Updated September 22nd.
A group of Tibetan monks from India are in the middle of a weeklong visit to the Island, where they are carefully constructing a small, square medicine sand mandala, as well as communing with Islanders and blessing the entire community.
Against the backdrop of a working farm in Edgartown on Tuesday, the maroon robes of the visiting Tibetan monks weaved through gardens and into the Slough Farm residency building. Their hands were often clasped or against their sides, their faces calm, and their laughs reverberated through the rafters of the large dining room in their home base at the farm.
The group of monks came to the Island at the request of a local resident, Rachel Elion Baird, to give their blessing, spread a message of compassion, and hold peace talks. They were also invited to help locals heal from tick-borne illnesses, which have hit the community hard this summer and in recent years.
“She wanted us to come here to do the blessings for the animals, for the ticks, and especially to bless the whole Island,” Geshe Phuntsho, a healer, ritual leader, and monk said in an interview with The Times. “I try to travel so I can make an impact in the lives of every being.”
This is his first time on the Island, but Phuntsho has known Baird for more than 25 years. They met in Vermont — Baird hosted the monks for a similar healing, and they’ve been in touch ever since. When Baird witnessed the struggles with tick-borne illnesses in her friends and fellow Islanders, she reached out to Phuntsho and Slough Farm, and organized the visit in an attempt to provide energetic medicine to locals and protect them from future harm.
“The imbalance for us to have so much Lyme, we need a little more medicine,” Baird said. “I think we live in dread of getting bit.”
The sand mandala the monks are creating is part of the medicine blessing, and the monks will also be traveling through the towns, speaking prayers and sacred chants with the intent of healing this aspect of Island life.
Phuntsho is also offering individual blessings to Islanders who sign up. Baird said the monks are not only on the Island to heal, but to empower. The contentment that the monks hold through all of life’s twists and turns resonated with her, and she hopes people will be able to access a deeper understanding and connection with one another through their presence.
“For us, it’s wherever you are that’s the best place,” Phuntsho said. “To spread love, kindness, compassion. To bless and send the energy — that’s what this life is all about.”
Phuntsho is from a small country in the Himalayas, and after learning Buddhist philosophy, he traveled to India to further his studies, then became a monk at age 21. When he’s not traversing the world to spread a message of peace, Phuntsho practices in the Gaden Shartse Monastery, where he’s lived for 36 years.
“The whole purpose of being a monk is being in service to the world or humanity,” Phuntsho said.
Since being on the Vineyard, Phuntsho said, he sees the natural beauty as similar to the monastery he lives in. He said it’s important to have gratitude for that inherent wealth of nature, and create an inner world that reflects it.
“I see … people who live here, on this Island, as very fortunate,” Phuntsho said as he smiled. “It’s clean, it’s kind of still untouched by the crazy, materialistic world.”
The medicine sand mandala — called a Menla — was created in the horse farm on the Slough property as Phuntsho conducted sacred blessings in the residency hall.
On Tuesday, monk Surya Bisht used metal tools filled with brightly colored sand to create intricate designs. He and a few others from the monastery work on the mandala for 11 to 12 hours a day, and the medicine mandala will take them five days in total to complete.
In his process, Bisht filled the metal tool with sand and rubbed another metal piece against it so the sand fell softly and slowly onto a table where the work is being displayed. He lowered his face closely to be sure the design was precise. Each small section takes the monks hours to create — from bright blue snakes to orange sun emblems — and the parts fit into the whole as a vibrant piece. When it’s finished, the mandala will be wiped away in ceremony, the art dispersed and held only in photographic and personal memory.
Phuntsho said he’s here to bring blessings, but that it’s up to the people who live here to bring lasting happiness to one another. According to his teachings, individuals can bring more healing to themselves and their community by cultivating compassion and developing inner strength.
Practices are what we are left with in the end, he said. People pass, times change, landscapes are eroded by wind and waves, but the beliefs held by each individual — whether positive or negative — remain through those rises and falls. Addressing those beliefs and cultivating kindness in the place of discontent can lead to great healing, he said.
“You may have wealth, you may have power, strength, looks, background, or anything. Down the line, it will cease away, one after the other. The spiritual practice will be the only one with you,” Phuntsho said. “Every place is the same place, but you make either heaven or hell out of it. You create the Island as a divine place.”
