Short answers, pulled from the story.
The 14th Dalai Lama was born on the 6th of July 1935 in the hamlet of Taktser within the Amdo region. His birth name was Lhamo Thondup and he was raised by a farming family under the control of warlord Ma Bufang.
Search teams followed omens from the sacred lake of Lhamo La-tso which pointed toward Amdo to find his successor. One team led by Kewtsang Rinpoche identified the child when he correctly recognized objects belonging to the previous Dalai Lama without hesitation.
The four-year-old traveled across Tibet on a large caravan arriving in Lhasa on the 8th of October 1939 after political complications required Muslim traders to advance funds for his release. His enthronement ceremony took place on the 22nd of February 1940 following negotiations that waived the traditional Golden Urn selection process.
On the 17th of November 1950 the fifteen-year-old assumed full temporal power as ruler of Tibet following the Battle of Chamdo where People's Republic of China forces annexed Central Tibet. Political pressure forced this early assumption of duties since customarily the Dalai Lama would take control at age twenty.
Fearing for his life during the Tibetan uprising on the 30th of March 1959 the Dalai Lama fled Tibet crossing into India with help from the CIA's Special Activities Division. He reached Tezpur in Assam on the 18th of April before establishing the Government of Tibet in Exile in Dharamshala.
The policy known as the Middle Way seeks to find common ground between preserving Tibetan identity and respecting Chinese sovereignty through dialogue rather than seeking full independence. By 2005 the current Dalai Lama emphasized that Tibet is part of China while its culture remains distinct and advocated genuine autonomy within the framework of the People's Republic of China.