My Family meets Ling Rinpoche, January 1986

My Family Meets Ling Rinpoche:January 1986

written April 18th 2007

I would like you to experience with me some of the darshan of the story. Imagine you are working as a fire lookout 6 months a year. You own a business too. However, because the fire lookout job is only May through October or thereabouts depending on the weather and rainy season. One day in September or early October 1985 while I was alone at the lookout 10 miles from the nearest human being on top of a mountain, a powerful Tibetan Diety said to me, "You will be leaving for India on December 10th". I went home and told my wife. Since she was used o me knowing things before they happened she said, "Where is the money coming from for this ?" I said, "I don't know. But if I or we are supposed to go it will come." It did from a completely unexpected source. However, it wasn't enough to pay to hire someone to run our business, make car payments etc too. So initially we gave the idea up. Then in the first week of December I had sort of given the idea of going up (even though we had a one month visa for India already). We were walking down Haight Street in San Francisco with my mother and friends and family.

My mother saw a special deal on 2 weeks in Hawaii and wanted to go into the travel agency to check it out. I went in to protect her from any unscrupulous salespersons. However, to my surprise I saw that this place might have what I was looking for too. I asked the travel agent whether he had discount air fares to Asia. He said, "We are the main travel booking agent for all the universities in the Bay area". I asked immediately how much 5 open ended 6 month tickets by way of Bangkok, to Kathmandu and to return would be. He said,"6000 dollars but you would have to leave before the 11th of December." I said, "We'll take them". I knew the disadvantage was that I couldn't cancel these tickets but in my heart I knew we would use them.

Within one week we were on our way on board a JAL 747 to Tokyo. It was 11 hours to Tokyo. Then I think it was either 5 or 7 hours to Bangkok and another 5 or 7 hours 2 weeks later to Kathmandu. Tokyo was enough like Canada or Europe to feel like I was still in the Western World. However, Bangkok was very different because almost no one spoke English, there were almost no cars made in America and I couldn't read the street signs or anything else.

I remember asking God if my family and I should stay longer in Bangkok or go immediately to Bodhgaya to meet a friend of ours we met in Santa Cruz, California. He was going to be at something called the Kalachakra there, we found out. I got it strongly that we should go to Kathmandu and rent a car or take a bus to the Indian border and then a bus to Bodhgaya. We did all these things and met our friend Geshe Lobsang Gyatso (who has now passed on in the U.S.). We called him Geshela which means (Dear Spiritual Friend). It takes about 20 years or more to become a Geshe. Geshela had started in Kham province as a six year old and was discovered by Lamas and taken to Lhasa. I think Geshela was born in 1932 so if he was still alive he would be about the age of the Dalai Lama.

After I and my family and 500,000 others had received the 4 day initiation from the Dalai lama we travelled with Geshela and friends by train to Varanasi to visit the Burning Ghat and the Ganges. Then we travelled to Agra by train to visit the Taj Mahal. In New Delhi my stepdaughter got Deli Belly (a little like Montezuma's revenge) so we decided to get her up into the mountains and out of the tropics so she might get well quicker. So we travelled by train and then bus to Dharmsala, where the Dalai Lama lives (at that time along with about 10,000 Tibetan Refugees who have made their home there and had started along with the Swiss and Europeans and Americans a Tibetan boarding school for Tibetan Refugees so they wouldn't lose their culture. Also, many Tibetans had started various businesses there like Hotels etc. We soon met a Tibetan mountain Guide that was a very good friend of Geshela at the Kailash Hotel. We needed more room because of our large groupd so we moved then to the Green Hotel. It was February and then there was no heat in the rooms and we were at about 6000 feet and so it got down to 20 or lower at night. So we bought a Kerosene cook stove so we could boil and sterilize water and also heat our large room in the Green Hotel so we wouldn't freeze to death during the night. Also, we cooked noodles, rice, tea and many other things while also heating our room enough to survive. Outside were 5 feet tall (if they stood up) Silver and black monkeys. We were told never to go into the forests at night as these big monkeys were stronger than a man and sometimes carried off small children and pets and ate them. So we made it a point of not wandering the forests at night. We never had trouble with this type of monkey as there weren't very many of them more then 2 or 3 that we saw at a time. They seemed to have a demeanor a little more like gorillas than monkeys. Whereas there were sometimes smaller monkeys other places. The smaller monkeys were actually more problematic because even though one might scare off a little one, one might then be attacked by about 100 and be bitten many times or die. So one had to be very careful around large groups of monkeys. You didn't want to have monkeys get food out of your hand. It was better to just throw food 10 feet or so, then hide the rest of the food from sight and watch them fight over the food.

I'm trying to set the scene a little so you know you aren't in Kansas anymore, Dorothy. Along with this many people wore native Tibetan dress both men and women, especially those older than 40 years old. Remember this was January 1986. When people arrived from Tibet everyone male and female had very long hair. Except the men usually had it braided sometimes with red ribbons. Because they grew up in Austere conditions they were very powerful and unafraid in demeanor even though they usually were uneducated formally in any western sense. I found them amazingly strong, compassionate, and adaptable. They had to be adaptable to survive in over 8000' climates without electricity for the most part.

One of the friends of Geshela, who had been a monk until he had Geshela carry his robes while he cared for his parents until they passed on, spoke excellent english because he was a mountain climbing guide for westerners. Eventually, he spoke such good english he was a translator for the Gyuto Tantric Singers from Tibet while they toured the United States and I believe Europe. He eventually came to live in the United States and married an American lady. One day he came to our room at the Green Hotel and told us to follow him. I had come to see him as a very well connected Tibetan fellow and asked my family to follow along with me and him. He wouldn't tell us where we were going as he said it was a secret. After 2 or three miles we were getting tired at that altitude so we stopped to rest. I said, "How far is it from here?" He pointed to a house made out of rocks with a slate roof that had been quarried nearby. I said, "Come on, kids, it's only that far. You can see it from here. They agreed and we walked the next mile all curious what our friend was bringing us too.

As our friend knocked on the door a monk came out and smiled. He welcomed us inside and on a table in the middle of a room sat a Lama that we were told was Ling Rinpoche. We were told he had been sitting there in the lotus position right hand raised in teaching position, Maitreya style, with his left hand sitting in his lap relaxed. We were told he had been sitting like this for 2 years. I asked if he were still alive. They gave me a look smiling and said his body isn't deteriorating but his isn't coming back. I experienced something in that room that I will never forget, because Ling Rinpoche was neither alive or dead in a medical sense. In other words his body was NOT putrifying even though it had been sitting on this table in lotus position for 2 years. I could experience his blessings (darshan) being projected into me and my family from whatever heaven he was in. I would have to say that this was one of the most amazing and unforgettable experiences of my life.

Later that year I was reading a book on Tibet while I was camping on Castle lake near Mt. Shasta California and I read that this is common with the most highly evolved lamas. Next, what happens is that their bodies at some point, possible within 3 years after reaching a heaven state of consciousness, is covered with wax to look exactly like the lama did while still alive. Then the body is placed in a Temple or Gonpa for a long time. I remember seeing these wax images life size in Gonpas but had no idea that they contained the real body of the high lama inside. I was given salt relics to be empowered by the physical and spiritual aspects of Ling Rinpoche. I also shared these empowerment relics with family and friends. Within the next day or two we also met Trijang Rinpoche who had reincarnated and was then about 4 years old. He banged a metal Dorje (Thunderbolt symbol) on top of each of our heads. He hit me so hard I worried I might pass out. However, I just laughed because of the general amazingness of what we were experiencing. I also could have visited the main Tibetan Oracle. However, I decided that I was so psychic already that it might unbalance me. I still feel I made a good choice. I was told most Oracles aren't psychics by nature. This seemed very odd to me but then I don't know any culture that has this Oracle tradition that exists anywhere today except in Tibetan Culture. Geshela did something he called MO that used a single normal dice for divining things. Each number had a specific meaning so sometimes he would roll the single dice several times in succession while writing down what each roll meant.

It is my understanding that the Body of Ling Rinpoche was the Regent in charge of Tibet until the Dalai Lama came of age. I felt very honored to have this experience. It greatly changed my life in ways I don't fully understand even to this day.The only word that describes the change is: Amazing!