Tibetan Medicine: Studying in Dharamsala
Memories of studying Tibetan medicine and astrology in Dharamsala, India
In 1997 I packed my bags for Dharamsala, the home in exile of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, to study Tibetan medicine and astrology at the Medical and Astrological Institute. I didn’t fully know why I was going. I just knew I had to.
This episode isn’t a lecture. It’s stories: the people, the places, the moments that stayed with me for nearly thirty years. That includes a celebration I’ll never forget, and a gold ring and earrings made for me by a man who walked out of Tibet with His Holiness.
Sometimes spirit puts us exactly where we need to be, and we only see why years later. This is one of those journeys.
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Episode Transcript
My 1997 journey to Dharamsala to study Tibetan medicine and astrology at the Dalai Lama's Men-Tsee-Khang: stories, people and a celebration I'll never forget
I was having a conversation with my Mum the other day, and I said “Oh you know, I've led a very ordinary life,” and she started to laugh. She said, “Karen, you have done a lot of things so far in your life” a nd I went, “Oh, do you think so?” She said, “Think about it, girl.”
A couple of interesting things happened after that, I had to make a visit to the doctors (not my favourite) and it just so happens that this new doctor is from Dharamsala in India - and that got the memory flowing because back in 1997 I was in Dharamsala - and it was a very special, deeply spiritual trip.
It was the very first time. that Tibetan medicine. and astrology had ever been taught in English. Now it's actually a seven-year training program and it's an oral tradition, so no written down teachings. There was myself ,an environmental scientist from Germany And Dr. Bobby Rose from Palm Springs. and myself from Albury we were the only students who were not western medical doctors - the rest all were, and they hailed from Russia and all kinds of places throughout the world.
This isn’t a teaching on Tibetan medicine or astrology, rather it is the retelling of some of the beautiful memories I have from that journey nigh on thirty years ago. So here it is…
I was living in Wodonga at the time. And I woke up one morning and I just had this incredible burn - it was right there in my head that I needed to go and do some training to do with herbs. Partly, I was like, “Where the hell has this come from?”
But I headed off down to the travel agent. to see about a trip to the amazon or something like that …. nada. Anyway, I went home, and blow me over. with a feather, there on my fax machine is an announcement from the Tibetan monks in Melbourne about a course. that's happening at Men-Tsee-Khan in Dharamsala. It was exactly the thing, so obviously I called them for a chat, got myself booked into the course in India and then tootled off back to Wodonga Travel and booked my flights.
Of course I had no money to do this - but I followed the thread and to get the money ball building set up a Healing Retreat that my friend Alison and I ran in Mountain Creek in the Kiewa Valley. Some ladies came from Melbourne and that got things started in a number of ways.
My on was living with his Dad at that time and my brother and sister-in-law had my daughter for a month, I mean, that was major. I think it probably put them off having kids for a little while, but they were pretty amazing and supported me to go.
So in due course, I got on an airplane and flew to India.
I'd been involved with Tibetan Buddhism a little - I'd done meditation with the monks in Melbourne, and also studied the works of Alice Bailey who channelled a member of the White Brotherhood known as ‘The Tibetan’, so that's kind of how it came together. It felt like home.
Do excuse me if I jump around or get emotional as I speak about this. or me these are beautiful memories of a powerful journey of trust, and spirit and inspiration and courage and the power of the human spirit as it was demonstrated to me….
Snippets from the podcast;
I remember the smell as we went got off the aeroplane in Singapore. I would have been... five or six years old. And the smell hit me. And when I got off the plane in Delhi, in the middle of the night - Wham! It was the same kind of smell. It was... you know ,was the humidity. It was the heat and the tropics, it was unique and fabulous, and just a little bit scarey.
The hostel I stayed at .was basic, but it was clean and I was exhausted. The next morning I woke up to all these amazing sounds, you know, the sound of the city waking up.
I really wanted to go to the marketplace for some reason. My friend Alison had said to me, “Karen, do not go out without a scarf around you”. So of course I forgot the blasted scarf, didn't I. The lady at the hostel, she got a taxi driver to take me and I really wanted to go into this marketplace and experience it and he did not want to come with me but I insisted, so in the end he did come with me. When I went into the market, It was, well, I'd never been in a place where there were that many people. Just the mass of humanity was overwhelming. It was just like a sea of humanity; shoulder to shoulder, moving and loud and Wow! It was incredible actually. All the sounds and the languages and I remember this one moment where there was this opening, and there were some very serious looking people selling guns. like machine guns and everything. I saw this, one guy looked at me right in my face, and then the sea of people closed. It was gone and i turned and we walked away.
Next we went to the temple. I had to be dressed appropriately to do that, and the scarf was important for that.
The driver came with me to the temple but he wouldn't enter with me. It was actually a very special experience to go in and... I don't remember the name of the temple now, but I remember the sense of humbleness and insignificance of my own presence and my own life in that moment. You know, the the history, the age of that temple. Comparatively, I was such a tiny, minute dot on the planet. Know what I mean?That night I caught a bus to go up to Dharamsala. This was one hell of a rickety old bus, mate, I gotta tell you. Lucky I was young and stupid, I tell you, because I don't know that I'd be wanting to get on that bus now. But I just launched myself onto it. I was sat with a Tibetan guy who'd been at the hostel. He kind of looked after me. He sat with me on the bus. I think we only had two stops. That's all I remember. If there were others, I obviously slept through them. Straight. and then up. Anyway. He was just the most charming. gorgeous young man, chatted to me. He spoke about his family, about Dharamsala, asked about where I came from, all of those things. We stopped at this roadhouse for a toilet break. Oh my god. My first, um, adult experience of having to use one of those squat toilets and it was filthy - disgusting. Fortunately, I had thought ahead and I had, my own TP. So, no problems there. i was very careful about what I ordered to eat as well. We we're back on the bus in no time.
Up the mountain to Dharamsala now, and I'm on the outer edge of the bus. I'm on the the side of the bus where I can look down over the edge of the mountain, and down there I'm seeing vehicles that have fallen off the road.. Let’s just say that was a little bit interesting for me. So. I just took some deep breaths and turned to my fellow passenger and had a chat.
It was a full moon that night. Sensational sky. As we bumped along the rough ride, eventually I thought, “Oh, I'm going to bust.” and I started to hope for another roadhouse. Well we did have a stop, but it was in the middle of God knows where. My bus companion explained to me that I was going to have to go pee on the side of the hill. No roadhouse - no yucky toilet - just a bunch of total strangers all relieving ourselves under the bright light of the full moon in an open space by the side of the road. Every now and then when the moon is really bright I remember.
While I was taking care of business, that lovely young man bought me a chai from the little shanty on the side of the road. It was my first ever chai, and it was the yummiest, yummiest thing. Perhaps it was because I was thirsty, because of the moment, or the environment - probably a combination of all those things That was my first experience of chai.
I stayed in the fanciest of the two hotels on offer and had to walk a couple of kilometres down the mountain on a dirt road. to get to Men-Tsee-Khan each day for class. There was a five day basic course and then a 10-day advanced training as well as a five day one on the Tibetan astrology if memory serves. We were being taught. in English, and they'd never done that before. It was so wonderful to hear about the amazing healing practices that the Tibetan doctors, their unique forms of diagnosis. Incredible. I wrote copious notes.
I had the incredible privilege of spending some time in conversation with His Holiness' personal physician. He was of course one of our lecturers. He taught us in Tibetan and one of the other doctors translated into English for us. During the conversation I mentioned, he actually did the seven wondrous pulses. on me - to diagnose my mother. He blew me away.
Also, urine analysis. - how it bubbles, the colour, the smell. the taste, all sorts of things it was absolutely fascinating - a very ancient system, and really, totally spot on.
Tibetan Medicine has a real strong spiritual connection too. Traditionally there is this whole thing about spirits, including evil or troublesome spirits that is part of it as well. Of course me being me, I did ask the difficult questions and I think that the doctors who were doing the lecturing. were a little shocked by some of my questions. Given it was the first time they'd ever done the training, they were a little on the back foot and answered, so I got the answers I needed. I would imagine. that. After that, they probably would have skirted those kinds of questions because it may have caused some skepticism for some of the western medical doctors that were present for the studies.
As the conversations continued over those evenings in the hotel restaurant, I mentioned to my Tibetan conversationalists that I'd love to get that golden beryl Id brought with me from home, that I'd love to get it set. in you know, some kind of jewellery setting, and did they know where I could go? Holy Magoli! had I hit gold - literally - I got put onto one of the. women who worked at this hotel who, it must have been her. a relative of hers I can't remember if it was her father or her grandfather -might have been her father. He was a jeweller, and he came out with His Holiness in that first trip over the mountains when His Holiness came from Tibet. So... we chatted and she took me. We made a day and a time and she took me out of town and I found myself following her up the mountainside - through scattered dwellings where the Tibetan people were living in a pretty basic way. What an amazing man. I showed him the stone for the ring, and I had the garnets with me. There was a gentle discussion, no negotiation - just respect. This was someone special, gifted, real, and honourable. I felt it. He said he would do it the traditional way. The beauty of meeting this gentleman, feeling so honoured to have met him, to see the exquisite nature of his work. It was such a gift to be able to have that experience.
I do believe that this stone, and this whole Tibetan thing, it streamed something together for me that I can't really put my finger on. One of the things that happens with people who, (and I've only discovered this relatively recently actually) one of the health conditions that happens with people who work in trance alot, so with mediumship and channeling, (if you want to call it that) there can often be a blood sugar issue. Diabetes can sometimes become a problem because something happens when you drop down into trance and then you're coming out - you know, up and down alot - there's this shift in the blood sugar that can become a bit problematic. There's a bit of research that's been done on it. Of course, when I first started working as a clinical hypnotist, I had no idea that most people. who do that work do not go into trance, that they use scripts. I didn't know that. I just did what I did and would drop into a trance state. and get the client into trance…I think I actually needed something. to support my system for the work that I was yet to do at that time. I didn't start doing trance work until many, many years later, I was probably. I was in my early 40s then when I started doing that work. And so this is... this trip was quite a long time before then so to me there's a real connection with that, plus my studies with the Tibetan. Anyway that's me just sort of putting some threads together retrospectively.
Now the Tibetan astrology If you're interested in that, Men-Tsee-Khan does actually publish a yearly Tibetan almanac, which you might be interested in in looking at. Also there is a strong link with Tibetan medicine and Tibetan astrology so the times that the medicines are made up, when they're taken, all that kind of thing, it's all together.
Now, the other thing that I wanted to share with you was perhaps one of the most amazing and moving experiences from that trip - something that demonstrated the power of the people, their heart and spirit. So. I'll just speak about it.
Tune in to the video or audio if you’re interested in knowing more. Im a bit over the typing at this point :)
Much love.
Karen xxx