the next one ◉

the dalai lama won a grammy last night for an audiobook of meditations, and beijing called it “anti-china political manipulation,” which is a remarkable thing to say about a ninety-year-old man reading reflections on compassion into a microphone. but the part i can’t stop circling is the reincarnation dispute — china insists that when he dies, his successor must be approved by the government. they want legal authority over where his soul goes next. a communist, officially atheist state demanding jurisdiction over a process they don’t believe in, because controlling the body wasn’t enough. they need to own the continuation. and there’s something in that which goes way beyond tibet. the impulse to claim not just a person but their aftermath. their legacy, their next chapter, the version of them that hasn’t happened yet. you see it in estate battles and posthumous branding and countries arguing over which civilization “started” what. the need to own what comes after. as if a life is only yours if you also get to say what it becomes once you’re done with it.