A Simple Monk

I saw the Dalai Lama speak on Wednesday, and ever since then I’ve been wondering: how do you write about an experience at once so profound and yet so simple?

I don’t know the answer to that question, and I hate to say “you had to be there”, because I think it’s one mark of the Dalai Lama’s greatness that his personality and his message are so powerful that you don’t have to see him in person to be deeply moved.

And yet: people want to know. He is a compelling figure, with a compelling message, and whenever I mention that I attended the Dalai Lama’s address (part of Connect Now through the University of Calgary), people ask me, “how was it?” “what is he like?” and so I try to explain.

Even though there were 15,000 people there, I felt like he was talking just to me.
His message is incredible, yet simple. Like he is.
He has a sharp wit and a great sense of humour.

But I fear it comes out sounding trite, in the end, and I worry that if I try to do him justice, I’ll end up sounding maudlin and overdone. On the other, hand, I really don’t want to sound like this Calgary Herald reporter, who writes “peace, love and understanding doesn’t make for great copy”, before admitting that, in the end, even a group of hardbitten journalists and photographers were moved. Well, peace may not make for great copy, but perhaps there are things more important in this world than selling newspapers.

In the end, all I can say is that I was deeply moved by the Nobel Peace Laureate, who describes himself as “a simple monk”. His message of compassion, peace and tolerance is simple. His assertion that we are all, in fact, the same is also simple. But it isn’t simplistic. In fact, the Dalai Lama’s first words were to elaborate on the notion of peace, pointing out that refraining from doing violence is not truly peace, and that only by achieving inner peace as individuals can we hope to bring peace to our families, our communities, and our world. Inner peace: now there’s a state of mind that’s not so easy to achieve.

And then there’s the concept of our interconnectedness. On this, the Dalai Lama said, “we are the same: human beings. I want a happy life, you want a happy
life. On that level we can work together…make a common effort for a
better world.” When you look at it that way, it’s kind of hard to justify things like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which he criticized as being failures: “the destruction of your neighbour is destruction of yourself. The concept of war is out of date.”

You can google “Dalai Lama Calgary” and get more awesome quotes, but here are some of the things he said that resonated most with me:

When I dream, I never dream of myself as chief monk. In my dreams, I only remember: I am Buddhist monk. That’s most important. That’s who I am.

Some people call me Living Buddha or God-King or demon. Doesn’t matter! These are just labels. I am same as you: human being.

The 20th century was a century of bloodshed. The youth can make their century, the 21st century, the century of peace.

Some people say I am anti-religious. Not true. We must be tolerant of all religions, and that includes non-believers.

Religion is not required for morals. Morals transcend religion – they are above religion.

So what will I change in my daily life after seeing the Dalai Lama? Am I going to start waking at 3:30 a.m. (as he does) so that I can meditate for five hours before beginning the busy work of my day? No. Nor would he recommend it. In fact, he was quite clear that many of his practices are not for laypeople or, indeed, Westerners. In a sweet and funny moment, he answered a grade eight girl’s question about making difficult choices by explaining that he consults state oracles and practices divination with his rosary, and although these are nearly always correct for him, they are not for her. So no early-morning meditation sessions for me, but I did walk away with one piece of concrete advice from the Dalai Lama that I’ve been practicing every day: 

Give your children much physical affection.

They, after all, are the guardians of the next century – the century of peace.