completed and has asked the Western bhikshunis to take the lead in making it happened. The visit to Thosamling and Dolma Ling brought home the great improvement in educational opportunities available for nuns in the Tibetan tradition since the time I went to Dharamsala and Nepal in 1975.

I gave talks at both Tushita Meditation Centre—the one in Dharamsala and the one in

Venerable turning prayer wheels
Delhi—and enjoyed visiting the room in Tushita Dharamsala where I was ordained in spring 1977. The last leg of the trip was leading a retreat at Cloud Mountain Retreat Center in Washington State, where I gave talks about emptiness. We hope to have these up on www.thubtenchodron.org before too long.

Meanwhile Nanc, Jan, Nerea, and Joan made great progress with the building projects at the Abbey. We are happy to announce that due to the kindness of many of you, we made the $15,000 matching grant! The writing studio is nearly complete, as is the community room. Many volunteers joined them to make this possible and to all of them we are grateful. The “Abbey crew” visited a Carmelite hermitage nearby and two of the nuns there subsequently visited the Abbey. We share many similarities in lifestyle and the sisters commented after listening to the Abbey residents chant the “Eight Verses of Thought Training,” that it reminded them of teachings of St. John of the Cross and Saint Teresa of Avila. We also enjoyed a visit from Geshe Thupten Phelgye, a monk from Seraje Monastery who is a member of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile. He works for peace in the Middle East and is also a strong advocate of vegetarianism in the Tibetan community.

In early October we had our first Forest Stewardship Roundtable. Seven people gathered to brainstorm from a Dharma perspective how to care for the abbey's land and the wildlife on it. We've begun mapping the roads and trails and in the future will learn more about the various micro-environments on the land.

Jan beaming
The full moon day in November was a special day for Jan Howell and for the Abbey. I gave Jan, who has been a resident of the abbey for eight months, the eight precepts of an anagarika (Tib: gomi genyen). This is the first step one takes towards monastic ordination at the Abbey, and Jan is our first anagarika. A joyful day for all of us!

Our All-day Practice Days, which are open to the public, have continued, and last week we had the first of a three-part series about stress management in Newport. 23 people attended—we're happy to meet our neighbors and to share the Buddha's wisdom in a secular way with our local community.

Angela Vuagniaux (Pema), our new office manager, just arrived. We are delighted to

Pema
have her at the Abbey. Many of you will come to know her when you call, write, and visit us. Pema just spent a year at Gampo Abbey in Canada, and brings a wealth of experience about community life and cross-cultural studies.

All summer we watched two lambs and their mother grow healthily at our neighbor's farm. When we heard that they planned to slaughter them for food, we decided buy them. Animal liberation is a traditional Buddhist practice and we rejoice that we were able to save their lives. We're now looking for safe homes for Karuna, Jigme, and Trinlay. Let us know if you'd like to house them.

From Dec. 8, 2005 to March 8, 2006, eleven people will do Vajrasattva retreat at Sravasti Abbey. In addition, I will do private retreat in the newly finished studio and 3 people will serve the retreat. Vajrasattva meditation is an excellent way to purify negative karma created by the ten destructive actions and by transgressions of precepts. Through purification practices, we let go of regret and guilt and prevent negative karmic imprints from ripening into suffering results. This practice also enables us to build up constructive attitudes and emotions such as forgiveness, love, compassion, and wisdom.

We would like to offer those who are unable to attend the retreat an opportunity to make a connection with it. You can do this by doing at least one session of Vajrasattva meditation with 108 recitations of the long mantra a day during the time of the retreat. This takes about 40 minutes.

Doing this, you will feel the support of a group of people doing the same meditation and will give your support to them, thus inspiring the practice of those doing retreat at the Abbey. If you are interested in participating in this way, please download the materials—the Vajrasattva sadhana (the text with the visualization, prayers, mantra, etc.), a commentary on the practice, and audio recording of Ven. Chodron leading the practice. Study the FPMT Vajrasattva practice book (available from www.fpmt.org) and read Becoming Vajrasattva by Lama Thubten Yeshe (Wisdom Publications) and Teachings from the Vajrasattva Retreat by Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

that you will participate in this way and we will mentally include you in the big community of Abbey practitioners. Send us your photo to place in the Abbey's meditation hall to symbolize your participation. Last year, about fifty people participated in the retreat from afar, including about fifteen prisoners. Many of the participants from afar wrote us to say what a powerful experience sharing in the retreat was for them. Knowing that the Vajrasattva retreat was going on at the Abbey, they felt supported in their practice and many of them shared us their insights during the retreat.

Some of you may want to offer a donation to help cover the costs of the retreat. This is greatly appreciated. The retreatants daily dedicate their positive potential (merit) for the benefactors. Please earmark your donation “Vajrasattva retreat.”

As Thanksgiving approaches, may we see clearly all that we have to be thankful for—our precious human life, the Buddha's teachings, friends and relatives. May we also be thankful for all those whom we don't know but due to whose efforts we stay alive, and may we even be thankful for those who challenge us and thus make us grow and enable us to deepen our compassion.

Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron

  • Nov. 15, 22, and 29 at 7PM Newport WA
  • “Dealing with Stress”
  • The Create Place, 900 West 4th Street, Newport WA

  • Nov. 25 – 27 Sravasti Abbey
  • “Rejoicing and Giving Thanks” Retreat
  • Info:
  • You're also welcome to come the evening of Wed., Nov. 23 and take the 8 Mahayana precepts with us on Thanksgiving Day. Please register with Barbara.

  • Dec. 2 7:00 PM Spokane WA
  • “How to Be Compassionate When We Can't Stop All the Suffering in the World”
  • Unitarian Universalist Church
  • 4340 W Fort Wright Dr., Spokane, WA
  • Info: reipe19@msn.com

  • Dec. 6, 2005 – March 10, 2006 Sravasti Abbey
    Vajrasattva Retreat. We cannot receive visitors during this time.

  • March 31 to April 5 Phoenicia NY (outside New York City)
  • Tara Retreat
  • Menla Retreat Center
  • 375 Patherkill Rd., Phoenicia NY
  • Info: www.menla.org, shanti@tibethouse.org, office@menla.org
  • Tel: 212.807.0563 or 845.688.6897

  • May 10, 17, 24, 31, 2006 live telephone teachings
  • Series on “Working with Anger”
  • Sponsored by Tricycle Magazine
  • http://www.tricycle.com/foundation/ttt-08.html

  • * May 27 – 28 Sravasti Abbey
  • Panchen Otrul Rinpoche will teach on the “King of Prayers” (The Extraordinary Aspiration of Samanthabhadra) at the Abbey.

  • June 9 – 16 Castle Rock WA
  • Ven. Chodron leads a Chenrezig Retreat and teaches on “108 Verses in Praise of Great Compassion” by Lama Lobsang Tayang
  • Cloud Mountain Retreat Center, Castle Rock WA
  • info@cloudmountain.org

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