Lama Tsultrim Allione: Wisdom Rising
This can be done with anger, with pride and arrogance, with the underlying feelings of inferiority, with the speediness of Karma and with depression, and the spaciness of Buddha sounding songs. You let the color go through your whole body, not just where you are feeling the obstructive pattern, and in the Dakini mandala practice, it does that, and you transform into that dancing, and in this case, brilliant red Dakini, and you become her. So that’s a whole other layer of symbolic meaning, what she’s holding, actually the embodiment of the fierce, wild, wise feminine. What we just did was sort of a gateway practice, and then what you do if you go deeper is to go actually into those five Dakinis.
SANDRA SEDGBEER: The book is filled with many practical things that we can do, and also many stories of people who have done this practice religiously for a year or more and noticed a tremendous change within themselves. Now you’ve recently announced the Wisdom Rising Mandala training program, so people can come to the Tara Mandala Retreat Centre in Colorado, and actually have training in this.
LAMA TSULTRIM ALLIONE: Yes, and yesterday we launched the ‘Wisdom Rising Online’ program which is 13 hours of material with me and a couple of other teachers teaching. So, people don’t even need to come to Tara Mandala. We love to have people here, but not everyone can travel to southwest Colorado. So, they can sign up and take the different parts when they want. There are certain times when I’ll be there, and other teachers will be online to teach or answer questions. So, it’s not completely art existing online, it has a wide life component.
SANDRA SEDGBEER: I want to return to the Women’s March and the Me Too Movement for a moment because in ‘Wisdom Rising’ you wrote that it was almost as if the energy, cohesion, and momentum of the Women’s Marc began to dissipate in the weeks and months afterward. It seems to me that what you’ve done with ‘Wisdom Rising’ is to write a book that could become a rallying cry. It gives us the opportunity to take that energy and do something with it. It gives us a practical way to move forward. Are you finding that many people are also recognizing this in the book?
LAMA TSULTRIM ALLIONE: Yes. Actually, the book is already coming out in five languages in Europe, so it’s not a uniquely American phenomenon however the Women’s March was triggered by an American event. And, yes, I think there are longing and a need for a deeper transformative practice, an inner practice, to match the out-moving energy – in this case of the Women’s Movement and so on. What do we have to draw on internally?
So, it really goes beyond mindfulness and those quite simpler kinds of meditation into very specific empowerment that is connected to the mandala. We haven’t talked so much about the mandala today, but that’s really important because the very form of the mandala – the shape, the structure, the blueprint that the mandala presents – is a healing structure. It is a structure that is a circle divided into quadrants with a center, which is found all over the world in many cultures. So, by placing your mind into the mandala, which, by the way, has been proven in many scientific studies to be effective in healing the mind, the emotions, and people in trauma, and so on. So, that’s another aspect that’s in ‘Wisdom Rising,’ that is sustaining and healing for people to enter into the mandala and be able to draw from that energy of centering and these very powerful energies of the five Dakinis. So, I was thinking what if all those people who were at the March, which was at least five million on seven continents, what if all of them were doing the Dakini mandala practice? What would that do to catalyze change and healing in our world? So that’s my mission; to have all those people doing the mandala practices and having those resources to draw on.
SANDRA SEDGBEER: It seems to me at this time in the world, where we’re seeing the degradation of women, the domination of marginalized groups, the destruction of the natural world, etc., that the fierce compassion of the Dakinis is needed more than ever. It almost feels to me as though there is something other than that is also driving this movement so that our consciousness is awakened. The yearning that you talk about is being stirred. The fires are being stoked within us. Do you feel that the Dakinis are participating in this process?
LAMA TSULTRIM ALLIONE: (Laughter) Definitely. They definitely are. It’s an interesting thing that you said: it feels as if it is almost coming from somewhere else. Why now? It seems as if the moment has arrived and I don’t know why exactly or what happened. It’s happening in Buddhism, too. There’s a Me-Too Movement in Buddhism now, and that actually started before the Me-Too Movement in Hollywood. So, it seems like this moment has arrived, that the tables are turning, and the feminine is stepping up. Some people say it’s because there are enough women in positions of power, and it’s something like 20%, for example, of Hollywood Producers are women then you’ll see a shift. It may be a matter of numbers and the gradual change and then a flip taking place. Who knows? But it is certainly happening, and the Dakinis are a resource from which we can draw. And, you know, the Dakini practice would be quite secret, and you wouldn’t get it so easily, but I decided to put it out there in this simplified form because I think these are urgent times and we need to pull out all the stops and give the resources that we can to the world because the seed of destruction is increasing so quickly.
SANDRA SEDGBEER: And the sense of urgency – even if people really don’t know what they’re feeling and why they’re feeling it – is palpable. I want to close with something you wrote: ‘This is a moment in history where we have been called upon to manifest the wisdom of the empowered feminine which, as we’ve seen, is historically respectful of the natural world, understanding the interdependence of humans and the world that surrounds us. Since the destiny of women and the destiny of nature have always been parallel, and since women are major proponents of ecological awareness, by women taking their power back and manifesting it in the world, our ecological situations will be subsequently transformed bringing balance, generating healing, and producing a culture of peace.’ That’s a beautiful statement., and a beautiful vision. How hopeful are you that we can and will achieve this?
LAMA TSULTRIM ALLIONE: Well, I tend to be optimistic. There are certainly lots of things to be pessimistic about, but there’s a story of someone in Tibet who was building Stupas, these big mound-like structures, as the Chinese were on the other side of the mountain destroying them. Somebody said ‘Why are you doing this? They are just going to take it down. Next month this will be gone.’ He said, ‘It’s in the act and the effort of doing it.’ That’s a blessing in importance.
Connect with Lama Tsultrim Allione
“Wisdom Rising – Journey into the Mandala of the Empowered Feminine” is published by Simon and Schuster. For more information about Lama Tsultrim Allione ’s upcoming Retreats and the Wisdom Rising Retreats, go to www.taramandala.org. You can view the video trailer of Lama Tsultrim Allione ’s Wisdom Rising at www.wisdomrisingbook.com
