Compassion Wheel Team

From left to right: Bill and Matt Clopton; Troy Stafford; Barbara Brown; Bridget Brewer; Dechen Brooke.

Barbara Brown

Barbara Brown’s architectural practice has been actively focused on community-oriented and residential projects in the Bay Area. She is a UC Berkeley alumni and a long-time supporter of Tibetan Buddhist causes and sacred place building efforts.
Since 2010, Barbara has been working with the Tibetan Association of Northern California to assist their members in creating a vibrant community center building in Richmond, CA. She also participated in the design and construction effort to create the new Prayer Wheel Gazebo at Gyuto Foundation in Richmond Heights.

Bill Clopton

Bill’s first connection to Buddhism was December 1969 in a week-long retreat with 3 Tibetan monks he had met in London, England. As a general contractor he has over 30 years of experience specializing in home construction and remodeling paying careful attention to all aspects of a project from client/builder, workers, design and craftsmanship of materials.

Troy Stafford

Troy Stafford is a master craftsman with 20 years experience in the Fine Arts and Museum framing field. He has collaborated with artists, galleries, collectors, and museum curatorial and conservation staff on a range of museum and private projects involving the design and creation of custom frames and the restoration of antique frames. He was personally requested by Lama Zopa Rinpoche to do the elaborate carvings of the prayer wheel and is receiving direct instructions from him.

Bridget Brewer

Bridget Brewer integrates her extensive background in landscape design and construction with her architectural practice in Sonoma County, where she is a board member of US Green Building Council. Her landscape work includes wildlife restoration in urban environments. She has received grants to restore neighborhood parks and urban creeks in Oakland and Berkeley. She has taught with the Insight Garden Program at San Quentin Prison as well as high school students planting food forests in Windsor.

Upcoming Retreats

How to Train a Happy Mind

Scott Snibbe

August 8 - 11, 2024
About this retreat Based on his book How to Train a Happy Mind, this three-day retreat with Scott Snibbe offers a relaxed tour of eight meditations that help bring out your best qualities, deepen your relationships, and build a better world. Each of the retreat’s practices is derived from the Tibetan Buddhist lamrim “stages of the path,” a series of analytical meditations highly refined over the centuries. This lesser-known form of meditation complements the more popular mindfulness meditation by using stories, emotions, and critical thinking to actively steer the mind away from frustration, craving, and loneliness, and toward happiness, connection, and satisfaction. The retreat requires no…

Lamrim Weekend Only

Gyumed Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Jampa

August 23 - 25, 2024
About the Retreat This is the complimentary retreat to the full Lamrim and Yamantaka Commentary retreat with our kind and compassionate guru, Gyumed Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Jampa. Use this page to register for the Friday to Sunday Lamrim only teachings.  No highest yoga tantra required. Rinpoche will begin with two days teaching on Lama Tsongkhapa’s famous prayer, The Foundation of All Good Qualities. A concise and stirring outline of the Lam-Rim, the prayer covers the entire graduated path to enlightenment, short enough to recite every day, profound enough to study for a lifetime. If you are looking to register for the full retreat of Lamrim…

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  • Spring has officially arrived and with it a sense of renewal, a spark of hope. Trees are leafing and blossoming. So many wildflowers dot the hillsides. Bees are buzzing and early morning birds chatter like townsfolk exclaiming the beauty of this valley.  Living a quiet......

Vajrapani Institute is affiliated with the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition www.FPMT.org