Machig (མ་གཅིག་) means "one mother." **Machig Labdrön (1055-1149)** was the **Tibetan female yogi who founded the *Chöd* ("cutting through") practice** — one of the few major Tibetan Buddhist lineages founded by a woman. **In Chöd, the practitioner visualizes offering their own body to demons and deities** — a radical practice for cutting ego-attachment that **traveled from Tibet back to India** (a rare reverse direction). Considered an emanation of the dakini Vajrayogini.
Subject of *The Life of Machig Labdrön* (12th-c. biography).
Machig reduces to five — the number of Chöd founder.