Global Buddhist Summit: Dalai Lama highlights situation in Tibet, calls for focus on wisdom, compassion

The Tibetan religious leader also stressed looking at the current situation from the broader perspective of courage to have a resilient mind, according to reports.

“I can also share with you that by engaging in this kind of inner development and particularly focusing on Wisdom and compassion. It really can help increase our courage as well," Dalai Lama said. 

"For example, in the case of my dealing with the current struggle and situation of Tibet, if you think just only about it from a narrow-angle, you can lose your hope,” he added.

“But if you look at this crisis and look at this current situation from the broader perspective of the courage that cultivation and compassion give you, then you can have a much more resilient mind. So, even in your daily life, there might be problems which may seem enormous and unbearable. Still, if you have the courage, you will be in a much stronger position to turn adversities into opportunities,” the Tibetan spiritual leader commented.

Highlighting the teachings of Buddha, Dalai Lama also spoke about his teachings on dependent origination and how everything is dependent upon each other.

“Among all the great spiritual teachers of the world, one thing that really defines the Buddha as a unique teacher from the Buddhist point of view is his teaching on dependent origination and it really captures the essence of Buddhist insight and Buddha’s teaching. When we look at the term itself, Dependent origination is composed of two syllables, one is dependent and the second is origination. These two capture a powerful insight into the understanding of the nature of reality,” Dalai Lama said at the Global Buddhist Summit, which was organized by the Ministry of Culture and the International Buddhist Confederation.

While sharing his personal experience, the Dalai Lama said further that if each one of us takes his teachings seriously, we will be able to see the real difference in our daily lives.

The Tibetan religious leader, while giving an example of monastery tradition, highlighted that more attention should be given to inner development and cultivation.

On day one of the first Global Buddhist Summit, which aimed to bring together leading Buddhist figures and experts from around the world to discuss Buddhist and universal issues and generate policy recommendations to address them together, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the Lord Buddha preached abandoning war, defeat and victory for eternal peace while inaugurating the summit.

PM Modi, during his address, also said that the world was facing the most challenging times of the century due to war, economic crisis, terrorism and climate change, and all these contemporary global challenges can be addressed through the teachings of Lord Buddha.