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Rangjung Neljorma Khadro Namsel Drönme, a female oracle to His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and highly realized being, now also teaching throughout the world.

The region of Tibet east of Lhasa and west of Amdo.

See Khadro-la. 

In Tibetan monasteries, colleges are divided into houses (khangtsen), and monks are generally assigned to these houses according to the region of Tibet (or neighboring country) from which they come.

A disciple of Gönpawa Wangchuk Gyaltsen; the dedicated meditator who could not even find time to cut the thorn bush outside his meditation room.

A white cotton scarf used by Tibetans for greetings and for offering to holy objects.

A tantric implement, a trident with symbolic elements.

Khedrub Gelek Palsang was one of the two main disciples of Lama Tsongkhapa, with Gyaltsab-je. He became the third Ganden Tripa (spiritual head of the Gelug school) and was posthumously given the title of First Panchen Lama. Read Khedrub-je’s biography in Treasury of Lives. 

Khunu Lama Rinpoche, Tenzin Gyaltsen, was born in the Kinnaur region of Himachal Pradesh, northern India. The people there revered him and called him “Khunu” Rinpoche (meaning “precious one from Kinnaur”). Also known as Negi Lama, he was an Indian scholar of Sanskrit and Tibetan and a great master and teacher of the Rime (non-sectarian) tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. He famously gave teachings to His Holiness the Dalai Lama on Shantideva's Guide and was also a guru of Lama Zopa Rinpoche. He composed a well-known text, The Jewel Lamp: A Praise of Bodhicitta, translated into English as Vast as the Heavens, Deep as the Sea.

In 1975 Rinpoche founded Tibet Center, the oldest Tibetan Buddhist center in New York City; a guru of Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

In full, The Extraordinary Aspiration of the Practice of Samantabhadra. A long prayer on the benefits of the mind of bodhicitta, one that Lama Zopa Rinpoche often suggests his students read.

A highly attained and learned ascetic yogi who lived in Dharamsala, India, and who is one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche's gurus.

See delusion.

Co-compiler of Mind Training: The Great Collection; holder of the Ngor throne of the Sakya school.

A great meditator who spent over twenty years (including six years in strict austerity with chulen practice) in retreat in Tsum, a valley in Nepal, before becoming one of the main teachers at Kopan Monastery, Nepal.

The monastery near Boudhanath in the Kathmandu valley, Nepal, founded in 1969 by Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

A multi-layered term that can mean wealth or material offerings given to the Sangha and the Three Jewels, and can also have a negative connotation of misusing offerings. Read more about the term dkor here.

The first buddha of this eon. See also Kashyapa, Kanakamuni, and Maitreya.

Also known as Krishnachari and Kanhapa; one of the eighty-four mahasiddhas.

The first of four classes of tantra, also called Action Tantra, because it emphasizes external activities, such as prayers, mudras and so forth.

One of the eight bodhisattvas.

A female form of Avalokiteshvara, revered in Chinese countries, her name is short for Guanshiyin, "She who hears the cries of the world."

Literally, "coiled". The system of the energy channels (nadis) and centers (chakras) within the human body.

Blissful energy dormant within the physical body, aroused through tantric practice and used to generate penetrative insight into the true nature of reality.

A female tantric deity associated with attracting positive energy and attaining positive goals, red, standing on one leg in a dancing posture and holding a flowery bow and arrow; an aspect of Tara.

A name given to a hidden practitioner.

Long-stranded grass used under the retreat seat during tantric initiations, and for making brooms in India. Shakyamuni Buddha made a seat out of kusha grass when he meditated under the bodhi tree at Bodhgaya and attained enlightenment.

The place in north India where the Buddha died and was cremated. The site of the 152-metre (500-foot) Maitreya statue to be built by the FPMT.

Literally, lord of refuge. A title of respect.

See generation stage.

Usually the lama’s residence within a monastery, from which his affairs are conducted.

A spiritual guide or teacher. One who shows a disciple the path to liberation and enlightenment. See guru.

See Atisha.

See Guru Puja.

See Lhundrup Rigsel, Khen Rinpoche Lama.

See Tsongkhapa, Lama Je.