Lama Ole and Hannah Nydahl

Lama Ole Nydahl is one of the very few Westerners who is a fully qualified Lama and meditation master in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. In 1968 he and his wife, Hannah, met their first Buddhist teacher, Lopon Tsechu Rinpoche, while on their honeymoon in Nepal. The following year Rinpoche sent them to meet the the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa, the spiritual leader of the ancient Karma Kagyu Lineage of Tibetan Buddhism. They became Karmapa's first western students and have dedicated their lives to Buddhism ever since. Karmapa had a profound influence on their lives and later recognized Lama Ole as a protector of the Karma Kagyu lineage. After spending three years in the Himalayas as Karmapa's personal students, receiving Buddhist teachings and empowerments and developing the needed experience in meditation, Karmapa asked them to bring Buddhism to the West.

In 1972, the Karmapa directed Lama Ole to create the first European Diamond Way center in Ole's hometown of Copenhagen, Denmark. Since then, Lama Ole has been in a different city nearly every day, traveling tirelessly, deflating hypocrisy with humor and compassion, and teaching those he meets at public courses, in the market place, and on the road according to their receptivity. He has a unique ability to extract the important core elements from the vast body of Diamond Way teachings-the highest teachings Buddha gave-and present them in a form understandable and useful for people in the modern western world. Currently he has founded over 400 meditation centers worldwide, from Vladivostok to San Francisco, and is probably the best-known western Buddhist teacher today. He has thousands of friends and students who meditate and study in his centers throughout Europe, the UK, North and South America, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, and Asia.

Integrating modern style and ancient wisdom, Lama Ole challenges people's concepts of life and Buddhism in an unorthodox manner. In addition to passing on vivid and authentic Buddhist teachings (always with a touch of dry Danish humor), he also gives longer meditation courses on the timeless practical methods of the Diamond Way-such as The Foundational Practices and Phowa, a meditation which is very useful at the moment of death. Since 1987, he has taught the Phowa practice to over 50,000 people around the globe. He has given numerous print, radio, and television interviews and is the author of six books, translated into many languages (Publisher-Blue Dolphin Press, Inc.): Entering the Diamond Way (1985); Ngondro (1990); Mahamudra (1990); Riding the Tiger (1992); The Nature of Mind (1993); The Way Things Are (1996). These teachings give the essence of Diamond Way Buddhism without all of the cultural trappings to independent western minds and encourage his students to recognize that fearlessness, joy, and active compassion are the most important qualities to develop in today's times.

Hannah Nydahl travels much of the year with Lama Ole and spends the rest of her time translating for the highest Rinpoches in the lineage and teaching at various Diamond Way Centers. Lama Ole also travels with Caty Hartung from Germany who has been instrumental in the organization and development of the Diamond Way Centers in Europe.

Since the death of the 16th Karmapa in 1981, Lama Ole and Hannah have kept the international Diamond Way Centers together. They continue to work with these centers today under the spiritual guidance of the 17th Karmapa, Thaye Dorje.