Travel, in the superficial sense at least, is a good cure for loneliness. When you travel, especially in the third world, you quickly find that you get more friends than you know what to do with.

But it’s only by having some distance from the world that you can see it whole, and understand what you should be doing with it.

Lonely Places, then are the places that are not on international wavelengths, do not know how to carry themselves, are lost when it comes to visitors. They are shy, defensive, curious places; places that do not know how they are supposed to behave.

Unlike many spiritual leaders, Dalai Lama is never been in a position to just sit on a mountain top handing out wisdom. He's had to live out his principles in the middle of this very complex situation, every day for sixty years or more. I think it's something that moves many people about his example.

One of the interesting things about Los Angeles is that it's still supplying the whole of the world with its dreams through movies and songs and TV - often of an all-American family at the same time as the real Los Angeles is peopled by souls from Vietnam, Guatemala, and Korea who look nothing like the images being beamed out. I think all that is going to have to change and illusion is going to have to catch up with reality in that regard.

Some people will always ground themselves very strongly in a piece of soil, a grandmother's property, a tiny plot of land, and that's great. But in the Age of Movement, there's no question that the number of people who don't - or can't - is growing exponentially.

I often think we're most happy when we forget the time.