In 1994, the year of the wooden dog, I had not yet been touched by the Buddha Dharma, yet I was already benefiting from the arrival in Brazil of His Eminence Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche.
In just over seven years in Brazil, Chagdud Rinpoche established the Chagdud Gonpa Brasil, a Vajrayana Buddhist Centre, in the Niyngma Lineage. His tireless work flourished, and Chagdud Rinpoche ordained some Brazilian Lamas, among them Lama Padma Samten, who founded the CEBB (Center for Bodhisattva Buddhist Studies), and by the blessings of the Buddhas Lama Samten invited Lama Alan Wallace to teach in Brazil, so in 2011 I did my first shamatha retreat with Lama Alan. The impression that such a contact caused me was so strong to the point of arising the aspiration to become his student, which at that time seemed something extremely distant to me. But now the fact is that I am here, a little over ten years later, in long-term retreat at Miyo Samten Ling.
What I want to say is that there is no personal history, but interdependence. I’m an ordinary person, but the presence of beings like Lama Alan allows me to adopt uncommon actions, which brought me to this moment in which I join a project, which is not personal either, but of several beings motivated by the benefit of many other beings. Wonderful! —Ana Paula Nicolodi D Almeida, artist and astrologer
