Seeing people struggling, like fish, writhing in shallow water with enmity against one another, I became afraid.

At one time, I had wanted to find some place where I could take shelter, but I never saw any such place. There is nothing in this world that is solid at base and not a part of it that is changeless.

I had seen them all trapped in mutual conflict, and that is why I had felt so repelled. But then I noticed something buried deep in their hearts. It was--I could just make it out--a dart.

It is a dart that makes its victims run all over the place. But, once it has been pulled out, all that running is finished, and so is the exhaustion that comes with it.

These are the things we can learn from this: The bonds of the world should not be pursued. Disenchanted with all sense pleasures, one should train oneself in calmness.

A man of wisdom should be truthful, without arrogance, without deceit, not slanderous, and not hateful. He should go beyond the evil of greed and miserliness.

To have your mind set on calmness, you must take power over sleepiness, drowsiness, and lethargy. There is no place for laziness and no recourse to pride.

Do not be led into lying, do not be attached to forms. You must see through all pride and fare along without violence.

Do not get excited by what is old, do not be contented with what is new. Do not grieve for what is lost or be controlled by desire.

I call this craving, the greed, a great flood, and the hankering I call attachment, hanging up. This bog of lust is difficult to cross.

But the man of wisdom stands on solid ground--he is like a brahmin, never moving from Truth, and when he has completely renounced, then, indeed, is he calm.

He has wisdom, he has complete knowledge, he has understood the Way Things Are. He is completely independent. In his perfect wanderings from place to place, he has no envy for anyone.

Desire is a chain, shackled to the world, and it is a difficult one to break. But, once that is done, there is no more grief and no more longing: the stream has been cut off, and there are no more chains.

Let there be nothing behind you; leave the future to one side. Do not clutch at what is left in the middle; then you will become a wanderer and calm.

When a man does not identify himself with mind and matter at all, when he does not grieve for what does not exist, then he cannot sustain any loss in this world.

When he does not think, "This is mine" or "That belongs to them," then, since he has no egoism, he cannot grieve with the thought of "I do not have."

If you ask me to describe a man who is unshakeable, I say that, where there is no harshness, where there is no greed, no trace of desire, and when a man is the same in all circumstances, then you have what I would call the praiseworthy condition of a man unshakeable.

A man of discernment, without a flutter of desire, does not accumulate--he has no conditioning--he has stopped all effort of every kind; so everywhere he sees peace and happiness.