“We are all walking toward death, carried by the river of aging. Contemplate on impermanence!”
 

--Anyen Rinpoche

Upcoming Events

The Next Dying with Confidence Training
Denver, CO Sept 26-30, 2013

The training program will give students the guidance and opportunity to master all the skills necessary for a practitioner to use death as an opportunity for enlightenment and to help all sentient beings.

PHOWA RETREAT
with Anyen Rinpoche
Nov 6-9, 2013 in Vermont

This is a rare opportunity to join Anyen Rinpoche in 4 days of intensive phowa practice.
Please email info@PhowaFoundation.org for information and an application.
Upcoming Events on the East Coast
 
Jul 19-21    
Omega Institute, NY  Getting Off the Emotional Roller Coaster  
     
         

The Phowa Foundation supports the vision of Anyen Rinpoche to help sentient beings around the world who are ill, in the dying process, or those wishing to prepare for death in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

Phowa is a traditional Tibetan Buddhist practice, performed by all lineages, that supports the dying person to release attachments, remember the spiritual teachings they have been given, and offer favorable conditions for liberation or a positive rebirth. It can benefit all beings, Buddhist or non-Buddhist, as well as animals.

Traditionally in Tibet, a lama who has known the dying person would be invited to the bedside and guide him or her through the dying process and the bardo states. For sincere practitioners in the West, we often do not have that opportunity. The Phowa Foundation works to connect our modern world of Western Buddhism with the long-held traditions of our Tibetan Buddhist lineages.

PHOWA FOUNDATION NEWS 2012

The second Dying with Confidence series of trainings began in October with a 5-day retreat in scenic Manchester, VT. Close to 40 students from across North America gathered for the first of three retreats which included instruction and practice in wind energy and phowa among other teachings in impermanence, the signs of death, and creating a "Dharma Vision" for our lifelong practice. Quickly feeling our connections to the practice and our desire to support each other over the next year, groups formed in a number of communities to continue to meet and practice phowa until our next retreat in May.

In April, our new Denver center hosted the second level of the Dying with Confidence Training that began last September in Crestone, CO. We could all feel the support and energy of six months of steady practice in phowa and wind energy over the weekend. Anyen Rinpoche continued his profound teachings on phowa, impermanence, the benefits of wind energy practice, the Bardo Prayers and the development of faith and devotion as the basis for reciting them, among other topics. We received the transmission for the amazing collections of prayers in our Bardo Prayers booklet to be used at the time of death. Level III will include a four-day phowa intensive in preparation for the weekend teachings on helping others through the dying process.

The next Dying with Confidence Level I Training takes place in Denver, September 26-30.

Click here for  Training details

This past year, a number of donations were made to the Phowa Foundation requesting Phowa on behalf of loved ones who had died. We have continued to support a retreatant in Tibet to perform Phowa and other rituals for the dying and deceased. With the donations given for Phowa services, Anyen Rinpoche will again be able to offer butterlamps in Nepal this January on behalf of the deceased and all beings in the bardos.

The two beautiful thangkas we commissioned of Buddha Amitabha and Vajrayogini arrived in time for our VT Dying with Confidence retreat. Between retreats, the thangkas hang in the shrine room of the Orgyen Khamdroling Center in Denver, also home to the Phowa Foundation.

This December, a number of students attended an End-of-Life Workshop generously donated by a local attorney. Covering many of the legal issues in creating our wills and ensuring our "Dharma Wills" with specific requests for the care of our body before and after death are carried out, the workshop really underscored our need to plan ahead and have all our documents ready now. Some students had not been aware that planning ahead for Phowa for themselves at the time of death was available through our website. Not only will we be ensuring that Phowa be performed at the best possible time for ourselves, we will also be able to help countless beings in the bardos now and in the future with our donations. Please see the Phowa Services page or email the Phowa Foundation at

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The Passing of a Dharma Friend
 by Clemma Dawsen

[The following was written by a student in the Dying with Confidence training in Vermont, which began last October. Soon after the first retreat, the local sangha began the journey of caring for two of its members—Bob, who was dying from early Alzheimer’s, and his wife, Sally, who had helped organize Anyen Rinpoche’s teachings in VT.]


I’m here to talk to you on behalf of our tiny sangha in rural Vermont and how together we experienced the teachings of Anyen Rinpoche in a very immediate way as we shared in the dying of one of our members. It’s our hope that reading this will give you an idea of how amazing and beautiful and possible it is to die with confidence. We should all aspire to be surrounded by trusted dharma friends. One of life’s greatest gifts is to be a dharma friend; if you are asked to be one you should have no doubt as to your good fortune.  Read more…