By Tenzin Monlam
DHARAMSHALA, August 9: The exiled Tibetan leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama yesterday stressed on the importance of taking a holistic approach to ‘combine an education of the heart with an education of the mind’ during his visit to Saboo and Stok in Ladakh region.
“Modern education, with its material goals, is not adequate. There is also a need for inner peace. What we need to do is take a more holistic approach to combine an education of the heart with an education of the mind,” said the Dalai Lama at the opening ceremony of the Ngari Institute of Buddhist Dialectics at Saboo.
The 81 year old Tibetan leader said, “As Buddhists, we need to study Buddhism. We need to use our intelligence to understand what the teachings mean. It’s not enough just to rely on rituals and recitations.”
He also added that they must use the human intelligence to the fullest, adding that they should also be careful to use it effectively for the benefit of others.
While on his way to Stok, the spiritual leader visited Siddhartha High School where he said that creating a more ‘compassionate humanity’ is not ‘religious aspiration but a question of the survival of the 7 billion human beings and the planet we live in’.
“We can no longer be short-sighted, thinking only of temporary rewards. We all want to live a happy life and seek to avoid suffering, but unfortunately, a great deal of our suffering is our own creation,” he said.
He highlighted that the violence that is happening today is because of the distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’. “The realistic way to create more peaceful human beings is not through prayer and teachings but through education. We must use common sense to understand the destructive consequences of anger and stress,” he said while adding compassion is not sacred, it is just a sense of concern and well-being of others.
At Stok Monastery His Holiness met with the young reincarnation of the late Bakula Rinpoche and later attended a luncheon reception hosted by the Ladakh royal family at Stok Palace.
The spiritual leader begins his teachings at Thiksey Monastery tomorrow after a fortnight of rest at the Shiwatsel Phodrang in Leh.
