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1. Wealth without independence is a unique form of poverty.
2. Financial independence is a spectrum.
3. Savings as buying "independence".
"Once you view savings as providing the benefit of independence, you stop viewing saving for tomorrow as sacrificing today."

Ch 8 Utility vs Status

The key to success in so many areas of life is endurance and longevity. I’m
not interested in anything that’s unsustainable.

"You are unlikely to have a good and meaningful life unless you can overcome your insatiability".

If you’re already satisfied with who you are, you naturally view money as a tool to be used to make things even better. That’s when you become wealthy.

Psychological wealth

Once you view contentment as the ultimate psychological mountaintop, your goals change.

Ch 2 Luck & Risk

Luck and risk are both realities that every outcome in life is guided by forces other than individual effort.

Be careful who you praise and admire. Be careful who you look down upon and wish to avoid becoming. Therefore, focus less on specific individuals and case studies and more on broad patterns.

Nothing is as good or as bad as it seems.

Ch 6 - Healing

"Life’s pain is not something to be overcome.
Instead, it calls for gentle love and healing.
The more forcefully we deny it, or try to forget about it, the stronger it rises up.
Gaze warmly at your pain, without denying or resisting it.
If you do, you will detect the love that lies beneath it."

Ch 4 Relationships & Ch 5 Courage

"What distresses us is less the circumstances we find ourselves in and more the energy we expend in resisting them."

"It seems we acquire the most strength and wisdom at those points in our lives that are the most difficult."

Ch 3 Empathy

"I wish you to be happy.
But do not wait for someone to make you happy.
Make the decision to be happy for yourself, and act on it.
Do not surrender to someone else the power to make you happy."

Ch 2: Family

"The greatest gift that parents can give their child is to be happy themselves.
If the parents are happy, then the child can grow up into a happy and confident adult.
But if the parents are not happy, then the child can feel worthless, unable to make their parents happy no matter what."

Ch 1 Self-Care

"Special moments are not separate from our everyday lives. When you make use of something special, it makes the moment special."

"Prayer connects the path between the head and the heart."

"A decision made because of the opinions of others is one we often come to regret."

Ch 19 & 20 on the Three Methods of Working with Chaos and The Trick of Choicelessness.

"Chaos is part of our home ground. Instead of looking for something higher or purer, work with it, just as it is."

Ch 15 & 16

"In order to feel compassion for other people, we have to feel compassion for ourselves."

Ch 13 & 14, beautiful reflections on widening the circle of compassion and bodhichitta - the love that will not die.

"When inspiration has become hidden, when we feel ready to give up, this is the time when healing can be found in the tenderness of pain itself."

Ch 11 & 12. Love this quote from Ch 12,

"Honesty without kindness, humor, and goodheartedness can be just mean. From the very beginning to the very end, pointing to our own hearts to discover what is true isn't just a matter of honesty but also of compassion and respect for what we see."

Ch 10 - Curious about Existence: Impermanence, Suffering, and Egolessness

Finished Ch 8 and 9 on the 8 worldly desires and 6 kinds of loneliness.

Finished 2 chapters and found these passages to be fascinating :

"And maybe, extracted something from inside you that I shouldn't have."

"It was you who did this painting, of course. You created it through your own power. But you also discovered it. You found this image buried within you and drew it out. You unearthed it, in a way."