Women massage their hands, face and legs as a relaxation technique during Tara Rokpa therapy at the Rokpa Support Network in the Harare suburb of Monavale, Zimbabwe. She and a few other women have just completed a four-hour Tara Rokpa therapy session and are conversing over tea.
They too have children with disabilities. Each of them attests to having struggled with discrimination in their communities as a result. Some were merely laughed at. Others were blamed. They were told that the disability was their fault because they gave birth at an advanced age and that they should have known better. She and the other women know this. But it still hurts.
I used to cry a lot, but now I am strong. The women say they gain strength from Tara Rokpa, a form of psychotherapy developed by Lama Akong Tulku Rinpoche, a Buddhist monk and doctor of traditional Tibetan medicine who died in His teachings combine Eastern and Western psychotherapy techniques, and has relaxation and compassion at its core, according to Tara Rokpa therapist Jayne Pilossof. They visit the temple once a month to take part in the free session.
Pilossof, who conducts the sessions, encourages participants to live fully in the moment, but to do so in a relaxed and intentional way. The sessions involve visualizations, massage and encouraging the participants to treat themselves and others with respect and kindness.
The Tara Rokpa therapeutic process proceeds in stages, which aid self-healing and in developing a calm state of mind, she says.
