He was born in Tibet but moved to India at a very young age. After receiving a complete education in the Nyingmapa tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, he went to Cambridge University in the UK in 1971. He has been teaching and translating Buddhism in the West for nearly 20 years now.
出生西藏、年幼時流亡印度，接受了西藏佛教寧瑪巴教派的完整教法，一九七○年代到英國劍橋大學研讀比較宗教學，此後一直在西方從事佛法翻譯和教導，至今二十餘年。