This 12 session course is a practical exploration of what it means to live a compassionate, awake, and grounded life in the modern world.
Together, we will study The 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva, a beloved Tibetan Buddhist text that offers clear, usable roadmap for meeting life’s challenges with wisdom and an open heart. We’ll explore this teachings in a relatable, down-to-earth way. Together, Lama Tsering and Noel will weave the traditional meaning of each verse as well as modern psychological and contemplative perspectives in order to work with them in life - relationships, family, work, and the internal landscapes we all carry.
This course is not just a study - it’s a living practice. Each session will include practicing meditations that help soften reactivity, open the heart, and clarify intention. We’ll practice and engage in discussions together as a mutually supportive community.
This course is appropriate for new and experienced practitioners alike - anyone wishing to deepen their understanding of the bodhisattva path (the path of the awakened heart warrior).
As with our previous program, this course will offer an optional opportunity to take (or re-affirm) refuge and bodhisattva vows - a personal commitment to cultivating awareness and compassionate action. (This is approached not as a commitment to any particular teacher or lineage, but to one’s own practice.)
As a guiding support, this course will lean into Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche’s text “The Heart of Compassion: The Thirty-seven Verses on the Practice of a Bodhisattva.” This text is considered to be a profound, comprehensive guide to the Buddhist path. Dilgo Khyentse (1910-1991) was a meditation master, scholar, and poet who was known for his playfulness and incredibly warm, loving presence. The text is a commentary (explanation) on Gyalse Ngulchu Thogme’s 14th century poem that was written as a distillation of Shantideva’s ‘Way of the Bodhisattva.
DATES AND TIMES
Mondays 7:00 - 8:30 PM EST at JP Centre Yoga
February 2nd - May 11th (no sessions 3/16, 4/13, 4/20)
Optional Refuge and Bodhisattva Vow Ceremony May 18th
Recordings will be available to those who can’t participate live, and for review.
INVESTMENT
Standard Rate | $750
We offer tiered pricing - Click here for more information on what to consider when choosing a tier.
ABOUT LAMA TSERING NGODUP YODSAMPA
Nyigma Lama, Hospital Chaplain, Spiritual Counselor
Since 1983 Tsering Ngodup Yodsampa (he/him), under the spiritual direction of his root teacher the late 14th Kunzig Shamarpa, has devoted his life to sharing the Dharma in the world. Following Kunzig Shamarpa’s advice Tsering lived 17 years in Europe bridging East and West by translating for and interpreting Tibetan spiritual masters and scholars from all four schools of Tibetan Buddhism.
Presently most of Tsering’s time is dedicated to Buddhist chaplaincy, meditation instructor for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and as a Supervisor to chaplaincy interns from the Harvard Divinity School Cambridge, Ma. Tsering provides support to patients and staff using a secular approach of the Indo-Tibetan tradition of mind training (lojong), a convergence of science and spirituality termed Cognitively Based Compassion Training. (CBCT).
ABOUT NOEL COAKLEY
Noel (he/him) is a mental health counselor and former school teacher (special ed.), Meditation Facilitator, Director of the Boston Center for Contemplative Practice, and Assistant Director of Dharma Moon.
He has been practicing meditation since 1996, initially with Indo-Tibetan traditions and then Yundrung Bön. Noel has been fortunate to learn from over 100 teachers, including HH the Dalai Lama and HH the 34th Menri Trizin.