Tibetan Buddhism

On the Dalai Lama’s 75th birthday, Tibetan Buddhism continues to spread, despite myth-making and scandals

In the spring of 1970 I was granted an interview with His Holiness the Dalai Lama at his residence in Mcleod Ganj in the Indian Himalayas. He was 35 at the time and had not yet visited the West. He greeted me with a huge smile and warm handshake – forestalling my attempt at traditional Tibetan prostrations.

In the conversation that followed, he seemed almost naively keen to hear about my life, my interests and why I had decided to study Tibetan Buddhism in India and Nepal. He was enthusiastic, bordering on boisterous and showed no sign of the gravitas that developed later – when he matured into his present status as an elder statesman and custodian of the moral high ground.

I fell under the spell of his charm at my first and later meetings and became a pioneer member of the Dalai Lama fan club. I was also inspired by the lamas I met in Kathmandu and the ones who welcomed me into the fold in McLeod Ganj.

Accounts of the magic and mystery of pre-Chinese Tibet by authors like Alexandra David Neel, Lama Govinda and W.Y Evans Wentz were essential reading on the 60s and 70s hippie trail and I was one of many travellers from the developed world who were enchanted by stories about the yogi-lamas. We learned that they could walk at superhuman speeds over huge distances, for example, or survive at sub-zero temperatures by generating inner heat or at the moment of death, direct their consciousness out through the fontanelle.

We learned about the wonders of Tibetan culture – the songs, poetry and exquisite visual art – all of it rooted in an ancient Buddhist tradition. We studied the scriptures, the history books and the lives of the great sages. We realised that an entire society was organised to enable as many people as possible to live as dedicated spiritual practitioners.

We took the stories home with us and told them to our friends, relatives – anyone who would listen. Tibetan whispers spread across the globe. In San Francisco, Sydney, Auckland and all over Europe, small pockets of interest in all things Tibetan started to extend into the wider population. People set up Tibetan centres and invited lamas to come to live and teach in them.

In parallel with a fascination with the myths and legends of old Tibet, I was learning, very slowly, to meditate. Samye Ling, in the Scottish borders, was the first Tibetan meditation centre in the West and for several years I spent my free time there – commuting by overnight train from London to Lockerbie. It was hard work.

I soon discovered that Tibetan Buddhism is not all deities floating on lotus blossoms, tinkling bells and cedarwood incense. On the meditation cushion, I endured knee agony, extreme boredom and oscillations between elation and despair until I finally understood why Buddhism is known as a “science of the mind.” As my struggles gave way to what the lama Trungpa Rinpoche describes as “cool boredom” – the depth and breadth of Tibetan Buddhist experience opened up for me and practice became a firm commitment.

In the early 1970s there were roughly a dozen Tibetan meditation centres worldwide. Today there is hardly a city or a medium-size town in the developed world that does not have at least one. A Google search on Tibetan Buddhism shows 1,600,000 results. This popularity pivots partly on show business chic, with outspoken enthusiasm from celebrities like Richard Gere, Harrison Ford, John Cleese and Joanna Lumley. It also resides in the saintly image of the Dalai Lama and his steadfast refusal to endorse violence against the Chinese occupation of his homeland. But I believe the primary factor is that most Tibetan lamas are very good at teaching meditation.

The bubble burst in 1994 when the lama Sogyal Rinpoche was sued for sexual harassment by an American woman known as Janice Doe. The lawsuit was settled out of court, but it triggered an avalanche of revelations on the internet about sexual and financial misconduct by Tibetan lamas. Some of them were lunatic fringe, but many were intelligent, reflective and soberly factual.

I followed these developments with a growing sense of disillusionment. My Shangri-La version of old Tibet crumbled with the realisation that alongside the focus on spirituality, the Tibetan social order was top-down hierarchical, xenophobic, feudal and in many instances ruthless and cruel. The present Dalai Lama is the 14th in a line of reincarnations. Several of his predecessors were murdered while still young, by regents determined to hang on to power. It also became clear to me that the lamas I respected as Buddhist teachers were medieval in their attitudes towards women.

So has this awareness of the dark side driven me away from Tibetan Buddhism? I went through a period of doubt and re-appraisal, took up Hatha Yoga and became an enthusiastic practitioner. But I see no contradiction between Buddhism and acknowledgement of an imperfect world – so I now benefit from two effective mind-body disciplines.

I wish The Dalai Lama many more years of healthy life. He has acquired unique status on the world stage as the man who loves everyone – and many people nowadays accept that the joy on his face originates from a genuinely open heart.

[Mary Finnigan, The Guardian]

“The Yogi’s Joy,” by Sangharakshita

June 11, 2010

Steve Bell

reviews

How would you feel if your teacher burned your book collection? A new book by Sangharakshita highlights a challenging friendship between a Tibetan guru and his disciple.

A good dharma book is humbling. It is like a spiritual friend who isn’t afraid of cutting through our defenses in the service of positive change. Sangharakshita’s new book, exploring three songs of Milarepa, challenged me in this way. The material is compiled from edited transcripts of seminars Sangharakshita gave to members of the Triratna Buddhist Order (formerly the Western Buddhist Order) in the late 70’s, about Milarepa, his songs and the spiritual life. The songs chosen are about spiritual friendship and its challenges. We get to see Milarepa beginning a relationship with one of his close disciples, Rechungpa. We get to watch as they get in tune with each other.

Title: The Yogi’s Joy: Songs of Milarepa
Author: Sangharakshita
Publisher: Windhorse Publications
ISBN: 1-899-57966-4
Available from: Windhorse Publications (UK), and Amazon.com.

Milarepa was a Tibetan yogi who lived 1052–1135 C.E. in medieval Tibet. The basic outline of Milarepa’s life is that he was cheated out of land by some relatives. He used black magic to create a storm that killed the thieves, and then, fearing that he would have a bad rebirth, he turned to the spiritual life in order to save himself. He went to Marpa for teachings. Marpa made him build, tear down and rebuild a tower, as a way to cleanse his karma. (You can go see the last tower Milarepa built, it still exists, the tower is situated in Lhodrak district, north of the Bhutanese border.) When Milarepa was ready and his karma was cleansed, Marpa told him to go and meditate in caves.

Legend has it that in Milarepa’s last teaching he flashed his calloused butt to a student to suggest how hard you need to meditate.

Milarepa is famous for his rigorous practice and his asceticism. He is said to have turned green from eating nettles, which formed the main component of his diet. One day the wind was so fierce that Milarepa passed out, and when he awakened his robe was gone. He liked to flout convention, and there are many stories of him being naked, or showing his body. Legend has it that in his last teaching he flashed his calloused butt to a student to suggest how hard you need to meditate. There is a spiritual intensity here that’s not for dilettantes. This is more of a spirituality of confrontation than of comfort, and Milarepa’s spiritual intensity and commitment, while it can seem inspiring, can also seem extreme and frightening.

The songs in The Yogi’s Joy are taken from The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa, which is the written records of Milarepa’s songs: the spiritual poems that he would sing as a way of teaching people the Dharma. Apparently it’s not too hard to improvise songs in the Tibetan language because of its structure. Ordinary folk would often sing as they worked, and Sangharakshita met many Tibetans in Kalimpong in the 1950’s who would improvise songs. The Yogi’s Joy is good at setting the historical stage, and at translating Milarepa’s teachings into a modern context.

We know enough Dharma; doing it is the hard thing.

Milarepa’s relationship with his discipline Rechungpa is at the heart of this book. Rechungpa went off to India to get some teaching, and comes back haughty and puffed up. He no longer wants to hang out with his guru Milarepa in caves, and instead wants to find some sponsors to give him a good meal and lodging. But Milarepa gets Rechungpa to go out for water, and while he’s away on this errand, Milarepa burns his books. This would have been a challenging moment in a spiritual friendship, I imagine. There’s something emotionally challenging in being receptive to another person, because of the level of trust and vulnerability involved. It’s not easy to be open to a true spiritual friend.

As well as being a story about the friendship between Milarepa and Rechungpa, The Yogi’s Joy is the meeting between Milarepa and Sangharakshita — two people of great spiritual depth. Sangharakshita was born in England in 1925 and spent almost 20 years in the east practicing Buddhism. In 1967, in England, he founded a Buddhist order — the Triratna Buddhist Order — which has spread around the world. Sangharakshita says, “If any westerner practices even a hundredth part of what they have read, they are probably doing pretty well.” You could say this about reading Sangharakshita’s book. He has many intense spiritual teachings, which it would be easy to just keep reading past as we move on to the next one. But to connect with spiritual teachings, to let them percolate into the deepest part of us, requires lingering reflecting, and — most importantly — putting the teachings into practice in one’s life.

Sangharakshita goes so far as to suggest that the many Dharma books we read, often quickly and superficially, hinder our spiritual progress. My spiritual friends read very slowly while I have gobbled Dharma books over the past seven years, and I even read this book quickly when it first came out. Rereading it has been a sobering lesson on how little sticks when you rush. In another way it heartens me because there’s so much depth, I can return and return to the book and still find things I’ve not understood or forgotten. We know enough Dharma; doing it is the hard thing.

Thousands come to see Dalai Lama

May 19, 2010

Betsy Hibbs cooked up a plan for drawing the attention, and perhaps a blessing, from the Dalai Lama. She wore a bright orange dress and was among the first in line with her lifelong friend, Deb Flammang-Roper.

“I’ve been meditating so he will see me. I would say Dalai Lama orange … Dalai Lama orange … Dalai Lama orange,” Hibbs said of her preparation for the event.

The two women were among thousands enjoying the sunshine and mild weather as they waited Tuesday morning to hear the Dalai Lama speak at the McLeod Center. The lines moved slowly, as guests were thoroughly searched, including metal detectors.

Hibbs has been studying up on the Dalai Lama and appreciates what he represents.

“I like his compassion toward people. It’s not religion, it’s how you live your life and how you treat people,” she said.

For Hibbs, who lives in Des Moines, but graduated from Cedar Falls High School with Flammang-Roper in 1976, it marked the third time she has seen a major spiritual leader. Each came at a different period in her life. She recalls seeing one when she was in her formative high school years and another at a time when she was drinking too much.

“I’ve seen Billy Graham and Pope John Paul. Now it’s the Dalai Lama and, hopefully, when I die I will see Jesus,” Hibbs said. “I’m trying to get some more wisdom before I carry on.”

The grassy hill on the south side of the McLeod Center served as gathering place and commercial center for the Dalai Lama visit. Vendors formed a semi-circle around the perimeter, with prayer flags hanging above and jewelry, meditation aids, clothing and sayings from the Dalai Lama below.

Most of the vendors were natives of Tibet who now live in the United States. Rinchen Gelek moved from Tibet for economic opportunity in the United States. He lives in California, where he has a shop that sells handmade Tibetan goods ranging from jewelry and prayer aids to sayings from the Dalai Lama.

A majority of the handmade goods are created by Tibetan refugees living in Nepal. The Tibetan-Americans selling wares at the event said Nepal has become the center of Tibetan culture as clashes with the Chinese has driven many people from their homeland.

Organizers for the Dalai Lama visit expected Chinese protesters to attend and even set up a designated “free speech” area across the street from the venue, but the roped-off area was completely empty all morning and not a protest was heard.

Mike Mooney, of Coralville, came to see the Dalai Lama with a couple friends. They worked at mastering a singing bowl, a metal bowl used for meditation. The user strikes the bowl with a small wooden mallet, then circles the mallet around the outside of the bowl producing a throbbing sound ranging from a low home, to a higher pitched sound, almost a whistle or siren.

The vendor, Tashi Karma, said the singing bowl is used for meditation or yoga, usually in group settings.

“It almost puts you in a trance state,” Karma said.

Mooney has been dabbling in the Dalai Lama’s teachings and Buddhism, but doesn’t claim any particular religion as his own.

“I’m not so much searching, more like happening to find,” Mooney said of his spiritual journey. He spent $55 on a singing bowl and plans to use it for his own meditation.

Mooney was excited to hear the Dalai Lama speak after reading up on the leader.

“I’m not particularly religiously affiliated, but this just seems peaceful. It seems right,” Mooney said.

Jonella Delimas came to Cedar Falls from Omaha, where she said she has long been struggling to find her balance. She works in corporate America, but is drawn to the teachings of Eastern religions.

“I’ve been reading his work and listening to his speeches for years. I love his peacefulness. He’s taught me a lot about being compassionate,” Delimas said.

Delimas had an extra ticket to the morning session, as a friend was unable to come. Standing in a long line to enter the McLeod Center, she held the ticket up. A woman came up and inquired about it and Delimas told her to have it, no charge. The lucky woman had come from Des Moines and gave Delimas a hug, saying “good karma to you.”

[via WCF Courier]

“The Novice,” by Stephen Schettini

May 10, 2010

Vishvapani

reviews

Vishvapani reviews Schettini’s heartfelt and vivid account of becoming a Tibetan Buddhist monk and his valuable reflections on what it means for westerners to practice Buddhism

When I first encountered Buddhism in the UK around 1980 there was already a generation of established practitioners, most of whom shared a common background. They were hippies … or should that be ex-hippies? Their faces lit up as they recounted their adventures: how they set out from respectable homes to discover the excitements of London’s Kings Road, join the flower children in the Haight, or make exotic journeys to the East. There were stories of dope deals that went wrong, revelatory acid trips, close shaves with bandits in the Afghan mountains, and spiritual discoveries in India.

Title: The Novice: Why I Became a Buddhist Monk, Why I Quit and What I Learned
Author: Stephen Schettini
Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press
ISBN: 978-1-60832-005-9
Available from: Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com.

All that is in The Novice. Stephen Schettini grew up in London and Gloucester in an English-Italian family with at least its share of emotional repression and Catholic guilt. At the time, he just wanted to get away and felt increasingly estranged from his family’s petty bourgeois ambitions. With his philosophical leanings and alienation from society, Schettini was a natural recruit to the counter-culture and he eventually hitchhiked along the hippy trail that led stretched from Europe to India. His story was so familiar that it seemed clichéd until it struck me that I couldn’t think of another book that tells it, and that Schettini tells it well. His writing is lucid and vivid, at least once the story gets going, and he doesn’t let the impulse to reminisce get in the way of his tale.

Also see:

In India, Schettini‘s path diverged from that of the Buddhists I had met, who had enjoyed their adventures and come home. He heard that the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan refugees were living in Dharamsala in the Himalayan foothills, and set off to find what they had to offer. The turning point came when Schettini met and studied with Lama Yeshe, “the hippy Lama,” who exuded warmth, taught in English and knew enough about the Western culture to pepper his teachings with humorous asides about supermarkets and consumerism. Something clicked for Schettini when he encountered Tibetan Buddhism: the promise of an inner peace that would resolve his emotional turmoil; a new identity that would end his isolation; a philosophy that answered his questions; and benign, seemingly all-knowing lamas upon whom he could rely.

Schettini soon became a monk and found himself in Switzerland studying with the famous scholar, Geshe Rabten, and sharing an intense existence with several other young monks. Two members of this tight-knit group have become prominent figures in western Buddhism. Alan Wallace is a leading figure in the dialogue between science and Buddhism, and Stephen Batchelor is a writer and teacher whose approach is amply expressed in the title of his latest book, Confession of a Buddhist Atheist (which is also part-autobiography and covers some of the same ground as The Novice).

The intellectual trajectories of Schettini’s fellow-monks suggest the struggles that awaited Schettini himself as he moved from immersing himself in Tibetan culture and religion and hoped to integrate it with the rest of his life. Geshe Rabten’s regime emphasized study, but this turned out to mean memorizing ancient texts and mastering traditional arguments. Debate was on the curriculum, but it involved deploying those arguments skillfully, rather than subjecting an issue to the kind of fundamental inquiry that is found in western philosophy. The monks developed a camaraderie mixed with competitiveness that stopped some way short of intimacy. But the wider community around Rabten included proprietorial lay-women, wealthy donors who were treated as favourites and, later, a younger monks with a starry-eyed faith in the infallibility of their teacher.

Wishing to get to know the Tibetans better, Schettini left Rabten and traveled to Sera monastery in southern India, where he was the only westerner. Living among Tibetans and speaking their the language, the sheen that had made them seem semi-mythic beings faded and Schettini saw their limitations. The monks were immersed in a dogmatic system that closed off the possibility of even posing certain questions, and some thoughts were literally unthinkable within the limitations of the Tibetan language. Meanwhile, they lived in insanitary conditions, and refused to take basic precautions against infection and disease. Schettini returned to Switzerland, skeptical of many aspects of the tradition and was astonished by the naivety of Rabten’s students, who seemed so “dazzled by exotic thinking and ritual” that they accept the Teacher’s decisions without question. Before long he quit.

The remaining 25 years of Schettini’s story are recounted briskly. Unlike Batchelor, whose time as a Tibetan monk takes up just a couple of chapters of his book, Schettini was too snagged by the self-doubt and insecurity underpinning his decision to become a monk to explore other philosophies or Buddhist traditions. In order to live happily in a way that was authentic he needed to uncover the buried emotions that had been with him all along. Schettini realized that the very difficulties he had once fled were, in fact, the keys to his happiness. He needed to face them, and face himself rather than fleeing or blaming the monastic establishment.

Schettini wrote and rewrote the book that became The Novice over many years as he wrestled with his past. But the product is far more than a therapy journal. In reflecting on his life and the religion he encountered Schettini tried to “pick out the gold from the dross.” The personal philosophy he arrives at is a kind of wary spiritually-aware humanism. He mistrusts institutions and dogmatically-held beliefs, holding that “the more deeply we are motivated by emotion, the more insistently we pass it off as reason” and that “denial is a force to be reckoned with and our principal obstacle.”

This is wise, but I read Schettini’s reflections with sadness. I am sad that the reality of Tibetan Buddhism fell so far short of the image that beguiled him and many others. And I am sad that his eventual stance is so circumspect. I believe there is more gold in Buddhism than Schettini acknowledges, however much dross may accompany it. Indeed, I think there are more possibilities in the human condition than he mentions, and that Buddhism speaks to many of them: possibilities of mental development, compassion, and moral excellence. Religious institutions may often be rigid, but that isn’t a reason to give up on creating better ones.

It is over forty years since westerners started to investigate Asian spiritual traditions in large numbers, and many of the institutions they created in their efforts to establish Buddhism in the West are likewise several decades old. It is high time to let go of illusions about both the mystical East or the glorious prospects for western Buddhism and reflect seriously and honestly on what has been learned. The Novice is a heart-felt, frank, informative and eloquent contribution.

See more writing by Vishvapani at Wise Attention

Miami kicks off Tibetan Culture Week with ceremony

March 24, 2010

With a pinch of flour thrown into the air with a Buddhist prayer, Miami University students and faculty kicked of Tibetan Culture Week.

About 75 people gathered for a Tibetan prayer flag ceremony outside Upham Hall Monday, March 22.

They stood quietly, some holding burning incenses, in the frigid misting rain as a Geshe Kalsang Damdul, a Tibetan monk, chanted prayers and rang a bell.

Each person then took a pinch of flour and held it above their heads saying together “sooo” three times before tossing it in the air.

“I thought it was a lot different than anything I’d been to before,” said Rachel Howell, a sophomore at Miami, who attended the ceremony for her anthropology class.

Miami sophomore Thea Peterson said she saw prayer flags hanging in temples in India while living there as a child. She also visited her father in Tibet last year while he was living there.

“I just really like the culture,” said Peterson, who attended the ceremony with friends from her Hindi class at Miami.

The ceremony was the first event in a week that will include a meditation session, lecture and others with Geshe Kalsang Damdul. The activities are conducted ahead of the October visit by the Dalai Lama.

On March 24, Geshe Kalsang Damdul will present “An Introduction to Tibetan Meditation” from 9 to 10 a.m. and a lecture “Toward a Compassionate World in the 21st Century” from 3 to 4 p.m. in 212 McMillan.

On March 25, “Global Women’s Day: Tibetan Women” will be from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Shriver Center and a showing of the film “Kundun” will take place from 7 to 9 p.m. in 101 Bachelor Hall.

Tibetan Culture Week planned before Dalai Lama visit

March 13, 2010

Oxford Press: Miami University is holding a Tibetan Culture Week March 22-26 in preparation of the Dalai Lama’s visit in October.

The week will offer a series of lectures, meditation sessions and a prayer flag ceremony that are free and open to the public.

Tibetan monk Geshe Kalsang Damdul, assistant director of the Institute of Buddhist Dialectics under the direct administration of the Dalai Lama, will lead the events.

The programs come ahead of the Dalai Lama’s visit to Miami University on Oct. 20-22 to recognize a program that takes students to Dharamsala, India for an entire semester.

“The success of the program is what promoted the Dalai Lama to accept the university’s invitation,” said Professor Deborah Akers. “He receives hundreds of invitations so we’re very lucky he accepted ours.”

The College of Higher Tibetan Studies has taken 65 students to Dharamsala with the semester-long program last fall and summer sessions during the last five years.

Students live among Tibetan refuges and take courses on Buddhist philosophy, Tibetan medicine and meditation, as well as an intensive sequence of language courses in Chinese, Tibetan and Hindi.

“The students return with a broader view on life. It’s a very unique program,” Akers said.

During Tibetan Culture Week, the public will be invited to a prayer flag ceremony at noon March 22, at the Hub near Upham Hall. During prayer flag rituals, a monk recites prayers, burns incense and makes offerings to the gods.

On March 24, Geshe Damdul will present “An Introduction to Tibetan Meditation” from 9 to 10 a.m. and a lecture “Toward a Compassionate World in the 21st Century” from 3 to 4 p.m. in 212 McMillan.

Throughout his visit, Geshe Damdul will meet with faculty and students to discuss Buddhist philosophy and issues between China and Tibet.

On March 25, “Global Women’s Day: Tibetan Women” will be held from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Shriver Center and a showing of the film “Kundun” will take place from 7 to 9 p.m. in 101 Bachelor Hall. The Association of Women Students is sponsoring the events. The film is co-sponsored by Students for a Free Tibet.

Ashland, Oregon, Buddhist center nears completion

March 11, 2010

Mail Tribune: With about $200,000 in donated labor from volunteers, a three-story, $1.6 million Buddhist meditation center is nearing completion in Ashland and will open for classes the first week of June.

The 5,800-square-foot home of Kagya Sukha Choling is a blend of traditional Tibetan and contemporary “green-sustainable” architecture — and is being lauded as an “eternal” structure that will offer spiritual and economic benefits.

“It’s a beautiful thing, long-lasting, environmentally friendly and embodying ethics and values we so much need today,” said Kagya Sukha Choling board member Anne Stine. “It’s a gift to the Rogue Valley community, a beacon for Ashland in terms of resources, classes and visitors — and good for the economy and other businesses.”

The center, founded in 2002 in a house on Granite Street, took out permits in 2005 to build at the Hersey Street location and set out to raise just over $1 million for construction.

The ground floor houses offices, library and classrooms. The second floor has a large meditation hall and kitchen while the top floor is apartments for the two lamas, plus quarters for visiting lamas.

An outside porch surrounds the top floor, which shows accents of red and gold. Final touches will include prayer wheels from Nepal, ornamental full moons, dharma wheels, two deer and banners.

In the remaining three months before opening, KSC has to raise the final $75,000 for the project.

Buddhist monk has inner peace, just needs driver’s license

September 29, 2009

Knox News: The Buddhist monk reaches a top speed of 5 mph as he maneuvers his 16-year-old Toyota around the grounds of the meditation center in West Tennessee.

It is a practice excursion to make sure that the monk, Khenpo Gawang Rinpoche, is familiar with the car the next time he takes his driver’s license test.

A scholar among Buddhists, he has the equivalent of a doctorate in religion and literature. That means nothing to driver’s license examiners who have flunked him three times on Tennessee’s written driver’s exam.

“It’s kind of important to drive, to be independent, but language is a problem,” says Khenpo, who lives about a mile from the meditation center that he founded here two years ago.

He wears the same deep amber and burgundy colors as those worn by one of his heroes, the Dalai Lama, leader-in-exile of Tibet. The amber represents wisdom, the burgundy compassion.

Like the Dalai Lama, the monk fled Chinese-occupied Tibet to study in India. The Dalai Lama was born to a farm family. The monk was born to yak herders. The monk has studied in group sessions with the Dalai Lama as his teacher and thinks of him primarily as a religious figure – “the holiest of monks, a good and great teacher.”

He also thinks of the Dalai Lama as a political figure, campaigning for world peace and for self-determination for Tibetans in an occupied country.

The monk and his students bought tickets as soon as they became available for the Dalai Lama’s visit to Memphis on Wednesday to accept an International Freedom Award from the National Civil Rights Museum. He later spoke at The Cannon Center for the Performing Arts on “Developing Peace and Harmony.”

For the monk, peace and harmony will improve when he finally gets a driver’s license. He has to rely on students to drive him to and from the center, the grocery store and to the orthodontist. As part of his adaptation to Western culture, he began wearing braces a year ago to correct an overbite that interfered with his ability to pronounce certain sounds in English.

Students call him “Khenpo,” a title that means teacher. His given name is only one name, Gawang. Rinpoche is another title, recognizing a lineage of revered teachers or mentors.

Khenpo, 35, began studying English seriously in 2007 when he decided to open the Memphis center, the Pema Karpo Buddhist Meditation Center. He has learned to use a computer along with Photoshop software and Skype, software that allows him to communicate by live computer video with other Skype users. When his English improves, he hopes to teach Buddhism and meditation to students anywhere in the world.

But his immersion in English language courses like Rosetta Stone and children’s programming on TV are, so far, no match for the written driver’s exam.

“Abbreviations very bad,” he says. Along with standard fare about lane changes and turn signals, the exams include abbreviations such as “DUI” (driving under the influence) and “BAC” (blood alcohol content).

“It’s confusing for him,” says Candia Ludy, a Memphian and former Baptist who formally converted to Buddhism in 1987. She was working as a coordinator of courses on Buddhism at the Shambhala Mountain Retreat near Boulder, Colo., when she met Khenpo in 2005 and invited him to Memphis in hopes he might open a center here.

One of his Memphis students, attorney Halley Marker, says Khenpo’s decision to open the Memphis center showed a “pioneer spirit” willing to bring Buddhism to the Bible belt.

Having his own center was a longtime goal for Khenpo, whose work also includes translating ancient Tibetan texts into English. His dream of a driver’s license also is a longtime goal. As a 10-year-old child, he visited Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, with his father and saw cars for the first time. When they returned to their mountain village, Khenpo and his brothers used frozen yak dung as makeshift wheels to build toy cars.

In Buddhist tradition, Khenpo does not worry about his driver’s license failures or fear his next exam. “Sometimes we need to accept our own karma,” he says.

He knows of nothing he did to account for his three flunked exams, but in Buddhist tradition he does not dwell on the past. “If you want good things then you must do good things.”

In the Arizona desert, Buddhists will embark on a three-year silent retreat

September 7, 2009