LONDON

Last year, the coordinator of the FPMT centers in the United Kingdom, Ven. Barbara Shannon, invited Tenzin Ösel to come to the UK. “Your visit would mean so much to so many devoted Dharma students here and would also help to build a connection with the younger generation of students who look to you for inspiration in these challenging and uncertain times.”

Ösel had already planned a visit, in particular, to attend twelve days of teachings at Jamyang Buddhist Centre in London with Geshe Tenzin Namdak, November 15 through 27.

A Dutch monk and a top graduate of the twenty-year philosophical study program at Sera Je Monastic University in south India – also Tenzin Ösel’s alma mater – Geshe-la had recently accepted the appointment as resident teacher at Jamyang by FPMT’s Spiritual Director Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

Of course, Geshe-la and Ösel had known each other when Ösel was at Sera Je. Geshe Namdak served as Ösel’s secretary helping him write thank you letters and other correspondence. Ösel left Sera Je when he was 18, in 2003.

Ösel was joined at Jamyang by fifteen others, many of them students of Lama Yeshe, Ösel’s former incarnation. Jamyang’s first director, in the late 1980s, Geoff Jukes, said it was, “Such a joy to join Ösel and old friends at Geshe Namdak’s wonderful teachings. A time of old memories and much hope for the future. So happy to see Ösel’s vision blossoming.”

Vicki Mackenzie, the author of the book about Ösel, The Boy Lama, said she, “Particularly enjoyed his honest and challenging debates with Geshe Namdak.”

Another former director, Di Carroll, said, “The love, warmth, and joy they shared for each other and their teachers was evident”.

Ösel gave a public talk at Jamyang on November 28 on Creating a Better Future. He opened it with a request for questions from the audience, answering each one, spontaneously and organically covering everything, giving people what they wanted to know.

“Trust in change,” he said. “Even the biggest problems can in the long run open up something new.” He told them, we should think of problems not as problems but as a process of learning to become stronger. “Change your perception.”

Jamyang’s director, Ven. Fabienne said that Ösel gave gifts to everyone involved in organizing the visit, which created “an intimate connection with him.”

PLANTING A TREE

Geshe Namdak and Ösel planted two fruit trees at Jamyang, joining a worldwide initiative supported by His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The story was reported in the English Daily Mirror newspaper, which itself is spearheading “The Million Mirror Tree” campaign.

“I love to plant trees. I’ve been planting trees since I was a child,” Ösel said. “Even if you plant just one tree, it will be there two, three hundred years after you. It starts with just one, doesn’t it?”

Ösel, himself, created a global organization for tree planting, The Global Tree Initiative. “And then we can offer it to His Holiness the Dalai Lama as part of his tree-planting movement.” plantgrowsave.org

NORTHUMBERLAND

From London, on December 1, Ösel and his team, executive assistant Jacie Keeley and partner, Sara, took the train north to Land of Joy, a retreat center in the countryside outside the village of Hexham in the county of Northumberland, thirty minutes west of the city of Newcastle.

For his talk in the meditation room, director Jenny MacQueen gave Ösel four topics to choose from – Outer Guru, Inner Guru; Patience vs Passivity; How to Keep Joyful Enthusiasm in a Complex World; and What does it mean to be a Practical, Engaged Buddhist in our modern Day and Age? “He took on the challenge of talking about all of them!” Jenny said. “He was so engaging and relaxed.”

The place was packed. People came from everywhere. “We’re quite remote,” said the program coordinator, Julia. “We’re in the middle of the Northumberland National Park, and it’s not so easy to get to us.”

WE MUST BE AWARE OF OUR DEMONS

What are we doing as a Buddhist, Ösel asked? “Every day, we’re starting to be a better person,” he said. “Every day starting to be a better person – I can’t stop repeating this. It is the basis, it is the basis. If we don’t get this, then forget about everything else, it’s not so helpful.

“We can take all these initiations, all these teachings, but if you’re not a compassionate person, starting with yourself, and you’re not making an effort to be aware of your demons, then it does not make any difference at the end of the day what practices you do.”

“You don’t train your mind just by chilling,” he added. “You train your mind when you are challenged by life in difficult situations. You have to be able to be aware, to observe your mind. That is training.

“So when somebody talks to you harshly, see them as your teacher because they are helping you to see those demons, which have come out from within.”

LEEDS

“Everyone was inspired by Tenzin Ösel,” said Kerry Prest, director of Jamyang Buddhist Centre in Leeds. He gave a talk there on December 4, explaining that “We are Bigger than Our Problems.”

Many people who’d never been to the center before came to hear him, Kerry said. “He hugged people, listened to them.” And he took such good care of all the center volunteers, making them feel very special. “He gave them each a mala – they were delighted!”

“And he loved our café and book shop!” He said that he’d been telling the Buddhist centers everywhere that they need these types of activities.

Dionne Norman appreciated his honesty. “He talked about his struggles and gave us powerful ways to make positive changes in our everyday life.”

Bob Charlton found Ösel “refreshing.” He appreciated his “openness and modern, practical approach to finding wellness within, revealing an extra-ordinary Dharma teacher.”

WE MUST CHANGE OUR PERSPECTIVE

Ösel told the people that a “simple way of explaining the Dharma is that we need to learn how to adapt in a positive way to any situation. We need to change our perspective, change our life.”

“That’s about it! Simple, right?”