Tibetan Medical External Therapies:
A Practical Introduction to Sowa Rigpa
With Dr. Nida Chenagtsang
SATURDAY AND Sunday, SEPTEMBER 27 & 28, 2025
2 - 6pm
Due to the practical nature of this course, it will NOT be livestreamed.
This workshop introduces participants to Sowa Rigpa, the traditional medical system of Tibet with special emphasis on the hands on external therapies.
Dr. Nida will introduce his new book, Tibetan Healing Massage, forthcoming from Sky Press.
For those who wish to embark on the journey of studying Sowa Rigpa, a one-year hybrid online training, Foundations of Sowa Rigpa begins this Fall. More information HERE.
IN-PERSON WORKSHOP PRICE:
$200
advanced registration required
Limited on-site accommodations are available, please register below:
ABOUT THE BOOK
Massage therapy is a part of every healing tradition in the world, and healing touch may be the oldest and most natural therapy known to humans: ancient Egyptian and Indian written records of massage therapy date from 2500 BCE, and oral traditions speak of origins still older. Kunyé is the massage therapy of Sowa Rigpa—traditional Tibetan Medicine—and with other Sowa Rigpa 'external therapies' forms a key component of a sophisticated and holistic system of medicine that offers us a path to health and happiness through the cultivation of balance and harmony.
With precise and varied manual techniques, specially-prepared herb-infused oils tailored to the individual's unique constitution and environment as well as the changes of both life and season, as well as an array of low-tech tools such as heated and cooled stones, herbal compresses, incense, copper cups, and traditional wooden tools, kunyé and the related external therapies discussed in this book offer a noninvasive and highly-adaptable approach to health and wellness that a properly trained therapist can safely and effectively practice for people of all ages and states of health.
Modern Western biomedicine recognizes that massage affects the circulation and flow of blood and lymph, reduces muscular tension, directly affects the nervous system, and enhances tissue healing; and that these effects provide a broad range of demonstrable benefits, such as reducing muscle tension, pain, stress, anxiety, and insomnia, and enhancing healing, mood, immunity, and overall well-being. Applied to the skin, muscles, and joints–as well as points and energy channels—kunyé, like all massage therapies, can positively affect the muscular, skeletal, circulatory, lymphatic, nervous, and other biological systems of the body, as well as through its attention to the humors and vital energies of the body, like all Sowa Rigpa therapies, also maintain and restore equilibrium of body, energy, and mind.
Tibetan physician and teacher Dr. Nida Chenagtsang received extensive training in kunyé and Sowa Rigpa external therapies as a young man, and through witnessing the healing power of these deceptively simple traditional therapies, has been since the beginning of his professional career inspired to both practice them extensively himself as well as advocate for their greater use by physicians and kunyé therapists to alleviate suffering and improve the health and happiness of patients and clients. After decades of treating patients and teaching students, Dr. Nida now shares his wisdom and experience in this in-depth overview of Sowa Rigpa's treasury of massage and external therapeutic techniques. Though sufficiently substantive to provide the theoretical and methodological framework for the serious student engaged in training to provide kunyé in a clinical setting–which will also include hands-on in-person practical instruction and assessment–this volume is also accessible to the nonspecialist reader approaching the topic for the first time.
For a more complete overview of Sowa Rigpa as a whole system of medicine, consult Foundations of Sowa Rigpa: A Guide to the Root Tantra of Tibetan Medicine (2024, Sky Press: Sowa Rigpa Publications)
Dr. Nida Chenagtsang
Born in Amdo, in North Eastern Tibet, Dr. Nida began his early studies Sowa Rigpa (Traditional Tibetan Medicine) at the local Tibetan Medicine hospital. Later he was awarded scholarship to enter the Lhasa Tibetan Medical University, where he completed his medical education in 1996 with practical training at the Tibetan Medicine hospitals in Lhasa and Lhoka.
A well-known poet in his youth, Dr. Nida later published many articles and books on Sowa Rigpa (Traditional Tibetan Medicine) and the Yuthok Nyingthig tradition both in the Tibetan and English languages which have been translated into several languages. He has extensively researched ancient Tibetan healing methods, and has gained high acclaim in the East and West for his revival of little known traditional Tibetan external healing therapies.
Dr. Nida is also the Founder and Medical Director of the Sowa Rigpa Institute: School of Traditional Tibetan Medicine and Co-Founder of the International Ngakmang Institute, established to preserve and maintain the Rebkong ngakpa non-monastic yogi/ini culture within modern Tibetan society.
In addition to his work as a physician, he trains students in Sowa Rigpa and the Yuthok Nyingthig tradition in over forty countries around the world.
