Some Glimpses

The next meditation day on July 18th in Le Bost will be held by Lama Seunam Dorje alone, without my participation.
And the following day, July 19th, there will be no meetings with me in Croizet, as I only return from Greece that day.
Also, from now on for 3 weeks I will not be receiving any emails, so of course I will also not be responding to them.
Have a good start into the summer!
Yours, Lhundrup

Dear friends,
We only have 10 years left to change our habits before it is too late to save our planet. The possibility for a precious human life on this earth is seriously in danger. Only if we, as the human race, manage to effect a major change now by reducing our carbon output into the atmosphere, future generations of humans will still have a chance. As dharma practitioners (whether calling ourselves Buddhist or not) it is our responsibility to preserve convenient conditions for the spiritual development of human beings on this planet Earth. I personally have decided to now give a high priority to these efforts in an ecological way of life. It is necessary that we as Buddhist practitioners and teachers join our efforts with everyone else in the growing movement to save life on this planet from the effects of our irresponsible behavior based on self interest.

In my own life this will mean first of all using more ecological means of transport: no more airplanes whenever it can be avoided, and severely cutting down on traveling by car. Perhaps I do not need a car at all. This I want to find out in the course of this year. Besides the bicycle, traveling by train is definitely the best means of transport. To apply this will surely slow down our life and makes us more dependent on others, but there is no chance for our planet if we are not willing to reduce our comfort.

The idea is to live with a standard of living that everyone else on our planet could also enjoy without adding to the damage already done.

Let us exchange on these topics wherever we have a chance. I will talk about it whenever I have an opportunity. For me it is an integral part of dharma practice. So much for today, I want to keep this letter really short, just the essentials.

Lots of good wishes to all of you!
Let’s take good care of ourselves, of the Earth and of future generations, Lhundrup

Dear friends,
today I posted about 15 small articles on this blog, all the little informations that I wanted to share with you in the last 2 months where I took little time for this. Tomorrow Rabjam, Djangchub and I are heading for Great Britain. Rabjam and myself will be visiting Scotland; my Scottish dress is already waiting there for me, as you can see from the photo below taken by friend who can obviously foretell the future...

Have fun with the articles while we are out in nature on our Mahamudra vacation up in the North-West of Scotland!
Yours, Lhundrup

When H.H. Karmapa Thaye Dorje met the dharma group in Freiburg he spoke about the need to joyfully continue in our efforts and to have confidence in the teachers and trust in the dharma teaching. He then gave as an encouragement the name of "Karma Tsöndrü Ling" to the house that was offered to him. This name means "The House of Joyful Perseverance in the Karma Kagyu Lineage", and actually the house has now become a place of great joy.

In the meditation hall, next to the document with the name given by the Gyalwa Karmapa, we put the following quote by Lama Gendun Rinpoche as a reminder. It was found by Martin Jantsch, one of our practitioners:

"When blessing, trust and joyful perseverance come together,
we are on the direct path to Awakening which all Buddhas have followed."

Let's imagine money had a voice and was able to tell us a bit about the stories that happen around it, the state of minf of those who handle it... a power-point presentation in German by Sylvia Führer and her friends.

If you want to know more about the recent developments in human rights in Chinese Tibet, follow this link.

Did you know that Michel and Marie-Christine are offering some beautiful photos of Lama Gendun Rinpoche and Le Bost (Dhagpo Kundrol Ling) from the earlier days on a private blog? Well, just follow the link!

The 2009 program of Lama Irene can now be found in the news section. I a sorry to be so late with it, but for 2 monts I have not taken care of my blog!!!!

I have just added a corrected version of the praise to Atisha in English. The corrections were suggested by Vessantara. Thank you very much!

Dear friends, I put you a new summary of the life of Buddha Shakyamuni in German language into the section "Buddha Shakyamuni". These are my notes which I used when giving the teaching in Laussedat more than a year ago.

This photo is actually showing a part of the wonderful thangka that was offered to the Freiburg Buddhist Center in Stadtstrasse.

I put you our latest monastery newsletter, the "Karmé Guendune" of March 2009, and our latest fund raising letter "Lettre Norbou" into the News section... We are in need of some solid financial support...

Joshua Bell, one of the most famous musicians of our time plays violin in a Washington D.C. subway station. What will happen? Do people notice it? Will the audience block the passage for the other passer-by? If you are interested (and I was!!!) read the article from Washington Post. It is quite amazing.

Dear friends,
from May 30 to June 6 next year (2010) I would like to try out something new: Many of you have been asking to have a Mahamudra group retreat in silence which is not usually done in our Kagyu lineage. However such retreats are very common in the Vipassana tradition. When exchanging with friends of the Vipassana tradition in Switzerland we came up with the idea to offer a silent retreat together where the two teachers (Fred von Allmen and myself) will give daily teachings of about 1 1/2 hours but the rest of the day will be spend in silence (except for the personal interviews).

Fred von Allmen is a teacher internationally know who has written a few books on meditation. He first trained with the Tibetan teacher Geshe Rabten and then turned towards the Vipassana teaching. Together with a group of very dedicated practitioners they have opened a most beautiful center in the Swiss Alpes which can host up to 70 people. Have a look at the beautiful photos taken by Fred himself. According to the languages of people signing up we will organize for the translations. As it looks we might end up with a German-French course and simultaneous English translation. To sign up, contact the "Meditationszentrum Beatenberg".

Franziska and Gerd sent me for her and my 50th birthday a photo from the time when we lived in the black forest close to Freiburg. It must have been in 1985.
You can see Franziska half covered as the second person from the right and myself in the center kneeling down with Stefanie (the little girl I became so close to during those three years) and Nora (the beloved dog of the house). The woman in white turning her head towards me with a lot of hair is actually Dorje Drölma Irene; it was the time when we got to know each other.
The next picture shows Franziska and myself when we were living for a week beginning of 1983 with a homeopath and his family in Sarnath near Varanasi while I was doing my thesis on homeopathy in India. I hope you can recognize something on the photo.

Dear friends,
today is the birthday of the 17th Gyalwa Karmapa Trinle Thaye Dorje and in homage to him I would like to share with you the link to one of the films that has most impressed me in my life: "The Lion's Roar", a film about the life of the 16th Karmapa. When I saw it for the first time in 1985 in Bern, Switzerland in a small cinema, I was so impressed that I immediately went back in after having seen it; I just needed t watch it a second time, and since then my life has developed accordingly... Now you can have at least a glimpse of it on YouTube.