I tend to attract strange people to me.  An old girlfriend wanted me to dress up in chef apparel and then come to her office and convince all her coworkers she was going out with a chef.  I asked her why and she just said it would be fun.  I thought it was weird and broke up with her.  Then there’s my friend John.  He’s a Tibetan Buddhist and even lives with several lamas, or Buddhist teachers, at a temple.  He claims that his teachers are omniscient or know everything and that he needs to go to Tibet and hide himself away in a cave and do nothing but meditate until he reaches enlightenment.  People from a nearby village will supposedly bring him food, which he can eat between meditations.  He thinks that this is what will make him happy, or at least happy by Tibetan Buddhist standards.  He feels bad because he hasn’t done this yet.  I tried to explain him that he shouldn’t feel terrible about dropping everything to go live in a cave for however long, but he doesn’t really want to listen.  I don’t think someone can get anywhere by completely abandoning the world, but it’s what he’s always wanted to do, even before he embraced Tibetan Buddhism.  I don’t know what to tell him anymore.