The offering practice of Chöd, or “severance”, is associated with the great Tibetan female master Machik Labdrön.
It “presents the enlightened perspective of the middle turning in conjunction with the Mantrayana activities for training in awareness. It is a radical method for cutting through the inflation of ego-fixation through the willingness to accept what is undesirable, the disregard of difficult circumstances, the realization that gods and demons are one’s own mind, and the understanding that oneself and others are utterly equal,” according to Jamgon Kongtrul Lodrö Thaye.
Eligibility to participate: This unique Vajrayana instruction confers great inspiration and blessing, but requires a certain level of experience. Please read the following carefully to determine if you have the necessary requirements to attend this Chöd instruction:
- It is required that participants have received the Buddhist Vow of Refuge.
- It is required that participants have experience with the Mahanaya practice of compassion meditation, known as “tong-len” or “taking-and-sending”.
- It is required that participants have experience with Vajrayana visualization practices such as Chenrezig or Green Tara.
If you meet the above requirements, you must *also* agree to complete the following preliminaries before the April 29th intensive:
- Purchase your own Milam Lungten text from Namse Bangdzo ($6) and mark it according to the template which will be provided. (Time commitment: shipping time + 20 minutes to mark your text).
- Watch the Chöd Instruments Lesson (~25 minutes), then practice the instruments as needed.
- Watch the video explanation of the 7 Brief Chöd
Contemplations (~90 minutes) then practice them daily (~10 minutes per day.)
If you have the prerequisites and can complete the preliminaries as outlined above, click here to learn more about the intensive workshop and register anytime before April 15th.
