Buddhist Studies Institute

The Bardo Retreat:

Buddhist practices for death & dying

November 3-5

Online with Pema Khandro

5pm PT San Francisco | 8pm ET New York | 11am AET Sydney

Facing realities of dying, death, and grief are central to our human experience. This program offers practical instructions for helping others in the process of dying and an overview of essential knowledge on death, bardo, and rebirth. This includes self-paced lectures on dying, loss, grief, and illness from Lamas and scholars of Buddhist Studies. This includes recorded lectures, and conversations with experts in caregiving, hospice, Buddhist ministry, Tibetan Buddhist history, and scientific research on reincarnation. It also includes a self-paced training in Buddhist funerary practices, known as Zhitro, led by Pema Khandro.

Fri. Nov 3rd – Kunzang Monlam with Pema Khandro
Sat. Nov 4th – The Tibetan Book of the Dead for Beginners: A Guide to Living and Dying, with Lama Lhanang and discussion with Pema Khandro
Sun. Nov 5th – Shitro for Departed Loved Ones with Pema Khandro

Annual Season of Practice Begins

November 1st

Online with Pema Khandro

5pm PT San Francisco | 8pm ET New York | 11am AET Sydney

“Use the 100 days to try to evoke a contemplative life…this may be something you don’t feel like doing, your attention span may be conditioned otherwise, and it may take some kind of effort, but it is a way of creating sovereignty and reclaiming sovereignty over our attention span.” ~ Pema Khandro

The Season of Practice is held each year starting November 1st – Tibetan Lunar New Year (Losar).

Listen to Pema Khandro Explain the Season of Practice

The Heart Sutra

with Pema Khandro, Ph.D & Shugen Roshi

December 1st – 3rd

Online

9am PST San Francisco | 12pm EST New York | 5pm GMT London

The Heart Sutra for more than two thousand years has been chanted daily by Buddhists around the world. Known as Prajnaparamita, the Heart Sutra, powerfully illuminates the path of freedom from suffering. The Heart Sutra contemplates the way we perceive, and what is beyond what our dualistic assumptions portray. This course with Lama Pema Khandro & Shughin Roshi explores the Heart Sutra from the Tibetan Buddhist perspective including the pivotal teachings of the four extreme mistakes on the spiritual path, discovery of one’s true nature and one’s true purpose.

Vajrayana Training

Under the Direction of Lama Pema Khandro

So you finished Ngondro (or didn’t), what’s next?

For students interested in pursuing the long-term accomplishment of traditional Vajrayana stages of study and practice, we invite you to check out Vajrayana Training.

The course is taught by Pema Khandro whose background of growing up in North America has provided her with an understanding of Western culture and learning styles. Thus the Vajrayana Training offers advanced esoteric teachings in a modern format. She engages straightforward language with a supportive teaching methodology that offers lecture, question and answer, slide shows with outlines of the material, recordings of the class for viewing and reference and the support of an assisting instructor who will follow up with one on one conversations after each class. The training is given in the accessible format of live web-cast teachings to keep Vajrayana accessible despite the demands of modern life. It is held on the first two Wednesdays of every month.

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