Seeing the Dalai Lama

Seeing the Dalai Lama was probably one of the spiritual highlights of my life.  He is so humble, delightful, so wise, that you just love him from the moment he walks onstage. He is a small man in stature, yes humbly larger than life. His entire face, especially his eyes, lights up when he smiles, which is often. He laughs a lot too. A soft deep chuckle that makes you smile and chuckle too. He emits happiness and peace. And he loves people. You can tell by his openness and general demeanor. He loves talking, communicating and sharing. He truly is interested in caring.

And as I watched him speak, softly, kindly, there was a rhythm to his words and his speech pattern. And it drew me in, so much so that I could not not listen. Hung on every word, every  story, every point of what he said. I wanted to be open and soak it all in, just like a sponge. To always remember this moment, his talk and the words he so wisely spoke to thousands of people in the audience. And the way he spoke, even though there were so many in the room, he made you feel as if he were only speaking ot you. His connection with people was that strong.

He came out on stage, spoke for about 30 seconds, looked out on the audience and smiled. He then pointed and announced that he would be going down there, turned around and left the stage. Everyone in then looked around, waiting, wondering where he would turn up…a minute later he walked out to the first row, and hugged a man as if they were long friends. And indeed they were. After a pleasant exchange, the Dalai Lama explained that the man he greeted was a good friend of his and someone he considered to be his hero.

I immediately wondered what kind of person the Dalai Lama calls his hero? He explained that he man he greeted in the audience is someone he has known many years that when his friend was 10 years old he lost his sight during an attack where he lived in WWII. Instead of getting angry and bitter, he went to school, attended college, and never let the loss of his sight stop his ambitions. He grew up to raise his own family with love and compassion. The Dalai Lama said he had the easy part, all he has to do is get up in front of people and talk, talk, talk, but this man he greeted in the audience, this man actually lived it. And that is why the called the man in the audience his hero.

And I took notes, so I would not forget. My hands typing as fast as they could, skipping keys and vowels just to make sure I could keep up and didn’t miss a thing. Here are the notes, please excuse the rawness of the notes:

• We should not rule by faith, we should use faith to find and rule with compassion. That is the way to a happy life and happy humanity.
• We should use common sense first, science second.
• We need a healthy mind and healthy body to keep up hygiene of the mind. Mental thinking is more important than physical comfort.
• Compassion and trust are based on respect. A happy home is based on trust.
• Those who are given love and affection from parents and others are happy. Those who grow up with abuse grow up to be distrustful and broken. They often lie and keep themselves at a distance from others. They often have a lack of compassion.
• We can change humanity and government, but it must be done through humanity.  Compassion must start from the individual.
• We must be happy no matter what the situation, must find that kind of peace within ourselves. Then we can change the world. Build a family, and neighbors, then a village.  We build this kind of world through talk, then prayer, and this grows.
• Action is more important prayer, but prayer with action is very powerful.
• Most unhappy problems, like those in Syria,, Iraq, Serbia and Africa are manmade.
• The 21^st century can be the century of compassion.

There was a question and answer session after he spoke, and those answers were incredible and had a great impact on my way of thinking.  He told many humorous stories about his childhood and his mother. But that is for the next blog.