Impermanence
Every community evolves, and ours is no different. Impermanence reminds us that change is not a disruption but a natural part of growth. This month’s newsletter gathers the transitions, initiatives and opportunities that are emerging within Tergar South Africa.
Let's meet these shifts with the same curiosity and warmth we bring to our practice; noticing what arises, what passes, and what opens.
With many thanks for all the contributions❤️
Lama Tashi
Last weekend, community members who attended the Path of Liberation 1 & 2 teachings with Mingyur Rinpoche in Cape Town in 2025 were fortunate to join an online reunion with Lama Tashi. From Australia, he shared his wisdom with us, teaching from midnight until three in the morning his time.
He offered a deep and profound teaching, delivered with a light and gentle touch. He encouraged us to engage sincerely with the practice, to stay aware of our intention and motivation, and to bring awareness into everything we do.
“You don’t have to be good, you have to be genuine,” he said, and he embodied this fully. A deep bow to a truly inspiring and authentic teacher. 🙏
Below is a reflection from one of the participants:
" Attending this past weekend’s teachings with Lama Tashi helped answer a number of questions around issues I have been experiencing on my own ongoing journey of applied practice.
Kindness towards oneself was a large message for me personally. His sharing on the Four Thoughts had me reflecting on my tendency to take on too much, which can lead to overworking myself in an attempt to meet the expectations of others, or my own.
His words of encouragement to rest the body, especially when the mind is trapped in negative tendencies, really spoke to me, because my past tendency has always been one of pushing through.
His words on the importance of developing a sense of gratitude towards recognising these tendencies with love and compassion helped almost immediately to dissolve the cycle of those habits — though I know this is part of the practice: to do that again and again, to the point that, in his words, “a patch is removed.”
I am deeply grateful for these teachings and look forward to applying what he shared."
Paul Boyter
With heartfelt gratitude to Lama Tashi for the opportunity to receive these teachings online, and to the organisers and facilitators whose quiet dedication made this precious gathering possible.
A call to support those affected in Nepal and Tibet
In response to the devastating floods and landslides in Nepal, Tergar Edinburgh invites Tergar meditation groups and practice communities around the world to come together and join them in creating a 24-hour global silent meditation practice for Nepal and Tibet, in solidarity with all those affected.
Tergar communities around the world are invited to take responsibility for one or more one-hour shifts, with members of the community joining the Zoom and sitting together in silence during their allocated hour.
When: Saturday 26 – Sunday 27 September 2026
Hosted by: Tergar Edinburgh
Allocated hours for Tergar South Africa:
Saturday 26 September: 09:00 - 10.00, Sunday 27 September 06:00 - 07:00
The practice would be dedicated to everyone affected by the disaster — those who have lost their lives, those who are missing, those who have lost homes and livelihoods, and all those involved in rescue, relief and recovery.
The Zoom link will be shared via our social media and WhatsApp groups.
Innate Wellbeing Program
From 28 July - 27 August the Innate Wellbeing program was introduced by Alex Kunkhyen as Community Wellness at The Commons in Muizenberg (Cape Town)
People who followed this meditation program were individual people living locally who already wanted to meditate and had no in-person place to do this. We asked some of the participants to share their experience with us:
" Kunkhyen held a wonderfully light yet grounded and focused program. As someone new to meditation circles, I walked away with much to be grateful for. Thank you Kunkhyen and Team Tergar."
Hein Langner
" I attended Kunkhyen meditation classes in July and August at the Commons in Muizenberg. My main motivation was to accompany my son who has had some stressful life events during the last few months. I was pleasantly surprised. I have attended numerous meditation classes and retreats over the last 27 years. Kunkhyen reached out with simplicity and focussed on making the teachings accessible to those new to dharma teachings and old timers like myself. Kunkhyen has special qualities in relating to people and has become a much loved teacher. I will highly recommend his classes."
Lilly Teggin
" I recently completed the Innate Wellbeing meditation program at The Commons in Muizenberg, led by Monk Kunkhyen, and I'm truly grateful for the gift it's given me. What stood out most was Kunkhyen's gentle approach — he took real time to explain how to sit with environmental noise (the train passing, voices and music from the bar next door) rather than trying to block it out. That's the opposite of how most people picture meditation, which is exactly why so many find it difficult. Learning to just let sound be there, instead of fighting it, changed how I approach practice completely. The short peer-to-peer discussions in each session were unexpectedly powerful too — often surprisingly revealing, and a real part of what made the sessions land.
This program reopened something for me. It inspired me to go deeper into Mingyur Rinpoche's teachings and I will soon be leading meditation sessions at The Commons myself when Kunkhyen isn't there. Can't recommend this program enough if you're looking for a real, grounded introduction to meditation."
Jaco du Plooy
Continuation of the Innate Wellbeing Series
The Innate Wellbeing series, originally led by Alex Kunkhyen, will now continue until the end of the year. Kunkhyen has returned to Nepal and has handed over the series to Adam Salmon, who will be leading these sessions for the next six weeks. Thereafter, Jaco du Plooy and Jean van der Mescht will hold the space.
Please note the new time slots below:
Community Meditation at The Commons, Muizenberg
Tuesdays: 18:15 – 19:15
Thursdays: 10:00 – 11:00
Whether you’re new to meditation or a seasoned practitioner, you’re warmly welcome. This is a chance to pause, drop in, and reconnect — with yourself and with others.
By donation. Everyone welcome. 🙌 Come for one session, or come to every one. Please share this with anyone who might need it 🙏
And as before, please feel free to stay afterwards for warm cacao or jasmine tea from The Commons Café.
Included in the program was the Community Practice Morning on Sunday 2 August. Community Practice Mornings or Days are organised more often in Cape Town. Please keep an eye on our social media to stay up to date! We share with you one of the participants experience:
" I love these Community Practice Days! This was the fourth or fifth one I've attended and I look forward to going to more. It's a real treat to spend the day so close to the ocean and the bustle of everyday life while stepping into a calm and peaceful space to meditate together as a group. It's always wonderful to see both familiar and new faces, and the break halfway is the perfect opportunity to grab a warm drink, get some fresh air and chat with others while enjoying the beautiful views. I am so grateful to everyone at SA Tergar who come together to make these days possible."
Jessica Nurick
Meditation Teacher Program by Mingyur Rinpoche
The Meditation Teacher Program (MTP) is an online course, led by senior Tergar faculty under the direct guidance of Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche. Participants learn to teach meditation using the approach of Mingyur Rinpoche and receive direct support from distinguished faculty and guest speakers, including scientists, Buddhist scholars, teaching experts, and experienced meditation teachers.
Last year 533 students took part in the teacher program, located in 69 countries across the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. They all graduated last month August.
Within Tergar South Africa we are grateful to anounce and very proud that four of our community members were part of this graduation: Janni Younge, Alex Kunkhyen and Luke Younge based in Cape Town and Angelic Pieplenbosch, based in Johannesburg. Congratulations for all of you! 🙌❤️
Upon their successful completion of the MTP, they all received a Certificate of Completion issued by Tergar International and have become a Tergar Certified Anytime Anywhere Meditation Teacher (TCAAMT). This means that they all have gained certification to teach introductory meditation programs and the Anytime Anywhere Meditation program (AAM) using Tergar’s secular meditation framework. No need to tell this is a great asset for our community in South Africa!
We asked Janni to share her experience with the MTP over the year:
How do you look back at the Meditation Teacher Program?
“Participating in the Meditation Teacher Program over the past year has been an extraordinary privilege. Under the guidance of my tutor Maya Sepulchre, it has been an extremely enriching experience, both in terms of learning to teach and in deepening my own personal practice. These two things have felt completely intertwined.
The most profound learning for me has been developing a real and increasingly consistent contact with the view: with awareness, love and compassion, and wisdom as innate qualities that underlie our experience of being human. The course has continually asked me not only to understand these as ideas, but to find their visibility in my own life and experience as qualities that underlie everything I experience. The course has guided me to explore how to communicate from that understanding, how to leave space or ask questions or offer a creative space in which we can experience that everything is imbued with this innate goodness. It is present in how we breathe, think, feel, relate to others, and move through the world.
In this sense, I feel I have been learning not simply how to teach meditation, but how to come from the view in approaching others: to trust that these qualities are present, and to learn how to speak to that part of another person.
The personal, reflective and experiential qualities that are so present throughout Tergar’s approach to teaching meditation really shine through the MTP. We are continually called to identify areas of life where the teachings can become personally relevant, and to learn how to ask questions that invite participants to engage with the meditation material consistently in their daily lives. At the same time, the program has encouraged us to develop our own vision of where and how meditation might be of genuine benefit within our communities and in the wider world.
What a deep source of joy this has been for me over the past year. I will miss being in the program but also I am excited about what it has made available and the motivation and capacity to make meditation available in our world.”
Janni Younge
We are also grateful to share that two other community members are accepted for participating in the next MTP program, starting September 14 this year: Paul Boyter based in Johannesburg and Jenny Canau based in Cape Town. We wish them a beautiful and inspiring year ahead 🙏
From the Board
Dear community members and friends,
With warmth and deep appreciation, the Board of Tergar South Africa would like to share the following message from Kunkhyen regarding his and Julian Ozanne’s decision to step back from their current leadership roles.
Both Kunkhyen and Julian have served this community with dedication, sincerity, and care. Their contribution has helped shape Tergar South Africa in profound and lasting ways; through practice, teaching, organisational development, outreach, and the steady work of building a sangha rooted in Rinpoche’s vision.
Moments of transition naturally bring reflection, gratitude, and change. As a board, we wish to honour the service that Kunkhyen and Julian have offered, and to express our heartfelt thanks for the many ways they have helped this community grow. We are also committed to supporting a thoughtful and careful handover, so that the work of Tergar South Africa can continue with stability, openness, and care.
With gratitude,
Ilonka Pieplenbosch, Michele Harvey and Luke Younge
A Message to Our Community
Dear friends,
I am writing to let you know of two changes in the leadership of Tergar South Africa. Julian Ozanne and I have decided to relinquish our roles as directors of the board and in the management of the organisation. A careful handover is under way.
Tergar South Africa belongs to its whole community, not to any group within it, and news like this should not travel by way of the proverbial grapevine. Which is why we wanted you to learn of our departure directly.
From September I begin a period of residential study at the Tergar Institute in Kathmandu. This involves several years of Buddhist philosophy and meditation, together with a deep immersion in the lineage of particular practices in the Mingyur Dorje ‘Dorje Drolo cycle’. Alongside this I will continue to develop and train as a Tergar facilitator and guide, having recently completed the Meditation Teacher Program along with three others from our South African community.
This is what I wish to focus on now: to study, to practise, and to evolve — and to ready myself to be of service to Rinpoche in whatever way I can, wherever that may be needed. Stepping back from my present role is what makes that possible.
My commitment to Rinpoche and to his teachings is unchanged, and so is my commitment to you. Whatever I am able to offer the South African community — practice support, teaching, guidance, simply sitting together — I will offer gladly and for as long as I am able.
Everything I have received here came to me through the kindness of others, and none of it was ever mine to keep. If these years have taught me anything, it is that the dharma lives in people, not in structures: in the person who keeps turning up on a Wednesday evening, in the newcomer who sits down for the first time and discovers something true about their own mind. That is what I love about this community, and no change of role can alter it.
Wherever I am, you are in my heart and in my practice.
What we have built together
It is worth pausing to look at what this community has brought into being in just a few years:
- Mingyur Rinpoche's teaching tour of South Africa
- A pilgrimage to Nepal
- Community wellness sessions at The Commons in Muizenberg, now grown into an ongoing, peer-led initiative with a beautiful growing community of its own
- Online teachings with visiting teachers, including Lama Tashi and Khenpo Pema Öser
- Joy of Living workshops in Cape Town and Johannesburg with George Hughes
- Corporate wellness programmes, including our work with the Vineyard Hotel staff
- Outreach programme development, facilitator training and support resources, including the meditation courses and practice groups in Makhaza, Khayelitsha
- Weekly practice groups and our First Sunday sessions, and the steady growth of sangha around them, as well as the growth of the Johannesburg community
- Our newsletters, keeping the whole community connected month by month
- Connection to the global community through the Tergar Country Level Organisation networks, and ongoing learning through our association with Tergar International
- Securing scholarships for four people to undertake the Meditation Teacher Program in 2025–2026, with all four graduates invited into the pool of Tergar Guides and Facilitators
None of this happened by itself. And without Julian's guidance and initiative, very little of it could have happened at all. His expertise gave us a board that genuinely functions, along with the financial and strategic capability to host teachings, tours and events. He was instrumental in bringing Mingyur Rinpoche to South Africa without the organisation incurring a serious loss. The community owes him a debt of thanks that is easy to overlook precisely because he carried it so competently and so quietly.
On difference
Any living community holds a great variety of people, temperaments and ways of seeing, and Tergar South Africa is no different. As we have grown, different views about how the organisation might best serve have naturally emerged among us. This is not a problem to be solved; it is how unity functions in practice — many perspectives held within one shared aspiration. Within the board, differences of this kind have been present for some time, and held unresolved for too long they begin to slow the very work they are meant to serve. For our part, this feels like the right moment to step back and let others carry the organisation forward in the way that seems best to them.
A reflection on service
Something we have both come to appreciate is that service at this level is itself a form of practice, and a demanding one. It asks for hours, for sacrifice, and — far more testingly — it puts you face to face with your own material: your pride, your reactivity, your need to be right. Rinpoche has always been open about his own journey with panic, and it seems to us that this is part of what he offers his students: a mandala in which you are given the chance to go genuinely deep, in practice and in service both. It is difficult. It is also radically beneficial and deeply meaningful, and neither of us would trade the experience.
With gratitude
Thank you to this community for the opportunity to serve, and for your trust and companionship along the way. To the board and the leadership who continue: our warmest wishes for the road ahead, and every confidence that Rinpoche's activity here will keep flourishing.
And finally, letting go is not the same as giving up. It is one of the practices Rinpoche points us to again and again: releasing the grip of needing things to go our way, while keeping the heart's commitment fully intact. That is what Julian and I are trying to do here, and we do it with warmth, and with confidence in the ongoing blessing of Mingyur Rinpoche as the guiding force carrying us all forward in a common vision.
We will both remain available through the handover.
With love and gratitude,
Kunkhyen (Alex Duncan)
Community meditation in September (in-person)
Cape Town
❁ First Sunday Community Meditation 6th September · 09:00 - 11:00. The Commons, Muizenberg
Whether you're new to meditation or a seasoned practitioner, you're warmly welcome. Practice coordinators Luke & Siyamthanda.
❁ Community Meditation at The Commons, Muizenberg
Tuesdays, 18:15 – 19:15 · Thursdays, 10:00 – 11:00
Everyone is welcome. This is a chance to pause, drop in, and reconnect — with yourself and with others. Practice coordinator Adam.
Johannesburg
❁ Sunday 20 September · 10:00 - 12:00. HeartCore Contemplative Studio. Sunday Community Meditation.
Beginner and experienced meditators are invited to join this gentle morning of meditation, reflection and connection. Practice coordinators Angelic & Paul.
Joy of Living cohort groups (online)
These online groups have already started and meet weekly for practice, video teachings, and group discussions in a supportive environment. Each cohort combines self-paced online learning with the support of a local practice community. Please note that completion of each level is a prerequisite for progressing to the next course.
If you are interested in joining one of the cohorts, please contact Paul Boyter via email: practicegroups@tergarsouthafrica.org.
❁ Joy of Living 1 (JOL1): Calming the Mind
When: Every Tuesday evening from 18:00 - 19:15.
Practice coordinators: Angelic Pieplenbosch & Janique
❁ Joy of Living 2 (JOL2): Opening the Heart
When: Every Tuesday evening from 18:00 - 19:15.
Practice coordinator: Paul Boyter.
When: Every Monday evening from 18:30 - 19:45.
Practice coordinator: Janni Younge.
❁ Joy of Living 3 (JOL3): Awakening Wisdom
When: Every Monday evening from 18:00 - 19:15.
Practice coordinator: Fiona Anderson.
Mingyur Rinpoche's books
The Joy of Living and Joyful Wisdom
If you need copies of The Joy of Living and/or Joyful Wisdom by Mingyur Rinpoche, you can order these books with Huni via WhatsApp on 0829012178.
