Life Release: The Tsetar Fund

Rinpoche and the sangha undertake the practice of life release, or tsetar, six times a year. Students and friends gather in Portland, Maine to purchase lobsters from the local suppliers. Taking the crates out to the dock, the rubber bands that bind their claws are cut. The fortunate females have their tails notched, and we then set them free. Females with notched tails are illegal to trap again. The market value fluctuates throughout the year, sometimes there may be a hundred released at a time. At other times that number reaches to five hundred. By participating in this event, either in person or by contributing any amount of money, you are welcome to make a connection and through that increase the energy of merit behind your own aspirations and prayers.

The motivation behind Compassionate Activity is that we can, in some small ways, make a difference. As Rinpoche has said, to stop at a puddle of water and save a drowning bug is perhaps not a big deal for us, but for that bug it is their very life being saved. If we can remember the great significance of letting go of our excessive self concern for the minute it takes to bend down and help another being, thinking only of their welfare, and then rejoice in the joy we have brought to another, we gain merit. While doing so we hold a far-reaching intention to benefit beings that sets an altruistic intention for all our future lives

You will also have the option to add a specific, brief prayer request to be read at the Life Release.