Author: Liz Chisler

We live in a culture that idolizes and glamorizes youth, but being young in today’s world is not always easy. Stress, self-hatred, self-consciousness and confusion in the face of the seemingly limitless possibilities new technologies have made available to us are just a few of...

  Young Muslims from North America and Europe leaving home to join ISIS, much to their parents’ alarm. Several years ago, college students joining the Occupy movement in large numbers. Urban youth joining street gangs with strict codes of honor and loyalty. Do these phenomena have anything...

Just over a year ago, when Gendun Drubpa Buddhist Center in Canada requested me to continue as resident teacher as my initial three-year commitment was finishing, Lama Zopa Rinpoche decided that, instead of that option or any of the others available to me at the...

According to the Buddhist worldview we have all been reincarnating since beginningless time, a rather mind-bending thought! Nevertheless, even though this means we come into the world with a great deal of preconditioning, and not as “blank slates,” it is well-known that the influences we...

The following article appeared as part of Vajrapani Institute's 2015 Annual Report The Wise Heart Teen Camp officially started in the Summer of 2014, however it had it beginnings in the the “teen tracks” taking place during Wise Heart Family Camp. Within this ten-year span, huge...

A key Mahayana Buddhist approach to eradicating problems is the practice of Thought Transformation (Lojong in Tibetan). This practice, when viewed without some understanding of Buddhist ideas, can seem quite bizarre and even counterproductive. It is a practice and theory where one uses...

Venerable Tenzin Chogkyi, our resident teacher, shares stories and insights from a Dharma journey that brought her back to Vajrapani Institute for the third time in late 2015. I want to offer the whole package ...