Author Guide · Buddhism & Spirituality
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At eighteen, Diane Perry, a girl from London, read a library book called Mind Unshaken and realised she was a Buddhist. At twenty she travelled to India, met her teacher, the 8th Khamtrul Rinpoche, and in 1964 became a novice nun under the name Tenzin Palmo, one of the first Westerners to do so. From 1976 to 1988 she lived in a cave in the Himalayas, and in 2000 she opened Dongyu Gatsal Ling, a nunnery in India. Her own books are edited teachings, given to ordinary practitioners. This guide covers her 4 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 4 key books · 2002–2026 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Tenzin Palmo has written four books of teachings: Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002), Into the Heart of Life (2011), The Heroic Heart (2022) and Change Your Mind, Change Your Life (2026). Her life story is told in a separate biography, Vicki Mackenzie’s Cave in the Snow (1998). Start with Reflections on a Mountain Lake, which covers the widest range of questions Western practitioners ask.
Where to Start with Tenzin Palmo
If you want her most wide-ranging book
→ Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002) — meditation, teachers, and women in Buddhism.
If you want Buddhist practice in daily life
→ Into the Heart of Life (2011) — impermanence, mindfulness, lojong and tonglen.
If you want a commentary on a classic text
→ The Heroic Heart (2022) — the Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva.
If you want the mind-training slogans
→ Change Your Mind, Change Your Life (2026) — her newest book.
4 Tenzin Palmo Books, in Order
Reflections on a Mountain Lake
A collection of her Dharma teachings on questions practitioners from all traditions run into: the particular difficulties facing Western students, what to expect from a teacher, gender and the role of women, and how to approach meditation. It first appeared with the subtitle A Western Nun Talks on Practical Buddhism; Shambhala reissued it in 2023 as Teachings on Practical Buddhism.
Into the Heart of Life
Essays based on her talks about bringing Buddhist teaching into daily life, published by Snow Lion with a foreword by the Twelfth Gyalwang Drukpa. It covers impermanence, the paramitas and the four foundations of mindfulness, as well as bodhicitta and the Tibetan practices of lojong and tonglen. Publishers Weekly wished it said more about her own path, but called her a strong voice on Tibetan Buddhism as practised by Westerners, particularly women.
The Heroic Heart
A modern commentary on The Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva by the Tibetan master Gyalse Tokme Zangpo (1295–1369). Each chapter opens with one verse, in the Padmakara Translation Group’s version, followed by her commentary. Published by Shambhala.
Change Your Mind, Change Your Life
A guide to lojong, Tibetan mind training, built on The Seven-Point Mind Training by Geshe Chekawa Yeshe Dorje. She goes through the slogans one by one, explaining what each means for modern life, including how to use illness, adversity and despair as material for practice. Published by Shambhala in May 2026.
In What Order to Read Tenzin Palmo
Her books do not build on each other, so publication order matters little. The first two are collections of talks on many subjects; the last two are commentaries on a single classic Tibetan text each, and ask a little more of the reader.
Start with Reflections on a Mountain Lake, then Into the Heart of Life. Go on to The Heroic Heart if you want to study one text closely, and Change Your Mind, Change Your Life if lojong is what you want to practise. Read Vicki Mackenzie’s biography Cave in the Snow at any point for the story of her life.
A reading path
1. Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002)
2. Into the Heart of Life (2011)
3. The Heroic Heart (2022)
4. Change Your Mind, Change Your Life (2026)
5. Cave in the Snow (1998), the biography by Vicki Mackenzie
A Book About Tenzin Palmo
Beyond the 4 key books: 1 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Biography (by another author)
1
1 book · 1998
- 1998Cave in the Snowa biography of Tenzin Palmo by the journalist Vicki Mackenzie, not written by Palmo herself; it tells the story of her twelve years in the cave
The years · 1943–2026
Quick facts about Tenzin Palmo
- Known for
- Tenzin Palmo is known as a British-born Tibetan Buddhist nun who spent twelve years in a Himalayan cave and later founded a nunnery for women in India.
- 1943
- Born Diane Perry in Hertfordshire
- 1964
- Novice nun in India, named Tenzin Palmo
- 1976
- Begins twelve years in a Himalayan cave
- Birth name
- Diane Perry
- Born
- 30 June 1943, Woolmers Park, Hertfordshire; raised in London
- Teacher
- The 8th Khamtrul Rinpoche, of the Drukpa Kagyu lineage
- Ordained
- As a novice in India in 1964; fully, in Hong Kong, in 1973
- Retreat
- Twelve years in a Himalayan cave, 1976–1988, three of them in strict retreat
- Founded
- Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery, India, opened in 2000
- Honours
- Title of Jetsunma from the 12th Gyalwang Drukpa (2008); BBC 100 Women (2023)
The red mark is 2002: Reflections on a Mountain Lake, her first and broadest book of teachings.
How Tenzin Palmo Teaches: Plain Answers from a Long Retreat
Her books began as talks. Reflections on a Mountain Lake and Into the Heart of Life are edited from teachings she gave to lay audiences, and they keep the shape of a talk: a question, a plain answer, an example. Their subjects are the ones practitioners actually raise, from how to meditate and how to choose a teacher to what to do with anger.
Her later books are commentaries on two short classics of Tibetan mind training: Gyalse Tokme Zangpo’s Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva in The Heroic Heart, and Geshe Chekawa’s Seven-Point Mind Training in Change Your Mind, Change Your Life. She takes a verse or slogan at a time and explains what it asks of someone living an ordinary modern life. Women’s place in Buddhism runs through all of it: she was for years the only nun among about a hundred monks at her teacher’s monastery, and was excluded from most of its activities.
Her link to non-duality is the Tibetan teaching of buddha-nature: the idea that the mind’s true nature is already awake and only needs to be recognised. The Tsadra Foundation’s recorded conversation with her on the subject is titled Buddha-Nature Is Who We Really Are. She teaches it as something to be found through practice, compassion and meditation, not as a philosophy to agree with.
Watch
Tenzin Palmo on buddha-nature
In a conversation for the Tsadra Foundation’s series on buddha-nature, she talks about the innate perfection of the mind and how to recognise it in practice.
Frequently asked questions about Tenzin Palmo’s books
How many books has Tenzin Palmo written?
Four books of teachings: Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002), Into the Heart of Life (2011), The Heroic Heart (2022) and Change Your Mind, Change Your Life (2026). A smaller compilation of talks she gave in Singapore in 1998, Three Teachings, also exists.
What are Tenzin Palmo’s books in order?
Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002), Into the Heart of Life (2011), The Heroic Heart (2022) and Change Your Mind, Change Your Life (2026).
Where should I start with Tenzin Palmo?
With Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002), a broad collection of teachings on meditation, teachers, Western practice and women in Buddhism. If you first want to know her story, read Vicki Mackenzie’s biography Cave in the Snow (1998).
What is Tenzin Palmo’s most famous book?
Of her own books, Reflections on a Mountain Lake (2002) is the best known. The book most people know her from, however, is Cave in the Snow (1998), an international bestseller about her years of retreat, which was written by Vicki Mackenzie, not by Tenzin Palmo.
Did Tenzin Palmo write Cave in the Snow?
No. Cave in the Snow (1998) is a biography of her by the journalist Vicki Mackenzie. It tells the story of her twelve years of seclusion in a cave in the Himalayas.
How long did Tenzin Palmo live in a cave?
Twelve years, from 1976 to 1988, in a remote cave in the Himalayas. Three of those years were spent in strict retreat.
What is Dongyu Gatsal Ling?
The nunnery Tenzin Palmo founded in India, out of concern for the situation of Buddhist nuns. It opened in 2000 and she is its director.
What does Jetsunma mean?
A rare honorific title, translated by her publisher as “Venerable Master”. The 12th Gyalwang Drukpa, head of the Drukpa Kagyu lineage, gave it to her in 2008.
What is The Heroic Heart about?
It is a commentary on The Thirty-Seven Practices of a Bodhisattva, a fourteenth-century Tibetan text by Gyalse Tokme Zangpo on living for the benefit of others. Each chapter takes one verse and explains it.
How does Tenzin Palmo relate to non-duality?
Through the teaching of buddha-nature, the idea that the mind’s true nature is already awake. She presents it as our real nature, something to be recognised through practice rather than acquired; her conversation on it for the Tsadra Foundation is titled Buddha-Nature Is Who We Really Are.
Footnotes
- Tenzin Palmo — Wikipedia
- Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo — Shambhala Publications
- Reflections on a Mountain Lake — Shambhala Publications
- Change Your Mind, Change Your Life — Shambhala Publications
- Into the Heart of Life (review) — Publishers Weekly, 2011
- The Heroic Heart — Tsadra Foundation
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all hers.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“I have made a vow to attain Enlightenment in the female form — no matter how many lifetimes it takes”
— Tenzin Palmo, quoted in Vicki Mackenzie, Cave in the Snow (1998)
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