Understand Your Mind

An interactive afternoon with Dominique Side

When we seek to find who we truly are, we may find ourselves identifying with our mind. Our thoughts, feelings, emotions and opinions colour so much of how we see and interact with the world around us.

In this teaching, Dominique Side will show how Buddhist psychology unpacks different facets of our mind to give us a clearer understanding of what mind is and how it functions. This gives us insights into how we can work with our mind to find a way out of our suffering and reveal our own capacity for inner peace.

About Dominique Side

Dominique Side encountered Tibetan Buddhism in the mid-1970s in London. She has studied with Sogyal Rinpoche and Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche in particular, and over the years held a number of leadership roles in Rigpa UK and in Lerab Ling, Rigpa’s retreat centre in southern France.

She has completed several strict retreats and has also obtained a PhD in Madhyamaka philosophy from Bristol University, UK. She taught Buddhism in London schools for eight years and has written textbooks on the subject. She is the author of Buddhism (Philip Allan Updates, 2005), Discovering Buddhism (Troubador, 2022) and A New Way of Seeing (Troubador, 2025).

Under the guidance of Dzongsar Khyentse she initiated the Milinda training programme for Dharma teachers in 2017, and she also served as vice-president of the European Buddhist Union for five years. As a senior teacher in Rigpa, she specializes in making Buddhist thought and philosophy accessible to all.

Since the Stockholm Conference in 1972, Dominique has been concerned by environmental issues and for 15 years worked professionally as a writer and editor on the interface between environment and economic development.