Dalai Lama & Paul Ekman

Buddhist spiritual leader, His Holiness The Dalai Lama and Human Lie Detector, Paul Ekman sit down to try to understand human suffering and how to stop it. Ekman, who spent five ten-hour days speaking to The Dalai Lama in India, says that emotional training is no different from golf. If people are willing to spend six hours a week improving their swing, they should be willing to spend time improving their minds too. Ekman openly admits that meeting the Dalai Lama completely changed the direction of his life and stopped him from retiring, while The Dalai Lama says conversations with scientists have broadened his own thinking so much that he sometimes prefers to describe himself as “a scientist.” The result of this dynamic is a pair which interacts with visible curiosity, resulting in a conversation that feels unexpectedly hopeful in its belief that people can genuinely change.

TRANSCRIPT:

Tania Ketenjian:
Last week on Sight Unseen, we heard the voices of spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and internationally recognized scientist Paul Ekman. What would bring together these two minds from seemingly disparate backgrounds? Interestingly, while their paths may seem different, both Dr. Ekman and the Dalai Lama have been studying the same things for the past several decades: emotions, awareness, compassion, and the path to change. I first learned of the work of Dr. Ekman in a fascinating article by Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker, speaking about a scientist who studied the universality of facial expressions and the ways in which our expressions both reflect and create our emotional state. Smile and you'll be happy, for instance. Frown and the muscles in your face will stimulate sadness. I interviewed Ekman for a documentary on happiness, and by that point, he and the Dalai Lama had had several meetings talking about emotions and science, East and West.

They were so inspired by each other that they decided instead of meeting in bits here and there, they would come together for a week in India and meet and speak there almost 10 hours a day. For 5 days. They did just that, and the result is the newly released book Emotional Awareness: Overcoming the Obstacles to Emotional Balance and Compassion. The book is an edited transcription of their conversation over that week in Dharmasala, India. It looks at emotions, where they come from, how we are aware of them or not, anger, hatred, compassion, and practice. Coming from the perspective of one of the world's most respected scientists and one of the world's spiritual leaders, Emotional Awareness is a rich book filled with insights and ways in which we can generate awareness and affect change in ourselves and the lives of others. My name is Tania Ketenjian. This is Sight Unseen, and I spoke with the Dalai Lama and Paul Ekman at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. This summer. One thing that I found fascinating in the book was the distinction made between being angry at a person versus being angry at their action. I wanted to learn more about that, so I asked the Dalai Lama to expand on that idea. He does that just here. This is part two of a two-part interview. Stay tuned.


Dalai Lama:
I think firstly, now here I think in order to know the basic thing, I think, for example, love or compassion, I think important to know there's two levels or two categories. One, love, the affection, I think more biological factor. That also focusing mainly on action. So, so long a person or group of people showing nice to you, then affection, love, compassion, and sense of concern about them, that much depend on their action. So, that's unreliable and biased. That kind of affection can extend only to your friend, cannot go up to your enemy, so-called enemy, because their action, their attitude is negative. Now, through training, through reasoning, the genuine sense of concern, not on relying on, not focusing on action, but rather being the person, irrespective their attitude. Then that kind of affection only develop through reasoning, that unbiased. And based on being, or human being, or sentient being, rather than their action. So now, hatred, usually, I think the opposite of that biased compassion. Hatred usually is based on their action. I think as a person, for example, unknown person, I think almost you say, no develop hatred. But someone who knows and who creates some problem, then you get the feeling of hatred or anger. So hatred, anger, I think much based on action, others' attitude, not being itself. So now, the real countermeasure for that is unbiased compassion. That is the real counterforce of the hatred. Of course, not easy. Firstly, you see, you need the reasons, or reasons, no? Then secondly, familiarize. All these reasons, then eventually your attitude, whole attitude, you see, can change. As a result, you will be a much happier person. That's sure.


Paul Ekman:
There's some place in the book where, I can't remember which one of us says it, but it's that we aren't disagreeing with each other enough. People will be disappointed we both disagree. So I don't disagree, but I want to emphasize a different aspect to this. If you become familiar with your mind, you have a chance—not a certainty, but a chance—of recognizing when the impulse to be angry arises, before you've said something, before you've acted, and you can sometimes consider, "Did he really mean to step on my toe? Did he not realize there is a line here and he's walked in as if I haven't been standing in line? Maybe he didn't realize that." Or maybe if he did, I could say something to him about it in a way that won't feel like I'm insulting him. That is the issue of choice. There are ways— no one wants to allow themselves to be oppressed or for others to be harmed, but there you— the— I believe, unfortunately, that the impulse to harm the actor is very central in anger. It can get detached. It must be detached if we are going to survive as a species, as a family, with friends, because there's always going to be disagreement.

We don't always agree about everything, but we have to detach it from— when you disagree with me, it doesn't mean I have to hurt you because of it. So I— just one other thought on this. The idea, one of the things that I had never thought of, all of my years of study, I never thought of this. The idea that one emotion might serve as an antidote to another emotion. That's a very interesting idea. I think it's a useful idea. You can actually— it's like you take an antidote, you recognize, "Oh, I've got this heartburn. I'll take something that's the opposite." "Oh, I'm feeling very irritable." I'll engage in an antidote exercise to lower this irritability I'm feeling. Now, in Western psychology, the idea existed for a long time that there were emotions that were opposites of each other. Fear is the opposite of anger. Sadness is the opposite of happiness. But never the idea that one could use opposite ways of regarding someone as an antidote to change your mental state. That's— but you have to first be on friendly terms with your mental state. Then you can begin to recognize things when they begin. When they— and then you can make choice. You can use antidotes. It's not a— none of this is simple, but none of this is beyond what anyone can achieve if they're willing to spend as much time as they spend learning how to play golf. You don't learn how to play golf in a couple of hours. You know, most people spend, who are serious golf players, they're spending 4, 5, 6 hours every week. Trying to improve this ability. So that's the ability. The one up here is the one we want to improve.


Tania Ketenjian:
So on the lines of reaction, one thing, another thing that is helpful is thinking, is my reaction going to aid the ultimate outcome? Which is where I think compassion comes in. Is this going to aid the person that I'm acting towards or the larger group that I'm acting towards. Compassion, the term compassion is a difficult one I think for Westerners to embrace because we're quite selfish in certain ways and individualistic. But it's very much in us I think, in every human being to be compassionate because ultimately there is that innate desire to love and to care for someone else. So I just want to ask about compassion on a sort of basic level, on a level that is attainable for each of us, from your perspective, Your Holiness, and then of course from yours, Dr. Ekman.


Dalai Lama:
Compassion or affection is most important as an element or emotion for our survival. Particularly, like human being, social animal, each individual's sort of survival depend on other. And then also, like human being, they come from mother. And to survive after birth is in the next, I think, few years. You see, one's own survival entirely depends on others' care. Care, not something like duty, but care out of compassion. So, that's not come from religion. Not come through training, but by nature, biological factor. So after birth, the mother's— mother as well as the child, both sides, tremendous affection each other. That's the basis of survival. Without that affection, without care of mother, the child will die. Even other animals like birds or cats, dogs, at young age, their survival entirely depend on others' care. So that's nature. So because of that, biologically, we equipped the a kind of emotion, sense of closeness feeling, or affection, or love, compassion. That's actually seed of compassion. Now that takes as a seed, then further reasoning. Even now you are getting sort of— Or say, you've grown up, looks, you see, you don't need affection from other. You are now independent. Instead of sort of help, seeking help from other, you have the ability to exploit on other or bully on other. So that sort of thinking, then get the feeling of compassion, no need. So, I think that's actually wrong.

Your own health viewpoint, more compassionate mind, it reduce fear, reduce anger, and bring more self-confidence. And bring peace of mind. That's very good for our health. Constant fear, hatred, very bad for our health. And also, I think, in real sense, the beauty, I think, inner beauty is more important than external beauty. We usually spend a lot of money for external beauty, what you call cosmetics. But often we can see the external beauty, very good, very attractive, but you spend a few moments, then you begin to feel the ugliness of the inner beauty. No longer the person, I say, knows, or not at all, the inner beauty. So, actually, inner beauty is more important than external beauty. But we usually just spend, or you usually pay more attention about external beauty rather than inner beauty. So, what is inner beauty? Sense of compassion, respect other, then automatically bring genuine friendship on the basis of trust. Social animal, human society, trust is very essential. If your life remain with fear, doubt, and how can develop genuine friendship? Then that's the, I think the trust is very basis of the community. We are social animal. So therefore, I think compassion is something very, very relevant, and basically seed of that is equipped by nature, by biological factor. That's my view. I usually make clear that sometimes people feel the practice of compassion, something good for other but for yourself, I think that's a real mistake, as I mentioned earlier. If you are concerned about your health and also if you want more friend, more beautiful smile, all these positive things which you want, The basis is human compassion, not money, not power. The result of practice of compassion, firstly, you get maximum benefit. So it is totally wrong, the practice of compassion is something good for others, not necessarily for yourself. That's, I think, totally a mistake. I feel like that.


Paul Ekman:
There's no doubt that in terms of the scientific work, that optimistic people, trusting people are happier people and have less biological problems, less illness, all of that. Darwin talked about a different basis, which I know you agree with, that why do we act to relieve the suffering of others? It is because when we witness their suffering, it hurts us. We feel it, their pain. They used to have— Bill Clinton used to say, "I feel your pain." Well, if you feel that other person's pain, that's very uncomfortable. And so Darwin said, you act to relieve your own pain by helping them. I think that's also a very rudimentary seed of compassion. It's not what occurs, because if it was, then all you'd do is be looking around being miserable all the time and acting to put out your own misery. No, I think as compassion, as a concern for others, emerges and develops and becomes no longer a choice, but more than a habit, it becomes the organization of yourself to lead a compassionate life, then there's a lot of joy to it. So you're not just getting rid of your own suffering. You're enlarging and having a very joyous life through a compassionate life.


Tania Ketenjian:
I think it's important to note that all of these are very much expanded on in Emotional Awareness. The book that is just coming out by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Dr. Paul Ekman, a conversation between them that happened over the course of several days in India. I just want to actually get back to the personal since we only have a few moments and talk about how the book— well, I won't say how it ends, but an aspect of the book in which you say, Dr. Ekman, how much you transformed after meeting His Holiness the Dalai Lama in the year 2000. I think that transformation is something that many of us are seeking, and I just want to speak about that with you a bit and explore how that manifested in you.


Paul Ekman:
Well, it's a complex story and a not explained story. I'm not at all unhappy about the fact that I can't explain everything or feel I have to have an answer for everything. But I know that in meeting the Dalai Lama, I had a déjà vu, an experience that I had known him before. We have those experiences, but this was a very intense experience. I know that being able to bring my daughter to this first meeting, who I knew had become very concerned with the plight of Tibetan exiles, and there I as a father could bring my daughter to meet with this world spiritual leader of the Tibetan nation, that was extraordinary impactful. But that doesn't, I think, explain the whole thing. But the rest I can't explain other than it changed the direction of my life, enlarged, allowed me to start thinking of things I hadn't thought of before and to have concerns that rejuvenated my life. When I met him, I was about to retire thinking, "I don't have anything more to do. Everything I can do, I've already thought of and done. So it's time to take a rest." And of course, I still haven't retired because there's now— there's so much. Every conversation, every time I reread this book, which I have now almost reread it as many times as I've read Darwin's Expression Book. Many, many times. But each time I read it, I see there are ideas in it that it would take an army of scientists and philosophers to discuss and explore. That's very exciting. So, wonderful adventure.


Tania Ketenjian:
And for you, Your Holiness, to have this time with Dr. Ekman, how has it affected you in your own life?


Dalai Lama:
I think my mind more broader as a result of experienced, knowledgeable sort of scientist. Of course, usually I got impression the genuine scientist, their mind is very unbiased and not fixed, open and always ready to look new things through investigation. That's very good. That is this sort of, or say, the, I think, door to open our mind, and through that way, progress always possible. If your mind something fixed, then difficult. I admire and deep respect. So therefore, I also, as I mentioned before, sometimes I feel, as they say, I prefer describe myself as a scientist.


Paul Ekman:
You're more than welcome.


Tania Ketenjian:
Emotional awareness is ultimately quite hopeful, I think. It offers a chance for this coming generation to hopefully reshape our direction. Can you touch upon that just briefly so that those listeners out there can possibly glean that and take it off with them?


Paul Ekman:
Well, all of us want to change our own lives, but what we both agree about is that it is the children, it is all of our children, it is that we need to focus our best efforts on. They are the future, they have the future, it will soon be in their hands and we, I think, hope that there are suggestions and ideas and encouragements that will help them begin the and continue the journey towards a more compassionate and unified world. I originally thought as a title for this book, "Uniting a Divided World," and then I decided, well, that's what we hope may occur, but this book is only a start, so we didn't use that title, but that's the goal, is we must allow our differences, but we have to unite our common concerns. And it is you and your children that will do this, and we hope this will help you.


Dalai Lama:
Yes, I agree, fully agree. The fact is, Every species of mammals always want happy life, and particularly human being. And since we call, or what we call, human civilization, and the recent centuries, modern science and technology, and all these, main purpose is bring more happiness, more comfortable life. And within 20th century, I think a human being, I think, found many, many advanced things in modern science and technology. Basically, I think life become much more comfortable, generally speaking. Yet, this gap, rich and poor, increasing, that also source of suffering, source of problem. Then, ecology problem, global warming. According many scientists, our own behavior also I hope I can make some contribution for that. So, our modern technology also sometimes brings more complications, more sort of sufferings, more problems. And those people who materially very comfortable, everything, you see, there, but still, As a human being, in deep inside, unhappy person. So therefore, it's definitely something lacking. Now time has come, you see, think more our inner value. Nothing wrong, nothing lose economically also. To think more our inner value. Inexpensive. Inexpensive. If you buy new car, you have to spend more money. But think about our inner value and try to pinpoint these different inner value and make distinction, a precise or these different sort of emotions, or different sort of our inner value, then at least I think worthwhile to carry some serious exploration in inner world. While we're exploring external space, very expensive. The exploration inner space, I don't think it's much expensive, but equally very, very important, very helpful, very useful. So I hope this century, 21st century, I think as a result of some respected thinkers' effort, like Paul Ekman, I think may open some new sort of approach. So that's my hope. Thank you.


Tania Ketenjian:
Those were the words of Dr. Ekman and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, speaking about issues raised in their conversation and subsequent book titled Emotional Awareness, Overcoming Obstacles to Emotional Balance and Compassion. My name is Tania Ketenjian. This is Sight Unseen. To hear part one of this two-part interview, please go to www.radio-tania.org. You're listening to KALX in Berkeley.