The Dalai Lama was surprised when former Australian of the Year, Pat McGorry, told him that youth suicide rates in rural Australia are higher than in cities.
The discussion was about happiness, sadness, compassion, consciousness, reality until the Dalai Lama insisted that Pat, who had been sitting quietly on stage, take his turn to speak. He was the last speaker.
Pat McGorry, was on stage in conversation with the Dalai Lama at the Happiness and Its Causes Conference - along with leading international scientific thinkers Dr Paul Ekman (via video link); Professor Marco Iacoboni (discovered mirror neurons); and Alan Wallace (consciousness expert).
And what Pat McGorry wanted answers to was how do you change society's attitude to mental disorders, how to you change people's minds in order to create a world where children with problems are caught in time to be treated so they grow out of their affliction like some kids grow out of asthma - he says this is possible if we try.
"It's an activist agenda," he told the Dalai Lama. "There's a lot of enemies because it's about changing the status quo and it's about reform. How do we present this to our enemies and change the way they think?" he asked.
And then he mentioned the high youth suicide rates in Australia . But what about on the farm? _ asked the Dalai Lama. And Pat McGorry told him that Australia's rural communities are in decay and towns are dying and there is no space for youth in cities or in country towns - that's what Headspace is about. McGorry is a Headspace director. The Dalai Lama recommended a more friendly, less self-centred, more warm-hearted society.
There must not be too many things that surprise the Dalai Lama - what do you think?
"I am not a specialist," he said. "Our existing education system is very much materialistic. We must introduce education for warm-heartedness."
It must be universal so this process of teaching warm-heartedness can not be through meditation or prayer or religion - it must be secular.
"There's no adequate information about warm-heartedness. We consider this a religious matter. You have to think seriously about that.
"We all have the same potential for warm-heartedness but we need to nurture these things: basic human qualities, good qualities."