Osel Tendzin

Ösel Tendzin (Tibetan: འོད་གསལ་བསྟན་འཛིན་, Wylie: 'od gsal bstan 'dzin) (1943–1990) was a western Buddhist. He was Chögyam Trungpa's principal student. On August 22, 1976, Chögyam Trungpa empowered Ösel Tendzin as his Vajra Regent and first Western lineage holder in the Karma Kagyu and Nyingma schools of Tibetan Buddhism. On August 25, 1990, Ösel Tendzin died of HIV/AIDS in San Francisco, California. His wife, Lila Rich, and a group of his students continue to live in Ojai, California.

Tendzin was born Thomas Frederick Rich, Jr. on June 28, 1943 in Passaic, New Jersey. He graduated in 1965 from Fordham University, initially working as a physical therapist in New York and Los Angeles. Before joining Vajradhatu he studied with Satchidananda Saraswati, who gave him the name Narayana.

Tendzin first met Trungpa in February 1971 in Boulder, Colorado. According to Tendzin, Trungpa revealed his intention to make Tendzin his successor not long after their initial meeting. Starting in 1973 Tendzin held various roles in the management of Vajradhatu. He served on the initial board of directors and as an executive vice-president of the organization. In April 1976, Tendzin's Regency was announced to the community for the first time. Trungpa recounted the moment in a later edition of his memoir, writing "to ensure that everything will not stop at my death, it is necessary to have one person as an inheritor, someone whom I can train and observe over a period of many years. For a long time it was in my mind to appoint Narayana to this role, and in the summer of 1976 I did so, empowering him as Dorje Gyaltsap, Vajra Regent.”

...
Wikipedia