Voice of Clear Light
Volume 14, Number 5 / October 2014
Space Still Available for Special Winter Dzogchen Retreat
First in Five-Part Dzogchen Series Begins with Ngondro
Space is filling fast, but there is still time to register for the Winter Retreat 2014 with Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche scheduled for Dec. 27, 2014–Jan. 1, 2015. This retreat, “The Experiential Transmission of Zhang Zhung, Part 1: Ngondro,” is the first in a special five-part series of this renowned Tibetan Bon Buddhist dzogchen teaching.
Dzogchen is considered the highest teaching in Bon and Tibetan Buddhism. Its fundamental tenet is that reality, including the individual, is primordially pure, complete and perfect, and that nothing needs to be transformed (as in tantra) or renounced (as in sutra) but only to be recognized for what it truly is. In this way, suffering self-liberates. The view, practice, meditation and conduct are all based on self-liberation—allowing all that arises in experience to exist just as it is, without grasping, aversion or elaboration by the conceptual mind.
Part 1: Ngondro includes the foundation practices and the entrance to this cycle of Tibetan Bon dzogchen teachings. A complete set of practices in themselves, the ngondro teachings offer instructions for taming, purifying and perfecting oneself. Although the practices that make up the ngondro are called preliminary or foundational practices, many practitioners adopt them as their main practice and complete the nine parts several times over the course of a lifetime.
Part 1: Ngondro is a prerequisite for further study of the Experiential Transmission series. The series will be held each December for the next five years and will conclude on Jan. 1, 2019.
