The Science of Happiness

Stumbling upon everyday teachers thrill and exhilarate me. They are like fresh, vibrant, sweet watermelons exploding with color and taste in a hot summer afternoon like this. More and more, I am discovering teachers whose backgrounds are a fascinating intersection of science (usually neuroscience, psychology, some quantum physics) and spirituality (typically Buddhism). I used to be turned off by Buddhism. I found it very frou-frou lacking in any really deep substance you can truly sink your teeth in. It incessantly talks about happiness in a way that was if not unappealing, just lacked resonance.

Until I met the scientists, the psychologists, and the philosophers.

My doubts were eased, albeit slowly, by intelligent, logical scientists who, with research and scientific, replicable data, substantiate the claims of Buddhism about happiness, calmness and equanimity. Meet the people who bring the art AND science of happiness in one digestible, practical, human package.

There is Dr. Rick Hanson, neuropsychologist, Buddhist meditation teacher and author of Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom. The basic premise of the book is that our brains possess plasticity and malleability and that we can alter our physiology through contemplative practices such as meditation. The book is pretty interesting because it talks about the physiology of the brain, illustrates it in very scientific (but digestible) way, and demonstrates evidence of how what we feed the brain (good, bad or indifferent) alters it.

Through American Public Media’s On Being, I also discovered Sylvia Boorstein, Psychologist and Buddhist Meditation Teacher (and also author), and James Kabat-Zinn, a molecular biologist and take this, “founding Executive Director of the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.” James Kabat-Zinn particularly appeals to me because I applaud him for his efforts in bringing mindfulness practice into mainstream medicine.

And then there is Matthieu Ricard, a French-born son of a philosopher and artist with a PhD in cell genetics, turned Tibetan Buddhist monk who is allegedly dubbed the Happiest Man on Earth based on the brain waves studied by neuroscientists. He is one of them "olympic meditators" and of course denies that there is any scientific evidence that solidifies this claim. Indeed an empiricist. I love this man. What I hear when I listen to this guy is a man who has obviously debated and philosophized so many million times ideas such as God and its existence, consciousness, and happiness (they way Tibetan monks are trained), but who have also experienced all these phenomenon first-hand. Here is a clip of him being interviewed by Krista Tippet:

Being: Video: Live Conversation with Matthieu Ricard | The "Happiest" Man in the World — Meeting Matthieu Ricard

These scientists are on to something. I will be stupid not to listen and pay attention.

But why do I even write about this? Because the teachings are so compelling and moving to me that I have to share it with people who might find value in it (yeah, yeah, sort of like a Mary Kay sales rep… LOL). Because I have watched my life change before my very eyes because of what I have learned from these teachers. Because I’m happier. Because in this world of economic recessions, wars, poverty, catastrophes, global warming, I can still taste the equianimity and appreciate the wholeness of the big picture, that I can still find it in me to be okay with the world (even the ugly parts).

Namaste.

World Peace by Puppies and Potatoes

My gripe about BBC World News (1 PM on NPR) is that its coverage on the Arab Spring is quite extensive – sometimes a little bit too much. For a person who shuns television, my connection to world events and news is 80% NPR, 10% TIME, and 10% the occasional online news (including Weekend Update with Seth Meyers - seriously!). I love journalism in its many forms and I have a fondness for NPR/BBC/APM journalists. News is not known to be a popular source of happy emotions, however. It is very telling of human behavior that only what bleeds leads.

I have been contemplating lately what an extremely despicable, dreadful thing war is. It’s heart-wrenching to hear about the thousands and thousands of voices suppressed, of lives lost… all faceless and nameless to me, yet somewhere, their lives are being mourned by those who loved them and meant the world to them. I cannot bear to imagine what it would be like to lose a child, a brother, a best friend to atrocities caused by war. Is it really necessary to kill and annihilate?

The question then becomes – what do you do?

I say go for an afternoon run with a smile in your heart, stopping to appreciate the beauty around you. If you pass by a litter of four seven week old puppies that are just the softest, sweetest things, stop to purr and scratch ears. Let them chew on your shoelaces.

I’m being serious.

The Dalai Lama is an advocate and ambassador of peace the world over. If you ask him what he would do, his answer probably won’t be very far from mine. The only way we can spread peace (and love and joy and cartwheels) is if we cultivate it within first. If we know it so intimately and touch it and dwell in it, the rest just takes care of itself. (Maybe?)

That “space” is elusive, but it is THERE. It exists, if you quiet yourself enough to allow it. I will not claim to live “there”, but I know for a fact and without any trace of doubt that the more you allow the equanimity and compassion into your own internal life, the more apparent this truth becomes. Every opportunity for “it” exists in our daily lives. You don’t need to retreat to the mountains for weeks of solitude to find it (but maybe it helps). It is in folding kitchen towels (just ask Sylvia Boorstein). It is in the bath when you indulge yourself in a little more “me” time. It is in front of you, on your dinner plate. It is in presence (or the attempt at it) in all you do. Take five minutes to yourself each day to just empty yourself and feel things. See what happens.

I have had the luxury of nights alone this week. I am cooking more healthy vegetarian meals and getting my summer routine going again. Last night, after running my usual two miles (and cuddling the puppies when I ran into them), I sat at the dinner table and took a bite of my dinner. And there “it” was. In the potatoes. I bit into it and I just tasted so intensely all the love everyone (including me!) put into growing, transporting, selling, cutting, cooking the potato. It was sweet and full of the good stuff I cannot even put words to. I’m telling you. It was ridiculous.

And so begins my personal crusade - World Peace by puppies and potatoes.

Namaste.

Nightmares

Dreams are very telling for me. They have been over the last couple of years. I may have whined about my lucid dreaming experiences, but later on have seen their utility in my life and have learned to accept it as a rare gift. I guess you can say that I’m one of those people who have bought into the Jungian view about the unconscious and their manifestations in dreams (better than Freudian, I think!). Guidance from a trained Jungian has taught me to understand my own psyche and the unconscious that lies latent. But experience has also taught me that there are never any definitive, linear interpretations to dreams. We can take stabs at what they mean, and most of the time, if you are attuned to your inner life, I honestly believe that they reveal amazing insight into emotions, feelings shoved deep in our unconscious. But again, you can fall into the dangerous trap of overanalysis and come out with the conclusion that rarely is there ever an absolute answer.

I have been feeling physically drained all week, which is quite ironic because this is the week that I don’t have anything outside of work planned. My schedule has been wide freaking open, I have to rub my eyes in disbelief. I don’t remember the last time I had a week like this! I can always tell when my cycle is looming over my head like a dark, heavy rain cloud. Exhaustion and craving for unhealthy salt-laden food is symptomatic. I can tell that this week is that week.

I skipped the confounding and nonsensical (to me, at least) Irish revelry and traded it in for a cozy night under the covers. I wasn’t prepared for the assault of nightmares (two that I can count).

I will not go into details, but I understood that the fear that I dare not confront in waking life intruded my dreaming life. Why? Just because that’s what dreams do. That’s what their purpose is. They say that when we are in our waking states, our egos are very safe and comfortable. Our egos let their guards down when we are asleep, which then makes for a conducive, safe backdrop for our unconscious to come out and play.

After almost two years of solitude (well....they were all mere flings, after all), I find myself on the verge of something beautifully and instantaneously terribly serious. During the day, I am the warrior, strong and ready for the battle again. At night, I’m the helpless, fearful princess trapped in the fortress waiting to be rescued. Apparently.

I may be unconventional in the sense that I am grateful for bad dreams, especially those that rock you to the core. It’s YOU telling YOU something, and the more important the message is, the more forceful the dream will be. And because you have been told, you are now in the position to ACT.

I processed today and I feel re-energized, rejuvenated. It makes me feel good that I understand the workings of my life a little bit more. A Buddhist teaching reverberated with me throughout the day that is helping me be a little less scared:


The nature of everything is impermanence. If we look at everything – relationships, loving people – through the impermanent nature of reality, if we look at, say, a water glass and understand that it is ALREADY BROKEN, then our relationship with it completely changes. If we love people as if we have already lost them (fatalistic or not, THAT is the eventuality of EVERYTHING), we become less afraid because when you think about it, who else are you not going to lose?

Namaste, high tens, cartwheels, and now, chaines….

And the Winners Are...

I have the most difficult time at bookstores. I start browsing and I never want to leave.

On a partly rainy afternoon, the North Face-wearing crowd congregated at the bookstore. Some were holiday shopping, some nosying. Some, like me, were there to scratch an itch. With the upcoming trip that commences with a 23-hour flight crossing continents, a stack of fresh books was imperative. After hours and hours of fruitful browsing, the winners are:

1. Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom by Dr. Rick Hanson. I HATE that this is in in the self-help self section and I hate that I hate self-help sections. There is such a societal stigma associated with self-help, and maybe not all of it unfounded either. A lot of these books are quick fixes that just do not work. A lot of these authors (kooks?) promise you this or that in 10 easy steps. They offer a one-size-fits all therapy in a 100 pages. Realistic? I have my doubts. I sought out this particular book since I have heard great reviews about it and it's a subject I am madly fascinated with - the intersection of science (particularly psychology) and spirituality. Rick Hanson himself is a neuropsychologist and a practicing Buddhist. The book was co-written by a neurologist who, with scientific, provable, replicable experiments, verify how contemplative practices impact and mold your physiological brain, and later on, the mind.

2. The Book by Alan Watts. I am sometimes happy that I wasn't alive yet in the sixties. It cannot be described enough how the sixties, with it's massive counter-culture movements and a socio-political climate ripe for it, was a profound time for collective awakening. It would have been an extremely overwhelming time and I think it would take a strong vessel to hold such intense and radical philosophical, cultural and spiritual shifts. I may not have been there to personally witness it but I am glad that I still have access to the great minds of that generation via the likes of Richard Alpert a.k.a. Ram Dass, an ex-Harvard professor who has a Ph.D. in Psychology from Stanford. Although not single-handedly, he is responsible for bringing the Eastern teachings of Yoga to flower power America. Alan Watts is a similar individual also influential in the 50's/60's. Although I have heard of him, I have not read his writings. I opened up the book and read a few pages and they instantly resonated with me. I'm actually excited about reading this one.

3. The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing by Jalaluddin Rumi. Rumi is one of the most revered Sufi poets who wrote about love with such precise eloquence. Love in its many forms takes us to places within where there are usually unspoken words for. It is a colossal task to describe the indescribable. Yet Rumi does it with such honesty and beauty enough to send chills up my spine.

"A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home."

"Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along."

"You dance inside my chest, where no one sees you."

There were other books that made it to the short-list, but not quite to the register.

The Other Contenders:

1. Total Freedom: The Essential Krishnamurti which is a collection of Jiddu Krishnamurti's (a great Indian philosopher) writings on human existence. I have always wanted to read Krishnamurti but the selection at the local bookstore was not that extensive and this one wasn't quite doing this for me.

2. The Book of Secrets by Deepak Chopra. The Banker encouraged me to get this and after hearing the title AND the author, I said no. The title turned me off so quickly because there seems a lot of ego in it. It connotes that Deepak Chopra is some authority on life and he knows and unlocked the secret to it. Really? I also mentally associate it with "The Secret" book which I found lacking in substance, to be honest. But out of curiosity, I checked it out. There it was: Fifteen Steps. To his credit though, they seem like they're the same Buddhist/Vedanta teachings repackaged to make it palatable to the mass market. What doesn't sit well with me is the marketing scheme (ergo the fifteen steps) which spells out that the intention is not to reveal or share a truth, but to make money.

3. Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac. I had wanted to get his biography on the Buddha, but the store didn't have a copy. I was going to settle for this one, but the first few pages lacked lucidity for me.

What does your reading list look like nowadays?

Gyrations on Gratitude

There is scientific evidence that gratefulness practices have the power to change the bleak outlook and glum disposition of the grim. I have written about neuroplasticity before, which is the ability of our mind to alter the brain by cultivating mini-patterns so that they eventually get entrenched in who we are. It’s practicing baby cartwheels to eventually get us ready for pole vaulting. Well, that’s a little extreme, but you get the idea.

Here is one particular case study. This is a video of a Buddhist meditation/Yoga teacher’s mother who supposedly was a sour miser who was “ruined” forever after her son “trained“ her to find something to be grateful about, no matter how teeny. It's a funny video. Oprah and her propaganda for gratitude diaries was on to something after all.

Since it is Thanksgiving week, I thought I myself would pronounce my gratefulness and thankfulness for the daily miracles in my own life. Because my life has been going at lightning speeds lately, it would be nice to memorialize these “little things”. It would be good practice to step away from the buzz of everyday life and create a little space for counting blessings, if not as a sustained practice, at least this week. Don’t you think it would be nice to look back at them again one day in the future, say five years from now?

But here is something you perhaps would not find in ten-steps-to-gratefulness-or-other books (not that I have checked).

Embodiment.

Contemplative and meditative traditions of Buddhism, Zen and Yoga could talk your ears off on this one. Simply put, it’s being in your body, ideally, at all times. What that means is watching your breath (a tiny bit of semi-useless piece of information: did you know that in a single breath, a quadrillion signals are fired by neurons? A quadrillion is a thousand million million. Lots of zeros!). Feeling your heartbeat. Feeling your hands and feet. When was the last time you felt your pinky finger? Exactly the point.

So they say that one shouldn’t just stop at gratefulness. One should feel what it is like to be grateful at the same time. After saying thanks, pause for a moment (closing your eyes help) and soak in the feeling, as if you’re a sommelier having intimate moment with wine.

Oh my goodness. How delicious.

The Chinese are superstitious about Mondays. They say that you should be careful about what you do at the start of the week, because chances are, you would tend to recreate these all week. Hmmm… did a neuropsychologist come up with that? Well, it’s a Monday and I guess there’s no better day for igniting a habit than today!

Today, I am grateful for:

• The gift of remembrance, of memory. I found myself remembering my Dad and the gift of memory allows me to reconnect to that part of me that is him, too. It makes the missing another person a little less lonely if you think that although they have passed on, they are still alive in you. My sleeping patterns have been so wildly off lately and I remembered how my Dad had the most abnormal sleeping habits I’ve seen in anyone. And sometimes I wonder if he was an enlightened being of some sort who has kept this secret all along until he left this plane. And if reincarnations were true, is he back in another human form somewhere and will we meet?
• Living a life that I want to live. It’s really unimaginably larger than life, when I really think about it. It’s amazing how reality is really very farfetched from what our minds can conceive. When I say unimaginably, nothing about where I am has been even remotely close to what my limited mind was capable of imagining and churning. There is stillness where I want stillness. There is tremendous activity where I direct it. It’s a delicate tightrope balance act on your hands, and I acknowledge that not everything is in my control. But for even that humbling truth, I am grateful.
• The internal mysterious rhythms that allow music and its inception to be possible. Making something phenomenal and jaw dropping from practically out of nothing - where does musical genius come from?
• Silence
• Malleable realities :)(a phrase stolen from Jason Mraz)
• Mondays. If it weren’t for them, there would be no Fridays.
• Friends and family who make time to nurture themselves and are proactive at owning their happiness and destinies. Yay!!!!
• Pretty little pink things for dainty wrists. Michael Kors and his designer who had the genius of designing a pink-faced chrono stainless steel oversized wear-to-the-shower watch
• Snow blanketing mountains. Gorgeous.
• Gavin DeGraw, wailing “I’m gonna love you more thank anyoneeeeeeeeeee….”
• Eyeglasses. Yeah, yeah. Gone were the days of 20-20. And just the gift of vision in general!
• Salsa. Oh MY GOD. Thank you, Billy Bob.
• Short workweeks
• Thanksgiving :)
• And all the turkeys who have died and are going to die yet. :(

What are YOU grateful for?

Namaste!

Something Doesn't Always Have to Give

In the last week, I have probably danced at least ten hours. I have been recruited to Salsa Reno's Bachata Dance Troupe which entails weekly rehearsals leading up to the International Bachata Festival in January 2011. Considering that I have a full-time job, friends outside of dancing, and an endless stack of books, it is a lot of time away from other things in my life. There's ultimate frisbee and running that I have to add in to that mix. In the backburner, there's rock climbing (the most immediate one since I intend to rock climb in Koh Laoliang, Thailand in a month), GRE for Grad School, and a foreign language class before Europe next summer.

I was supposed to play frisbee at 10:30AM today, but I had to cave in to more time resuscitating and reenergizing. I was up until 3AM this morning and was dancing from pretty much 9PM onwards. My feet hate me right now. I am sorry, frisbee. My bed takes precedence. I think I might have to give you up for now.

I have been running like a madwoman at 100 miles per hour last week and my one constant fear is that I will lose time for probably one of the most important things in my life which is nurturing my spirit. I think I will absolutely loathe myself if I give that part of my life up. I checked my email today and I came across a series of lectures on "Art Sutra - Buddhism, Yoga and the Search for Selfless Expression". I missed kirtan last night, but I could still manage to go to "Art, Music and Spiritual Practice" if I so desired. And so I crawled out of bed telling myself if I can dance for 15 hours, I could do something meditative for 1.5 hours.

I walked in the room and I immediately felt embraced by the potent energy of the room, the people. I sat on the floor and dropped in. I got goosebumps. The collective energy of the room was wildly, palpably, overwhelming. I needed this.

The talk was given by Darin McFadyen, a lively person with his soul right in his laughing eyes, for everyone to take. He had long, thick hair in dreadlocks, I was curious what how they would feel like between my fingers. He had a very endearing English accent and I suspect he's from London. He sat in front of the room, on a cushion, cross-legged. He had a very lean body frame which tells me he could be at the very least vegetarian (if he's Buddhist, he very well must be), or a raw foodist, and maybe does Yoga. He had a white t-shirt on and jeans. He is a DJ. A regular guy. Nothing about him would say "spiritual" except if you picked up on the red string (is it a kalava?) tied on his right wrist.

I went to this place without any expectations. I didn't know what he was going to talk about. It turns out, it was about making your art (be it music, dance, visual) your Yoga. Making it your meditation. Making it your spiritual practice. How? Simple. By offering your art for the goodness of the world. Can you imagine this kind of loving consciousness? It's insanely radical.

I already see my dancing as a meditation. Outside of class, I get absorbed by the dance. It is a transcendental experience for me. I am lost. There is no dancer. There is no dance. One melts in the other. And I believe in the inspiring power of art in whatever shape or form. It can lift you up. It can take you to higher consciousness sometimes. It is a medium for people to come together and meet in the unitive space of the oneness. I remember a few weeks ago at a social dance party, someone approached me after I had finished dancing the merengue. She said, "It was so beautiful watching you dance." I have only been dancing a couple months then and I was so honored to touch something in a complete stranger without doing anything extra-special or world-churning. I just danced.

But to offer dancing for the love of humanity? That is just totally radical. I have never heard of such a thing. But I see the unseen in this DJ and I touch it. The genuineness. I intuitively see that this is what he does. This is his truth. This is reality. He believes in it with every strand of his wild dreadlocks. If he can do it, why in the world can't I?

I am deeply attached to my spiritual practice. I often say that it saved my life. And my belief is, all beings, at some point in their lives, have to find it. It is an inevitability. To even fathom that I could lose it because I am pouring myself into other things kills me. But today, I realized that something doesn't always have to give. There can be a merger of these two passions. They are not delineated. They are different expressions that can lead to the same place.

And it blows my mind that until noon today, I did not know that I would be meeting such a soul today with such a message. There are no accidents.

When the talk was over, Darrin and I chatted for a little bit. He grasped my hands and held me tight and we were crown-to-crown. We were not talking - it's not necessary. We held each other and was lost in the pure love of it.

True unconditional love, baby.

Unconditional love from me to you and Namaste,

Trish

On Neuroplasticity

I find myself drawn to teachers who straddle the delicate line between exoteric and esoteric, who walk between the ethereal and the material, who balance between the spiritual and the worldly. On the material plane, I understand that this is a very dualistic way of seeing the reality of things, but I have to be honest about where I am. I cannot claim non-dualism and oneness when I am not there. I guess this is why I am drawn to The Dalai Lama who is a staunch supporter of both science and religion. The Buddha himself has been said to possess a scientific mind as well in his adamant teaching for his students to experience the teachings for themselves. Empirical knowledge, after all, may be one of those things that can leave lasting imprints on people. As opposed to just reading or hearing or understanding something from a purely intellectual level, first-hand experience and experimentation is still the most powerful of teachers.

I am astounded by the stuff that I have been finding about the intersection of spirituality and science, particularly how it has been scientifically proven that meditative practices do have positive and lasting effects on the brain, and therefore, can also alter a persons disposition. If you are curious, here is a video of Rick Hanson, a neuro-psychologist-slash-Buddhist-practitioner-slash-meditation-teacher, talking at Google about his scientific findings in the spiritual realm.

While the Eastern practices of meditation are said to eventually lead us to enlightenment (which really is essentially "moksha" or liberation and, in Christianity, eternal salvation and heaven), my experience has been that psychology can be used with these contemplative practices as a powerful tool to get to the same place. I personally like Carl Jung's definition of enlightenment - that which is to bring unconsciousness to consciousness.

We live in a very cluttered, chaotic world, and admit it, we have been conditioned all our lives to assimilate, socialize and conform. If we survive adolescence and the early impressionable years of adulthood unscathed, then awesome. More power. But does that really exist? Does anyone really ever get here without any form of psychological wounding? Then when we get older (happens at mid-life for a lot of people), there is a sudden onslaught of existential questions. Is this all that there is? This can't be it. There has to be more to life than this. Some turn to fast cars and boob jobs. Some turn to a Higher Being. If we choose the latter path, we then realize that everything they told us when we were young about happiness has been wrong - success, money, houses, cars - they all bring us fleeting waves of happiness but not lasting and true joy. Where is that everlasting happiness then if it cannot be bought or acquired?

I personally believe that psychology in whatever form you can get it (podcasts, books, psychotherapy, dream analysis, etc.) can be that bridge between your past and everything you knew about life, and where you want to be, which is to become that vessel of joy, love, compassion, and unconditionality. I am not a New Age chick and I don't proselytize self help books either. I think it is important to exercise both caution and discrimination when choosing who to listen to or read. What is also important to me is that these people have to 1.) do or have done the work themselves and 2.) are grounded in proven teachings, which are usually a combination of Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and Buddhism.

Spirituality is known to be a safe place to hide. Everything is supposedly happy, mellow, zen, and perfect. It's an easy fix, people think. I just sit and my life will suddenly get better??? If it was seriously THAT easy, wouldn't you think then that enlightenment would be everywhere?

My reality has been that because of my psychological make-up and controlling tendencies, I cannot get to that unchanging place of perpetual oneness and unceasing bliss and reside there unless I deal with my demons first. I cannot use spirituality as an escape route, as another identity that I build around myself out of my need to feel whole and complete. I have to deserve that. I have to work for it. I have to sort out my issues because they are there. Denial of their existence doesn't work and I know because I have tried it again and again. Meditation alone will not heal. It is not meant to.

I do believe that people are wired very differently. In Yoga, there are four paths because someone somewhere (Patanjali? I don't even know..) realized that people have different tendencies and inclinations. Some think more than they feel. Some are more anahata than sahasrara (see more about chakras here, if you're interested). According to one of my Vedanta teachers, each of the four Yogas speaks to certain types of personalities. Jnana is for the scholarly, intellectual types. Karma is for the givers and caretakers. Bhakti is for the devotional. Raja is for the contemplative. Ultimately, the goal is to integrate all of these paths.

My teachers are my teachers. My experiences are my own. In as much as I am, on the deepest of levels, one with everything, I have unique fingerprints that nobody else in the world has. Yes, we are one, but we are separate and we must accept and embrace that separateness before we can get to the oneness...

Dharamsala Calling

I missed a golden opportunity to see The Fourteenth Dalai Lama today.

I crawled to bed early last night because my body has been fighting a battle with an impending cold the last four days. Although my body has been winning (and I am impressed, but even more grateful), sometimes, even the most valiant of warriors get weary and need to rest his head to prepare for another day of battle. As I was resting, I had missed a call from my Indian brother to call his dad, my Indian Father. He didn't say what it was about so I figured it probably wasn't a life and death situation. I decided to call him back in the morning.

After I got to work, I dialed my Indian Father's number on my cellphone.

"Hello, Trish. How are you? I thought you said you wanted to meet The Dalai Lama? We're going to see him today."

I had to ask him to repeat what he said because sometimes, his accent is too thick, I have trouble understanding his words.

"The Dalai Lama. We are leaving right now for San Jose. To see The Dalai Lama. Are you at work? Leave your car there. We'll pick you up."

Who would have imagined that I would be having a conversation like this on a Tuesday morning?

Unfortunately, I had to turn it down. The responsible and sensible part of me had to. If I wasn't already at work, things would have turned out differently and I am only left to think that this is not yet the time for The Dalai Lama and I to meet.

There are many, many great men who live today, among our midst, who do selfless, tremendous acts to change the world. I have so much respect and admiration for The Dalai Lama for his compassionate and passionate approach to not even just governing while in exile, but of loving humanity as a whole. Men like him inspire me to challenge the way I'm living my own life, urging myself to extend out of my own self, to live a more selfless existence.

My friend Fiana has been in India for a few weeks now and she has asked me to meet her in Varkala. I declined. I do not feel called nor compelled.

But for Dharamsala, I feel differently. Dharamsala calls me.

Maybe next year?