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When one heart speaks with another
In commemoration of the 21st anniversary of the enthronement of Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo on September 24, we are presenting testimonials from Jetsunma’s students about her impact on their lives.
Sometimes in life we are caught unawares; we are in a place we think we understand, our future unfolding in a framework that makes sense. We may be happy or even sad, but it is familiar to us, which offers a level of comfort. Then an event, a person, an experience moves through our familiar world and a thread is pulled, however slightly, and a possibility arises for a new life, a different perspective. Things we took for granted, we assumed to be fixed, begin to unravel and if we look deeply – if we have the courage to do so – we discover that perhaps what we understood to be our future is less certain than we had ever imagined.
1998 was a good year for me. I owned a lovely house that was truly a home. I was in a relationship that had strengthened through some turbulent times. We had dogs and cats whom I loved. I was engaging in fiction writing, and had had some exciting successes. Everything was as I had always wished it to be. Or so I thought.
A woman I had for a short time shared a house with had traveled to the USA to be ordained as a Buddhist nun. I was not alone in our small town community in being intrigued at this decision. How could someone – in what seemed a short space of time – commit her life to something so foreign? When she returned, at her teacher’s instructions, to open a Centre, curiosity prompted me to go.
The teacher was Jetsunma, and no doubt the fact she was a woman appealed to me. But what held me was the way her heart spoke with mine. I went each week to listen and watch her video teachings, and every time I listened not just with my ears, but with my entire being. She offered compassion and kindness to me, to the world, with every word. She was neither mystical nor remote. Although not present in the flesh, she was accessible to all of us who listened with open minds.
Three months later I wrote to this extraordinary woman whom I had never met and asked her to be my teacher. I never received a reply, yet the answer was already known, with an absolute certainty that surprised me. I had not been searching for a spiritual path. I had not been yearning to change my life. Yet when her heart spoke with mine in a language that needed no translation, a glimmer of recognition was sparked. I realized I had been longing – always – for something beyond the life I knew.
The Buddhist path may not seem simple or easy. In the west we have no context for devotion and surrender and renunciation. For a love that is not defined by self or other. For an unwavering commitment to something intangible, not derived from personal ambition or desire for success. For welcoming with an unimpeded heart the wisdom of your teacher as the foundation of your life. Much of what I had accepted as true I have come to question, as I am offered the opportunity to look deeper and ever deeper into the potential of awakened compassion.
Despite the quizzical looks I may receive at the choice I have made to surrender my heart to my teacher’s, I have never felt regret. Nothing has been lost to me. Instead, my life is constantly enriched, my heart softened, my understanding deepened. The opportunity to surrender to a source that never wavers from the wisdom of pure and potent compassion is a gift. I am grateful beyond words for what Jetsunma offers, without cessation. Her heart speaks with mine, has become mine, and this I treasure with every breath.
Ani Kunzang
The Lady – A Poem for Jetsunma
The Lady
who is her own
lineage
takes flesh
again for our sake.
She appears
in the world
as the perfection
of our own mind–
she, the reflection
of pure intention,
stripped of attachments
girded for battle for our sake.
What causes
have we created
in lockstep for ages
with the armies of ignorance?
What pause in the
preoccupation of hatred?
What sheathing of desire?
Allowed us to glance up
at the moment she passes,
showing a glimpse
of the clear light,
the crack in the door
of suffering
if we will follow
The Lady.
Wild Flowers Bloom in the Desert
This is one Australian student’s story about the miracle of finding her teacher in this life. It is a story about the blessings of Guru Rinpoche.
In the centre of Australia there is red desert; rain is infrequent, sand is in abundance and only hardy plants survive. The dryness of the land desiccates everything. But then the rains miraculously comes, unexpectedly, and almost overnight these beautiful colourful and exquisite wild flowers bloom in the desert. The beauty and abundance that the rains bring to the desert is, for me, like the story of finding one’s teacher: a rare, beautiful and powerful event.
In the early 1990s I lived in Darwin, the capital city of a vast Northern Territory which spanned both desert in the south around Alice Springs and tropical rainforest in the north around Darwin.
While living in Darwin I had made a decision to formally become a Buddhist after considering all possible spiritual options! This decision was fast-tracked after I read Sogyal Rinpoche’s book The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. I decided, after reading Sogyal Rinpoche’s book, I liked the sound of Tibetan (Vajrayana) Buddhism. Once I had made the decision to become a Buddhist I discovered a small Tibetan Buddhist practice group in Darwin. Soon after joining the group I received a Chenrezig empowerment from a wonderful Rinpoche and I subsequently took refuge him.
I knew I had finally found my general spiritual ‘home’ in Tibetan Buddhism but I also knew I hadn’t quite found the ‘home within the home’ so-to-speak: I needed to keep looking. Reading Sogyal Rinpoche’s book I had worked out that it was fundamental on the Dharma path to have a teacher so I made wishing prayers to the picture of Guru Rinpoche in his book to find my teacher! Of Guru Rinpoche, Sogyal Rinpoche wrote: ‘One of his qualities is that he has the power to give his blessing instantly to whoever prays to him, and whatever we may pray for, he has the power to grant our wish immediately.’
I specified to Guru Rinpoche that I wish to find my teacher and that I wanted my teacher to be a woman! Ha! How presumptuous I was!! I immediately discarded the idea that I might ever find a female teacher as I did not know of any female teachers at that time in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition and if there were any they must be as rare as hen’s teeth! And being a bit of a know-it-all I thought I knew this for a fact!
Around this time I had cause to travel to America for a conference and I was traveling on one of the American Airlines. In a flight magazine there was a picture of Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo and a description of her recognition as a reincarnate Lama. The article described Jetsunma as a ‘housewife’ with children and I remember looking at her picture closely thinking that she didn’t look Lama-like (my experience of ‘Lama-looks’ being extremely limited). I’m embarrassed now to confess my reaction to seeing Jetsunma’s picture for the first time. I met my Lama in a flight magazine and I had profound non-recognition!
In this period, I also had a dream of the word ‘Nyingma’. I didn’t know what the word meant so I asked around and was told it meant ‘old school’ in Tibetan Buddhism. I didn’t know any more than that.
Increasingly I felt a very very strong pull to live in Alice Springs in the desert. I couldn’t think of a good reason why I would leave the Dharma group in Darwin that I had just found, particularly as I was such a new student. I was worried that I would fall into a proverbial spiritual hole in Alice Springs but I couldn’t continue to deny the urge to move to Alice Springs! Fortunately the decision was kind of made for me. My partner at that time had found a job in Alice Springs and that was the catalyst to leave Darwin. She told me that a friend who she used to work with had come back to Alice Springs as a Buddhist Nun and she thought she was from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. The fact that there was a Buddhist Nun in Alice Springs was consoling to me. This Buddhist Nun turned out to be Ani Miranda who was Jetsunma’s first student from Australia. After meeting Jetsunma, Ani Miranda had been ordained as a Nun by HH Penor Rinpoche the head of the Palyul lineage (a Nyingma lineage).
In a way the story ends in Alice Springs when I met Ani Miranda (the rest is history/herstory as they say). Ani Miranda’s presence in Alice Springs provided a tangible link to Jetsunma. I began accumulating Guru Rinpoche’s 7-line prayer and then Ngondro and I listened weekly to Jetsunma’s video teachings. This went on two or more years. I felt at home in this practice tradition (Nyingma) but I still wasn’t sure Jetsunma was my teacher. So how was I going to find out? I thought the best way was to be in her physical presence. So when Jetsunma gave Phowa teachings in 2000 I had the good fortune to be able to attend her teachings in Sedona, America.
So that’s how I found myself in Jetsunma’s physical presence. I will never forget the moment when Jetsunma entered the room to teach. All my uncertainty about whether or not Jetsunma was my teacher fell away and I realized I was in the presence of an extraordinary Lama for whom I wished to remain inseparable from.
Jetsunma says that Guru Rinpoche will appear to you as your root teacher and so it is. Through meeting Jetsunma my heart has been opened and my life change radically in ways that I could never have predicted. So, there you have it. I found my teacher first in a flight magazine above the earth and then on the earth in the Australian desert thousands of kilometers from where Jetsunma lives. How miraculous is that?
Jetsunma is a Shower of Blessings inseparable from Guru Rinpoche. Through her blessings the wild flower of Guru Yoga blossomed in the desert in my heart. May I be of benefit.
Ani Tenzin Wangmo
14 February 2009
Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo
On September 24, 1988, Alyce Zeoli was enthroned as Jetsunma Ahkon Lhamo, throneholder of the Palyul Lineage, by His Holiness Penor Rinpoche. In honor of this exquisite blessing, and in commemoration of the 21st anniversary of Jetsunma’s enthronement, we will be doing a series of posts from her students about what her presence and her teaching have meant in their lives.
To view a video of the enthronement ceremony, click here
