Mangala Shri Bhuti

PROFILE MANGALA SHRI BHUTI rowing up in rural northern India amid the Tibetan diaspora, Dzigar Kongtrul GRinpoche was always fascinated by Amer- ica, but he never dreamed he would one day by Michael Haederle wind up living there, leading a vibrant sangha of dedicated practitioners. Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel, Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, and their son, Dungse Jampal Norbu Yet by his early twenties he had met and mar- (Top) View of Samten Ling retreat lands and new temple under ried an American, Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel, construction near Crestone, Colorado and the two were living in Nepal, where she was teaching English. In 1989 their lives took an Rinpoche’s flourishing network of retreat and unexpected turn when Mattis-Namgyel, at home study centers. “His teacher had told him to go with their newborn son, realized she would have be of benefit where he could and share the teach- to resume teaching at the American Cultural ings,” says Sasha Dorje Meyerowitz, MSB’s vice Center to keep the working visa that allowed president for development and a longtime stu- her to stay in Nepal. dent. “It was just a twist of fate that we all ben- She was reluctant to leave her infant to return efited from.” to work. Meanwhile, a visitor from Naropa Twenty-five years later, Kongtrul Rinpoche University offered Kongtrul Rinpoche a teach- and Mattis-Namgyel are both well-known teaching position there. “We decided to move to the ers and authors who travel widely to deliver Bud- States,” says Mattis-Namgyel. “We hadn’t enter- dhist teachings. While he continues to spend part tained the thought until then.” of each year in India, Kongtrul Rinpoche seems at Thus the seeds were sown for the establish- home in the West, delivering his practical, acces- ment of Mangala Shri Bhuti (MSB), Kongtrul sible dharma discourses in public settings and FALL 2013 buddhadharma: the practitioner’s quarterly 77 Kongtrul Rinpoche shortly after he had “Yet at the same time, it is the kind of put aside his monk’s robes. “I found out struggle that binds the sangha together he was someone who has a monastery and gives the sangha a sense of achieve- in Tibet and who was trained by some ment when we attain a milestone.” great teachers,” she says. “We started Intensive retreat practice is central to become close, and I studied with him to MSB’s mission, says Mattis-Nam- and we married. I made a good choice.” gyel, who did back-to-back three-year She became his first Western student retreats at Samten Ling starting when and remained his student after they got her son was nine. Retreatants spend married. most of their time alone in their cab- It’s an unusual relationship, she ins, cooking their own meals, but she acknowledges, but not necessarily prob- saw her son when he came home from lematic. “I feel in this tradition there’s a school. “He said, ‘Mom, I really like misunderstanding that being a student is you in retreat, because I always know a very subservient thing,” she says. “It’s where you are,’” she says. “He felt com- Phuntsok Choling, Mangala Shri Bhuti’s center near not about subservience, it’s about being fortable. I wouldn’t have done it if he Boulder, Colorado empowered as a person. It means ask- hadn’t felt comfortable.” ing questions and investigating things Meyerowitz, a New York City native conveying more traditional teachings in and maybe even disagreeing some- who once worked as a cameraman for his work with individual students, such times. It was a maturing process for low-budget films and documentaries, has as Pema Chödrön, who has studied with me.” Their son, Dungse Jampal Norbu, been a student of Kongtrul Rinpoche’s him for many years. “I hope my work, now twenty-four, has for the past five since 1997. “I went through kind of a and the teachings and the work of all of years been living in India, studying the challenging time and realized I needed to us who are involved in the organization, dharma and the Tibetan language under have a living teacher,” he says. Eventu- helps expand the roots of Buddhism in his father’s supervision in preparation ally, he packed up and moved to Colo- this country,” he says. for one day becoming his dharma heir. rado. “I feel like it’s become almost like Kongtrul Rinpoche was born in 1964 Over time, MSB has grown to include a new life since I started studying with in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh such major facilities as the Samten Ling Rinpoche,” he says. to parents who had fled Tibet following retreat center near Crestone, Colorado, Meyerowitz finds Kongtrul Rinpoche the 1959 Chinese invasion. “My father a collection of thirteen secluded cabins “very down-to-earth and accessible”— was a rinpoche, and he was the one set high in the foothills of the Sangre de and always willing to innovate. These who was responsible for establishing the Cristo mountains; the Phuntsak Choling days, MSB connects its far-flung mem- Tibetan community [in India] where I practice center near Boulder; Pema Osel bers with the help of an information- was born and grew up,” he says. Do Ngak, a retreat center near Vershire, packed website with web and audio As a young Nyingma monk, he Vermont; and the Guna Institute in Bir, links. It also has 10,000 Facebook underwent the traditional shedra India. There are also practice centers friends and nearly 4,000 Twitter follow- monastic training, with a focus on his in Japan and Brazil, as well as local ers. Meyerowitz initially was skeptical school’s Longchen Nyingtik lineage. His dharma groups in the U.S., Canada, of creating a Facebook presence for the root teacher was His Holiness Dilgo Europe, and Asia. organization because it seemed superfi- Khyentse Rinpoche, but he also studied Construction is currently underway cial but has come to share his teacher’s with Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, Nyoshul on the Sangdo Palri temple, situated in enthusiasm for the medium. “Rinpoche Khen Rinpoche, and Khenpo Rinchen. the main meadow at Samten Ling. Its says he loves Facebook because people Mattis-Namgyel grew up in Los design is a hybrid of Tibetan and Japa- in their pajamas in their hour of need Angeles, where her father was a record- nese architectural styles. Much of the who don’t want any commitment can company executive and her mother work in building and maintaining the get knowledge,” Meyerowitz says. was a psychologist and a practitioner retreat centers has been done by mem- Where Kongtrul Rinpoche once was of Tibetan Buddhism. After completing bers of the sangha, which numbers some deeply involved in almost every aspect her undergraduate degree in anthropol- 230 formal students and a larger pool of of the organization, in the past six or ogy, she headed to India. The ostensible informal supporters. seven years he has stepped back a bit. purpose was to conduct fieldwork, but It’s a long way from the days when “Rinpoche’s in our lives,” says Mey- in her heart she knew she was looking Kongtrul Rinpoche and Mattis-Namgyel erowitz, “but I think his long-term goal for a teacher. hosted small gatherings in their Boulder is to get the students to mature. He’s “I had a lot of deeper questions about home. “It has been a struggle from the emphasized the need for students to take my life,” Mattis-Namgyel says. She met beginning,” says Kongtrul Rinpoche. their seat more and feel empowered.” 78 buddhadharma: the practitioner’s quarterly FALL 2013 .

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