First of all, I went to the seminar on The Mystical Arts of Tibet. Fun, right? Welllll......The people presenting were a group of monks from Tibet that couldn't speak english very well, so most of what they said I didn't understand. However, there was a powerpoint that went along with the seminar that kind of explained what they were attempting to say.
The seminar was about this thing called a mandala, which is super important to the monks because it is a tool used to create peace on earth and get rid of "negative energy." It is made from millions of grains of sand, and is usually about five feet by five feet in size. Different colors, shapes, and areas represent very different things. The four elements (water, earth, wind, and fire) are the basis of the construction on this thing called a cross vajra, which is the foundation on which the madala is physically and mentally constructed.
The five colors of the mandala(white, green, yellow, blue, and red) represent the five activities of enlightenment.
The circle in the center signifies unbreakable teaching.
The eight petals in the middle of the circle are the "channel petals." These eight petals surround one main petal.
Then the monk talked about afflictions that the mandala would cure.
The five mental afflictions are ignorance, attachment, anger, pride, and jealousy.
There are also four steps that he talked about (suffering, karma, freedom from suffering, and path leading from suffering) that lead to enlightenment.
The seminar started out with this super awesome chant by the monks that was very interesting to watch. I thought that the chant was probably the best part, based primarily on the fact that the monk was so hard to understand. Halfway through his speech he actually had a translator come up and translate for him because he knew we couldn't understand him! It's too bad that the translator was just as hard to understand.. :(
Here is a picture of the mandala!
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