We ask attendees at the opening night of the BuddhaFest film festival to talk about their attraction to Buddhism. Watch an audio slideshow of the interviews and listen to a Buddhist chant performed during the opening ceremony.

"I am a human being, I'm a Buddhist monk, I am a Westerner," says Nicholas Vreeland, who is also a successful and sophisticated photographer. Recently, the Dalai Lama asked him to lead one of Tibetan Buddhism's most important monasteries.

In a video inspired by the Buddhafest Short Films Showcase, watch everyday people saying what they believe it means to be “awake.”

“The message is that the Buddha is within and moving about in very mysterious ways,” says James Ulak, senior curator of Japanese art at the Smithsonian Institution’s Freer and Sackler Galleries.

Monks from the Dalai Lama's private monastery in India spent five days building a sand mandala at Auburn Theological Seminary in New York City. The mandala is a symbolic structure that represents a Buddha's dwelling. It is said to bring peace and harmony to the area where it is being made. Karen Humphries Sallick, who organized the monks' tour, explains.

“It’s a spectacular opportunity for cross-cultural associations that are peace-based, that are based in the holiness of this land,” says Steve Lozar, a council leader of the Salish Tribe in Montana.

The widespread crisis in Japan is marked by ongoing relief efforts and acknowledgment of the impermanence of life.

When disaster strikes, the character of a culture is revealed, and in Japan, perceptions of disaster are deeply rooted in traditional religious culture.

"Just sit down and feel your breath," suggests teacher and author Sharon Salzberg. "We tune in, we connect, we come back."

"Through the regular practice of meditation we discover the real happiness of simplicity, of connection, of presence." Read excerpts from Sharon Salzberg's new book on the power of meditation.