Chanted Meditations

Please check the calendars for all dates, times and locations!

Reciting ancient prayers translated into English, we receive the blessings and guidance of the holy beings. We also make requests for ourselves or for others who need help or protection.

Pujas are open to everyone, although you might want to try one of the shorter ones first! People sit on chairs or on cushions on the floor, whichever they prefer.

The Offering to the Spiritual Guide puja takes place on the 10th and 25th of every month; Wishfulfilling Jewel takes place every Sunday (sometimes Monday); and Melodious Drum is usually the last Friday or Saturday evening of the month. Find out the schedule of our pujas by looking at our calendar.

Compassion Buddha Puja A swift and powerful method for increasing our love and compassion, by relying upon Compassion Buddha Avalokiteshvara.

Tara Puja By offering praises and requests to Mother Tara, the female Buddha of wisdom, we increase our fearlessness and swift wisdom and come under Tara's loving care and protection. (On December 31st/January 1st, we do a special traditional Tara practice which consists of six one-hour sessions over a 24-hour period.)

Prostrations: The Bodhisattva's Confession of Moral Downfalls
By sincerely confessing all of our harmful actions to the thirty-five Confession Buddhas, we can purify all of the negativity in our mind and thereby experience immediate and lasting peace and happiness. This practice is incredibly cleansing because it combines chanted prayers with the traditional Buddhist 'exercise' of prostrations. This puja really gets your heart moving!

Amitayus Puja In this practice of the Buddha of long life, merit and wisdom, we engage in guided visualization, meditation and mantra recitation to increase our own and others' long life, wisdom and good fortune.

Medicine Buddha The Medicine Buddha Puja is a powerful healing practice both for ourself and others.

Offering to the Spiritual Guide Puja By engaging in this puja, we have the opportunity to mix our mind with our Spiritual Guide's enlightened blessings and inspiration and gain experience of all the stages of the spiritual path of Sutra and Tantra.

Protector Pujas
A Dharma Protector is an emanation of a Buddha or a Bodhisattva whose main functions are to avert the inner and outer obstacles that prevent practitioners from gaining spiritual realizations, and to arrange all of the necessary conditions for the success of their practice.

Wisdom Buddha Dorje Shugdän always helps, guides and protects Buddhist practitioners by granting blessings, increasing their wisdom, fulfilling their wishes and bestowing success on all of their virtuous activities.

There are brief, medium-length, and long sadhanas of Dorje Shugdän, called Heart Jewel, Wishfulfilling Jewel and Melodious Drum.

(1) Heart Jewel Puja In this puja, we practice the special Guru yoga of Je Tsongkhapa and make prayers to our Dharma Protector, Dorje Shugdän, to remove obstacles and gather favourable conditions for our spiritual practice. These two practices are the very essence of the New Kadampa Tradition of Mahayana Buddhism.

(2) Wishfulfilling Jewel Puja
A slightly more extensive version of Heart Jewel, usually combined with a tsog (lit. "assembly of practitioners") offering. Please feel free to bring a vegetarian food offering.

(3) Melodious Drum This extensive sadhana is called "Kangso" in Tibetan, which means "Fulfilling and Restoring Ritual". During this puja, we make extensive offerings and perform other practices to fulfil our heart commitment: to rely upon the Protector sincerely, regarding him as inseparable from the Guru and Yidam (personal Tantric Deity) and to practice the pure Dharma of Lamrim (Stages of the Path), Lojong (Training the Mind) and Mahamudra.

For more information about prayer booklets, audio prayers and printed prayers, please see the Tharpa website.