For me the first great joy of traveling is simply the luxury of leaving all my beliefs and certainties at home, and seeing everything I thought I knew in a different light, and from a crooked angle.

Suffering is a privilege. It moves us toward thinking of essential things and shakes us out of complacency. Calamity cracks you open, moves you to change your ways.

I wanted to bring the book out right now because I think anyone who cares about Tibet knew there would be disturbances in the run up to the Olympics [2008]. Many Tibetans feel it's their last chance to broadcast their suffering and frustration and pain to the world before the Olympics take place and China is accepted as a modern nation and the world forgets about Tibet.

You can continue your practice, you can exercise kindness, you can practice meditation whether you're in a prison or a millionaire's house, whether you're in India or Tibet.

In an age of distraction, nothing can feel more luxurious than paying attention.

The less conscious one is of being a writer, the better the writing.

In a world full of shifting borders, everything is happening all at once in every possible direction.