Tenzin Gyatso, the fourteenth Dalai Lama, was born in 1935 to a peasant family in a remote part of Tibet. Although living in exile, he is the beloved traditional and religious leader of millions of Tibetans and has become a global icon of peace, compassion, spiritual living, and nonviolent struggle for justice.

The Dalai Lama's My Spiritual Journey brings the world a message: one of suffering, success, and hope. This vivid and moving portrait of the Dalai Lama's life journey is personal in tone but universal in scope. Using previously unpublished materials, augmented by interviews, the Dalai Lama , with his trusted collaborator's help, presents a spiritual narrative of his life. Memories, stories, anecdotes, and ideas are gathered together to make an accessible and comprehensive whole.

The book is organized into three parts. In the first part, he uses his childhood memories to show his human dimension and stresses the importance of relating to each other on the basis of common humanity rather than on differences in belief. In the second part, he considers himself as a Buddhist monk. He explains the source of his bodhisattva ideal and invites us to transform the world by transforming our own mind. His third aspect, that of a Dalai Lama, provides an opportunity to explain his wish to establish Tibet as a sanctuary of peace for the world, where humanity and nature can live in harmonious balance.

Perhaps of greatest interest will be the sections where the Dalai Lama presents his views on the issues of our time-great and small-including:
. His views on 9/11 and religious militancy
. Stopping the bloodshed in Tibet
. Our responsibility to the environment
. His thoughts on what he would like to see happen when he steps down and who might succeed him.
. Whether his next incarnation might be as a woman.