Final Day of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Switzerland visit
Day 3 of Mind and Life XX conference in Zurich
[Sunday, 11 April 2010]
The final session of ML XX began with
Roshi Joan Halifax quoting His Holiness from years ago Compassion is
not a luxury, it is a necessity for human beings to survive. Moving on
to the sole formal presentation of the session, William George of
Harvard Business School spoke of compassionate, authentic leadership.
In his view it is essential for a healthy society. He sees the global
financial mess not as an economic failure, but a spiritual failure;
peoples desire for more and more satisfaction derived from materialism
led down a path of greed and destruction. There is a loss of confidence
in our leaders today, but failures in leadership ultimately come from
leaders who place their self-interest ahead of others, inevitably
causing great damage.
However, on the bright side, we are
seeing the emergence of a new type of leadership, and this growing
style is no longer based on Top Down management it is based on
empowerment. The job of a leader is to serve, not to exert brute
authority. The mission of organizations should be to serve society, not
shareholders, according to Mr. George. Over the long term, this is what
sustains performance.
But leaders are not born or made, they
are developed. Bill asked the Dalai Lama, How do you think we can
develop more leaders? His Holiness replied, I believe it comes from the
training of inner values. Which many of you out there may already know,
but you may not be fully convinced. I think mainly education will help
development. With proper thought, we can make education and other
fields develop more compassionate people. Even Hitler didnt start out
evil from birth; it was his development and the circumstances of his
life that allowed him to become who he was. Though the media in
Jerusalem made it sound like I called him a positive person when I
first said this.
His Holiness continued, You should
spread these ideas about this type of leadership through talks, to the
media, so that they are well known. Make a list of the qualities that
this leader would have and list them A, B, C, and so on. And then when
people go to elections, they can take this list and judge who their
leaders might be based on this list!
Richard Davidson returned to the stage
and took a moment to thank His Holiness for making this twentieth Mind
& Life dialogue possible. This could never have happened with
anyone else. No other world leader has spent so much time in dialogue
with scientists, he said to commanding applause. Well, I dont have a
country to run, joked His Holiness. I have been quite free! Thupten
Jinpa chimed in, He does it partly to pass the time! After summarizing
the first sessions scientific findings, he said, Over these sessions,
weve seen that in practice as well as in basic research that there are
distinct gender differences when it comes to altruism and compassion.
Why do you think that is?
I think the neurons are the same,
organs are the same, His Holiness mused after a moment. The Buddha
would have wanted to give equal opportunities to men and women.
Discrimination has often been in the way of equality. Masculine traits
have been associated as strength. Feminine is wisdom. We must develop
toward a mother-centered being; she would be the ultimate source of
affection. Over this meeting we have been learning that women
biologically have more sensitivity to this. Throughout evolution,
leadership only came recently, when groups evolved to become more
complex. Power stepped in and kept stability, which pushed education
and compassion to more secondary roles.
Ive learned much from living in India
liberty, democracy. he continued. Because so many of the thoughts and
ideas I have had developed while in India, I now consider myself a son
of India. Which always irritates my bosses in China! He also said that
intelligence alone is not enough; we need more compassion. Education
will help bring equality to males and females. Women should take more
of the active leadership roles. Although, he quipped, some females not
so compassionate!
Ernst Fehr thought of some challenges
for the future. What in Buddhism could be translated to the context of
this conference? he asked His Holiness.
It is clear that we need different
religions, began the Dalai Lamas response. They have different
perspectives but produce similar effects. A Muslim friend told me how a
true practitioner must love all living creatures. We have to tackle the
root cause of the problems in economic systems. We must recognize
secular ethics. There is Buddhist science, Buddhist philosophy and
Buddhist religion. Leave out the religion and look at the Buddhist
science. Buddhism brings the necessity of compassion to social
sciences. Your happiness is related to others happiness. All
interconnected. Buddhist science provides better knowledge about
emotion. He continued, However, we should respect all religions; do not
try to convert people. Respect. Is Buddhism useful for economics in
society? No. But take the values and perspectives of a religious
person, and utilize that.
His Holiness with the speakers of the XX Mind & Life Conference
His Holiness thanked everyone for such
an important conference, and he expressed how encouraged he felt with
what had been discussed. Thus ended Mind & Life XX: Altruism and
Compassion in Economic Systems. By all accounts, there were great
dialogue, very insightful research presentations, examples of real
world economic compassion and happiness with how it all intertwined.
Tashi Delek!
His Holiness arriving for his public talk in Zurich
Over 10,500 people listened to His Holiness public talk
His Holiness the Dalai Lama (from left), Speaker Penpa Tsering, and Kalon Tripa Samdhong Rinpoche
during the Tibetan National Anthem before addressing the Tibetan community
in Switzerland & Liechtenstein
President (left) and Vice-President (right) listening to His Holiness address to the Tibetan community
–Report filed by The Tibet Bureau, Geneva
