If anything or anyone distresses you, think how you'll feel a week - a month - a year later. If you can imagine yourself being happy and peaceful then, why waste all that time? Be happy and peaceful now.

That's what life is for, to find that joy in yourself.

Happiness is like a plant: It must be watered daily with giving thoughts and actions.

In a sense, each of us is an island. In another sense, however, we are all one. For though islands appear separate, and may even be situated at great distances from one another, they are only extrusions of the same planet, Earth.

The essence of Ananda is both personal and sociological. Personally for people who seek truth or identities of God, it helps to be with other people who share those ideals. Environment is stronger than willpower, and when you are with people who have high ideals, it helps you to grow in your ideals.

Trust life, even if you cannot trust people. For human nature is unreliable, but life itself is ruled by immutable law. Right action leads always, in the end, to victory.

Don't live to be unhappy, live to be happy. If you live to be happy you'll find the things that make you happy. And as you do that you find that sharing with others makes you much happier than taking from them.