Northwest Dharma Celebration

NWDC 2025 ~ Profound Wisdom

March 21-23, 2025

Where: Kadampa Meditation Center Washington in Seattle, WA

Dates: March 21-23, 2025

The Northwest Dharma Celebration is a special opportunity for people from all over the Northwest to gather together as a spiritual community to receive empowerments, Dharma teachings, and to spend time with Sangha. This annual event was created by Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche, founder of the New Kadampa Tradition – International Kadampa Buddhist Union, to foster our spiritual growth and the growth of Dharma throughout our broad region.

Profound Wisdom

The Blessing Empowerment of Wisdom Buddha Manjushri
With essential teachings from How to Understand the Mind
With Western US National Spiritual Director Gen Kelsang Demo

Our world needs wisdom. When our actions are informed by wisdom, we make the world a better place. The truth is, there’s nothing that doesn’t get better with more wisdom - we take better care of our body, our family, our community, and our planet. Join us for a weekend devoted to wisdom!

What will we do? We'll receive teachings and blessings, spend time with our regional Sangha community, and meditate together. Gen Kelsang Demo, our National Spiritual Director, will give the blessing Empowerment of the Wisdom Buddha, Manjushri, and provide insightful commentary on the Sadhana, Treasury of Wisdom combined with teachings from How to Understand the Mind.

About the empowerment

The empowerment ceremony is a blissful guided meditation transmitted over centuries, that draws us into the clear wisdom energy of the enlightened mind itself. When we open ourself to receiving Manjushri’s blessings, our mind is empowered to experience the truth of how things exist, providing methods and solutions for solving our inner problems of worry, fear, anger or the sense of hopelessness. Wisdom is a special type of virtuous intelligence that helps us to understand what ways of thinking are beneficial, and which are counterproductive.

About How to Understand the Mind

Gen Demo will give essential teachings from Geshe Kelsang Gyatso's book, How to Understand the Mind. This book is an extraordinary exploration of the mind and its myriad mental factors. With a deeper understanding of our mind, we are empowered to control and transform our mind, leading to lasting joy independent of external conditions.

Schedule