Our most valuable teachers are our enemies.While our friends can help us in many ways, only our enemies can provide us with the challenge we need to develop tolerance, patience, and compassionthree virtues essential for building character, developing peace of mind, and bringing us true happiness.
There is...a tendency to think of the spiritual life as primarily introspective, divorced from the concerns of everyday life....Faith that does not translate into actions is no faith at all.
While people are often content to criticize and blame others for what goes wrong, surely we should at least attempt to put forward constructive ideas. One thing is for certain: given human beings' love of truth, justice, peace, and freedom, creating a better, more compassionate world is a genuine possibility. The potential is there.
The question of world peace, the question of family peace, the question of peace between wife and husband, or peace between parents and children, everything is dependent on that feeling of love and warmheartedness.
We can change society, change humanity by changing ourselves as individuals. By cultivating inner values, we can change our own lives and those of our families. This is how we can create a more peaceful world.
The future will be in the hands of those of you who belong to the 21st century. You have the opportunity and responsibility to build a better humanity. This means developing warm-heartednes s in this very life, here and now. So, do whatever work you do, but ask yourselves now and then, 'How can I contribute to human beings being happier and more peaceful?'
It is not enough simply to wish that love and compassion should increase in us. We need to make a sustained effort, again and again, to cultivate the positive aspects within us - and the key here is constant familiarity. The nature of human thoughts and emotions is such that the more you engage in them, the more you consciously develop them, the more powerful they become.
There should be a spirit of dialogue. Whenever we see any disagreements, we must think how to solve them on the basis of recognition of oneness of the entire humanity. This is the modern reality.