Flexibility, openness and softness are consorting with life. When you are rigid and you know the answer and don't listen to other people's point of view, you are consorting with death. Everything that is old and close to death is brittle and breaks apart including our thinking. So always stay flexible and soft and listen to others with caring. And truthfully, all of the verses hit me - especially when you think about them for days, and then write on them.

I didn't work hard for success. I worked hard because that's what is in me. I showed up in this world somehow knowing that you have to work hard. You can't just have a thought. You have to follow the thought through.

When you're feeling unwell, remember that the same power that actually made your body knows how to restore it to its original state of well-being. All you have to do is remove the obstacles erected by you and your toxic world, and allow this healing power to flow through you.

I'm not saying that a child who was abused or beaten or abandoned made that happen, but your reaction to it is always yours.

Our lives are greatly enriched when we immerse ourselves in literature and spiritual writing, not because we are going to be tested but purely for the sake of enrichment.

One of the important principles I live by is the idea that you have to contemplate yourself as surrounded by the conditions you intend to produce.

Hidden in all good fortune is misfortune. And in all misfortune is good fortune. It's never going to stay the same as long you are in the world or unless you die while you are alive and become an enlightened Zen Master. But those people don't exist. When you study their lives, you find that they had the same struggles as the rest of us. It's not so much about being able to always have calm. Calmness isn't just the absence of noise or troubles. It's being able to find calm within yourself when other stuff is going on.