Happiness is a skill, emotional balance is a skill, compassion and altruism are skills, and like any skill they need to be developed. That's what education is about.

When faced with adverse circumstances, if you can do something, do it and there is not need to worry. If you can't do anything, then there is no point to worry. So in either case, worrying is an added suffering. But this does not mean of course that we should not be unhappy about injustice, abuse and other kinds of behavior that brings suffering upon others.

Confidence is closely linked to how well our perceptions match reality

Let us live simply in the freshness of the present moment, in the clarity of pure awakened mind.

True freedom means freeing oneself from the dictates of the ego and its accompanying emotions.

If contemplation of other people's pain just increases distress, then I think we should see it in another way. If we don't center too much on ourselves, then [we] increase our courage and our determination to remedy the pain, not our distress. If we have unconditional compassion, then it increases our courage. So that's the difference, self-centered motivation versus altruistic motivation.

We try to fix the outside so much, but our control of the outer world is limited, temporary, and often, illusory.