Happy Losar – 2149 the year of the Water Tiger

Happy Losar 2149 – the year of the Water Tiger 
​March 2022

Happy Losar from Khenpo Ngawang Dhamchoe and all at Kamalashila Tibetan Buddhist Centre!

The day began with rose-golden clouds and soon saw new and old friends gathering on the mountain to raise prayer flags for the new year. Khenpo la explained that this is like raising our mind to the positive, straight, and tall.

As Khenpo la led us in a ‘Sang’ Smoke offering puja, fragrant smoke billowed around us, through the trees and into the sky, cleansing us of negativities.

To bless us with sweet and caring speech, Khenpo la and Ani la offered us traditional home-made Tibetan ‘Khabze’ biscuits. 

Then, after some instructions from Khenpo la, we all raised our arms to the sky and called out, from the top of our lungs, the traditional, ‘So, so, so…’ to declare our positive minds victorious over the negative. Smiles and laughter all round. Together, we entered the gompa, took our places and began The Sixteen Arhat Puja to seal our wishes for a positive mind and New Year for all sentient beings.
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Thank you to all who came and to those of you who could not come, please know that you were in our hearts on this day. May all of us conquer our own anger, jealousy, and negative emotions this year and place in our mind the tall flags of kindness.

Chötrul Düchen ("Great Day of Miraculous Manifestations")
སྲིད་པ་གསུམ་ན་དཔྗེ་མྗེད་ཡྟོན་ཏན་གྱི། །
Homage to you, who performed great miracles in Śravastī,
མཉན་དུ་ཡྟོད་པར་ཆྟོ་འཕྲུལ་ཆྗེན་པྟོ་བསྟན། །
Unmatched in their splendour in all the three realms,
ལྷ་མི་འགྟོ་བ་ཀུན་གིས་རབ་མཆྟོད་པས། །
And through the offerings made by gods, humans, and other beings,
བསྟན་པ་རྒྱས་པར་མཛད་ལ་ཕྱག་འཚལ་ལྟོ། །
Caused the teachings to prosper and increase. 

Chötrul Düchen is one of four events in the life of the Buddha, according to Tibetan traditions. Chötrul Düchen closely follows Losar, the Tibetan New Year. It takes place on the fifteenth day of the first month in the Tibetan calendar during the full moon. The first fifteen days of the year celebrate the fifteen days during which the Buddha displayed miracles for his disciples so as to increase their devotion. During Chötrul Düchen (“Great Day of Miraculous Manifestations”), it is believed that the effects of both positive and negative actions are multiplied ten million times.