About Machik

Growing a global community committed to a ​stronger future for Tibet

OUR Vision

Machik seeks to chart new pathways forward for Tibetan communities. By respecting the standpoint of others and appreciating our responsibility toward one another and to our collective human future, we have learned that meaningful change is possible, even under challenging circumstances. In our years of working directly with local Tibetan communities and beyond, these principles have enabled us to find our way across many uncertainties. Founded on a core commitment to the ideals of civic engagement, gender equity, and social innovation, Machik works to develop new opportunities for learning and bridging cultural divides that in turn grow understanding across difference.  We work to provide new platforms for developing partnerships that create alternative pathways for a strong, healthy and more sustainable future in Tibet. Through outreach efforts to Tibetans, Chinese and global citizens alike, we seek to build a shared understanding of the potential of this work for our collective human future. In these uncertain times, the renewal of hope and spirit across political and cultural divides will require the courage to cross uncharted terrain. It will require imagination to envision new possibilities and a resolve to make the choices necessary to realize a more fair, just and peaceful world. Our work is about enabling meaningful social change, one heart at a time.

Read our Story

Our Approach

Our work began in 1998 with a commitment to grassroots rural community service and education, especially for girls and women. From bricks and mortar construction projects to revitalizing community values, we have worked to strengthen Tibetan capacity by investing in and promoting service to communities. With this as our foundation, today our work continues to center our core commitment to supporting, incubating, and celebrating capacity of Tibetans in Tibet and in diaspora.

Engagement

We seek to make global impact by creating a nexus for building new transnational, multicultural, and institutional partnerships, and creative synergies at the local, regional and global levels. In this way, we grow a global community committed to a stronger future for Tibet.

Innovation

Machik is committed to working with dynamic Tibetan individuals or groups and global citizens who are innovative in their approach to meeting key challenges in their communities and who demonstrate an uncommon dedication to making a measurable impact.

Bridging Divides

Machik develops unique opportunities for bridging cultural divides through deep listening, lifelong learning, and sharing in new spaces that grow understanding across difference.  ​

EPIC AWARD

མ་གཅིག་ machik
In Tibetan, Machik means “one mother” and was also the epithet of Machik Lapdron, an 11th century Tibetan female innovator who developed the practice of Chod. This evocative name embodies the values of compassionate commitment to grassroots communities, using innovative approaches to tackling age-old problems, and the desire to build an engaged global conversation about Tibet, all of which are central to how we approach this work.