HH the DL

So I got to see His Holiness the Dalai Lama when he was in town Friday. This is one of the things I so love about NYC, how it has turned this area of my life on its head. In New York, eventually, everyone comes to you.

He was lecturing on emptiness, 70 verses by Nagarjuna. The thing that's persisting with me now was a glancing reference to the Buddha's teachings, the idea that there were levels taught to his various students. Not all students were equal. As I'm writing a piece on whether or not Al Jazeera English should broadcast in the U.S., I'm struck by the conflict. I want to believe, to trust, that everyone has the capacity to make up his or her own mind when presented with all the information. And yet, this is not the way the world works now. It is not the way the world has ever worked. Twenty-some years later, I continue to be amazed each time I run into information such as this, information that parallels the great teaching of my Buddha my mom when she told me: Life isn't fair.