Happy Losar!

Ligmincha Celebrates Tibetan New Year February 23

Prayer flags below Triten Norbutse Monastery in KathmanduLigmincha will hold its annual Losar webcast on Sunday, February 23, at 10 a.m. New York time. The event will be livestreamed from Ligmincha’s Facebook page. Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche will have a message for us, and he will be joined by many of our resident lamas. We will have a short guided practice and then share greetings from our sanghas around the world. This is a wonderful time to gather together, share our good wishes and enjoy each other’s company.

Losar is the name for the Tibetan New Year. It is a time for expressing gratitude and thanks to the natural world and all the beings who inhabit it. In preparation for Losar one thoroughly cleans one’s home, decorates, burns incense, prepares special foods and brews chang (barley beer). In his book Healing with Form, Energy and Light, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche writes:

During Losar, the Tibetan celebration of the new year, we did not drink champagne to celebrate. Instead, we went to the local spring to perform a ritual of gratitude. We made offerings to the nagas, the water spirits who activated the water element in the area. We made smoke offerings to the local spirits associated with the natural world around us. Beliefs and behaviors like ours evolved long ago and are often seen as primitive in the West. But they are not only projections of human fears onto the natural world, as some anthropologists and historians suggest. Our way of relating to the elements originated in the direct experiences by our sages and common people of the sacred nature of the external and internal elements. We call these elements earth, water, fire, air, and space.

This year, following the Tibetan calendar, Losar is celebrated from February 24–26. Each year in the Tibetan calendar is characterized by one of the five elements and belongs to one of the 12 zodiac symbols. This year, 2020 by our calendar and 2147 by the Tibetan calendar, is the year of the male iron mouse. The year of the mouse begins the cycle of the 12 zodiac figures in the Tibetan calendar.

Learn more about Tibetan astrology and the calendar

Many of our practice groups and centers will be organizing live events and activities on this day. Please check local webpages and social media channels for more information about these opportunities.