Respect for self respect for others

Venerable Dagpo Rinpoché gently invites his audience to investigate themselves as human beings, leaving aside religion, philosophy and suchlike, and to look realistically at ourselves and others.

With simplicity and precision, Rinpoché outlines the pragmatic Buddhist win-win approach to happiness, in which happiness is respected as a legitimate goal for ourselves and all others. After thorough analysis we can even see that such happiness is attainable.

The “self”, the relation between mind and body, the positive and negative thoughts and qualities in our mind, our enormous potential, and how we and others are interdependent, are all woven together with practical guidance in this public talk. Common-sense advice is given for everyday situations, and we see how we it is possible to attain our full potential by gradually, with courage and energy, taking control of our own minds.

Rinpoché’s advice for dealing with others is also to be applied to ourselves. As he explains:

“Respect never implies weakness. Deciding to respect others does not entail indiscriminately accepting everything and anything in their behaviour. Far from it. There are times when we have to be firm and set limits for people who would otherwise tend to go too far. But we can be firm while still genuinely maintaining the greatest respect for the person in question. We should not confuse people with their actions.”