The Aro gTér Tradition is principally concerned with transforming our experience of everyday being, rather than achieving an esoteric or spiritualised mode of existence. Our aim is to engender cheerful courage, perceptive consideration, sincere determination, natural gallantry, graciousness, creativity, and spaciousness. The teachers of the Aro gTér Tradition are not monks or nuns. They are [...]
"Centres are very important in the West; very important to help firmly establish traditions such as yours. You must keep your money and build your own centre in the West." — Kyabjé Kunzang Dorje Rinpoche Quoted in 'Why now? Kyabjé Kunzang Dorje Rinpoche & Jomo Samphel' Please see the Appeal page for more information about the [...]
In meditation, we come face to face with our deepest feelings and conflicts. We may discover aspects of ourselves from which at first we recoil: fear, anger, loss, and shame. However, with further practice we develop a new and relaxed tolerance for the entirety of ourselves and our situations. Habitual emotional patterns lose their grip. [...]
At the outset of the project, the Drala Jong Blog published an article about His Holiness Dud'jom Rinpoche and his instructions to Ngak'chang Rinpoche. "In 1977 His Holiness Dud'jom Rinpoche gave direction to Ngak'chang Chögyam Rinpoche that he must work to preserve the gendun karpo in the West. Prior to his passing in 1988, Dud'jom Rinpoche was [...]
The way out of the maze begins with non-conceptual experience – and that we can only find through meditation. In meditation we discover what we are like in the dynamic space which exists before thoughts and conceptual complexity arise. We learn to experience the impossible polarities we find there without the accustomed knee-jerk reactions. We [...]
In 2011, the Drala Jong Blog published an interview, in three parts, with Ngak'chang Rinpoche and Khandro Déchen on the subject of Drala Jong. We thought it would be useful to highlight these articles for new readers. "[I]t doesn’t cost a lot to transform a place – such as painting a room the shrine room [...]
Buddhism is a path beyond implausible alternatives: self-righteous religion and self-indulgent consumerism; saccharine sentimentality and alienated depression; cautious respectability and pretentious rebellion. It is neither a simplistic compromise between extremes, nor a bland contract with mediocrity. Aro Introduction The Drala Jong project seeks to create a home for the Aro gTér Lineage. Please see [...]
The Aro Buddhist tradition wishes to establish a permanent centre in Britain to make this rare strand of Buddhism more accessible to people in the home country of our lineage holders Ngak’chang Rinpoche and Khandro Déchen. We intend to raise £500,000 to establish a centre capable of hosting residential and non-residential events. This will be [...]
Samsara is a funfair where success rewards you with an inflatable hammer that you cannot use. Samsara is a funfair where any appearance of progress is swings and roundabouts back and forth and round and round. Samsara is play perceived as reality and taken seriously. The children at the fair know that it’s a game [...]
The Drala Jong project is being managed by Sang-ngak-chö-dzon, the UK charity of the Aro gTér lineage. The name Sang-ngak-chö-dzong was given to us by His Holiness Düd’jom Rinpoche, specifically for our work of establishing the non-celibate householder tradition of Tibetan Buddhism in the West. For more information about the project and how you could [...]
