I have to confess I was beginning to feel uneasy about driving home the message here. For reasons that have been highlighted:
1. Overkill
2. Media fatigue
But -- (there's always a but) I recall the horror stories related to me during my investigations. The sorrow. The fear. The ongoing doubt and insecurity.
CH really did a great deal of irresponsible harm. There is not a shadow of doubt about this.
I agree that therapists in London should to sort him out effectively and definitively. Hopefully some of his *victims* will support them.
Pema

If anyone is interested here is a little research on the meaning of thunder being:

"Native American tradition honors the existence of Thunder Beings. These Thunder Beings are understood by Native Americans to be messengers from the powers on high, the Star People (extraterrestrial visitors). The Thunder Beings are a force for both dissolution and re-creation. In the Plains Indian tradition, a person who has a visit by a Thunder Being, in person, in vision or in dream, becomes a heyoka, a "contrary". [4] This heyoka then customarily soon starts behaving in a way opposite to the conventions of the dominant culture. The heyoka does so, precisely in order to wake up society to see that there are other and fresher ways of doing things. Thus, the heyokais the human counterpart of the Thunder Beings, who repeatedly dissolve the existing order and fashion a new arrangement from the pieces.

As we transition from the Fourth into the Fifth World, it occurs to me that not all heyokasare Plains Indians. Some have yellow skin, others black, others white. These heyokas of every color are experiencers, and have been changed by their experience of extraterrestrial contact by messengers from the sky (Thunder Beings). As modern-day heyokas, experiencers are charged to live as active witnesses against the ignorance and corruption of the Fourth World, and to live as witnesses of the Fifth World which is emerging. In doing so, modern heyokas honor the Thunder Beings, the Star Nations, who have come as cosmic midwives to help us birth the Fifth World. "

Richard Boylan

Hi Gondolf,
Yes -- ngondro certainly sorts out the must-dos from the wannabes. For the benefit of participants here who are not familiar with Tibetan Buddhism, ngondro is a preliminary practice required by all schools before embarking on Tantra. That's an over simplifaction, but the detail would be tedious. Ngondro involves:
108,000 full prostrations
108,000 guru yogas
108,000 mandala visualisations
108,000 mantras
Yogis usually complete this in 3 months. Most westerners take 6 months. Often a lama will suggest you do ngondro more than once. I know people who have done it 3 times. Not me though. Betcha CH never did it.
Cheers
Pema

Pema, Gondolf and others,
I have heard recently that none of Christopher Hansard's apprentices or students are working with him any more. There have also been further revelations of sexual (and other) misconduct.

Are you aware of this?

Inquiries appear to indicate that Eden has closed, and Mr. Hansard has not resurfaced as of yet. Do you know something further about these allegations?

How interesting, one wonders if this is a temporary closure? Any further confirmation of this development? Jeff Bowe

I echo the words of Dorje early on in this forum “My concern, however, is for those poor people who walk away, hurt or disappointed with their hopes shattered or their trust betrayed.”
My concern is for those who feel they have been abused and have nowhere to take their confusion.

We have read that Christopher teaches that one should live as a tiger and not as a sheep. If this is true then how is it that so many have chosen to submissively follow as sheep? The real victims here are his, and all the families affected in one way or another. To those who now have to pick up the pieces. We want to offer our hearts to you, and to his family if it is still intact in any way.

We noticed and it has recently been confirmed for us that something of significance was being played out all along between Christopher and his first in command for nearly the length of his marriage and quite likely still is. He may be an untreated manic-depressive and a charlatan, but he has an accomplice of equally low moral and possibly even darker sustenance. It sounds to me like he has enjoyed himself immensely over the years in countless illicit affairs and as mentioned in an earlier post this could quite possibly be the result of untreated childhood trauma and a symptom of how truly sick he has become. Regardless one seems to have remained as a constant fixture through out the time we have known him and she certainly has enjoyed the fruits of that apparent sickness that some are intimating, as well as his susceptibility to the wiles of women, and has ridden on his coat tails for many years, publishing a book, and even greedily copyrighting an exercise and energy system that is simply not hers to own and it was not the only to be published in english by the way. There are at least 2 others we found written by Rimpoches who do not seem to be cashing in on the celebrity and publicity that Dr. Hansard and Dr. Wright have been seeking. If he is truly sick, then she is as equally, and no wonder they have built their affair on the foundation of a lie.

My family and I have been patients on and off for many years, and became acquainted with some of the apprentices and visited other practitioners as required. Our visits became less frequent when we heard how one of our friend's was treated during their training with him, though it was under her dictatorship, and it was nothing short of psychological abuse. When they departed they endured the severe ostracisation and isolation that is commonplace in cults and described through out this site and they are dealing with the effects of this even now. Although we felt Christopher's story was suspect, we did see benefit from treatments, but we have also witnessed too much in the way of a serious lack of integrity. We are choosing no longer to be a part of this, at least until we witness some great turn around of these events or a substantial effort to make things right both morally and ethically. The behaviour of these two is every mother’s, every wife’s, and indeed every family’s worst nightmare. His chiropractor as she has been referred to, was cordial, even friendly on occasion, but it was Jekyl and Hyde, and we saw on more than one visit, her abuse of her position and utter disrespect towards others, snapping at reception, and even short with patients. Although this was usually in Dr. Hansard’s absence in recent years. She undoubtedly learned to throw around her weight from him as it seems he has taught her everything she knows. The other woman who enjoyed all the benefits of being a mistress and first in command but none of the responsibility and burden of trying to hold a family together while another’s sole purpose is to destroy it. If any one should wrongfully assume that the energetic and spiritual effects of an infidelity are not felt, go unnoticed and do not interfere with a marriage and a family, think again. Shame on you both.

If it is true that Dr. Hansard no longer has apprentices it is likely because Dr. Wright has simply relieved herself of competition.
If however any of you on this forum are still involved perhaps you can use this resource as a first step to getting out as our friend has. We have found some helpful links and reading here ourselves.
You do not have to be a part of this, though it is difficult, you will get through this.

Happily Married and Happily Healthy

I don't know why you refer to Hansard as Dr.? He is not a doctor - registered medical practitioner and never will be. He would like to think that - delusions of grandeur I suspect, but that does not make it real and he is not.

I have been watching this posting for some time, at times it has both amused me, confused me and made me more than a little alarmed. I must say from the outset that .I knew Christopher Hansard and my standpoint is of a person who actively does not like him. Having said this I feel compelled to write because of some of the things that have been said and the opinions that have been expressed on this site about an individual.

My perceptions of Christopher are that
1 He is very angry person.
2 He should stop practising immediately for both his clients and his own sake.
3 He probably suffers from some form of depression and paranoia (which I am not qualified to make a judgement upon or diagnose).
4 He has absolutely no concept of personal space. This can make him quite intimidating as he is regularly perceived to invade personal space.
5 He is both a bully and a coward.
6 Taught by persons unknown

I have known Christopher Hansard for some 15 years and I worked for a brief time in his clinic some 10 years ago. During that brief time I worked in his clinic I saw him produce some remarkable healing of clients. I also saw him abuse his apprentices, fellow workers, staff and clients. Though I had never seen any sexual impropriety.

My interest in Christopher came as I'm interested in all things Tibetan. I have been collecting books and information on Tibet since I was a child and I have over 200 of them. So to meet someone who was a genuine practitioner of a Tibetan medical system to me was both fascinating and any culmination of a lifelong interest. To discover that individual was a very good physician but a deeply flawed person was also disappointing

Christopher's Tibetan medical system or spiritual system predates the Buddhist systems that operate in Tibet. Dur Bon is not a Buddhist-based system so to expect any similarity, apart from cultural similarity, is quite naive. As is asking the Tibetan Buddhist community very specific questions about Dur Bon. Anyone who has had any dealings with the various Buddhist sects can tell you they very rarely agree and by and large dismiss each other as being ill informed, poor offshoots of something original or misguided. The equivalent would be asking the Catholic Pope what the southern Baptists of the Mount Zion Church of Alabama USA are having breakfast. The only similarity between the two faiths being that they both use a Bible which has been extensively and heavily edited and has chapters added or missing depending on your faith.

Christopher's knowledge predates the Internet and is very extensive in the use of oriental herbal medicine and acupuncture, the kind of skills he has had to be learnt from an experienced practitioner. People say they can find no reference to his teacher. Has it occurred to anyone that his teacher may have been practising under an assumed name because of potential persecution of his family back in Tibet and by the occupying forces? Also names tend to be a movable feast in certain countries and names are adopted and dropped during certain phases of life and during certain physical and/or spiritual quests or aspects of their life. Anyone who follows Japanese customs and Japanese Buddhism will be aware of the changing of spiritual guidance names. So there is a possibility that Christopher's teacher may have existed.

I once caught Christopher lying to a client. When I challenged him about those who replied with the following. ‘I do this all the time and the tail grows in the telling till conventionally they say are Christopher surely not. I do this because people actually have to question their own process and everybody else's processes to become healthy sometimes it's a question of performing your own reality check’. While I accepted his statement as part of the processes that he used within his own practice I did not particularly care for it myself.

As for Christopher not answering things about his family I can say that I did meet his mother. She told me that she had been a practising GP in New Zealand. She also said that she had been on medication for depression in the last 30 years. While I do not like Christopher, to have a mother who is on medication for depression and then had a father who cannot cope with it and runs off must have been exceptionally unpleasant experience as a child. Given that set of circumstances I would not wish to discuss my family or have any ‘well-intentioned’ investigative journalist hammering on my mother's door.

I have great sympathy with Christopher's apprentices many of whom have studied with him out of a genuine need and desire. It is rather unfortunate that his personality will reflect upon the good works that they have performed as individuals. Many of Christopher's apprentices have come from other areas of natural medicine and are highly skilled in themselves. They are capable of judging whether a system works or not. You will notice none of them actually have said that the Dur Bon system is pure fabrication, for all of them the standpoint has been about Christopher, his personality and the way he conducts its affairs with the world. My heart goes out to his apprentices as many of them had been with him a long time and it has been there excellent work that is actually maintained the successful aspects of Hansard's clinics.

This entire witch hunt, which may or may not be justified, was started off by Pema. Pema is by profession a journalist and we all know that journalists only seek the truth. They then sell the truth to newspapers, and if that truth has little twists or distortions which make it better copy they tend to remain. The journalists usually say ‘I sold the article and they changed it and there was nothing I could do about the editing’. Wouldn't it be a wonderful thing to be the person in charge of the exposé of a man who has written several successful, if not cheesy, books on self-help. I say this because I can see no difference between the Christopher Hansard truth and the journalistic truth. The wonderful thing about being a journalist and selling the story to the newspaper is of course if you do get it wrong it does not seem to reflect on you. So many people have had their lives and destroyed by journalists getting things wrong yet they never get an apology or compensation or someone to come along and reassembled their lives.

Pema hides behind the name she has adopted as does virtually everybody on this site (as do I) it seems Christopher Hansard is the only person who has his name bandied around. It is to me a great joy and happiness to know that Pemas Buddhist endeavours have enabled her to stare at pretty pictures hours on end, mumble mantras and of course contort herself into all manners of positions. I am sure in her own mind this makes her very superior person. There are many schools of Buddhism that would find this frankly ridiculous and of course it is not the practice of Dur Bon. As to the northern treasures school not existing I recently had a Russian client whose grandmother, during the last year in Siberia, was treated by a doctor from Tibet who said he belonged to the northern treasures school.

Christopher has made the fundamental mistake of allowing himself to be set up as a guru and as with all gurus the pedestal he has been placed on is a tall and very shaky one! I agree that Christopher is not suited to practice and should stop practising, but as I stated before I can see no difference between Pema's journalistic truth and Christopher Hansards personal one.


James

I wrote this last night when the site was down, I noticed this morning that references are being made to the chiropractor Stephanie Wright. I feel this is both cruel and unusual punishment as Stephanie is both highly skilled as a chiropractor and an acupuncturist. The exercise mentioned, a form of Tibetan yoga, I have seen many times in my travels in India and Nepal in one form or another all claim to be the pure form of Tibetan yoga. I do feel the vitriol that is now being pointed at Stephanie is unjustified and unwarranted. If anything Stephanie Wrights continued presence at Hansard's clinics was a stabilising influence and many of the clients who got better owe it purely to the efforts of Stefanie. Within the context of this site Stephanie is possibly the greatest victim of all.

There is no excuse or justification for Mr. Hansard's self-serving, cynical exploitation and misrepresentation of the Tibetan Bon tradition. As has been noted previously he is not a qualified Doctor, nor an authentic practitioner of Tibetan medicine (he has not completed a recognized course of medicine at the Tibetan Institute of Medicine in India). Hansard does not speak or write Tibetan (a curious deficiency when one considers it the esssesntial medium in becoming a fully trained and qualified Physician of Tibetan medicine) while his so-called 'tradition' is an exotic fabrication. There are serious questions surrounding his activities and claims, for more detailed information please visit

[christopherhansard.blogspot.com]

Meanwhile, for the interest of visitors to this forum, including the various duplicitous guises adopted by Mr. Hansard, here are some key points regarding his bizarre claims.

1) Dur-Bon is an [b:b88e2c4085]archaic[/b:b88e2c4085] traditional practice which does not involve medicine or healing whatsoever.

2) There, is amongst the traditional and authentic Tibean Bon tradition no recognition or practise of 'Dur-Bon'

3) Written and spoken Tibetan is required to learn, and achieve a full understanding of, genuine Tibetan medicine, Hansard has neither

4) The so-called 'Tibetan Bon Community', he claims, 'predicted' his birth, is completely unknown to Tibetan Bonpos I have consulted

5) The 'teacher' Hansard claims came from the remote wilds of Amdo would be most unlikely to have learned sufficient English, to tutor a four-year old New Zealand boy in the complex mysteries of Tibetan medicine, given the wild and empty nature of a region, populated mostly by nomads

6) Based upon a reasonable estimation of Hansard's age, this mysterious Tibetan 'teacher' would have been required to obtain travel authorization from the Communist Chinese Regime, during a period when Tibet was sealed off from the outside and world, and religious persecution and cultural destruction was being visited upon Tibetans. This is highly unlikely.

7) The 'tribe' Hansard states his 'teacher' came from, the so-called 'GNam', is completely unknown to Tibetan Bon scholars and does not appear as a clan name on authentic Tibetan Bon texts

8) The name he gives this 'teacher', 'Urgyen' is not a Tibetan-Bon name, it's a Tibetan Buddhist name, closely linked to the Nyingmapa tradition

9) There is no correspondence of "twelve teachings", which you describe, within the traditional and genuine native religion of Tibetan Bon

10) The so-called 'Northern Treasure School' Hansard claims as his 'lineage' is in fact not a school at all, but is based upon texts found in the Northern part of Tibet

11) The name Ürgyen gNam Chuk, does not as hansard states mean 'sky metal', that should be 'namchag'

So many questions, so much manipulation, delusion and falsification that selfishly capitalized upon Tibetan culture, and in doing so appears to have resulted in trauma and abuse for those placed their trust in this individual.