Weekly New York Courses
MEDITATION MONDAYS
Mondays, 7–8:30pm
January 16, 30; February 13; March 5, 19; April 2, 16, 30
Free and open to all
On Mondays when the Lama Chopa course is not being broadcast from Ann Arbor and Jewel Heart retreats in the US are not being held, Jewel Heart New York will feature group practice sessions, which will be led by senior students.
White Tara
Jan 16, Feb 13, Mar 5, Apr 2
The first session in each month will be a White Tara practice. White Tara, healing protector and mother goddess of Tibetan Buddhism, is called upon around the world by those in need of healing guidance and safe-keeping. Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche, like many Gelugpa lamas, has a particularly close connection with White Tara and has taught numerous facets of the White Tara practice over the past 3 decades in the West.
White Tara healing practices were the focus of the Memorial Day 2011 retreat and these monthly group practices will follow in that same pattern. The January 16 practice will be led by Amy Hertz. The remaining sessions will be facilitated by experienced senior students as well.
Medicine Buddha
Jan 30, Mar 19, Apr 16
The second session in each month will be a Medicine Buddha practice. Medicine Buddha is an extremely powerful form of enlightened energy directed at helping us to accomplish our spiritual goals as well as healing. This practice benefits those who are ill and even those who have died.
Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche has emphazied this practice at two successive Fall retreats. We are very pleased to announce that the Medicine Buddha practice will be facilitated by Mya Myint.
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A Preparatory Course for Summer Retreat and a Powerful Overview of Mahayana Buddhism in it’s Own Right
Synopsis of “Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life”
Thursdays, March 22 through June 14, 7:00 to 8:30PM
Suggested Donation for the 13-Week Course:
Non-Members– $130; Members– free
As you all know, the upcoming Summer Retreat in Ann Arbor will present a rare opportunity to receive teachings on Shantideva’s “Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life” from our teacher and one of Tibetan Buddhism’s greatest living masters, Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche. As preparation for this extraordinary event, Jewel Heart New York will present a new Jewel Heart course, which will be facilitated by senior Jewel Heart students.
The root text is available in several translations and formats. Reading assignments and supplementary text lists will be provided after registration.
If you are thinking about attending Summer Retreat, or if you want to learn about this reknowned text, this course is for you!
Pre-registration is encouraged ([email protected] or [email protected]).
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Gelek Rimpoche’s Tricycle Teachings on the Four Noble Truths
January 5, 12, 19, and 26
7:00 to 8:30
SUGGESTED DONATION: non-members $40 / members free
(No one will be turned away due to lack of funds)
The Four Noble Truths are the basis of Buddha’s teaching. Maitreya Buddha, the future Buddha of Love, gives the example of helping someone who is sick: First, you need to diagnose what is wrong, and second, you have to treat or get rid of the cause of that particular misery. Recognizing suffering and then looking at where it comes from, seeing its cause, are the first two noble truths.
The first and second truths are the negative aspect of the Four Noble Truths. One brings the other as a negative consequence. The cause of suffering brings about suffering itself—pain, a life in samsara, and all of that. Maitreya also talks about the purpose of the Four Noble Truths. The purpose of the First Noble Truth is to recognize our suffering. The purpose of the second is to learn not to entertain, develop, or grow the causes of suffering. The purpose of the Third Noble Truth is to attain cessation of suffering. The purpose of the fourth is to show you how to practice.
-Gelek Rimpoche
These weekly teachings will be based upon Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche’s Four Noble Truths transcript as well as the DVD from Rimpoche’s Tricycle teachings on the same subject. We are fortunate to have accomplished practioners and wonderful teachers Robyn Brentano and Mark Magill as facilitators. Please join us for this rich exposition of Shakyamuni Buddha’s first extensive teaching after obtaining enlightenment under the bodhi tree.
New York Programs January – April 2012
TIBETAN BUDDHISM WITH GELEK RIMPOCHE
SUNDAY MORNING VIDEO WEBCASTS
We are pleased to announce that Gelek Rimpoche will give weekly Sunday morning talks from 10 – 11am beginning Sunday, January 1. Speaking from Ann Arbor and New York and other locations, these talks will also be a live video webcast.
Stay tuned to Rimpoche’s calendar and the webcast calendar for the 2012 schedule.
To become a Jewel Heart webcast subscriber, visit this site.
LAMA CHOPA COURSE
Mondays, 7–8:30pm
January 9, 23; February 6, 20; March 12, 26; April 9, 23
SUGGESTED DONATION:
Non-Members- $80 / Members- Free
Lama Chopa is a complete guru yoga practice integrating aspects of sutra and tantra into a common framework, based on Gelek Rimpoche’s commentary Guru Devotion: Integrating the Primordial Mind. The transcript is available in hard cover from the Jewel Heart Store and as a PDF file from the Digital Dharmaportion of this web site.
This course is open to all.
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Kind Mind, Happy Body
With Gelek Rimpoche and Cyndi Lee
An Om Yoga Benefit for Jewel Heart
Saturday, May 19
Dharma Talk by Gelek Rimpoche– 5:00 to 5:45 PM
Restorative Yoga Class with Cyndi Lee– 6:00 to 7:30
DONATION: Restorative Yoga Only- $25; Both- $45
Gelek Rimpoche returns to OM Yoga to join with Cyndi Lee in offering an afternoon of compassion, inspiration and relaxation. Rimpoche speak about compassion in his usual accessible style, geared toward every day life.
Cyndi will then lead participants through a restorative yoga class designed to students move foward into a state of deep relaxation and rejuvenation. This class can be attended by absolutely anyone, no yoga experience required. Cyndi will offer simple postures supported by bolsters and cushions, which de-stress and refresh the entire mind/body system. And all for a very good cause.
You can register here.
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HOW TO BECOME A BUDDHA 101
Jewel Heart New York Presents:
Odyssey to Freedom
SESSION 3: Coming Soon!
SUGGESTED DONATION: non-members $25 / members free
FACILITATED BY ANNE DORAN AND KATHLEEN WHITE
Please preregister at [email protected]
We are not heroes of a far away conflict—run afoul of an angry Titan—shipwrecked; imprisoned; with crass and greedy suitors vying for the hand of our beloved spouse, consuming our fortune while we yearn for our freedom. But then again, are we really all THAT different from Odysseus? As the Lama Chopa states, “No one wants even the slightest suffering, or is ever content with the happiness they have; in this we are all alike.”
In the Kadampa tradition, the Lam Rim is a graduated, step-by-step summary of every essential point of the Buddha’s teachings on how to free ourselves and ultimately all other mother sentient beings from suffering. The progenitor of the various Lam Rims, A Lamp on the Path to Enlightenment, was compiled by the great Bengali Master, Atisha. Applying a contemporary flair to this time-honored roadmap, Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche created the Odyssey to Freedom as a concise and complete Lam Rim outline for the 21st century.
Odyssey to Freedom sets the stage for reflection on our everyday experience within a spiritual context and provides the path that leads to total enlightenment.
Jewel Heart New York will be offering Saturday Odyssey to Freedom workshops once per month throughout 2012.
Ready for your journey on the graduated path to enlightenment?
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Make Every Day Meaningful
Saturday, March 10, 1:00 to 4:00 PM
Jewel Heart New York
We are please to announce that our beloved teacher, Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche, will be in New York and teaching at the Jewel Heart New York Dharma Center. The teaching will be on Saturday, March 10 from 1:00 to 4:00 PM. This is an increasingly rare opportunity to take teachings directly from this great master here in our own community.
Rimpoche’s teaching, “Make Every Day Meaningful”, will be based upon The Foundation of All Perfections, a concise poetic rendering of the complete path to enlightenment by the 14th/15th Century Tibetan master Tsongkhapa. All are welcome. The talk will be tailored to everyone from a first time attendee to a Tibetan Buddhist teaching up through experienced practitioners.
Born in Lhasa, Tibet, in 1939, Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche was recognized as an incarnate lama at the age of four. Carefully tutored from an early age by some of Tibet’s greatest living masters, Rimpoche gained renown for his powers of memory, intellectual judgment and penetrating insight. Now Rimpoche brings his life experience and wisdom to both the east and the west.
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Please don’t miss the exhibition “The Value of Water: Sustaining a Green Planet” at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. The exhibition is curated by Jewel Heart New York’s Fredericka Foster and Lisa Schubert. The work of several Jewel Heart artists is featured in the exhibition.
The entire exhibition is open Monday through Saturday from 10:00 – 5:00 and runs through March 25, 2012.
See the Cathedral’s website for details, http://www.stjohndivine.org/VOW.html.
“Enter The Conversation: Liturgy and Water”
Thursday, March 8, 2012 7:00 pm
Essential to biological life, water is regarded by many religions as the elemental medium through which human beings experience transformation and passage – body, mind and soul. Birth rites, baptism, ritual cleansing and funerary rituals using water are considered sanctifying acts of divine grace and favor in the unfolding of the human soul and spirit. Some form of ritual or liturgy is common to most cultures and faith traditions.
Among other things, liturgy might be defined as a ritual enactment of the ongoing unfolding of human consciousness of the divine through human expressions in language, music, movement and visual impression. Traditions and cultures claim their own distinctive means of expressing collective consciousness of the divine as a holy and
life-giving reality.
At some crucial point, it is essential for human beings to commit themselves to the reality represented by the rituals of sanctification and holiness. It is this personal and public dedication that changes the world. It is the essence of advocacy and the means by which human beings align themselves with the divine.
Participants will discuss how the theme of water is represented in specific liturgies and in what manner liturgy might point to current action, to advocacy.
Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche, distinguished teacher and founder of Jewel Heart, a Tibetan Buddhist Center will join Daisy Khan, Executive Director of the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA) and the Reverend Tom Miller, Canon for Liturgy & the Arts at the Cathedral to examine how water is used and understood in the Abrahamic and Tibetan Buddhist traditions. The Very Reverend Dr. James A. Kowalski, Dean, will moderate. An additional guest will be announced shortly.