There is no real evil in life, except great pain; all the rest is imaginary, and depends on the light in which we view things
Interpretation
Great pain is the only true evil; everything else is subjective and based on our perspective.
This quote suggests that the only genuine evil we encounter in life is significant pain, while all other sufferings or troubles are subjective and can be perceived differently depending on our outlook. It emphasizes the importance of perspective in shaping our experiences and understanding the nature of our challenges.
In practice
This quote can be used in a motivational talk about how perspective can change our experience of challenges.
It is day by day that we go forward; today we are as we were yesterday and tomorrow we shall be like ourselves today. So we go on without being aware of it, and this is one of the miracles of Providence that I so love.
When I step into this library, I cannot understand why I ever step out of it.
A man's shortcomings are taken from his epoch; his virtues and greatness belong to himself.
If you follow reason far enough it always leads to conclusions that are contrary to reason.
For in the immediate world, everything is to be discerned, for him who can discern it, and central and simply, without either dissection into science, or digestion into art, but with the whole of consciousness, seeking to perceive it as it stands: so that the aspect of a street in sunlight can roar in the heart of itself as a symphony, perhaps as no symphony can: and all of consciousness is shifted from the imagined, the revisive, to the effort to perceive simply the cruel radiation of what is.
Our whole social environment seems to us to be filled with forces which really exist only in our own minds.
Perhaps you know some well-off families who do not seem to suffer from their riches. They do not overeat themselves; they find occupations to keep themselves in health; they do not worry about their position; they put their money into safe investments and are content with a low rate of interest; and they bring up their children to live simply and do useful work. But this means that they do not live like rich people at all, and might therefore just as well have ordinary incomes.
This is the work of Nâma-Rupa - name and form. Everything that has form, everything that calls up an idea in your mind, is within Maya; for everything that is bound by the laws of time, space, and causation is within Maya.
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