9-month program based on Keys of Knowledge by Tarthang Tulku
Start September 8 | Online
Free Q&A session on September 8
This new 9-month program, named after the book’s inspiring final chapter, is based on Tarthang Tulku’s concise book Keys of Knowledge.
This series of essays, based on talks given by Rinpoche to close students in the summer of 2016, examines in pithy ways the architecture of human experience and the way I, me, mine and mind interact.
“As long as we do not embody knowledge, we move through life as if we were lost or asleep. We would like to do it differently. We would like to develop ways of cooperating with the mind; we would like to create a new home for awareness.”
Tarthang Tulku, Keys of Knowledge
Program The Great Journey
- September 8, 2025 – June 1, 2026
- Monday 19.00-20.30 CEST
- 31 online classes
- Retreat weekend Mind at Ease live-online in the new Stupa Center Winterswijk March 20-22
- Led by Elske van de Hulst
- English spoken
- After each class you will receive a handout and a link to the recording of the lesson.
All material is for private use only and should not be distributed.
Costs: € 675 or 9 x €75 per month
You want to try out?
Welcome on our free opening session and Q & A Sep 8
The Great Journey Invitation
In Keys of Knowledge, we cultivate a practical way of life that could be called mystical. We explore the field of our reality, the realm of body, mind, and senses, of energy, waves and gravity, of space and knowledge. Many of us may be used to a journey marked by emotional pain, disappointment, and disillusion. Looking closely at time and the operations of mind, we open up our ability to contact transformative knowledge: experience comes alive. What would it be like to manifest compassion, caring and ease? To embody knowledge? That is the great journey invitation.
“In the course of our journey, at first we may proceed rather slowly, but then we graduate. Once we graduate, we see clearly that the unfolding of linear time, and the sense of progress on a path – aspects of reality that seemed so fundamental and vital – are in fact only marks, points imposed on the rhythms of time.”
Tarthang Tulku, Keys of Knowledge, Chapter 8, “The Great Journey”
Instructor
Elske van de Hulst is co-dean and senior instructor at Nyingma Centrum Nederland in Amsterdam.
Between 1969 and 1995, she worked in the theatre as an actress, director and author. She taught at the Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten and for many years was a member of the Dutch Arts Council. In 1998 she started studying the theatre of the mind, guided by Tarthang Tulku’s books, and has not stopped since.
Elske teaches Meditation, Knowledge of Freedom, Revelations of Mind, Dimensions of Mind, Caring and Lotus Trilogy teachings in Amsterdam and elsewhere.
Practical information
Who can attend
Those with a background in other teachings by Tarthang Tulku are welcome to continue their journey with us in the Great Journey program. The program is a good sequel for students of Dimensions of Mind, Knowledge of Freedom, Buddhist studies or the Time Space Knowledge vision. Others, with a stable foundation in meditation and self-observation are also very welcome to attend.
Methods
The program follows the sequence of chapters at a pace of one chapter every three to four weeks. Readings, experiential practice and contemplations encourage ease and harmony of body, mind and thoughts. Excerpts from other books by Tarthang Tulku will occasionally be brought in to deepen the exploration.
Between classes, there will be reading assignments preparing for the next meeting, as well as self- observations which aim to carry the investigation into daily life. Suggestions will also be given for daily practice, as well as occasional writing or creative assignments.
Retreat weekend in the World Peace Stupa Center Europe
Included in The Great Journey program is a retreat weekend in our new retreat center in Winterswijk, beautifully located at the Dutch German border. This retreat weekend, entitled Mind at Ease is planned for March 20-22. All Great Journey program participants are warmly encouraged to participate in person if they can, but online participation in core sessions will be made available as well.
Participation in the retreat is included in the program costs. In the retreat, which will be co-taught by Elske van de Hulst and Matthias Brenner, we will work with materials from Keys of Knowledge combined with Kum Nye exercises that offer experiential ways to open up the treasures of direct experience.
Participants will need to buy the book Keys of Knowledge
available through Dharma Publishing (USA)
or through Lotus Design Shop (Europe).