EC Blog Archive for the ‘About the EC’ Category

A place like the EC with all its local and international projects, frequent events and unceasing flow of guests can be a complex thing to navigate organization-wise. Throughout the 4,5 years of building it up many different teams and working groups established to keep the EC not only running but foremost inspiring and home-like for many friends from around the world.

Last weekend, the team leaders and representatives of the different EC teams met under Michael’s guidance to take look at how our work is organized and what could be improved. After an introduction into the latest knowledge on the subject we proceeded with mapping all our groups, their roles and how they interact with each other. The following presentations of each teams’ maps resulted into insights and action plans to be used as a basis for further development of how we do things here. We aim, as in all our centers, for the leanest organization possible – after all, it is only a tool on our way of human development towards liberation and ultimately enlightenment for the benefit of all.

Britta, Pit & Martin

By Martin

Life at the EC is fast – and Lama Ole is even faster.

In less than 24 hours, he arrived home after touring the Channel countries – just to repack the bags and drive off for a weekend course in Switzerland and afterwards the Americas tour starting in Canada next week.

The packing frenzy did not stop the Lama from guiding the morning meditation for the EC sangha, praising our gompa in the villa: “This is a very powerful, very blessed place!”

By meike

Autumn mornings in Allgäu frequently transform the surroundings of our EC into a magical mystery fairy tale wonderland…. we wanted to share some impressions. Enjoy!

By meike

Last week Lama Ole arrived for some project days at the EC after giving lectures in Hungary and the Czech Republic for as many as 2000 people in Budapest.

Upon arrival he surprised the EC sangha with a spontaneous session of questions and answers in the Diamond Room gompa – and afterwards joined a movie night for the benefit of moreEC.

Lama Ole and a film team spent the first project day recalling the decades of bringing Diamond Way Buddhism from Tibet to the West, filming a documentary movie about his wife Hannah Nydahl. In between he was photographed for a book of portrait pictures of Diamond Way practitioners that will be sold for the moreEC campaign.

As usual during his work days at the EC, emails by Lama Ole’s students were answered and project meetings took place. Also, a letter to all his students was written that will be sent out to the worldwide sangha soon.

Another interview was filmed on the villa’s terrace overviewing the Great Alpsee lake on the third project day. This material will be used to inform about Lama Ole’s book “Buddha and Love” in several countries, especially the USA, where the long-awaited English translation is going to be published soon.

After climbing one of the highest trees surrounding the EC, Lama Ole and Caty rounded off the last project day by meeting and meditating with the EC sangha and guests. On Friday morning after blessing a newlywed couple, it was time to say goodbye for now with the Lama leaving for the annual German center meeting in Braunschweig on Friday.

Time and again, Lama Ole´s project days give an insight into the tremendous amounts of work he does joyfully every day for the benefit of all beings.

By meike

Only a week after Lama Ole finished a tour of the Nordic countries, many Danes, Finns, Norwegians, and Swedes made their way down to Bavaria to meet again – this time at the EC for the Nordic Country Weekend.

The weather could not have been more welcoming to the Vikings –  icy temperatures at night and warm sunshine with bright blue autumn skies all day long. The perfect setting for the Finnish “Outside adventure”, which saw brilliant performances in disciplines like wheelbarrow races.

For the sanghas of the North, it was a nice opportunity to come together, get to know each other, and focus on the exchange of experiences. Denmark is going to celebrate 40 years of Buddhism in the West next year – we learned a lot about the roots of Buddhism in Western Europe this weekend.

Following the wishes of their teacher, H.H. the 16th Karmapa, Lama Ole and his wife Hannah started one of the first Buddhist Centers in the West in their hometown of Copenhagen in the beginning of the 1970s, after returning from meditating and studying Buddhism for years in the East. Karmapa visited the North for the first time in 1974. Leif Andersen, a contemporary witness and international traveling teacher today, shared lots of inspiring memories and showed pictures from these times. Diamond Way Buddhism in the West started in Skandinavia and Graz – with over 600 centers around the world today.

Rounding up an evening of questions and answers with traveling teachers from all present Nordic countries, the Baucafé saw a very joyful party at night – viking style, of course! This did not stop anyone from showing very informative presentations and telling about the ongoings in their home sanghas on Sunday. Even the very young Icelandic sangha sent greetings and a portrait of their meditation group in Reykjavik via video.

It was certainly a weekend of many new friendships and connections – with lots of fun and tasty regional specialities in and in between the lectures and meetings. Inspired by this weekend, the next and from now on annual meeting of the Nordic sanghas was already fixed for next year in Sweden.

By meike

Last weekend we had a wonderful experience here at the Europe Center. It was a bit rainy and cold, so we were more than happy to stay inside for a weekend, eager to learn about the masters and mistresses of the Karma Kagyu lineage.

Manfred Seegers kicked off the weekend with the opening lecture. He explained buddhist terminology and told us that at the end of the packed weekend, we should understand what “Kagyu” means, and if not we would need to start again!

On Saturday morning Kerstin Seifert gave the first of two sessions entitled “Indian and Tibetan origins of our lineage”, and gave us an insight into many of the un-named great female masters of the lineage and of what it might have been like to be Buddhist at that time.

Manfred continued in the afternoon, taking us over the mountains from Indian to Tibet and into the time of the Karmapas. On Saturday evening Kerstin and Manfred were joined by Detlev Goebel from “Buddhism Today” for a question and answer session – with a brief interruption in proceedings for the EC to be connected to Poland, Latvia and other countries for a MoreEC evening via live streaming.

On Sunday the amazing duo concluded the weekend with explanations on the meaning of Guru Yoga practice on the 16th Karmapa and its use through our foundational practices. The perfect end to a wonderfully inspiring weekend!

By cristina

The dedicated work of the past summer months by the EC roof team is coming to an end – half of the new villa’s roof is almost finished and shining. For the other half, which is to be retiled in 2012, we need your wishes!

As you might know by now – it is not “just” a solid new roof. Our EC villa will be covered by your wishes for the benefit of all. All the wishes already made during and around the summer course are now on the roof – thanks to our professional roof expert Edwin and his team, not a single one of them broke in the tiling process. The wishes of our precious teachers like Shamar Rinpoche, Sherab Gyaltsen Rinpoche, Lama Toensang and Lama Ole Nydahl were already placed on the very top of the roof in the middle.

You can buy tiles to write your individual wishes or those of your home sangha directly at the EC when you come or you send them to us by mail and we write them on a tile in your name. All money is collected exclusively for moreEC.

A roof tile with your individual wishes:
suggested donation: 2 Euros or more

An edge roof tile for Diamond Way Buddhist Centers, groups and sanghas:
suggested donation: 108 Euros or more
Of course you can buy as many as you like individually or as a center/group.

It’s easy to place your roof tile order:
1) Write down your wishes
2) Send a mail with your group’s or center’s complete contact information, amount of tiles and your wishes to Frauke: moreroof@yahoo.de
2) Please transfer the money to the respective national accounts with the listed here and write only “Spende Europazentrum” as the reason for payment.

And last but not least  – please don’t forget to come as soon as you can to spend some time under a roof that is being built to last longer than 100 years and consists of your wishes.

By meike

In case you think we’re blogging a little bit much about tree climbing at the moment… we agree and promise to stop after this post – at least for a while.

However, the view we had last weekend from the old spruce behind the Baucafé is something we definitely want to share! Equipped with professional climbing gear and well-secured thanks to the expertise of Jürgen and JC, we made our way up the huge tree – it is something close to 40m in height. So hopefully you enjoy the view as much as we did!

By meike

An apple a day keeps the doctor away, as they say…

Well, it was a few more than just one apple that we shook and picked from the trees in the courtyard today – it was literally raining apples! Turns out there were so many this year that we now have 200 liters of tasty, EC grown apple juice for you to enjoy here. Or take a 5 or 10 l pack home to your friends! Please just ask us before we run out.

By meike

With Shamar Rinpoche, Sherab Gyaltsen Rinpoche, and Lama Ole teaching thousands of students in Southern Germany, Salzburg, Hamburg and Frankfurt during the last weeks, we had some unusually quiet days at the EC.

Those of us who stayed used the time to focus on meditation, work, spending quality time with friends and family and listening to the live streamings from the courses. The golden Allgäu autumn with still summer-like temperatures and lots of sunshine gave the perfect setting for that. Some brave ones are even still going for daily swims in the Alpsee lake!

Susan and Chris from Calgary in Canada gave us an insight on Diamond Way Buddhism in Canada,  sharing some inspiring photos and stories from past and present. They came to visit the EC, along with a dozen of other friends from different parts of the world after the Salzburg course.

Slowly the focus is shifting to getting the EC ready for winter. The first snow already fell on the neighbouring mountains – or was that the last snow of the past season? So we will shake and climb the apple trees in the yard, make our famous EC apple juice, and engage in some extensive fire wood chopping this weekend. Come and join if you like, all help is welcome to get our home winter-ready.

The more quiet times will be over again soon anyway. Coming up are the Transmission Weekend about the Kagyu Masters of the Mahamudra transmission lineage as well as the Nordic Country Weekend. If you would like to come for one of these events, please register here.

By meike