H.E. Garchen Rinpoche's 90th birthday!
- Micha Strauss
- Apr 12
- 6 min read
In the honor of H.E. Garchen Rinpoche's 90th birthday we wish to send out an email to you all to let you know what is going on with us.
Today is Rinpoche's official birthday and he is celebrating 90 years in this body, on this earth.
Rinpoche has been our guiding light for the past 18 years and we are so humbled that we had the chance not only to meet Rinpoche in person in this lifetime but to have the light of prayer wheels touch our hearts and mind stream back then in that fateful day when we first met Rinpoche in this lifetime.
What aspirations did we have in our previous lives? To have such a strong connection with Rinpoche that by only seeing him for a moment and looking into his eyes that Karmic connection just blew up with sparks? We must have walked alongside Rinpoche in many lifetimes as the foolish blind donkeys that we are, stumbling in the fog of mind … but that must have had some merit since we now, in this lifetime, thanks to Rinpoche's kindness have crafted 3223 prayer wheels (till now as I write these lines) since that day we met with Rinpoche for the very first time in this lifetime.
Wow….
Who could have seen what would become? What would unfold? Where we will be in our lives? How many prayer wheels would become real and sent out to spin all around the world?
Today, on this special day, Rinpoche is celebrating at the Garchen Buddhist Institute with so many who have gathered to celebrate with him! We did not have the karma to go and celebrate with everyone but we feel the love from here as we sit in our prayer wheel studio this morning!
So much love!
What honor…
We must all give much thanks to the fact that such a realized being gave us a moment of his time, of his prayers, of his love… we must dedicate all our merit for the benefit of all beings!
Today I feel humbled than in most days. To have had this karma, to have had this merit, to have had so many experiences with Rinpoche… I owe him more than I will ever be able to repay…
Thank you, Rinpoche, for being the Buddha that you are! For seeing all beings! for working all your life for the benefit of all beings! we are all in your debt! May all be free! May all see the nature of mind and abide in it!
Happy birthday Rinpoche!!!! We love you so so so much!!!
some updates
Here in the Holy Land of Israel things are very strange now. The war "seems" to be over for the time being. I say for the time being because it did not really end, it seems that someone just hit the pause button and we are all waiting to see what happens next when someone presses the play button once again… will more missiles be fired? Will there be peace? Will we all learn to live with each other? Or will this never end and we will have a new season in the forever show called The War in the Middle East? Who knows?
For us here, me and Ayelet, we have had the very first night of sleeping "not in our cloths" which felt like we are kind of back to normal, but not really… because as I said this feels like a pause and not a stop on the player…
A few weeks back when the war was still going on strong and missile attacks were a part of the day and night routine Ayelet told me: "listen, this is the most beautiful time of the year outside! Everything is green, all the wild flowers are blooming and we are missing it all! We have to go outside at least once to see some nature…"
So, feeling a bit suicidal we took ourselves and went for a walk outside to the fields. Why do I say a bit suicidal? Because the rules of engagement here with our interceptor missiles are that the system only fires upon missiles that will land within 100 meters or so from the fence of any town, village, city and so forth. So, if you walk outside of these borders of the village you are in what is called "open spaces" and missiles will not be intercepted. By the way, all the roads, highways and so forth are "open spaces" so no missiles are being intercepted if the system sees that this is where the missile would land. That is why if you are in your car and the siren goes off you must pull over to the side of the road, exit your car and lie down on the ground. That is the only way you will be saved or unharmed… maybe.
So, since we have much "open space" all around our community and it is all green now with so many wild flowers Ayelet said let's go. And so, we did.
We took our bag with all of the most important things we own and took a walk outside in the fields to see wild flowers and greenery… it was so beautiful! Even though there was some doubt about the fact that we might not make it back alive, we did not care anymore. We had to go outside like normal people do when they live in normal places.
Here are some photos of the walk we took.
Other than that, for now, it seems like some "normal" has come back into our life here. Life returned to some normality (not in the north where the war with Hezbollah is still on) and we are so thankful for that!
CNC news
Prayer wheel orders stopped (which always happens in war times) but that gave me the chance to sit with my new CNC machine and learn G code so I can start crafting prayer wheels on it and make H.E. Garchen Rinpoche's prayer wheel design prayer wheels for a much more affordable price. So, the first thing I did was starting conversations with Claude AI so it could teach me G code.
in my mind, I thought that Claude AI can teach me G code since it knows all codes but after 5 days of many hours a day learning code and putting it into the machine and almost crashing it every single time, I was frustrated to the max. I did not know what to do anymore. It seems that with Claude AI I walk 3 steps forward and then 5 steps backwards. It was so frustrating! And I did not understand why.
So, after a week of this frustration, I decided I need to do something different or I will completely lose it so I asked a different AI how to have Claude AI teach me G code and that was when I learned something new! This AI told me that I made a mistake and I should have started the conversation with Claude AI by telling it rules it can not override. So basically, I had to ask an AI how to have a different AI teach me… hahahahaha! This is SO crazy!!! What a time to be alive in…
But that day I wrote my very first G code and the machine made its first part! It worked!!!!
The joy was overwhelming. Many dances were preformed…
So, the first part of the prayer wheel was made automatically! Now I have 6 more programs to write to complete the prayer wheel and once that is done we will offer the world the H.E. Garchen Rinpoche's prayer wheel design prayer wheels as Rinpoche has asked us so many years ago to do and we did not follow his advice, not because we are bad students, we just needed to have the Karma to be able to do that! And that time is now.
The fact that Ella (the new CNC lathe) made its first part of a prayer wheel in Rinpoche's birthday days of celebrations is a major deal for us! There must be some karmic seeds that made this happen with such auspiciousness…
Soon, very soon, we will announce the new CNC made HEGR prayer wheels on our shop for sale!
This is SO exciting!!!! here is the 5 minute video of the part being made automatically, enjoy!
So, we are "somewhat back to normal" even though it does not really feel like that…Guess we will have to wait and see what happens next on this show called "life in Israel".
Thank you all for being there for us during these harsh times, for all the prayers you prayed, emails you have sent, for the WhatsApp messages, for the phone calls, for everything! We feel so blessed… so honored… so loved by you all out there…
May we continue to have the merit to craft more and more prayer wheels for you all out there before we die!
Micha (and Ayelet of course)
Glad you both are okay and many congratulations on the new prayer wheel equipment success!