Discovering the Buddha within
Guru Vajradhara His Holiness Chamgon Kenting Tai Situpa’s new teaching and practice program
New cycle in New Delhi – Information Year 1
Year 1 will be taught April 11-16, 2026 in New Delhi, by Guru Vajradhara H. H. Chamgon Kenting Tai Situpa himself
Kindly find all information and registration for the new cycle in New Delhi, starting in 2026, in the links below:
All you need to know about the 3 years’ program
General orientation
Discovering the Buddha within is a new experimental learning program of the Buddha Dharma created as part of the vast vision of Guru Vajradhara His Holiness the 12th Chamgon Kenting Tai Situpa. Since the Palpung Institution was continued in Northern India 1976, monasteries, temples, centers and study groups were volontarily established, dedicated to the Palpung lineage. For many years resident lamas and students of Palpung Dharma Centers worldwide have been requesting His Holiness the 12th Chamgon Kenting Tai Situpa to create a step-by step Dharma study curriculum adapted to foreign students that can be taught and practiced in all Palpung Dharma Centers.
The aim of this curriculum is to explain the essence of the Buddha's teachings in an easy and understandable yet comprehensive way. The Buddha Shakyamuni has shown the nature of beings' minds and phenomena on three different levels, each consecutive level being deeper and wider than the former one.
This three-year curriculum follows the Buddha's teachings on the Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, followed by the sacred transmission of four tantras that correspond to three gradual levels of discovering the ultimate nature of the mind and phenomena. The best way for a foreign audience to be able to acquire a proper understanding of these basic three levels of the Buddha Dharma is to approach it through one's own direct experience of various meditations connected to each of the three levels.
For each level, the teacher will explain the view (intellectual understanding), meditation (experiential understanding), and application (applying this understanding to change one's daily habits) of the topics according to Shravakayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana.
Meditations that form the core part of each level are divided into two sections:
Shamatha (Abiding peacefully) and Vipashyana (Superior insight).
Through these three aspects - view, meditation, and action - one will discover the Buddha within oneself.
The aim of this curriculum is to explain the essence of the Buddha’s teachings in an easy and understandable yet comprehensive way.
The Discovering the Buddha within curriculum consists of three levels:
Level One: Inner Peace
Level Two: Awakened Heart
Level Three: Original Purity
The aim of this curriculum is to explain the essence of the Buddha's teachings in an easy and understandable yet comprehensive way. The Buddha Shakyamuni has shown the nature of beings' minds and phenomena on three different levels, each consecutive level being deeper and wider than the former one.
This three-year curriculum follows the Buddha's teachings on the Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, followed by the sacred transmission of four tantras that correspond to three gradual levels of discovering the ultimate nature of the mind and phenomena. The best way for a foreign audience to be able to acquire a proper understanding of these basic three levels of the Buddha Dharma is to approach it through one's own direct experience of various meditations connected to each of the three levels.
For each level, the teacher will explain the view (intellectual understanding), meditation (experiential understanding), and application (applying this understanding to change one's daily habits) of the topics according to Shravakayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana.
Meditations that form the core part of each level are divided into two sections:
Shamatha (Abiding peacefully) and Vipashyana (Superior insight).
Through these three aspects - view, meditation, and action - one will discover the Buddha within oneself.
The aim of this curriculum is to explain the essence of the Buddha’s teachings in an easy and understandable yet comprehensive way.
The Discovering the Buddha within curriculum consists of three levels:
Level One: Inner Peace
Level Two: Awakened Heart
Level Three: Original Purity
Practice of meditation
This program is open to everyone.
For those new to Buddhism, practice at least 10 minutes every day for a minimum of 30 consecutive days.
For those who are already practicing the Buddha Dharma, their actual practice will work in place.
For those new to Buddhism, practice at least 10 minutes every day for a minimum of 30 consecutive days.
For those who are already practicing the Buddha Dharma, their actual practice will work in place.
Mentoring during the year
During the meetings, Chöje Lama Palmo will go through Rinpoche's teachings one by one and clarify students' questions with regard to view, meditation and post meditation.
Additionally, she will meditate with us online and will give meditation instructions for each teaching.
Chöje Lama Palmo has the distinct quality to condense deep topics into easy to remember bits and pieces and assist disciples from her own deep practice.
She facilitates practitioners' experience of the dharma to become a living truth, pervading their daily lives; a pillar in students' thinking, practicing and applying it.
Participants of year 1, from long-time disciples to beginners, considered it tremendously helpful to be offered this precious opportunity.
Additionally, she will meditate with us online and will give meditation instructions for each teaching.
Chöje Lama Palmo has the distinct quality to condense deep topics into easy to remember bits and pieces and assist disciples from her own deep practice.
She facilitates practitioners' experience of the dharma to become a living truth, pervading their daily lives; a pillar in students' thinking, practicing and applying it.
Participants of year 1, from long-time disciples to beginners, considered it tremendously helpful to be offered this precious opportunity.
Prerequisites year 1-3
Prerequisites for participation year 1
- For those new to Buddhism, practice at least 10 minutes every day for a minimum of 30 consecutive days.
- For those who are already practicing the Buddha Dharma, their actual practice will work in place.
Prerequisites for participation year 2
- Anyone who attended Discovering the Buddha Within 1 WORLDWIDE
- Students who completed Joy of Living 1 and 50 hours of practices
- Students of Guru Vajradhara's transmission of Mahamudra Ocean of Definitive Meaning
Prerequisites for participation year 3
- Anyone who attended Discovering the Buddha Within 2 WORLDWIDE in person
- Students who completed Joy of Living 1-2 and 3 and 50 hours of practices
- Students of Guru Vajradhara's transmission of Mahamudra Ocean of Definitive Meaning
Contents of the 3 years’ program
The three years’ three levels – short description
Inner Peace
Inner Peace
The first level focuses on calming the mind and developing insight and wisdom through some simple yet profound study, meditations, and contemplations derived from the Shravakayana teachings of the Buddha. Awareness meditations and precise knowledge will allow students to discover inner peace, accept and let go of worldly concerns without grasping at or rejecting them, and develop a stable aspiration for genuine freedom. Guided meditations and question-and-answer sessions will help students learn how to start a daily meditation practice at home. In this level students will 1. Learn the essence of meditation and develop and nurture awareness and inner peace using breath, body, feelings, thoughts, emotions, and phenomena as a support for meditation. 2. Learn the basics of Buddhism through knowledge and advanced insight meditation- They understand the shortcomings of one's life and the world, the origins and cessation of suffering, and the means to reach that cessation, along with understanding refuge-the starting point of the path to an everlasting state of well-being, rich with innate goodness and radiant pure qualities.
- They develop advanced insight meditation mainly based on experiential observation of the natural flow of everything as being impermanent.
Awakened Heart
Awakened Heart
Through meditations on loving kindness, compassion, joy, equanimity, and so forth, students will learn to awaken their hearts and discover their innate goodness, further enriching the calm state of mind and deepening their meditation through recognition of emptiness, which is the essence of the Mahayana. In this level students will 1. Discover their inner goodness- By discovering and cultivating love, compassion, appreciation or joy, and
- By developing their potential through six perfect states of mind, the six paramita
- By training their mind to transform defilements into love and compassion
- By learning about and meditating on bodhicitta, the awakening mind.
- By gaining an advanced insight that understands selflessness through direct experience.
Original Purity
Original Purity
Meditations connected with buddha nature, which is the basis of Vajrayana, the last of Buddha's teachings, will allow students to discover their enlightened nature, the primordial purity of the mind and the universe, and to experience pure perception of everyone and everything. In this level students will 1. Discover the primordial purity of their own mind and the universe- By discovering through advanced insight their own buddha nature and the original purity of everything.
- By appreciating and developing gratitude for one's own enlightened mind, by meditating on guru yoga, and by learning about creation and completion stage meditations according to the Vajrayana.
