Dalai Lama interacts with students, delegates from Washington

Dharamshala [Himachal Pradesh], Nov 12 (ANI): The Dalai Lama held an interactive session on "Cultivating Compassion in the Next Generation" with a delegation from Washington at his residence in Dharamshala on Monday.
The discussion saw the involvement of youth and community leaders from Washington state led by Cyrus Habib, the Lieutenant Governor of Washington.
Apart from that, over 1500 members participated in the discussion through video conferences from six different universities and institutes in Washington D.C. including groups at Seattle University, Whitman College, Evergreen State College, Edmonds Center for the Arts, Temple De Hirsch Sinai in Seattle and Gonzaga University.
The discussion dwelled on topics including mitigating climate change, overcoming inequality and improving civil discourse in politics.
Also, six scholars from the Compassion Scholar Program who wish to make their community more compassionate attended the meet. The program draws its inspiration from the Dalai Lama's wisdom to serve others in the face of suffering.
Dalai Lama remarked that he considered meetings, such as this kind, to be really meaningful and effective as he explained about his principal commitments, one being the advancement of human values that are deeply rooted in human nature such as compassion, warm-heartedness, and forgiveness, etc.
"The real human nature one that is unfiltered is primarily displayed by the children when their innocence has not been tempered by the materialistic values and goal" explained the Dalai Lama.
He added that modern human is now "increasingly equating happiness with wealth, possession, and power as a result of the inadequacy in modern education."
Following Dalai Lama's address, each of the scholars explained the projects they will work on inspired by their personal experiences. One scholar aspires to build a program for elderly people facing loneliness and solitude by having them mingled with young kids at school. Another wanted to work for the foster kids while others wanted to raise campaigns to fight discrimination and stereotypes. To each scholar, Dalai Lama offered pieces of advice on the oneness of humanity and how education is the most effective medium to bring changes on any scale.
"Education you see has the power to mould and shape the future generation. If education lacks the inclusion of basic human values like compassion, it will only generate self-centered and narrow-minded generation" asserted Dalai Lama.
Dalai Lama concluded with a clarion urging imbibing the practice of giving patience and compassion to others while taking in their anger, suspicion, and frustration in order to retain peace of mind and peace of others.
Meanwhile, Cyrus Habib, the Lieutenant Governor of Washington said, "Our meeting with His Holiness was beautiful and inspiring. We also have compassion scholars with us."
He explained further how the new program identified young people who are committed to expanding compassion in their communities.
"They have specific projects that they would like to initiate in their communities. They had the honour to share those projects with His Holiness. it was important to me that before we had a meeting with His Holiness our young scholars would get to see what compassion actually looks like in the real world, in the tradition of His Holiness and the secular ethics that he teaches us all. It is just a great joy for us to be here," Habib told reporters after the meeting.
Monday was the final day of the American delegation's five-day visit to Dharmashala.
During their stay, they had also met leaders from all three branches of the Central Tibetan Administration and visited cultural sites including Library Tibetan works and archives, Norbulingka Institute, Tibetan Museum, Tibetan Medical, and Astrology Institute.
The program was organised and facilitated by the Association of Washington Generals and the Office of the Lieutenant Governor of Washington State. (ANI)