Merigar’s Forty Years

Activities and Events for Summer 2021

In 1981, Chögyal Namkhai Norbu, together with the first group of his students, chose a farm in the Amiata area of Tuscany, Italy as the first Gar of the Dzogchen Community. As a result Merigar, the Residence of the Mountain of Fire, was established, a place where people interested in the study and practice of Dzogchen according to the teachings of Master Chögyal Namkhai Norbu could meet. This year marks forty years from the founding.

It is an important milestone to remember and to celebrate, despite, and perhaps even more reason to do so, this difficult situation that we are all going through, and with the mourning for the passing of our Teacher, now almost three years ago, still alive within us.

The best way to express our gratitude towards him for what he transmitted and taught us by his example all these years seemed to be to concretely demonstrate how much we treasure his teachings. We are deeply convinced of the immense value and importance they have for our evolution as individuals and as a human community that is more aware, open, generous and loving towards ourselves and life around us.

At Merigar we are therefore organizing a series of events that are free and open to all, some in collaboration with the Municipality of Arcidosso, to concretely share our mutual experiences. The events will take place throughout the summer and will have different themes. On one hand we will share the experiences and activities that have always defined us, such as meditation, Yantra Yoga, the Dance of the Vajra and Khaita Joyful Dances. On the other, aspiring to mutual enrichment, we will open ourselves to the experiences of others and discover the various ways in which gratitude, love and solidarity can be expressed in the current situation.

In this historical phase, in which we have perhaps understood more than in the past of our condition of uncertainty, often the cause of anxiety and frustration and, at times, anguish, we will share the experience of awareness of the breath, of its relationship with our mental state and how, through the breath, we can bring our mind towards a calmer and more relaxed state. We will share experiences of sitting meditation and meditation in movement with the Dance of the Vajra to overcome our mental constraints and preconceptions, the real cages in which we imprison ourselves, and make our life and the lives of those around us more meaningful.

We will dance together Khaita Joyful Dances, which inspire a sense of harmony in the dancers and among the people who take part with their melodious music and graceful movements that help to overcome the moments of sadness and discouragement that have often been with us over the past year. For some events, we will welcome guests from other organizations involved in helping and supporting people in various conditions of need.

On August 6, Father Alberto Bormolini will speak to us about the fire of passions, a divine fire: from passionate love to love as service and compassion. Father Alberto Bormolini is president of a non-profit organization, which for years has been committed to accompanying the dying and supporting those who remain and suffer in mourning. On August 27, a meeting is scheduled with the deputy minister of the secular Franciscan order of the Campania region, the lay Franciscan Antonio Aiello, who will share with us the meaning and practice of love and compassion in the Christian world.

For the theme of solidarity, the experience of ASIA will not be lacking, the ONLUS founded by Chögyal Namkhai Norbu which, in addition to Italy, for years has been bringing help and support to Tibet, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Mongolia, India and Bhutan to preserve their unique cultural and environmental heritages, promote sustainable development processes, and build schools, study colleges and hospitals.

We will also try to set up meetings to share the experiences of those in our community and in the Amiata community who are engaged as social volunteers.

The gakyil and the Lings of Merigar, in Italy and in Europe, will give their contribution from a distance, organizing in turn initiatives in order to feel part of this symbolically important moment.

In addition to the events relating to Merigar’s forty years, there will also be several courses and retreats for practitioners starting in early June. The main events will be the August retreat (10-14) focused on the text The Stairway to Liberation by Chögyal Namkhai Norbu, and the collective practices scheduled from 22 to 27 September, but you will find many other courses and events that we are adding to the program.

As always, we invite you to consult the Merigar website (www.merigar.it) on the Courses and Events page to stay up to date on the activities that Merigar offers both face-to-face and online and we invite you to participate as much as possible this summer at Merigar! Work on the Yellow House is being completed and the Path of Awareness will also be completed soon, while the Great Stupa of Enlightenment was repainted on May 20, in the auspicious month of Saga Dawa. Merigar is ready to welcome you!

Provisional Calendar of Events July to September

Please visit  https://www.merigar.it/en/courses-and-events/ for updates

Every Sunday in July and August, in the park of via Tibet in Arcidosso, Merigar will offer sessions of Yantra Yoga and awareness of breath as well as Khaita Joyful Dances

July 2-8 Training course to teach Kumar Kumari, Yantra Yoga for boys and girls (restricted)

July 9-14 The Semdzin (restricted)

July 16-18 Course on Sa-che (Tibetan geomancy)

July 16-22 Deepening Course of the Dance of the Song of the Vajra – in connection with Gars and Lings from all over the world (restricted)

July 24-25 Meditation in Movement, the Dance of the Vajra

July 26-August 2 Training program for new Khaita instructors and experts

July 30 – August 1 Course on the potentiality of the elements

August

Every Sunday in July and August, in the park of via Tibet in Arcidosso, Merigar will offer sessions of Yantra Yoga and awareness of breath as well as Khaita Joyful Dances

August 3-5 Khalong

August 6 The fire of the passions, a divine fire. From passionate love to love as service and compassion

August 7-8 The other, my mirror. Selfless love, the heart of Buddhist ethics

August 10-14 Practice Retreat based on The Stairway to Liberation by Master Chögyal Namkhai Norbu. (restricted)

August 16-19 Meditation and Yoga

August 20-22 Mandarava Practice Retreat (restricted)

August 20-22 The Path of the Heart. Art as a path to knowledge

August 20 – September 15 19th Training for Tibetan Translators

August 23 and 24 Days with children at Merigar

August 26 Meetings and exchanges on the world of Amiata volunteering and practitioners from the Dzogchen Community

August 27 Meeting with the coordinator of the lay Franciscans of Central-Southern Italy, Antonio Aiello

August 28 and 29 The Nine Purification Breathings and the Rhythmic Breathing of Yantra Yoga and the benefits according to Tibetan medicine

September

September 1-5 Deepening of the 5 pranayamas and meeting with teachers and expert practitioners of Yantra Yoga (restricted)

September 10-17  Deepening of the Song of the Vajra and the related Dance (restricted)

September 11 On the occasion of the 700th anniversary of Dante’s death, the Merigar Library is organizing: Visions of hell: Dante’s imagination and the Buddhist perspective

September 18-20 Vajra Dance and sitting practice retreat (restricted)

September 22-27 Collective Practices (restricted)

Update on the prayer flags at Merigar

In an article published in the previous issue of The Mirror we explained how the prayer flags are made at Merigar and we asked readers to share their contributions and memories that could help us to reconstruct the history of this tradition. Thanks to your messages, photos and further research, we were able to gather more information that we can share with you.

A large tarchog with different mantra inscriptions was raised at Merigar as early as 1982 and lungta were also hanging around the yellow house in the same year. A particular year was 1984, when the lungta were prepared and hung in March on the occasion of Losar. In fact, that year marked the beginning of the year of the Wood Mouse, the first of the sixty-year cycle (rabjung). For more details and updates visit https://www.merigar.it/en/our-facilities/prayer-flags/