如何让世界变得更美好 | 2018新春特辑

Many people want to change the world for the better, but that ideal seems so awe-inspiring that they think they can make no headway unless they perform some great acts of daring or heroism, or envision themselves in some political or religious place of power, or promote an uprising or rebellion.

The ideal seems so remote and unreachable that sometimes any means, however reprehensible, eventually can seem justified.

You will often condone quite reprehensible acts if you think they were committed for the sake of a greater good.

You must be reckless in pursuit of the ideal — reckless enough to insist that each step you take along the way is worthy of that ideal...

To change the world for the better, you must begin by changing your own life. There is no other way.

Every time you affirm the rightness of your own existence, you help others. Your mental states are part of the planet's psychic atmosphere.

For a start you will acknowledge your existence in the framework of nature, and to do that you must recognize the vast cooperative processes that connect each species with each other one.

You begin by honoring life in all of its forms.

You begin by accepting your own worth as a part of the universe, and by granting every other being that same recognition.

You begin by changing your thoughts toward your contemporaries, your country, your family, your working companions.

You cannot love your neighbor, in fact, until you love yourself, and if you believe that it is wrong to love yourself, then you are indeed unable to love anyone else.

If the ideal of loving your neighbor like yourself seems remote, you will at least absolutely refrain from killing your neighbor – and your neighbor is any other person on the face of the planet.

In a manner of speaking, you must be a practicing idealist if you are to remain a true idealist for long.

You must take small practical steps, often when you would prefer to take giant ones – but you must move in the direction of your ideals through action. Otherwise you will feel disillusioned, or powerless, or sure, again, that only drastic, highly unideal methods will ever bring about the achievement of a given ideal state or situation.

Developing your own abilities, whatever they may be, exploring and expanding your experience of selfhood, gives life a sense of purpose, meaning, and creative excitement...

When you do not take any steps toward an ideal position, then your life does lack excitement. You become depressed. You might become an idealist in reverse, so that you find a certain excitement in contemplating the occurrence of natural disasters, such as earthquakes.You may begin to concentrate your attention on such activities. You may contemplate the end of the world instead, but in either case you are propelled by a sense of personal frustration...

Each person alive helps paint the living picture of civilization as it exists at any given time, in your terms. Be your own best artist.

Your thoughts, feelings and expectations are like the living brush strokes with which you paint your corner of life's landscape.

If you do your best in your own life, then you are indeed helping to improve the quality of all life.

Your thoughts are as real as snowflakes or raindrops or clouds. They mix and merge with the thoughts of others, to form man's living scape, providing the vast mental elements from which physical events will be formed.

I would like each of my readers to be a practicing idealist...If you do this, your life will automatically be provided with excitement, natural zest and creativity, and those characteristics will be reflected outward into the social, political, economic, and scientific worlds.