Since moving to the spiritual mecca of Crestone, Colorado in March of 2020, my wife and I have made pilgrimages to many of the areas sacred sites. At 7,923 feet in elevation and located next to the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, Crestone is both beautiful and isolated, subject to extremes of weather, wind, and temperature. It includes an astonishing array of spiritual sites – more than two dozen ashrams, monasteries, temples, retreat centers, stupas, shrines, labyrinths, and other sacred landmarks. Although pilgrimage may seem an antiquated religious ritual, it remains a vibrant activity in the modern world as pilgrims combine traditional motives – such as seeking a remedy for physical or spiritual problems – with contemporary searches for identity or interpersonal connection.
Our most recent pilgrimage was to the Tashi Gomang Stupa, located about two miles by trail from our home. Since the time of the Buddha’s (566-485 BCE) death, Buddhists have constructed stupas to contain the relics of enlightened teachers. Stupas have become places of veneration and pilgrimage in Buddhist cultures throughout the world. A stupa is an architectural rendering of the Buddhist path, the stages and aspects of enlightenment. When a great Buddhist teacher leaves his or her physical existence, the body that remains is considered to be permeated with the very essence of awakened mind, possessing tremendous intrinsic power and blessings. The appropriate vessel for containing these relics is a stupa. Through its design and contents, a stupa is regarded as having the power to transmit the essence of awakened mind, on the spot, to anyone ready to receive it.
Within the Tibetan tradition there are eight kinds of stupas representing eight major events in the life of the Buddha. The Tashi Gomang Stupa commemorates the Buddha’s first teachings in Benares (Varanasi) when he expounded the Four Noble Truths and the Twelve Links of Interdependence. These teachings reveal the truth of suffering, the cause of suffering and the skillful means to bring about the cessation of suffering (enlightenment).
The stupa itself is completely enclosed and contains many special objects inside. A depository of offerings was placed underneath it in tribute to the goddess of the earth and local deities. It was considered essential to ask their permission before construction could take place. The base, or throne of the stupa was filled with juniper which has special powers of purification. Treasure vases were placed in the juniper along with musical instruments, medicines, herbs, food, precious jewels, silks, brocades, perfumes, gold, and silver. Through the blessings of the stupa, these substances will work to bring good health, harmony, peace, and prosperity to its surroundings.
The stupa has been filled with 100,000 tsa-tsas (or miniature stupas) made by volunteers. Within each tsa-tsa is a roll of prayers, and mantras. The tsa-tsas were blessed and consecrated by visiting lamas before being placed inside the stupa. Also inside the stupa are earth, water, and stone from the eight great pilgrimage sites in India; wood from the Bodhi tree under which the Buddha attained enlightenment, water from a cave of Milarepa, and other sacred objects.
The tsok-shing or “life force” pole was placed in the center of the bell-shaped body of the stupa and reaches to the top of the spire. It was carved from a juniper tree into the shape of an obelisk, with a half dorje (vajra - thunderbolt) at the bottom and a small stupa at the top. Precious relics were placed in the life-force pole and then it was painted, inscribed in gold with the Buddha’s teachings, and wrapped in silks and brocades. It rests on two mandalas, also covered with offerings.
The statue of His Holiness the 16th Karmapa, wearing his Black Crown, was placed at the front of the stupa. Artisans in Nepal made the statue and its encasing niche and frame, as well as the ornamentation on top of the spire. The gold leaf finish and additional ornamentation was done on site in Baca Grande. Inside the statue is another tsok-shing, rolls of mantras, and relics from all sixteen Karmapas and other saints.
The Tashi Gomang Stupa embodies His Holiness the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa. In the words of H.H. Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche: “Within the stupa the teacher remains unchanging. The Buddha said that whoever sees the stupa will be liberated by the sight of it. Feeling the breeze around the stupa liberates by its touch. Having thus seen or experienced the stupa, by thinking of one’s experience of it, one is liberated through recollection. As our world increasingly adopts a secular and atheistic perspective in many domains of experience, pilgrimage, for many like myself, remains a potent force.
Again the guru said: Beings with inferior karma aim at the grandeur and vanity of this world and act with no thought of karmic ripening.
Future misery will endure much longer than that of the present, so feel motherly love and compassion for the beings of the three realms.
Keep constant company with the awakened mind of bodhichitta.
Forsake the ten nonvirtues and adopt the ten virtues.
Don’t regard any sentient being as your enemy: to do so is only your mind’s delusion. Don’t seek food and drink through lies and deceit. Though your belly will be full in this life, it will weigh heavy in the following.
Don’t get involved in business and making profits: in general, it is distracting for both yourself and others.
Attach no importance to wealth, because it is the enemy of meditation and Dharma practice.
Dwelling only on food is a cause of distraction: keep your meditation provisions sufficient merely to sustain yourself.
Don’t live in villages or areas which promote attachment and aversion. When your body is in seclusion your mind will be also.
Give up idle gossip and speak less. If you hurt another’s feelings, both of you create negative karma.
In general, all sentient beings without exception have been your parents, so don’t allow yourself to feel attached or hostile. Maintain a peaceful frame of mind.
Give up angry and harsh words; instead speak with a smiling face.
Your parents’ kindness cannot be repaid even if you sacrifice your life, so be respectful in thought, word, and deed.
Virtue and evil both come from perceived objects and companions, so don’t keep company with evildoers.
Don’t remain in a place where people are hostile towards you and which futhers anger and desire. If you do, it only increases disturbing emotions in yourself and others.
Stay where your state of mind is at ease and your Dharma practice will automatically progress. To remain in places of extreme attachment and aversion is only distracting. Stay where your Dharma practice develops.
If you become conceited, your virtues diminish, so give up being arrogant and haughty. If you become disappointed and disheartened, console yourself and be your own counsel. Re-embark on the path.
When you understand the faults of samsara, there is no teacher to seek apart from that. When you have taken impermanence to heart, there is no encouragement to depend upon apart from that. When you realize all that appears and exists to be your mind, there is no path of enlightenment apart from that.
When you have firm devotion to your master, there is no buddha to find apart from that. When you delight all sentient beings, there are no Three Jewels to worship apart from that. When you cut the basis and root of thought, there is no innate nature to meditate upon apart from that. When samsaric existence is freed in itself, there is no awakened state to accomplish apart from that. Once you realize this, samsara and nirvana are not two.
- Advice from the Lotus-Born Padmasambhava to the Dakini Yeshe Tsogyal
“ The native spirit Āḷavaka: “I will ask you a question, ascetic. If you don’t answer me, I’ll drive you insane, or explode your heart, or grab you by the feet and throw you to the far shore of the Ganges!”
Buddha: “I don’t see anyone in this world with its gods, Māras, and Brahmās, this population with its ascetics and brahmins, its gods and humans who could do that to me. But anyway, ask what you wish.”
“What’s a person’s best wealth?
What brings happiness when practiced well?
What’s the sweetest taste of all?
The one who they say has the best life: how do they live?”
“Faith here is a person’s best wealth.
The teaching brings happiness when practiced well.
Truth is the sweetest taste of all.
The one who they say has the best life lives by wisdom.”
“How do you cross the flood?
How do you cross the deluge?
How do you get over suffering?
How do you get purified?”
“By faith you cross the flood,
and by diligence the deluge.
By energy you get past suffering,
and you’re purified by wisdom.”
“How do you get wisdom?
How do you earn wealth?
How do you get a good reputation?
How do you hold on to friends?
How do the departed not grieve
when passing from this world to the next?”
"One who is diligent and discerning
gains wisdom by wanting to learn,
having faith in the perfected ones,
and the teaching for becoming extinguished.
Being responsible, acting appropriately,
and working hard you earn wealth.
Truthfulness wins you a good reputation.
You hold on to friends by giving.
That’s how the departed do not grieve
when passing from this world to the next.
A faithful householder
who has these four qualities
does not grieve after passing away:
truth, principle, steadfastness, and generosity.
Go ahead, ask others as well,
there are many ascetics and brahmins.
See whether anything better is found
than truth, self-control, generosity, and patience.”
“Why now would I question
the many ascetics and brahmins?
Today I understand
what’s good for the next life.
It was truly for my benefit
that the Buddha came to stay at Āḷavī.
Today I understand
where a gift is very fruitful.
I myself will journey village to village, town to town, paying homage to the Buddha, and the natural excellence of the teaching!”
