In his 2015 commencement address at the University of Southern California, author (and frequent Lion’s Roar contributor) Pico Iyer recalls his singular meeting with Leonard Cohen, on the grounds of Mt. Baldy Zen Center in Los Angeles.
“It took me a while to realize that this ragged monk was my hero since boyhood,” Iyer says, adding, “I have met a lot of interesting people in my thirty-two years as a journalist, and I have never met anybody so gracious, so humble, so articulate.” He then goes on to talk quite personally about his work, his travels, technology, and the relationship between meditation and happiness. Watch above.
For more from Pico, check out his previous Shambhala Sun pieces, (including his recent feature on Cohen) as well his new article, “On the Road with the Dalai Lama,” found inside our special publication, The Dalai Lama, out this fall.
