Teachers
For the benefit of lay practitioners, Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche established a number of Dharma centers throughout the world. These retreat centers allow us the opportunity to engage in individual retreats or group practice. Introductory seminars, week-long retreats, and Vajrayana empowerments are also offered throughout the year. Our Gomde centers welcome everyone who wishes to study and practice the profound teachings of the Buddha.
Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche
www.gomde.org
Meditation master and renowned teacher Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche has been teaching audiences around the world for the past 25 years. Marked by warmth, humor and wit, his teachings offer a unique opportunity to directly connect with the Buddhist tradition in a fresh, vital way that is relevant to our lives today.
The eldest son of Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche was born in 1951 in Eastern Tibet. At the age of 18 months, he was recognized as the seventh incarnation of the Drikung Kagyü lama Gar Drubchen, a Tibetan siddhaand a spiritual emanation of Nagarjuna, the second-century Indian Buddhist philosopher.
Shortly before the invasion of Tibet in 1959, Rinpoche left with his family for Sikkim. From the ages of 13 to 24, he studied in the Karma Kagyü, Drikung Kagyü, and Nyingma traditions under the guidance of such eminent masters as the 16 th Gyalwa Karmapa, Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, and Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche. He achieved the degree of khenpo at a very early age.
In 1974 he left Rumtek to join his family in Boudhanath, Nepal, where, at the command of the 16 th Karmapa, they established Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling Monastery. Installed as the monastery’s abbot in 1975 by the Karmapa, Rinpoche followed the Karmapa’s advice to turn his efforts towards instructing Western practitioners. Honing his English language _skills, he began to offer weekend teachings to travelers. Over the years this has developed into an annual 10-day autumn seminar. Rinpoche’s Saturday morning teachings at the monastery remain a popular event, drawing dozens of visitors each week. He founded the Rangjung Yeshe Institute for Buddhist Studies in 1981. Rinpoche is also the founder of Rangjung Yeshe Publications, with more than 40 Buddhist titles, including his own books: Union of Mahamudra and Dzogchen, Song of Karmapa, Bardo Guidebook, Indisputable Truth, and Present Fresh Wakefulness.
“The real object of devotion is thought-free wakefulness, which is the ultimate guru of our innate nature — your natural mind, your self-existing wakefulness or natural awareness. This is the true view of Mahamudra and Dzogchen. So first we must recognise, then train in that recognition and attain stability. But remember, this recognition must be genuine and not some kind of personal concept we’ve made up. If we can train in genuine thought-free wakefulness, then it is possible to awaken to ePnlightenment fully and completely in this very lifetime. But it doesn’t help much just to train in your own intellectualized version of the view, no matter how long you try. Tha_t is why it is said that Vajrayana can be very risky, but also has great advantages.” – Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche
Click here to read a chapter on “Meditation” from Indisputable Truth.
Click here to read a chapter on “Introductory Teachings” from Present Fresh Wakefulness.
_“Natural Happiness” article by Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche (published in the January 2007 issue of Buddhadharma) PDF (218KB)
Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche and Yangsi Rinpoche
Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche (1920 – 1996) was _widely acknowledged as one of the great meditation masters of modern times. Leaving Tibet in the face of the Chinese invasion in 1959, he settled in the hermitage of Nagi Gompa, on the northern slopes of Nepal’s Kathmandu Valley. Here he lived quietly as a true Dzogchen yogi, visited by a steady stream of scholars, students, and practitioners from around the world. Throughout the course of his life he spent more than 20 years in meditation retreat.
Tulku Urgyen was famed for his profound meditative realization and for the concise, lucid and humorous style with which he imparted the essence of the Dzogchen teachings. His method of teaching was ‘instruction through one’s own experience.’ Using few words, this way of teaching points out the nature of mind, revealing a natural simplicity of wakefulness that enables the student to actually touch the heart of the Buddha’s Wisdom Mind.
Tulku Urgyen’s startlingly clear teachings have been captured in several books, including Rainbow Painting, Repeating the Words of the Buddha, Vajra Speech,and As It Is. He had many foreign students, and was keenly interested in the expansion of the Dharma to the West. Many teachers uphold Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche’s lineage but the principal holders are his family: Chökyi Nyima Rinpoche, Chokling Rinpoche, Phakchok RInpoche, Tsoknyi Rinpoche and Mingyur Rinpoche.
Yangsi Rinpoche
Born in August, 2001, Tulku Urgyen Yangsi Rinpoche was enthroned at the age of seven in Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling Monastery in Boudhanath by Kyabje Trulshik Rinpoche on Lha Bab Duchen in November, 2008, one of the four great Buddhist holidays that commemorate aspects of Buddha Sakyamuni’s realization and teaching.
Kyabje Trulshik Rinpoche enthroned Yangsi Rinpoche with the auspicious name Ngawang Urgyen Tenzin Jikdral Dorje, meaning (ngawang) Sovereign of Manjushri’s wisdom speech (urgyen tenzin) who upholds the teachings of Uddiyana’s Guru Rinpoche with (dorje) unchanging (jikdral) fearlessness.
Yangsi Rinpoche has resided at Nagi Gompa Hermitage since 2009 and displayed a strong preference for contemplative life. At Nagi Gompa and Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling, Rinpoche — with the assistance of tulkus and khenpos – has studied Dharma and learned practices preparing him for advanced study and practice. He has received many empowerments from realized lamas, including Yangthang Rinpoche, Chokling Rinpoche and Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche. For several years, Yangsi Rinpoche has participated in leading Chokling Tersar drubchens along with Chokling Rinpoche, Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche, and Phakchok Rinpoche at both Nagi Gompa and Ka-Nying Shedrub Ling Monastery.
Now that Yangsi Rinpoche is approaching maturity, his Dharma studies and practice have intensified. Based on his impeccable enlightened activity throughout his past lives, and his strong connection with countless realized masters, auspicious circumstances are unfolding for him to continue to guide and benefit beings, both near and far.
Chokling Rinpoche
Tsikey Chokling Rinpoche was born in eastern Tibet in 1953, the second son of Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche. Recognized by the Karmapa as the fourth reincarnation of the great 19th-century tertön Chokgyur Lingpa Rinpoche, he studied at Rumtek Monastery in Sikkim and received transmissions of the entire Nyingma lineage from Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche and Dudjom Rinpoche. He lives at Ka-Nying Shedrup Ling, one of the largest monasteries in Nepal, where he serves as Vajra Master, presiding over the Vajrayana rituals for the living and dead. He is a tertön and lay practitioner with a wife and four children. His oldest son, Phakchok Rinpoche, is an important Taklung Kagyü tulku, while the youngest, Yangsi Rinpoche, is the reincarnation of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. His book Lotus Ocean was recently issued by Rangjung Yeshe Publications
Phakchok Rinpoche
Born in 1981 to Chokling Rinpoche and his wife Dechen Paldron, Phakchok Rinpoche is grandson of Tulku Ugyen Rinpoche and the eldest brother of the Yangsi Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheP. Recognized by the Kagyü regents and ordained by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, he has studied with a number of great lamas, including Khyentse Rinpoche, Dudjom Rinpoche, Tulku Ugyen Rinpoche, Penor Rinpoche, Trulshik Rinpoche and Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche. An enthusiastic and vibrant young lama, his teachings are direct, accessible, and always fresh, opening up our minds in a playful and inspiring way. Phakchok Rinpoche is the abbot of a monastery in Chapagaon in the southern Kathmandu Valley, as well as head of Riwoche Monastery in Tibet’s Dokham region.
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