Learn to Meditate Live + Zoom
2025-08-12 18:30 - 19:30, 2025-08-19 18:30 - 19:30, 2025-08-26 18:30 - 19:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Mahakankala Kadampa Buddhist Center, 1825 State Street Suite 202, Santa Barbara, CA, 93101, United States
Meditation is like food, water, fresh air, and sunshine – we need it every day for healthy living. Come learn the basics so you can start your own practice at home – or come to improve your practice by learning something new!
No special clothes are required – but we do take our shoes off in the meditation room. We have chairs and cushions, but you are welcome to bring your own.
Our Resident Teacher, Kadam Keli, has been practicing meditation for many years. She will be guiding this 3-week series. Everyone is welcome. You are welcome to attend one class, or the series.
This class is offered in-person at our Center, but you can attend from home on zoom with a $35 membership for the series.

Wednesday Evening Meditation Class
2025-08-13 18:30 - 19:30, 2025-08-20 18:30 - 19:30, 2025-08-27 18:30 - 19:30
Fundamentals of Buddhist Meditation

Each class begins with a guided breathing meditation and culminates with a second meditation based upon the evening’s topic. Perfect for beginners or those with meditation experience. Open to everyone.
Please arrive a few minutes early to settle.

The Happiness Habit
2025-08-15 17:30 - 18:30, 2025-08-22 17:30 - 18:30
A meditation series to start your weekend – Bring a Friend for free!
“Always rely upon a happy mind alone.” – Geshe Chekhawa
Our own habits of gratitude, sense of purpose, and especially cherishing others are our best friends. Spend more time with them!
Each class begins with a guided breathing meditation, a Dharma talk, and culminates with a second meditation based upon the evening’s topic. Perfect for beginners or those with meditation experience. Open to everyone.
Drop in, or join as a monthly member for this ongoing Friday class.
Please arrive a few minutes early to settle.

Wishfulfilling Jewel Prayers w/ Meditation
2025-08-15 19:00 - 20:15
If you enjoy meditating with others, chanted meditations are a great opportunity to engage in group meditation. These chanted meditations are also known in Sanskrit as puja, meaning offering, or as sadhana, which means method for receiving attainments.
Using prayers in English, we receive the blessings, protection and guidance of the holy beings. We can make requests for ourselves or for others who need help or protection. These spiritual practices create a strong connection with the Buddhas, and help us purify our negativity and fill our mind with positive, healing energy.
By relying upon this practice, we can purify negativity, accumulate merit, and receive blessings. In this way, we will naturally accomplish all the realizations of the stages of the path to Enlightenment and attain a very special Dharma wisdom.
All chanted prayers are free.

Creating a Pure World - Introduction to Mandala Offering
2025-08-16 15:00 - 16:30
In this special Saturday afternoon class we will learn about the special practice of mandala offering.
Mandala means universe. When we make mandala offerings, we imagine we are offering a completely pure universe to all Buddhas. The mental action of mandala offering is a very powerful cause of spiritual realizations and good fortune in general. The secret ingredients – meditation on the emptiness of all things, and our own generation of the minds of giving, compassion for all living beings, and faith in enlightened beings.
This drop-in class is suitable for newcomers to the practice of meditation and Buddhism, and is particularly suitable for students who wish to engage in the Guru Yoga Mandala Offering sessions in the day retreat that follows on Sunday, August 31 – Offering A Pure World Day Retreat.
Offering a Pure World Day Retreat Schedule
Session 1 9:00-10:30am
Session 2 11:00am-12:30pm
Session 3 2:00-3:30pm
Session 4 4:00-5:30pm

Creating a Pure World - GYMO Day Retreat
2025-08-17 09:00 - 17:30
Every year, Kadampa centers around the world arrange preliminary retreats in which people engage in practices that help prepare the mind for deeper meditation. Generally these retreats are four sessions a day over seven days. This year we are offering a mini 1-day Guru Yoga Mandala Offering Retreat. This retreat unites the two practices of Guru Yoga and Mandala Offering.
Guru Yoga is a special and powerful method that enables us to receive the blessings of all Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and holy beings. Receiving this inspiration into our mind bestows inner peace and gives rise to realizations of renunciation, universal compassion, and wisdom realizing emptiness.
Meditation plants the seeds of realizations within our mind but if our mind is devoid of good karma we will be planting seeds in barren ground. Accumulating merit creates a rich and fertile mental environment within which our meditations will swiftly ripen and transform into realizations. The practice of Mandala Offering creates vast good fortune and is a method to attain the Pure Land of a Buddha. Mandala means universe. We create a completely pure universe with our imagination and offer it to the Enlightened Buddhas.
Sunday’s retreat schedule:
Each retreat session is 90 minutes long including prayers.
Session 1 9:00-10:30am
Session 2 11:00am-12:30pm
Session 3 2:00-3:30pm
Session 4 4:00-5:30pm
Cost of retreat: $20. (Member benefits apply.)

Heart Jewel Prayers
2025-08-18 17:00 - 18:00
Join us In Person
If you enjoy meditating with others, chanted meditations are a great opportunity to engage in group meditation. These chanted meditations are also known in Sanskrit as pujas, meaning offering; and the prayers we recite are sadhanas, meaning methods for receiving attainments.
Our prayers are in English. We request the blessings, protection and guidance of the holy beings. We can make requests for ourselves or for others who need help or protection. These spiritual practices create a strong connection with the Buddhas, and help us purify our negativity and fill our mind with positive, healing energy.
Heart Jewel puja includes a period of silence for meditation. By relying upon this practice, we can purify negativity, accumulate merit, and receive blessings. In this way, we will naturally accomplish all the realizations of the stages of the path to Enlightenment and attain a very special Dharma wisdom.
All chanted prayers are free.

Guided Lamrim Meditation Live + Zoom
2025-08-18 18:30 - 19:30
Learn the most essential teachings of Mahayana Buddhism as we meditate together on most Monday evenings. Please check our web calendar to confirm class meetings.
Each class begins with a guided breathing meditation, preparatory prayers, and culminates with a second meditation based upon the topic of the evening. Drop in to any or all classes in this course. Perfect for beginners or those with meditation experience.
About the Class
Lamrim is a special presentation of Buddhist teachings that modern people can practice in their daily lives. Lamrim originated with the Indian Buddhist Master Atisha, and was later clarified by Tibetan Master and scholar Je Tsongkhapa.
Our Founder, Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche, makes Lamrim even more accessible for modern people in his books, which appear in many languages. These are the texts we use in the class for our Lamrim meditations.

Please arrive five minutes early to settle, either in person or on zoom.
(Zoom access is available with a monthly membership.)
Membership: Class included with Online, GP, FP and Benefactor Memberships. Contact us to join.

Guided Lamrim Meditation
2025-08-18 18:30 - 19:30, 2025-08-25 18:30 - 19:30

Lunchtime Guided Meditation
2025-08-19 12:30 - 13:00, 2025-08-26 12:30 - 13:00
Simply breathe. Relieve stress. Find peace.

Our Lunchtime Meditations are great for beginners and experienced meditators. Drop in any Tuesday at 12:30 for 30 minutes of peaceful meditation.
Cost per class: $5

Heart Jewel Prayers
2025-08-19 17:00 - 18:00, 2025-08-26 17:00 - 18:00
Join us In Person
If you enjoy meditating with others, chanted meditations are a great opportunity to engage in group meditation. These chanted meditations are also known in Sanskrit as pujas, meaning offering; and the prayers we recite are sadhanas, meaning methods for receiving attainments.
Our prayers are in English. We request the blessings, protection and guidance of the holy beings. We can make requests for ourselves or for others who need help or protection. These spiritual practices create a strong connection with the Buddhas, and help us purify our negativity and fill our mind with positive, healing energy.
Heart Jewel puja includes a period of silence for meditation. By relying upon this practice, we can purify negativity, accumulate merit, and receive blessings. In this way, we will naturally accomplish all the realizations of the stages of the path to Enlightenment and attain a very special Dharma wisdom.
All chanted prayers are free.

Wishfulfilling Jewel Prayers w/ Offerings
2025-08-22 19:00 - 20:15
If you enjoy meditating with others, chanted meditations are a great opportunity to engage in group meditation. These chanted meditations are also known in Sanskrit as puja, meaning offering, or as sadhana, meaning method for receiving attainments.
Using prayers in English, we receive the blessings, protection and guidance of holy beings. We can make requests for ourselves or for others who need help or protection. These spiritual practices create a strong connection with the Buddhas, help us purify our negativity, and fill our mind with positive, healing energy.
In this way, we will naturally accomplish all the realizations of the stages of the path to Enlightenment and attain a very special Dharma wisdom.
All chanted prayers are free.

Prayers for World Peace
2025-08-24 10:30 - 11:00, 2025-08-31 10:30 - 11:00
Cultivating inner peace by learning to cherish others is the best method for establishing world peace. Thirty minutes of meaningful contemplation using prayers in English, turning our minds towards the happiness and freedom of every living being.
Stay after for a guided meditation class.

Sunday Morning Meditation Class
2025-08-24 11:00 - 12:00, 2025-08-31 11:00 - 12:00
Each Sunday morning class begins with a guided breathing meditation and Dharma talk, and culminates with a second meditation based upon the morning’s topic. Perfect for beginners or those with meditation experience. Open to everyone.
Please arrive a few minutes early to settle.

Offering to the Spiritual Guide Prayers
2025-08-25 18:30 - 20:30
Everyone is welcome to join us for this beautiful prayer practice.
Offering to the Spiritual Guide is a special Guru yoga of Je Tsongkhapa in conjunction with Highest Yoga Tantra. It was compiled by the first Panchen Lama, Losang Chökyi Gyaltsän, as a preliminary practice for Vajrayana Mahamudra. The main practice is relying upon the Spiritual Guide, but it also includes all the essential practices of the stages of the path (Lamrim) and training the mind (Lojong), as well as both the generation stage and completion stage of Highest Yoga Tantra.
This puja (prayer practice) normally takes place on or near the 10th & 25th of the month.

All chanted prayers are free.

Melodious Drum Puja
2025-08-29 17:00 - 20:30
This extensive sadhana or “ritual prayers for spiritual attainments” is called Melodious Drum Victorious in All Directions, or Kangso in Tibetan, which means “Fulfilling and Restoring Ritual”.
Usually performed once a month in Dharma Centers in our tradition, it is used for fulfilling our heart commitment to practice Lamrim, Lojong, and Mahamudra, for restoring any degenerate or broken commitments we may have incurred, and to rely on the Dharma Protector Dorje Shugden, regarding him as inseparable from our Spiritual Guide and Buddha.

Powa Prayers
2025-08-31 12:30 - 13:15
Through practicing transference of consciousness, known as powa, with faith, compassion, and concentration we can transfer the consciousness of those recently deceased to a higher rebirth or to the Pure Land of a Buddha. The Powa Ceremony can be done either by a group of practitioners or individually on behalf of one or more deceased persons, or countless deceased beings. By engaging in this practice we also create a great collection of virtue, which will also lead us into the pathway to a Buddha’s Pure Land.
All chanted prayers are free.
