Well, I don't remember exactly how many years ago since Lama Namgyal and I met. But that's not important. Our relationship gets deeper genuinely, every year. I believe that human relationships, especially the positive ones, should grow and get deeper and more genuine as time goes by. This would be a great support for one's own life.

Even though we Buddhists love to say that samsara is suffering, life is short and everything is impermanent and so on so forth, we should nurture and keep positive and warm relationships with other human beings, with other living beings, trees, flowers, everything in this universe. Genuine spiritual life can be very lonely if you don't have support from friends and beings who are there constantly to keep you on track. Life can be very miserable, especially if you see what's happening in our world today, if you don't have moral support from people, beings and things around you. But this kind of support is a reciprocal relationship, sometimes you reach out first, sometimes when others reach out, you are supposed to reach back too. As I always say, we don't live in this world or in this universe, alone by ourselves, everything is relatively true and interdependent on each other. Even if you are the most powerful person on this earth, without others living with you, what are you going to do with your power?

Whenever people think about Lama Namgyal's devotion to his own gurus, they really feel that he is very special. In fact, this is the case for me too. Whenever I think about Lama Chokyi Sengey and Lama Namgyal, I feel that they are very special, in the way they keep their positive and loving connection with their gurus and help their gurus' activities to grow without second thoughts, without any doubt. I really wish I have students, or rather disciples, like them. While many people complain to me that it's so difficult to find a genuine guru to guide them, I can tell you from a guru's point of view, "It's so difficult to find genuine students who wish to be guided." People these days have a lot of doubts and many conditions when it comes to "gurus". I am not saying that they cannot have doubts, of course in this world, everyone has the right to have doubts, to have fun and to do whatever they want. What I mean is that people change their mind ever so quickly. Most people live their entire life shopping for gurus based on popularity, the number of followers, the number of centres, and they sometimes become collectors of gurus. Is this going to be beneficial? Some rate the gurus by how much the gurus follow them or agree with them. If gurus don't follow their wishes, then gurus are not genuine, they are not caring and they are not powerful to help. So you see, people like me will soon be out of job. Fortunately, there are still people like Lama Namgyal around to give us some work to do.

I am the sort of person who loves to talk to people and communicate with people. I have met so many people who criticise their own gurus and I usually feel quite funny hearing them complain about their ex-gurus to me. This is something that I have never heard from Lama Chokyi Sengey and Lama Namgyal. For instance, they were serving one of their late gurus, Bokar Rinpoche, with one pointed devotion throughout Rinpoche's entire life and even now, after Rinpoche's parinirvana, they are still doing their best to continue to serve their guru with their best skills that they can think of. In fact, due to their genuine devotion, they always have wonderful things to talk about their experiences with all of their gurus and about their retreats of three years and more. When one gets the true message of the teachings, one starts to have very easy approach to all the root gurus and lineages that he or she is related with. There is also one thing that a guru needs to be careful in terms of guiding the followers and he or she ought to be skillful to lead the fresh and innocent followers who have a lot of confidence and hope in the guru. As gurus, we should not always blame the followers for acting strangely, we should try our best to help them with skills so that they will correct their strange acts.

Speaking about Lama Chokyi Sengey, I just left him and his group in Avignon. They gave me such a warm hospitality that I am still feeling the warmth and love. In fact, it was very difficult for Lama Chokyi Sengey's centre to accommodate so many people for the public talk and the teachings, they had to turn some people away due to the limited space. Everybody was surprised that many people turned up for my modest presence this time. I think it was because of the genuine connection I had with Bokar Rinpoche, Lama Chokyi Sengey, Lama Namgyal and all other students and members of the late Rinpoche.

The late Bokar Rinpoche and I were receiving highest Tantric teachings from one of the most prominent yogis and abbots of the last century, Khenpo Noryang Rinpoche. We were together with the great Khenpo Noryang of Drukpa Zigar Monastery for a long time, and we treated each other warmly with mutual understanding and support. I can still remember that we often discussed about many parts of the different Tantric practices and found many similarities in our individual practices.

I just want to take some extra time to talk about choosing your guru. Before you commit yourself to a guru, it is really your own responsibility to check him or her inside out, thoroughly, it is your right. Once committed, it's better to follow and this makes your own life a lot easier, less confusion, that is of course if you've found yourself a genuine guru. Most people are blaming their ex-gurus for many strange things, but first of all, you must ask yourself what were the conditions or expectations you had when you took this person as a guru. Was it because you were attracted to him or her physically? Or was it because you were influenced by what other people told you? You are choosing your guru, so you must be cautious and take some time to examine. That's why for me, I have a lot of friends, I don't have that many students or disciples, because firstly it takes me at least 12 years to check and secondly, most people quit before the "probationary period". Maybe that's not too bad news for me, less dropouts from the senior followers.

I want to tell you a little about Chantal who is here with me. I would call Chantal, Lama Namgyal's partner, my Dharma sister, rather than my student, even though she may call herself "student", I won't object to that. As you know, one of my gurus is His Holiness the late Pawo Rinpoche who was also Chantal's guru. She was of course very devoted to His Holiness Pawo Rinpoche and because of that, she "inherited" a lot of his qualities, such as humility in practice, strength in devotion, ability to develop concentration in meditation, loving in all relationships and many other positive qualities. She is in fact doing a lot of things that I request Lama Namgyal to do for me as a favour, but she never comes out to show off. It is a sign of genuine love towards Lama Namgyal and true devotion to the Dharma. What a rare and great quality it is! Whenever I meet her, she reminds me so much of the great qualities of my own gurus, especially of His Holiness the late Pawo Rinpoche. Homage to my beloved gurus and their teachings!

Anyway, I don't want to bore you too much with my gossips. I want to rest and have some walk around and visit the hut where Lama Namgyal and Chantal or Drolkar did a lot of practices, especially Guru Kilaya, very successfully. I am indeed very proud of myself being able to come here. Lama Namgyal was extremely kind to arrange for a BMW to drive me up here, although I actually did not expect anything like this at all. Lama Namgyal wanted to offer me the best from his genuine heart of devotion, which makes me feel very special of him. It's not the luxurious car and comfort that matter to me, it's the heart of sincerity and the efforts that Lama Namgyal makes that really touches my heart. Usually this is true for me with any of my students. No wonder it is said that devotion is everything for the practice.

By the way, I have been receiving very encouraging emails from so many people, asking me to keep writing more on the web and share my views. I hope this is helpful. If news like this is becoming too much to take, let me know, I would be more than delighted to write less.