“4. The practice of all the bodhisattvas is to renounce this life’s concerns,
For friends and relatives, long acquainted, must all go their separate ways;
Wealth and prized possessions, painstakingly acquired, must all be left behind;
And consciousness, the guest who lodges in the body, must in time depart…
Here is my short report, observations and photos of the event and my experiences. In brief, it was one of the most memorable and blissful events I have attended, in particular for the walk around Berlin with Rinpoche I was fortunate to be able to go on. Although I rarely watch movies, one of my favourite is Wings of Desire (Der Himmel über Berlin (Angels Over Berlin) by Wim Wenders, which I watched as a teenager. Spending such precious and rare time with Rinpoche, having my photo taken with him with the “Angels” of the Berlin Dom cathedral in the background, and listening to him teach the 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva and bestowing the Dzambhala empowerment, seemed not only like a dream come true but like the “angels (dakinis) of Berlin” were indeed watching over us and listening to our wishes and thoughts.
Music? Angels Over Berlin soundtrack music, Illusions by Marlene Dietrich, Too Marvelous for Words by Billie Holiday, Lovely Day by Bill Withers, Saxophone Song by Kate Bush.
37 Practices of a Bodhisattva: generating love and compassion for all beings and giving up attachment to “comfort”
Rinpoche first shared some background on the extraordinary abilities and mind of giving and kindness, that the author of the renowned verse text Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, Gyalse Thogme Zangpo (1295-1369) showed even as a young child. Such as when gathering firewood he would give others any wood he had instead of keeping it for himself. The 37 practices are in short verse format and cover a range of topics, including:
The verse on seeing all beings like our kind mothers, reminded me of a teaching the 17th Karmapa gave recently when he spoke about how those who eat meat and practice the Bodhisattva vows and conduct would never want to eat meat (the murdered flesh of their “kind mothers”) and that if they had to do so, then they would be weeping profusely with compassion and not enjoying it at all and follow the example of young children who do not need religious scripture to justify their natural reaction to seeing animals murdered for meat (see video clip here).
“Blissful” walk around Berlin with 9th Gyalton Rinpoche
After the first day teaching, I was fortunate to be able to go on a walk around central Berlin for a few hours and visit some of the main sights there with Rinpoche his attendant, a nun from Sikkim and lama from Kham, and two other laypeople from the centre. It was a beautiful sunny day, and had a blissful time walking around with Rinpoche being able to spend time and freely ask him questions, which he was happy to discuss and answer. Here is a lovely short video made by the nun who was in the group, uploaded here on Youtube.
A couple of the photos, I personally requested Rinpoche take of me in front of an interesting time “art installation” at a museum in which the times of various locations globally were all represented. I noticed he had a small vintage Leica camera he was using to take photos, which when I asked him about it, he told me had been given to him as a child by his parents and that he liked to take photos. I wanted to see myself next to this symbolic artwork through his “photographer’s eye” and was very happy with the result, shared here below! A photo I will cherish forever for various reasons.
I asked Rinpoche who his “inspirations” were for his photgraphy, and he told me his gurus. I also shared with Rinpoche that I was a big admirer of the painter Georgia O’Keefe, whose lover had been Alfred Stieglitz, a German man considered to be the originator of contemporary photography as an art-form (such as his “Songs of the Sky” photos of clouds). Rinpoche told me he was not aware of Stieglitz or O’Keefe, so was happy to have been able to share it. For an art review, I wrote on a photography exhibition of Nicolas Vreeland in Dharamsala 2021, On Trees, see here.
The walk ended with lunch at a vegetarian Vietnamese restaurant, which brought back happy memories of my first meeting in person with Rinpoche in Hanoi, Vietnam at one of the oldest temples there, for his course Buddha Within I: Inner Peace, which I wrote about here. Berlin had vegan restaurants and options everywhere, unlike many places I have visited in Asia, it was vegan/animal friendly indeed!
Dzambhala: inner and outer wealth
The final day of the event was a Dzambhala empowerment (which more people attended), and Rinpoche gave a brief teaching on Dzambhala (the deity of wealth), emphasising that people often think that the deity is about getting more material wealth, but that inner wealth such as generosity, ethics, kindness, uplifting others and paying people compliments and caring for them, are also forms of wealth we can all share. The empowerment ended with a “jewel” fourth empowerment entering the secret bhagavan realm of the lotus and uniting wisdom/emptiness with bliss/method in the Vajrayana way, AH!
Thus the event ended with smiles and inner riches and bliss as we offered white scarves katags to Rinpoche and chanted the Dzambhala mantra. As if “by magic” the following day, I received a very generous (and unexpected and needed) donation online from a sponsor, clearly a direct result of the power of Dzambhala and Rinpoche!
Also, the following day, there was an announcement on Facebook that Gyalton Rinpoche’s root guru, HE 12th Khenting Tai Situpa had finished a million White Tara mantra retreat, and this photo from a past event was published of flowers raining down on his head in Bodh Gaya. White Tara is one of my own personal yidam deities and the 8th Tai Situpa in particular had a special connection to her, which I will write more about soon. For more on the 8th Tai Situpa’s time in Lijiang, Yunnan and his writing a White Tara sadhana in Chinese for the Naxi Kings there, see here. It seemed a suitable and timely finale to the event, a shower of White Tara and sweet smelling floral blessings indeed!
Bodhicarya Berlin: Artworks and calligraphy by HH 17th Gyalwang Karmapa
Thank you Adele for sharing your journey w us your readers. I feel like I was there. I also very much like the Karmapa’s art work that you included.🙏