The daughter of H.E. Mindrolling Rinpoche, a high lama in the Tibetan Nyingma tradition, she was identified at an early age as an incarnation of several renowned woman teachers from Tibetan history, including Yeshe Tsogyal, the consort of Padmasambhava, the saint credited with bringing Buddhism to Tibet, Machig Labdron, the female founder of the Chod (or ego-cutting) lineage, and the Great Khandro of Tsurphu, the consort of the 15th karmapa, who was a predecessor of the 17th Gyalwa Karmapa, the young lama who recently escaped Tibet.
As a girl, Khandro Rinpoche attended Christian convent schools in India, and her precise, British-accented English and ability to simplify complex Eastern concepts have won her a growing following in the West. She is currently on a six-city tour of the United States. Rinpoche (an honorific meaning "precious one" given to incarnate teachers) spoke with Indira and Lawrence Pintak during a stop in Boston.
One of the great debates in American Buddhism is over how the dharma will change as it comes to this country. Are you concerned?
If it is a Westernization of Buddhism as it was when Buddhism traveled from India into Tibet and then Tibetan Buddhism evolved, that's how it should be. It's good as long as one doesn't separate it from the core instructions of the Buddha and add new interpretations. But wherever there are people who try to change the original teachings to suit personal likes and dislikes, or when personal interpretations come in, then I don't agree with that. And a lot of times it does happen.
Are American Buddhists moving in the right direction?
People need to realize that we are at the very kindergarten level. The difference is going to come when people understand [they cannot] take dharma as just a change of clothes that you wear. People get a vague idea of what Buddhism is, read a few books, do a little meditation, and then run around wanting to establish dharma. And that's not how it's going to be. Dharma is going to be established when there are living people who embody it completely.
The guru is central to Tibetan Buddhism. Is the concept misunderstood here?
In the Western way of looking at it, a student is a student and the teacher is a teacher. Whereas the Buddhist way of looking at it is that the teacher is never the teacher alone, and the student is never the student alone. These two positions are not solid. You are a teacher when you need to be a teacher, you are a student when you need to be a student. It has to be that flexible. Our roles never should stagnate. Now if any tulku [incarnate lama] were to get stuck to the idea that "I am a tulku," that's the biggest egoistic display there is. You should never assume that because some title has been bestowed to you that you are so and so. It's beside the point.
How do you feel about the rise of American teachers of Buddhism?
When you take up the position of teacher, you don't have a life. From my point of view, it's impossible to have a life and do what you want to do and still be able to teach. As a teacher, you have to be the embodiment of that teaching, and if there's a reluctance, and you say "my life's my life," then you've immediately made it into two different identities. When that is understood, we can say it's now a place where there is living Buddhism, rather than talked Buddhism.
