We may be joined these days more by the questions we have in common than by the answers we share.

Many people would say that A Tibetan monk, even in Lhasa, may be free while the ruler of China may not be free.

Every day there are small moments when we have a choice: will we take in more stuff, or just clear our minds out for a bit?

Gandhi or Bishop Tutu or the Dalai Lama. I think they're really embodiments of what we aspire to and, by keeping them in our heads, we're reminding ourselves of who we could be. That's what we're hoping to climb up towards.

Dalai Lama is very interested in learning from and sharing tips with people in other traditions, but he always stresses that we shouldn't underestimate the important differences between them.

For more and more of us, home has really less to do with a piece of soil than, you could say, with a piece of soul. If somebody suddenly asks me, "Where's your home?" I think about my sweetheart or my closest friends or the songs that travel with me wherever I happen to be.

We travel, in essence, to become young fools again - to slow time down and get taken in, and fall in love once more.