Matthieu Ricard's Blog, page 2

Words of Alexandre Jollien - 1

A few days ago, I had the joy of meeting again Alexandre Jollien — a much loved Swiss philosopher who is handicapped from birth — in the quiet of a village in the snow. I asked him questions on a number of topics. Here are some of his answers:

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Individualism: “Individualism is to cut off oneself from others and position oneself as separate from the other. This is the beginning of suffering. Many philosophers today have made themselves dealers of a “custom-made happiness” by praising the difference between self and other. The other person is seen, at best, as a footstep or, worse, as an opponent. Both are serious problems.”

Narcissism: “Instead of being open to the other, one closes in on oneself. This is the world upside down.”

On “interested” altruism: “You can take altruism to make it an instrument of the ego, a screen to achieve your own interest.”

Goodness: “We are used to look for what is wrong. We are glad to devalue the other. We must learn to look for what is good.”

How to extend altruism: “By acknowledging the connection we have to our loved ones and by understanding that our fellows are as close to us as our child. Altruism is like the ripples on the surface of water when you throw a stone. The circles are very small at first, then they expand to embrace the entire surface of the ocean.”

Mind and Life XXVI, Mind, Brain and Matter

In January, twenty of the world’s foremost scientists and philosophers, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and other senior Tibetan scholars gathered for a week in South India to discuss Quantum physics, neurosciences, the nature of consciousness, and the applications of contemplative practices in clinical and educational settings.

The meeting was an historical event as it was held in the presence of 8,000 monks who asked the scientists questions until late at night. As a result of this dynamic exchange and other recent developments, scientific education will now be included in the monastic studies in many Tibetan monasteries, the first major change in the curriculum in 500 years.

The proceedings can be seen on YouTube by searching for Mind and Life XXVI.

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Annual celebration with 570 Yogis near Rekong, in the Amdo province, North-East Tibet

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Celebrating the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of the Mind and Life Institute

The Mind and Life Institute held its 25th meeting last November in New York City. The meeting also corresponded to its 25 years of activities since Chilean-born neuroscientist and thinker Francisco Varela and American lawyer Adam Engle founded it. Over the years, the Mind and Life Institute has organized remarkable meetings between His Holiness the Dalai Lama and some of the leading scientists of the world. During the meetings they engaged in two- to five-day long dialogues on major issues pertaining to modern science and Buddhist science. Topics have included the nature of reality and consciousness and training of mind through contemplative practices.

Not only did these discussions led to fascinating insights, but also created an extremely fertile collaboration between scientists and contemplatives engaging in actual scientific research furthering our knowledge and making a very positive contribution to society.

An ever increasing number of research projects were, and are still, being launched in many laboratories throughout the world including that of the late Francisco Varela in France; of Richard Davidson and Antoine Lutz in Madison, Wisconsin; of Paul Ekman and Robert Levenson in San Francisco in Berkeley; of Cliff Saron at U.C. Davies; of Jonathan Cohen and Brent Field in Princeton; of Amishi Jha in Pennsylvania, and of Tania Singer at the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig, to name but a few. 

The smaller core Mind and Life meetings took place in India at His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s residence. Numerous important public meeting were also held including: a significant meeting at MIT in Boston on Investigating the Mind, in 2003, attended by a 1000 scientists including a few Nobel laureates; a meeting in Zurich dedicated to Altruism in Modern Economic Systems; and one in Delhi that brought together major contemplative traditions of India.

Contemporary luminaries have been an integral part of the Mind and Life Institute for many years: Daniel Goleman, the author of Emotional Intelligence; Jon Kabat-Zin, who first launched the Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction program 30 years ago that is now taught in hundreds of hospitals in the world and has led to more research clinical studies than any other program; Joan Halifax, who started the Being with Dying Program and Upaya, and many other important thinkers.

I was fortunate to be involved in Mind and Life since the 2000, when the groundbreaking meeting on “Dealing with Destructive Emotions” was held at His Holiness the Dalai Lama residence in Dharamsala, India. Since then, as a meditative subject, I spent dozen of hours in MRI scanners, at the labs of Richie Davidson, Antoine Lutz, Brent Field, and Tania Singer, and became a close friend and humble collaborator with many of the eminent scientists who participated in Mind and Life events, such as Paul Ekman, Wolf Singer, and Daniel Batson.

One of the greatest achievements of Mind and Life has been its yearly Summer Institute. For the last seven years it has attracted over a hundred young scientists from all over the world, senior researchers and Buddhist philosophers and practitioners who, over a week, explore a specific topic, in a format that combines scientific presentations, informal discussions, and periods of meditation practice culminating in a day of silence.

Mind and Life has also organized networks that are working in the fields of education and, more recently, studying craving and the opposite, flourishing.

In April 2012, the first International Symposium on Contemplative Research was held in Denver attended by 700 specialists. The next one will be held in Berlin in October 2013 and will be dedicated to exploring individual and social transformation.

The Dalai Lama often describes Buddhism as being, above all, a science of the mind.  One of the great tragedies of our time is that we significantly underestimate our capacity for change. But the collaborative research catalyzed by the Mind and Life Institute has shown that it is indeed possible to transform ourselves for the betterment of our own lives and for society, by cultivating wholesome states of mind, thought after thought, day after day, year after year.

Adam Engle retired this year, after guiding the Institute for 25 years on its journey to becoming a respected worldwide organization that brings together the highest standards of modern science and contemplative practice. Arthur Zajonc is the current president and a Mind and Life Europe has been established in Zurich. I look forward to many more public events, meetings with His Holiness, and retreats with scientists and students over the coming years.

From horses to motorbikes

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From Competition to Cooperation - 2

I am more and more convinced that altruism is not a luxury. It is not merely a noble sentiment that we apply only when things go well. It has become a necessity. Greater consideration for others is how we will be able to solve the challenges of today in the short-term for the economy, subsequently applied to living standards, and in the long run to the environment.

Cooperation must be preferred over competition. Altruistic people must cooperate and work together. Then they will have the advantage over selfish people, who will always fight amongst themselves.

Not everyone can become altruistic. Therefore, those who are altruistic must make the rules of the game in order for those who are selfish to have a stake in behaving for the common good, as if they were altruistic. An enlightened regulation of the economic system is therefore what is needed, not a laissez-faire attitude such as individualists advocate.

A society in which people do not cooperate with each other is bound to collapse. We cannot indefinitely use others as if they were objects. A society entirely based on profit completely loses its human dimension.

We must also open our eyes to the way animals are used as instruments; they are no longer considered as living beings, but as agricultural products, as meat machines. With industrial animal farming, we have reached a point of total inhumanity. A billion and a half animals are killed each year in terrible conditions in France alone. Their short lives are a never-ending process of death and suffering. Take a look at the remarkable documentary Earthlings* that clearly shows how indifferently we treat animals.

Can we still possibly keep our eyes closed? Maybe one day, Wells’ futuristic vision will become a reality: “No meat on Utopia’s round planet. There used to be meat, before. But today, we can no longer stand the idea of slaughterhouses… I still remember how happy I was, as a child, when the last slaughterhouse was closed.”

* Earthlings, directed by Shaun Monson, available at www.earthlings.com

From Competition to Cooperation - 1

The business world is a world of competition that often is very intense. Unhealthy competition is driven by greed, hostility, and unscrupulous selfishness. However, competition can also used as a source of inspiration to improve what we do. Nothing could be better than a society centered on cooperation rather than on competition.

Competition does not necessarily mean eliminating competitors by any means. On the contrary, in order to prosper, a company may, for instance, become a leader and inspire investors by intelligently adopting ethical values and a healthy environmental approach. Competition can drive us to improve the quality of products for the benefit of all.

Competition is linked to the modern exacerbated tendency towards consumerism. The effects of this have been well documented. Tim Kasser, the American researcher and author of The High Price of Materialism, spent 25 years studying tens of thousands of people. He researched the correlation between the tendency towards consumerism and living standards, social ties, health, and so on.

With his team he established a questionnaire to assess the extent to which people are attached to consumerism, and the extent to which they are concerned by “external” values (wealth, material property, social image, and so on) compared to “inner” values (contentment with one’s own life, friendship and social ties, ecological values, empathy).

He found that the higher the score on the “consumerism” scale, the less contented the people felt. Those high on the scale search for constantly fluctuating hedonistic pleasures and feel less concerned by the eudemonic satisfaction derived from durable inner values. They are driven by material values and have many professional social relations, but few friends. They are less content in their family life, and are even in less good health. They are less concerned by global issues that affect society as a whole, such as the environment.

That being said, they want happiness just as much as anyone else. No one gets up in the morning with the wish to suffer all day long! However, these people look for happiness where it cannot be found. Therefore, we need to understand, individually and collectively, that inner contentment contributes to a successful life more than excessive consumerism. Consumerism is a little like drinking salty water; the more we drink, the thirstier we become. Values such as contentment and simplicity on the other hand, have been praised by contemplative traditions for millennia.

In particular, we must learn to avoid pursuing what is superfluous. Thirst for the superfluous has come to such an exaggerated point that we now need to be aware of it. A healthy economy should be able to provide for everyone’s real needs. However, we devote a great part of our resources, work, and time to the pursuit of what is neither necessary nor useful to the common good.

It makes no sense for a nation to be the wealthiest and most powerful if it is one of the unhappiest. We must put the accent on “gross national happiness” rather than “gross national product”. Otherwise, what is the point of breaking our backs and working so hard?

Consuming is certainly vital for our survival, but we need to think about how to give it a constructive and altruistic dimension. An altruistic economy means that people should not be driven exclusively by personal gain (the classical economic theory). Instead, trust, respect for equality, and consideration for the intrinsic value of others (not considering others as instruments just to be used for the promotion of our interests) should become a primary component of human feelings and behavior.

Kham riders, Eastern Tibet 2

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Tolerance: a Nonviolent Tool to Change the World

Tolerance goes hand in hand with courage, inner strength, and intelligence, the qualities that alleviate mental suffering and prevent us from falling into negative thinking.

If we follow a path of retaliation - ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’ - then, in the words of Gandhi, “the world will soon be blind and toothless.” Violence begets violence and leads to disastrous results. We must avoid violence as a solution at all costs; conflicts should be resolved by negotiation and dialogue.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama often speaks of tolerance. Tolerance does not mean ‘go ahead and hurt me,” nor does it imply that we should submit to or ignore malice and wrongdoing. We should neither passively give way to aggression, nor try to destroy those who harm us. If we are the object of abuse or injustice, we need to find the appropriate means to counter this it. It is essential that we find a way to break the cycle of hostility, hatred, and aggression.

We need to always preserve within ourselves invincible compassion and inextinguishable inner strength. The motivation that inspires our actions and the final result of these actions are key. Sweet words said with the intention to deceive may have the appearance of gentleness, but actually they are a form of violence. On the other hand, the act of a mother who roughly shoves aside her child to keep him from being run over by a car may appear to be violent, but is in fact a form of nonviolence.

Kham riders, Eastern Tibet 1

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