A chief cause of unhappiness is what I call mental movies. Mental movies are a misuse of the imagination. You know how it goes. You have a painful experience with someone, then run it over and over in your mind. You visualize what you said, what he did, how you both felt. As awful as it is, you feel compelled to repeat the film day and night. It is as if you were locked inside a theatre playing a horrible movie.

You know what is right. Deep down, you know. The battle between your true wisdom and the counterfeit wisdom of society is what causes frustration. Refuse to compromise with what you know is right-with what is right for you.

A person obsessed with the need to be happy will never be so. The obsession is the obstruction.

Is the beam from a lighthouse affected by howling wind and rain? It remains perfectly steadfast and unaffected by the storm. Your true self is like that. Nothing can ever harm you once you are consciously aware that it is so.

Do not mistake desire for love. Desire leaves home in a frantic search for one gratification after another. Love is at home with itself.

Can you think of anything more permanently elating than to know that you are on the right road at last?

No one on earth can hurt you, unless you accept the hurt in your own mind. . . The problem is not other people; it is your reaction.