General Spiritual Director
Work Day with Resident Teachers preparing for International Summer Festival
Jul 21, 2026
JUL 25 - AUG 9, 2025
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International Summer Festival 2025 diaries
It's a beautiful sunny day and there is a happy anticipation in the air that this afternoon we will meet Mother Tara in the empowerment with Gen-la Dekyong. To prepare we engage in a series of meditations with Kadam Bridget Heyes to develop our compassionate motivation into a strong wish for enlightenment, so that we have the actual power to help others.
Day 9 ~ MEETING WITH ARYA TARA
In the afternoon, people joyfully file into the Temple and the empowerment begins. Almost 2000 people are in the Temple in front of a beautiful statue of Arya Tara surrounded by an array of delightful offerings, and 1500 join online from their home or centers around the globe. A gentle breeze blows through the open Temple doors, as Gen-la talks about how Tara is the embodiment of the wind element of all the Buddhas.
“Homage to Tara, the Swift One, the Heroine,
Whose eyes are like a flash of lightning,
Who arose from the opening of a lotus,
Born from the tears of the Protector of the Three Worlds.”
She is our Superior Liberator, our protector and companion in this life and beyond this life. She is swift like the wind. She guides faithful Kadampas in their Lamrim practice and in their daily lives. We feel her powerful presence, blessings and protection during the ceremony. In a flash she is there to help us, we just need to remember her! She is always caring for us alongside our Spiritual Guide.
the benefits of relying upon Tara
Gen-la helps us to understand how to skillfully rely on Arya Tara, in our daily practice and especially through reciting the 21 verses of praise in Liberation from Sorrow. These bring inconceivable benefits and Venerable Geshe-la encouraged us to engage in 24 hour Tara practice, reciting these verses seven times, six times a day, when we see the world filled with sickness, natural disaster, war and misfortune, or when we ourselves are filled with sorrow or fear.
For the first time ever at an International Festival, on Thursday we will begin this practice as a collective Sangha, calling on Mother Tara to bestow her blessings and protection on the world and to bring about the lasting peace that comes from inner wisdom and compassion. This will be such a powerful and auspicious event
MEDiTATION WITH KADAM BRIDGET HEYES
a beautiful statue of Arya Tara with an array of delightful offerings
such a blessed atmosphere today
After the empowerment there is a gentle blessed atmosphere as people fan out across the Festival site. There is a new meal system in place, with ticketed meals and an array of street food stalls which makes it easy for people to enjoy meeting with friends over meals and to picnic in the sunshine. As the day turns to evening people meet up, take walks and finally enjoy puja together.
